Advanced Gaming & Theory

The Great Google+ Exodus

I am irritated. The news says that Google+ was a failure, even though many of us prefer it. I suppose that if you place it up against Facebook, then everything is a failure. I happened to LOVE G+, and this whole Data Breach thing is garbage. I don't know about you, but whatever the mean ol' hackers got it wasn't anything that they couldn't get from polite conversation. No credit card numbers, nothing to help anybody steal our identities.

Whatever. Nothing that we can do about it, right? It does make me question the integrity of Google itself. I don't know about you, but I have a lot of time invested here! Is Blogger itself in trouble?

Needless to say, I am abandoning the G+ network. I see no point posting to a social network that has no future. I noticed that most of my contacts and folks I follow are going to MeWe, so I went too.

It makes me miss G+. I really liked the interface, MeWe is modelled after Facebook, but at least they won't conduct psychological experiments on us or block our feeds if do something crazy, such as going vegan or whatever.

Like G+ we aren't inundated with ads. You get only what you sign up for which makes it a winner in my book!

What this means for blogger, your guess is as good as mine. Many bloggers had linked their's up to G+, but I never did as it made all of the comments posted on this blog prior to G+ turn invisible.

If you were a friend or a fan of this blog, you can find me at mewe.com/i/rip.x1

The Mystery of Dave Arneson's Engine

(This article was written as part of Murkhill's Week-long celebration of Dave Arneson. Click the link to find more great articles!)

Like many other Dungeon Masters, I had never heard of Dave Arneson until well after his death. He had been edited out of the history of the game, but what we know as Dungeons & Dragons is based on the game of Dave Arneson’s invention. You see, Dave Arneson did not just develop a game, the key word here is that he INVENTED a game. This is something that hasn’t been done in our common age. Folks who designed games always based the principals from ancient games and they put a new spin on them, but Dave didn’t do that. The very idea of playing a game without a board or markers, to our knowledge, has never been done before.

The game which he invented doesn’t have a name, so we refer to it as Blackmoor, and it is an elusive concept. There are different forms of it; there were the games that Dave ran at conventions or private games with strangers who wanted to delve into the mysterious dungeon, but at this point, the actual game of Blackmoor had not been played in many years. The earliest games were more along the lines of what we’d expect from a long-term D&D group, and the world that they discovered and developed through play is what we now know as Blackmoor.

Now, what made Blackmoor so revolutionary was how it was played. Players could try anything, and they were expected too! Arneson developed systems on the spot to determine the results of each action, and he did this in real time. He didn’t have a book which told him the rules, he invented rules at the table which he felt would give the best results.

It is said that Dave based his game on TSR’s Chainmail, and he did use it briefly, but as his book “The First Fantasy Campaign” will show you, he quickly abandoned Chainmail in favour of his own knowledge that he had gleaned from his years as a wargamer.

The actual campaign of Blackmoor was much more advanced than what would become Dungeons & Dragons, on some levels it was a cooperative game, but on others, it was very competitive; and there were different levels of play. Blackmoor was both a strategic game and, separately, a tactical game. Players controlled armies at what we would consider low levels of play, and sometimes these player-controlled strongholds appeared to act as villains. We know that Arneson did use miniatures from time to time, could this be what was going on? Just a test of a player’s defences?

This is something that I myself have discovered about the game; one can use it as the basis and setting for a huge variety of games, be it tactical miniature play, free-form exploration, or even a well-developed mystery which incorporates everything on an as-needed basis. One can play an individual or even a nation’s decision maker! The limits are truly up to our ability to imagine.

The original players were well versed in wargames, so their games reflected this background, but that doesn’t mean that the game was one dimensional, as it wasn’t. It didn’t become one dimensional until the public became interested, then Dave would take this game, in its preserved state, to them. In this game, players rolled up a character and Dave would take them into the dungeon; but was this game Dungeons & Dragons? The answer is no.

THE GAME OF BLACKMOOR

At its heart, this was a very simple game of logistics. The idea was to go into the gilded hole and return with enough money to perhaps finance another expedition. Sounds like D&D! However most players didn’t get a second expedition as it was a one time only kind of deal, but for the Blackmoor bunch, they did get more than one shot at it, and this aspect of the game literally distracted them from the original campaign. They were building a system as they went, and like I said, the game required set rules that never changed and another set of guidelines to allow the DM to handle every situation. This was the game that Gary Gygax played, the game that Dungeons & Dragons was based on. Finding this game is a challenge all in itself, elements are hidden inside of D&D but D&D was ultimately a corporate product while the game of Blackmoor was not. I would like to share with you some of my thoughts on how I feel the game of Blackmoor differed from Dungeons & Dragons.

1. The Magic System

The spells cast by Wizards and Clerics were purchased beforehand. Spell-casters were limited by their actual spell level, but one was only limited to the spells which one managed to purchase and was able to carry with them. This system required strategy on the players part, choosing which spells to bring with them and forced logistical decisions, as the spells themselves took up what the character could carry out, which was treasure.

2. Equipment

Everyone had to be smart about what they brought down with them. How much a character could carry was strictly observed. This was on purpose and while it has its place in D&D it often isn’t observed. Arneson was a master of relieving the players of their gold, having to abandon equipment and placing limitations on how much one could bring back kept the game going. Not to mention the players having to figure out ways to keep the treasure that they did have safe.

3. Armour

One of the contentions between Arneson and Gygax was the combat system. It is my belief that, like the wizard, the fighter had to plan his trips as well. This required purchasing and repairing armour which took damage so that the character's body did not. Gygax used an avoidance mechanic, while Arneson didn’t. If one had Plate mail, one had to deal with the weight of the plate, but the armour would take X amount of hits until it was ruined and the character was exposed and took the damage himself.

4. Hit Dice

I personally wonder if hp were Gygax’s addition to the game? I am not sure if Arneson used them. I believe that a character could take 1 hit per level before death. I could be wrong, each HD could = 1d6 of hit points, but during my games, I tend to abandon hit points in favour of the HD method, but I do go back and forth depending on the exact situation and the context of the battle.

We also don’t know how much of an influence Chainmail ultimately had on Blackmoor, if a Monster had 4HD did the players need to hit him 4 times in the same round before it was dead? It is doubtful since each successful hit reduces the armour's ability to protect you, but Arneson was always changing things up, and he did play with hp at D&D conventions and while he had no qualms about killing temporary characters, the Blackmoor bunch didn’t seem to have a very high mortality rate. This could be due to player skill or due to design as Arneson never stopped play-testing.

5. Dice

Arneson’s system did not use the D&D dice, as they were not really a thing that one could buy yet. Instead, he relied on d6s to generate statistical odds. He was a big fan of percentages, how he decided each roll is still kind of a mystery to me. Many wargames still rely only on the d6, and no doubt the study of these systems hold the answers.

There is much more to the enigma of Blackmoor, it wasn’t just a combat/exploration game, but a game that simulated a person who had to prepare for things. It was the ultimate wargame campaign that put the player in charge of all of the things that standard wargames took for granted and was presented in a way that required the imagination of the participants to envision what their characters were seeing. This game blended every conceivable element, but you can see a specific focus on logistics, a reliance on the player's ability to prepare and interact with the setting, and also cemented the idea of dangerous combat that was best avoided if at all possible. The focus of the game wasn’t necessarily becoming god-like beings, it was a game that allowed the players to feel and explore both the setting and their character. The sad thing is that Arneson’s engine doesn’t have to be limited in any way, it can simulate any time and any situation. There is still more work to be done on the engine, but this work has stopped with Dungeons & Dragons which immediately put limitations upon it.

Playing Like it's 1973

We wrapped up the Second Season of Ravenloft: Masque of the Red Death, and we can now get started on a project that I have been really looking forward to; our own world! If Gothic Earth has taught me anything, it is that it is incredibly easy to create your own spaces. not to mention that it is more interesting to DM because I'm not even sure what is out there.

The biggest change to this game will be the ruleset. It is no secret that there are things in AD&D that I just don't like anymore, and through talking to some of the original players I have found the basic source materials that AD&D was based upon and use that instead. So, we'll be using mostely original Dungeons & Dragons and homebrew it on a need to basis. I want a game that is more Dave Arneson than Gary Gygax, but less tongue in cheek.

I am shooting for a classic game where the players don't know the rules. The more I examine systems, the more I notice the players basing decisions on game facts rather than their own imaginations. I've done my best to weed this kind of metagaming out of their thinking; you know, not limiting them to the character sheet. Is it too late to bring back that sense of wonder and amazement after 30 years of AD&D? I think so.

The TSR Code of Ethics

An interesting article has popped up over at Shane Plays about how TSR had a "Code of Ethics" that might be of interest to you. Go ahead and pop on over there and give it a read, I'll wait here.

http://shaneplays.com/rpg-history-tsr-code-of-ethics-dd-comics-code-authority-rules/#codeofethicsimages

Oh! You're back!

The whole time that I was reading that, I kept getting images of all of the times that they broke those rules. Ultimately, the documents are worthless, or were they? Sure, they broke a rule here or there, but I can only think of specific examples. For the most part, they DID keep to this Code, and they did so at their own peril.

This goes back to the Satanic Panic, so they say, but what really happened was that TSR wanted to bring their product to the mainstream market. What they did had nothing to do with "Keeping Children's Minds Safe", the very idea of a normal someone suddenly losing their mind and identity to a game is insulting. This wasn't done to make the Pope happy, this was done to make INVESTORS happy. Investors who had no idea what in the world that this product was, but they weren't going to let a little thing like that get in the way of wanting to control it.

The Golden Age of Dungeons & Dragons, back when D&D was Pop Culture. Back when it was a set of tools and rough ideas which you the user used to create your own adventures and told your own stories. Those days were gone. Now TSR was into telling you what the stories were, and they were safe, sanitary, and bland . . . unless of course, that got in the way of TSR's profits.

TSR controlled the monologue, and they have always done this well. Heck, they convinced us that 2e was a new system that was even better than the OLD crummy AD&D, when it was just the same system but clamped down tighter so that they had better control of the product. I'm not even convinced that 2e could really even stand on its own; during my games, I've always got to go back to 1e because it was just more fun! How many 2e books do you need to do the work of the 1e DMG?

Yes, yes. I know that this is a 2e Blog. I enjoy the rules, but that doesn't mean that I'm drinking the Kool-ade and liking it. Whenever you spend time with these products as we do, critical thinking is crucial, and I don't always like what I see.

Like many users at the time, I was addicted to modules. TSR had me believing that it was just too hard to do this myself, and that I didn't have time, or that my work just couldn't compete with the fine Professionals at TSR. I was a sucker. TSR didn't want you to see how easy it was to do it yourself, so instead of spending hours writing my own material, I'd spend days fixing their modules and tailoring them to fit my group. Some of the things on this list I changed, but looking back, it wasn't much. Somehow they managed to get me following this code as well.

That said, if one thinks about it, this code defies the very nature of Role Playing Games. It defies what it is that we do. We are talking about a medium where anything can happen, and the possiblities are endless. What if we just don't care that the hamlet has problems with trolls, they don't have to live there, and if trolls are making things dangerous, why risk my character on protecting these fools who want to live out in the middle of troll country? Why would I want to kill all of those goblins when I can enslave them all and have my own army? This NPC who invited me into his house and is described in detail is no doubt the villain, why not just kill him now while he isn't expecting it? Then you've got the DM that says, That isn't the way that the story goes! But isn't that the whole point behind the game?

Further Reading:

Trollsmyth: Abandoned Territory

Can World Building turn into a huge Red Herring?

Hey there Party People! Just popping in to say that I'm not dead, though we did have to cancel the last session because of the Flu, which was a bummer.

So what have I been up to while not updating my blog? Well, I've been prepping. Been second guessing myself a lot as well. I've got my major notes but I've noticed that I spend a lot of time crafting things that ultimately serve no purpose other than to expand a culture or project color. Things should function on multiple levels, aesthetics are good, but not when they distract away from ideas. I think that I kind of overwhelm my players with unintentional red herrings.

That said, I am working on tightening my focus, at least when it comes to preparing my notes. I know as a player I always hated blank worlds. I can't tell you how many times I played and the world was just too bland. I may had gone to the opposite spectrum. Designing an entire session based on just getting to know a foreign environment. Is that boring? We only get to play every forth Saturday, I really need to keep things moving.

Gothic Earth Session 14: The Hot Winter

Last nights game was all about movement. The party got out of Switzerland and their search for Fu Manchu and the Sacred Spirit Blade has finally had a break; George Weathermay discovered that the artifact had been sold in an auction in Egypt. Boarding a pleasure cruise, they sailed to the Far East, and all feel that they were led by their nose by the Celserial Order of the Si-Fan, but what are they to do?

The trail has taken them across the world into the exotic jungles of British Controlled Burma where they will find themselves learning more about their enemy than they probably want to.

I love movement! It is a big part of the game. The game was liner, we had skipped October, tis a busy month, I didn't even have time to blog, and the writing time that I did have was spent researching and prepping.

You never know what your players are going to do, but I was shocked when they told me when their boat landed at Morocco, their first port, that they were just going to spend their time on the ship and not leave. WHAT?!?! Who does that? I had even posted some cool films of Tangiers on our Communications page to get them wondering why it was there, and they watched them; but, "we've decided that we are staying on the ship and relaxing." I told them they can relax in Tangiers so that they could find the clue and we can play this game.

I had written a murder mystery for them as well, but they weren't feeling it, so I didn't push it. They were interested in the main story arc, THANK GOD! A twisting and turning web that has them wondering what is going on, and a return to the true campaign.

I hope that they enjoyed their break this game, it is always calmest before the storm.

Speculation on the Wargames biggest influence on D&D

There are camps in the RPG community, those that prefer to campaign, and those that don't. Where did the idea of campaigning start? The answer is that its roots go back to wargames, and I can see how this came to be.

There are two kinds of wargames: your standard single games, one and done, and then there is a much more difficult game which is the campaign. In the campaign, you've got to preserve your troops as those who survive will be moving on to the next game. It changes the way that we play completely! But, why do we do this?

I was playing a WW2 game, and I saw that the enemy was going to take a city. My best course of action was to withdraw and move as many units as I could to a more defensible position. It didn't look good, I had made a mistake and my opponent was capitalizing on it. He was going to overpower my major artillery and take it all away if I didn't play my cards right. I was looking at a losing game.

Enter the 3rd Infantry. These guys were tough, I knew that but I had to sacrifice them to get my tanks and less tough infantry out of the area, so I ordered them to hold their ground for as long as possible so that I could move the majority of my forces back behind a river. I didn't know how long they could hold it, but if I didn't I was definitely loosing everything.

It was at this point that something extraordinary happened. The 3rd Infantry held. They were blasted by everything that the enemy had, but through lucky rolls and fate this piece not just held its position, allowing me to retreat without taking losses, but it was destroying the enemy. I was even able to get the 3rd Infantry out of there as well, once their job was done I was amazed. It was so much fun watching this take place. Once I got them out of danger I moved them behind my lines and didn't ask any more of them. They were very beat up and another attack on them would have wiped them out. I felt something for this unit. Even though this was just a game, something in me felt proud in that little marker. It became more than just a marker, it had guts and stamina that I had never seen before.

I ended up wining that game, all because the 3rd Infantry had done their job. I enjoy this game and played it again but the 3rd Infantry was no longer the stoic band of heroes that it was during that game. Even in winning that scenario they were gone at the end of it, never to appear again. I still treat that piece with reverence though. I remember what it had done as if it was a real thing.

You see this in wargames. Specific pieces do something that is so surprising that they become important to the player. We want to know more about them, and a story took place. We use them again and again! When we are playing a campaign, that specific band of heroes can continue. We'll treat them differently. For me; even though my tanks did more damage, the 3rd Infantry was still my favorite.

I am sure that Dave Arneson and Gary Gygax felt the same way about specific members of their forces. They became more than just a painted piece of lead, this piece did great things once! What if we could break that group down and play them individually and that is the point of the game? We can learn even more about this unit! That sounds like fun! And it is, we call it D&D.

I myself prefer campaign style, especially when it comes to D&D. No one-shots, I want to see my character succeed against bad odds, to fail on his own terms, to be more than just a cardboard counter, a little lead sculpture, or a collection of digital 1's and 0's. D&D allows this to happen in a way where even folks who never had an S.S. Panzer Division tear into their enemies like an unstoppable monster.

Gothic Earth: Session 13 (Ding Dong)

I had gotten some excellent advice from our friend Scott Anderson, I had designed an overly precise flaw to the dungeon, and none of us were really paying attention to the game. So, we had to back up. I asked my players what they wanted to do, and told them what my thoughts were. Most of the last game wasn't a total loss, we did good work! We decided to back things up to just before the party left the elevator, the relic of Sebaldus gave everyone a dire warning of what lay ahead.

CORRECTING THE RULES

I also had to correct some mechanical flaws that have crept into the system. Masque of the Red Death, I don't feel, was designed for higher levels of play. I don't think that the designers ever thought that folks like us would be playing it long term.

If I could go back to the beginning I would have blended the two spellcasting classes into one class, and added psionics as a fourth class. Mystics are just too limited in what they can do, and they are reduced to spell work because if the bad guys are able to close, folks are going to die. To correct the problem I have abandoned the Priest Sphere system and allowed the player to pick spells based off of role-playing rather than the very limited system core to Masque rules. The altered casting times still apply! But the system for acquiring spells doesn't work. To give the player an offensive option I also gave her a psionic wild talent, which play-tested fine.

With combat, I had to drop the Rate Of Fire as it applies to firearms. As it sat, a random encounter of eight 0th level bandits who got the jump on the party, all of them having 6 shots apiece, would TPK even our 8th level party in a couple of rounds, which won't work, so I reverted back to Core rules of 3/2 for fighters and one shot for everyone else. I've got a PC who has a trick shooting proficiency, I let him fire into melee with no penalties.

The AC issue (everyone's base AC is 10) was addressed by reminding them all that AC floats, it improves with taking cover and using your environment. On my end, I had to apply this system to my creatures.

These changes all improved the game. Combat was much swifter and more fair for everyone.

INFORMING THE PARTY OF NEW VICTORY CONDITIONS

This dungeon was my own design, because of events outside of the game which was beyond our control, they were all killed. We went back to the beginning of the 9th dungeon level, and I let everybody know that this was it. No takebacks. The party could not leave this dungeon, and they must finish tonight. If at the end of the night they still haven't slain the Belalp witch, they lost. She escapes and entombs them all in the dungeon and the game is over.

The players had taken over the elevator and made it secure. Two players were unable to attend the game, their characters controlled the elevator and guarded the supplies that they had so the active party was unencumbered.

Play Begins

The players went back up to the main dungeon and systematically cleared it out and found some nice weapons and armor that I had placed up there. I had hidden some Drow Platemail+5 as well as a Drow Longsword+5. Both of these items helped immensely and disappeared as soon as they left the dungeon.

I had wanted to take away their guns, this tomb hasn't been opened for a thousand years, everything except for the witch is dead and cursed, mostly ogre skeletons and zombies, and another section for the huge undead giants. Guns were pretty worthless, but I had old-fashioned arms scattered around to deal with them. The trick was to increase your AC. We had four players show up for this session and the game was well balanced, tons of XP to go around nice treasure, and the player who had put on the Drow armor and was a tank managed to find a huge spider which she rode around the giant section of the dungeon.

One player did end up dying, the victim of a giant banshee, but she was resurrected before she turned into an undead herself. It was a dangerous place and I expected some fatalities. By searching the dungeon before taking on the 9th level they were ready to take on that dangerous stuff.

Right out of the elevator, on the bottom level they had to face an entire unit of lawful monster skeletons who fought like centurions, it was a brutal battle and this time they were more evenly matched. It was still a long encounter, powerful undead fighters who were also very difficult to hit. The party figured out a way to punch a hole into their defense and managed to control the pace of the fight. It wasn't just a dice-fest either, which made things go more smoothly and we all enjoyed it more.

Finally, they fought their way to the Witch and after a long tricky battle she tried begging for mercy and they promply executed her. They had control of the dungeon and it was getting late so we decided to skip the battle with the undead centurions, choosing to quickly summarize it, the skeletons would have done the exact same thing, and offered no challenge.

They fetched the Relic, this time the witch was dead so the Demonic god was weaker and Sebaldus had a chance of defeating it . . . a 25% chance, but since the witch was dead, the party could still escape if Sabaldus lost. I had them roll the dice. They needed a 75 or higher to defeat the devil: they rolled a 76. Sebaldus destroyed the sentient idol, breaking the curse on the land and finally defeating this dungeon.

Sebaldus rewarded those who showed up in different ways. The Cleric was granted the Wild Talent, The Gunslinger was given more strength, the German Spy was granted Dexterity, and the Explorer was given the ability to know Latin.

The fun that we all had from this session more than made up for the last session!

AFTERMATH

This was my most ambitious game design. It incorporated a lot of OD&D principles, and while the initial prep for it was intense, there was virtually no prep once we started playing it. The entire scenario lasted us seven sessions.

It featured two separate dungeons; a mine and a witches lair, both reset themselves in a way that they could always be explored and offer challenges. We didn't finish the mine section, it had one more scenario hidden in it which was never triggered.

Overall, it offered something for everybody at the table. A very difficult mystery to solve, a living world to interact with, tons of NPCs which were fun to run, and enough XP to bring the regular players up to level so they can take on even more grueling challenges ahead, as I now think that they are ready to get back on the trail of the main campaign villain, Fu Manchu. So! It is off to London, which I will write and maybe play with some Play-By-Post via Facebook. We are skipping the game for the month of October, and opting to have a Halloween Party instead.

Gothic Earth: Session 12 TPK

Well, last weeks game had some major issues and ended up falling apart. Technically, everybody died, but there were things going on beyond our ability to control. It was horrible. Nobody had their thinking caps on and this is a very hard game. I knew that from the beginning. Whenever something like this happens, you learn a lot, and we did.

Lets back up. We took a month off and are playing twice this month, this being the first session to make up for August. I had beat them down with a dragon, and their characters needed time to heal up. This gave us a week where they just stayed in their cabin, and I really don't like that much missing time, especially since this campaign will only last for 10 years of in-game time. To fill the gap I wrote some fiction.

There were things that I wanted to recap, and game elements which weren't being utilized, such as the mystics tarot cards. I never wanted to shut the game down for the time it takes to focus on divination, not in real-time anyway, so I took the opportunity to do that. Providing hints, and clues and basically telling them that it is time to move. They are transporting the bones of Saint Sabaldus, he is their knight, but there is a dark knight as well, and the party can't fight him, Sabaldus has to.

I also revealed that there were three parts, the Dragon, the creature in the mine, and the Witch, these were all connected, not separate at all, but one big problem. In order to tip the scale in Sabaldus's favor they had to eliminate at least one of these targets.

I also decided to bring the character who died last adventure back to life. I have never done this before, in all my years of gaming nobody has ever been resurrected. It was a pointless death, but I also had the Holy Relic. The character had served the town, so the town served her. They fetched her body from the canyon and returned her to the party where Sabaldus gave her back her life. In exchange for this, they lost the girl that they had saved to the witches. This also speeds up the clock, once she is made a witch they will form a coven, and this will allow the ancient witch who is imprisoned under the church to escape.

I introduced a new character as well, a German Detective who has been hunting them ever since they left Germany with the artifact, he showed up with a ton of men and they have now taken over the village of Belalp, and they arrested Van Helsing, so he is off of the table as well.

At that point, we began the game. Everybody really loved the story, the player who had died was jazzed as I had told her to keep this to herself, she rolled her Resurrection survival and passed it. Then they cleared out of town taking the artifact with them.

I thought that they were going after the dragon, they almost killed it last time, and it is injured still; I'd figure that they'd go finish the job. They didn't, instead they went right to the Tomb of the Witch, and broke the seal. There was no going back now, the Witch was officially loose.

This specific dungeon was the hardest thing that I have ever drawn up. It hasn't seen a living soul since Father Sabaldus trapped her in there back when he was alive. Inside is a living nightmare, those who followed the Witch Kevra were entombed as well, and a war over supplies raged inside until every one of them were dead. This war repeats itself over and over again. Even the dead here cannot be slain, the curse always brings them back.

Somehow, I don't know how they do it, my dungeons are always mazes, but they always seem to stumble right where they need to go. The nastiest trap in the place, they figured out. An elevator which must be locked at the bottom, it goes to the Witch's chambers, and she controls the undead to lower the elevator if she wants to. If the players don't pay attention to this elevator, they will be the ones who are entombed down there as it is the only way in or out.

So, the players fight their way to the witch's chambers, and find an evil sentient statue of some forgotten pagan god, it is casting spells, and the witch appears but gets blown away. The players take the Relic into the room, Sam knows that this is where the artifact belongs, and then the war begins, the horror of true good vs. evil, but since they didn't really kill any of the beasts party (the witch, the dragon, and whatever is haunting the darkness in the mine) Sabaldus can't win. I am describing this battle of light and telling them that it is getting darker and darker and they aren't doing anything about it. They are just sitting their listening to this. Finally I just shut down the game.

We've been playing this game for almost a whole year. Everyone was distracted and having difficulty. They didn't understand what was going on, I thought that it was obvious, but was wrong. A couple of the players were loving it, it is harder than hell. The Wizard didn't show up to play, so they had no offensive spells. We also figured out that the Mystic is unbalanced and unplayable at the level that she is at. When they designed the Masque of the Red Death box set, it was meant for a one shot adventure, but we've been playing it long-term. She is not a normal cleric, and is so restricted in her spells that all she is is a medic, and she hated it. We talked after the game and decided to grant her an offensive psionic power which hopefully will give her character that little boost that she needs.

I felt like a failure. I take things personally, I do! I did make a big error during the game. I couldn't find the stats for the ancient witch, it wasn't on my stat block sheet, instead I had placed it right on the Random Encounters sheet and had forgot, so I improvised. She had a Fake Kevra, which I ran, but I gave it way too much power, and hit one of the fighters almost killing him instantly. Afterwards I found my mistake, so there is that.

I offered two options: We could either hold the game where it is at, or we could reboot it from where the PC resurrected. So far they have opted to hold, they returned to the elevator and locked it between floors so they are safe, but I told them that there is only one path to win the scenario. They have to kill this witch tomorrow. If they flee, they'll be killed. With all of the bumbling they did end up cornering both themselves and the witch, but with the injuries that they have, they are in a very tight spot.

I feel like a cad for stopping the game because of TPK. We've got a character who has no hp left, a high level cleric who is helpless in a pit of the undead, a fighter who can't enter the Demon room, and another fighter who was charmed by the statue and is now working for it. Only the thief of the party is unharmed, and they hope to kill the witch in her own domain. Personally, I think that they are doomed if they follow this path.

I don't know. I didn't give them any XP because I was angry, but calmed down during the post game discussion. There are lots of reasons why the game collapsed, but it still feels cheap. I am not willing to take it easy on them in regards to fighting the witch. That would be a huge disservice to them. Like I said, the majority of the players were cool with the difficulty level, but we all agreed that we weren't mentally in the game as the game required us to be.

What would you do?

Do you think that it was wrong to not TPK a party for one off night? It was many factors: my bumbling, bad dice rolls, and caring for a player who was not able to play. I have no problem TPKing early games, but we've been playing these characters for over 10 years, they got us back into the hobby. I can't do that to them.

Bad games are a bummer!

Game of Thrones > Le Morte D'Arthur

On the GOOGLE+ community Literary Role Playing Game Society, our Friend, Vb Wyrde from Ethos RPG made an interesting comment the other day in regards to Game of Thrones, I responded and have decided that I want to keep this response for future reference as I feel that this is a good summary of my current thoughts in regards to game design. Click here for direct quote.

The Gamemaster can write the past, but the players write the present. The future belongs to the dice and cause & effect. The Gamemaster can influence the present, just like the player can influence the past with good ideas but when a DM tries to write all of it then they aren't playing the game.

The story is a bi-product of play. Our brains just do that. We put stuff in order. We make order from chaos. With that said, I think that one of the game's strengths in regard to the medium is that one can lose, one can lose big! And while a computer would shut the game down, the movie would grind to a halt, the table-top RPG keeps going, and will probably be more interesting because of the loss.

Game of Thrones is a magnificent muse for a homebrewed setting. An excellent example of Feudalism at work, the mythology of the land, the cities, and the ruling houses . . . specifically the mythology of the noble houses. This isn't anything that I've ever thought of doing before!

Hell, I would say that how they present Knights is a game changer too. In the past, all of my knights were based on Lancelot, a knight who failed, betraying his king, his family, and himself.

Watching it, and marveling at the world they built. We can do that. Making our NPCs more effective, especially in terms of back ground movement.

I think that many of us base our games on the legends of King Arthur, but this was a cautionary tale. Arthur and everyone in it failed. The politics implied aren't all that well defined. I think that Game of Thrones provides a much stronger picture of life in a feudal society.

The Gay Agenda vs. AD&D

When I was a teen the world was a different place. My generation was one where we excepted the freedom of blacks, my grandfather hadn't yet, but he learned. Now the folks who are homosexual are dealing with acceptance, and just as my grandfather before me, I saw a dumb idea that was taught to me for what it was.

I don't typically express my own politics, but this really isn't a political issue. This has to do with basic human rights. Hate is hate, and hate is wrong. If a dude wants to marry another dude I don't really see what business this is of mine. It's not hurting me one way or the other. If that family wants to adopt kids, cool! Better then the alternative. I know the system and the system is not a kind place to be trapped in. I guess that this is political isn't it? But, I still think that gay people make better parents than idiots who rally against it.

As far as my game is concerned, I'm not going to limit it by not exploring the subject. It is just too interesting not to incorporate it. As DM my job is to make your character's lives as difficult as possible, regardless of faith, race, or creed. I'm an equal opportunity trouble maker. As a player I've played female characters, as well as gay ones. It is Role-playing! Why would I want to play myself?

I've seen examples of DMs treating players really badly. They do this because they are dumb asses, and I don't play with dumb asses. I do, however, steal their players.

At my table we explore politics. Not our politics, mind you, just politics in general. All table top RPG games are political games. We each have the right to use stereotypes, enforce bizarre laws, target minorities with slavery and violence, not to mention actively engaging in genocide as this is a sound strategy. As Dungeon Masters we cause problems, and if the players don't go looking for trouble, well then, we'll make sure to bring that trouble to you. Through exploring topics which are difficult to swallow, we become better people. It need not be in your face, nor should the DM be on a soap box. We don't judge our players, we judge the game. Politics move the game along, and bad political decisions become speeding hot rods. With that said, there is a difference between being a dumb ass and playing the game. In the game, if the players are interested in creating social change, they can. That is the point.

If you want to repress women, create racial slurs, and execute pillow biters, do it, but allow your players to cause social change. If somebody complains that you're being a pig, just agree and challenge them to do something about it. We can't fix idiots in the real world, but we can in ours.

This honestly shouldn't even be a problem, and I doubt that it really is. The person who made this an issue is no better than any other hate mongering pig and deserves to be treated as such.

Gothic Earth Session 11: The Legend of Zudet

In our last game of the summer, we lost a character. As DM I get rather fond of them, and I am always attempted to cheat, but that just isn't the way that this game works. Most character deaths are not brave or noble. There is no great sacrifice, or dying at the hands of a worthy opponent. Most PC casualties are stupid and pointless. As a player, that more often than not was the case for me. D&D is about taking risks and doing your best to minimize them, but eventually, especially with fickle dice, your luck is just going to run out. Trouble, more often than not, comes from rushing ahead. You rarely see the one that gets you until it is too late. When it happens, you typically feel stupid, and hindsight automatically kicks right in.

The players believed that they needed more power before entering the Vault of the Witch, and I agree, but it did cost them dearly. Magic items in my games are pretty hard to find, it's not that they aren't there, it is just that they are typically out of the way and off the beaten path. The players know this, but game time is so limited they really tend to keep focused on different goals. This goal on game day was searching the wilderness for what is going on out there.

They have found a sign of dragon. The kobolds are using the mine to pay tribute to a reptilian god. I never came out and said it, but there was enough out there to suggest an ancient evil living in the mountains. This is a modern game, taking place in 1890, the dragon I placed in the area is modified from the Monstrous Manual description (as are all of my monsters) to fit a more folklore feel.

They knew that the dragon was wealthy, and they are fairly high level, especially for us! They took a vote and decided that they would go dragon hunting. I didn't help them in any way, the players moved around the play map, slowly exploring different sections, I had had enough areas out there prepped to have a good idea of what is out there, but much of the fine details were determined randomly, and it was one of these that ended up causing the incident.

I knew that there was probably a rope bridge that led over a deep canyon on the main map, but I didn't know where it was. We found it and it was the way that was made by the kobolds to get over the canyon, of course, kobolds are not known for giving much thought to safety, so this 3 rope bridge that stretched at least a mile in length was dangerous as all get out!

I like skill checks, but I also like them to be a mixture of old Dungeons & Dragons where player agency and ideas were prized over the dice, and AD&D, which favors the dice to decide stuff like this. The character in question, a spy, had very good DEX, so her player figured that she could scoot right across there, she rolled over her DEX score, and I allowed a saving throw which she failed as well and she was gone.

I really enjoyed the character, her player was a novice who became very good very quickly. It isn't easy to keep low-level AD&D PCs alive, but she was able to do it. Her story was magnificent, through play she took what was going on very seriously and became a good leader. She was a German spy who worked for the old regime which was being replaced. She went back to Germany and extracted the former Prime Minister and her King from the hands of his enemies and delivered him safely to Zurich. It was an amazing story!

She stepped up to the call of duty again in Belalp, when the Sheriff was attacked, she took over his duties, ignoring her own agenda until law was restored to the village. Now she is dead because of something stupid, at least it was an ending. Her death will have consequences, she must now start a new character and take this novice PC into a very difficult dungeon.

While everybody else played, she rolled up a new PC and we got it introduced before the session expired. A Russian specializing in thieving abilities, and a fellow member of The Watchmen. It will be interesting to see where she takes this one.

The players had spent much of the night, frustrated because I wouldn't just put the dragon's lair somewhere randomly, I had already placed it and I stuck to it. Eventually, they found it. A cylinder-shaped tube deep in the earth, lined with a kobold apartments. At the bottom was discovered an ancient pyramid made of onyx, its top broken off and overflowing with treasure. The party quickly took a couple of things and ran for it. After a couple of hours, the creature realized that something was wrong, the rest of the day, they are racing out of there while the sounds of roaring and menace echo through the mountains, and creatures run for cover. They hurry as fast as they can to get across the rope bridge before the sun goes down, and when dusk does arrive the lamentations of the dragon Zudet stop and the creature's hunt has begun.

They had made a predictable escape and kept running through the night, when the dragon saw them, and made its attack, the players reacted at the same time, their tiny guns against sheer power. Only one player made their saving throw against the blast of flames which engulfed them, this looked like a total party kill, instantly two characters dropped below 0, just shy of death. The players shot wildly, missing more than they hit, the one exception was the explorer. He took the full brunt of the blast, heavily injured but still standing, his shots hit the mountain's monster, doing just enough damage to trigger a morale check, which the dragon failed. It turned itself invisible, and hide itself to heal and stew over what had happened.

The players knew that there was no way that they could survive a second attack, the healer was able to quickly get to the two downed characters and stabilize them before they died from their wounds. So far, they have kept their treasures and their lives, just barely, but they came at a very high price. The party was able to return to civilization, but minus an important member of the team and heavily injured. Through magic and rest they will be healed enough after a week or two to attempt to explore the Witches Vault. This will have to wait for September :(

SESSION DESIGN NOTES

The movement rates that I had set in the snowy mountains was too low, movement was only possible on the roll of a 5 or a 6, I had to correct this during play because we were getting bored.

The players were also keen on trying to get me to put things in every space that they were in, searching each hex. I had to improvise a better system on the fly that allowed a more limited chance of a feature being discovered. They were literally only moving one hex at a time, when the game was set for them to move much faster. This could had been why I was getting bored, they probably did this around 30 to 40 times.

Prior to play I designed a better system to flesh out the underground cave system which was never mapped, and hid some features down there that can be discovered randomly. I also hid treasures within, but one of the treasures was designed for the character who died, this was moved to a new location, I had failed to identify the dragon's hoard and had no idea that the players would decide to seek this out.

The player's felt happy with the work that they had gotten done. The explorer really wants to go back and finish off that dragon, which may not be a bad idea, though creatures of myth and legend are never that easy, and a creature this old and who has kept itself a secret for so long is not going to fall victim to a bullet.

While they lost a character, the gunfighter who hasn't changed in a couple of years now has finally gained a level. This is a huge achievement! While 8^th level in many games is obtained quickly, my game progresses much slower, progression slows down dramatically after 5^th level, this is years of dedicated play and keeping a risk taking player who is always there in the thick of things alive. He is heavily scarred and beat up, but he is still one of the most dangerous men alive in my world, who is now even more elite.

I am glad that they didn't decide to break the seal of Sabaldus, that dungeon is going to take multiple sessions, and skill to defeat, an 8 week break between sessions would really suck. Are they ready for it now? I don't think so. The new character is 1^st level, and while she will progress quickly taking her into the finale of a complex and devious death trap is really expecting a lot.

Wizard's Weapons Fixed with the wave of a wand!

I've never been all that happy with the wizard class, specifically in regards to Weapon Proficiency. At

Level 20 they have Four slots. This is fine! This isn't my problem, the problem is that the 2^nd Edition AD&D Players Handbook picks these weapons for you.

Dagger
Staff
Darts
Knife
Sling

It adds that the weapons that require no training can be used, this would imply that nobody needs to be proficient in them, but whatever. The deal is that, for me personally, most of these five items are not things that I mentally associate with wizards.

Dagger, and staff: Okay, I can see that. But, where did all of that other stuff come from? The answer probably goes back to OD&D, a wizard's weapon does 1d4. I can get behind this! Regardless of what a wizard chooses, mixed with his god-awful THAC0, if a mage is proficient in a sword of some kind, it still does 1d4.

I know that in my own games, we identify staff as a quarterstaff and give it the damage of 1d6. Dudes like Little John were specialized in the quarterstaff and could dish out serious damage, while a wizard probably just dorks the other guy. The 1d4 rule makes more sense; Playing a wizard, I would except that ruling.

I don't know about you, but when I think of a wizard I don't see him attacking with a dagger or swinging a staff around. In my mind's eye it is always a wand. That is what I see! Now I'll admit that I have never read the Vance series of bookswhich the AD&D system is based on. I will also admit that the biggest inspiration to what I know about fantasy wizards was gleamed by collecting stickers in the 80's (it was a thing), and ain't no rainbow summoning wizard walking around carrying a dart. That said, would it break the game to give the wizard a wand? Now, I'm not talking about those weird wands of power found in the Dungeon Master's Guide, I'm thinking just a basic everyday wand that a wizard can use in melee.

Let's stat it out:

Item: Magic Wand

Cost: 10gp

Weight: 0 lbs.

Size: S

Type: P

Speed Factor: 2

Damage: S-M 1d4, L 1d3

It acts like a missile weapon.

ROF: 1

Short Range: 5 feet

Medium: 10 feet

Long: 15 feet

If you want, you can even have it augment spells, but you don't have to. Naturally, this could open up a new can of worms if you let it, and it might be interesting! But, you don't have to. You can just judge that it is a melee weapon, and that is all. A quick burst of magic that is regulated by the users crummy THAC0.

Alternatively you can rule that a basic magic staff can be constructed at 10^th level which has a longer range (10/20/30) and is required to augment spells of 5^th level and beyond.

Augmenting Spells shouldn't be overly powerful, maybe just reducing the casting time of spells with Somatic, or verbal/Somatic components only by 1. Or keeping the Somatic based spells as is but doubling the casting time if the caster doesn't have a wand.

Spells can also be developed specifically for wands. Now keep in mind that I suck at writing spells, if you can improve the wording do it. This stuff isn't play-tested either, but I really can't see how this can break the game.

CREATE WAND (Alteration)

Spell Level: 2^nd

Range: Touch

Components: V, M

Duration: Permanent

Casting Time: 3 days

Area of Effect: Special

Saving Throw: None

This spell can merge a magical component into a stick cut from a hardwood tree specifically for this purpose. The magical component can be collected from a magical and rare plant, and ground Ornamental stone of at least 10gp value. The magical component, over the course of three days which include regular breaks for eating, and resting, is verbally coaxed inside of the wand forming its core.

Once completed, a magic word is chosen to activate its basic power, as well as a specific flick which will cause a quick burst of magic which can be aimed at a specific target with a normal attack roll which inflicts 1-4 hp of damage. The target does not receive a saving throw, however magic resistance of any kind will always be immune to this attack.

WARNING: Augmenting spells which require the material components of stones, jewels, and/or gems which are consumed during casting tend to destroy the stones inside of the wand as well, rendering it useless forever more.

IMPROVED CREATE WAND (Alteration)

Spell Level: 4^th

Range: Touch

Components: V, M

Duration: Permanent

Casting Time: 3 days

Area of Effect: Special

Saving Throw: None

This spell can merge a magical component into a stick cut from a hardwood tree specifically for this purpose. The magical component can be collected from a creature of mystical origin (Phoenix Feather, Unicorn Hair, Ground Dragon Claw etc.) given to the caster by the creature in freewill. The magical component, over the course of three days which include regular breaks for eating, and resting, is verbally coaxed inside of the wand forming its core.

Once completed, a magic word is chosen to activate its basic power, as well as a specific flick which will cause a quick burst of magic that can be aimed at a specific target with a normal attack roll which inflicts 2-5 hp of damage. The target does not receive a saving throw, though Magic Resistance will function as normal.

A wand constructed of a creature which has the same alignment as the caster, will act as a wand+1, +3 against targets which are natural enemies of the creature regardless of magic resistance. A target of the same alignment as the creature may not be effected at all.

NOTES

The only problem that I really see with this is the lack of expendables. I tend to just charge a monthly living fee to players, having a wand puts them in at least the Middle-High Living Class, if they drop below Middle Class the wand can become damaged and break on the roll of a 1.

A wand can also break if it becomes subjected to a Saving Throw, if this is the case it falls under Wood, thin on the Item Saving Throws table.

A wand is also ruined if it is subject to Dispel Magic.

A wand cannot be used if the caster is unable to speak, flick their wand, or if magic doesn't function in that area. Areas of wild magic can also cause some weird things to happen.

Wand attacks work exactly the same as missiles, targets gain bonuses for taking cover, and if the armor vs weapon type is used, damaged is halved. It is also dangerous to fire a wand into a melee, see the rules for how to run it.

A basic wand may be commercially available or the player had to buy one from his instructor.

A captured or found wand must be attuned to the finder. The captured or found wand functions normally until either a natural 20 or a 1 is rolled. 20 indicates that the wand is attuned to the user, if it was captured the wand now belongs to the new owner. If a 1 is rolled before a natural 20, the wand rejects the new owner and no longer functions, if not, in the case of an improved wand, outright cursing them. Of course attuning oneself to a found or captured wand can be done through practice, the player just keeps rolling until a 20 or a 1 is rolled. Alternatively, an improved wand can be a bit more difficult, a limited amount of time (maybe 10 tries) can be attempted against a specific target, (INANIMATE OBJECT= AC 10?) failure to hit within that window results in the wand ignoring you.

A cursed wand always rebounds on the user with the roll of a 1. Always strikes a random person on a successful hit, and only hits the specific target if a 20 is rolled. The user of a cursed wand refuses to see that it is a problem until the curse is broken.

Finavryn brought up a similar idea on the OD&D Discussion Forum, writing a cantrip spell he calls ZAP, which can be found HERE

Gothic Earth Session 10: The Lost Village of Old Belalp

I forgot to jot down my notes from last game. I made up a quick play session out in the fringe of the village, blatantly ripping off one of my favorite movies, The Witch. They were able to defeat the scenario really quickly, and save a young girl who they have taken on as a potential henchmen. What? Didn't see that coming, but we'll see where it goes.

The players have been reluctant to explore the wilderness, so I put some pressure on them, Mr. Harker, who is now just down the mountain helping with research in the city of Brig has been followed by a German Detective, he had been seen with PC Sam White at a bank in Zurich. He is smart and looking to recover the Relic of St. Sabaldus. Harker had to risk sending a pigeon up to the players, but it is unknown if the message had been intercepted or not.

In other news, the scholar who has written a book on the Belalp Witch has finally been able to finance an expedition to search an area where she believes is the best spot to find old Belalp, and the players manage to get hired on to lead this expedition.

It just so happens that one of the players were able to decipher the clues found a few sessions back and had a really good idea where the church was, but they were able to get there with a bigger party and on somebody else's dime. It was a bit more difficult than they thought, the church wasn't where the cryptic map suggested. Well, it was, but it was buried deep under the ice. After more searching they found a chimney sticking out of the glacier of Mt. Sparhorn, melting the snow, the Explorer PC climbed down and discovered the perfectly preserved medieval village of Belalp trapped under a dome of blue ice.

The scholar had also hired some big strong locals who were far too large to climb down the narrow chimney, but this presented a problem. The party needs to HIDE the Relic of Sabaldus in the church, and it will do no good to have the world know about this place. Exploring the entombed village, they find a cave to the south which leads to the medieval Cathedral they have been searching for for so long.

Exploring the Cathedral, they find an ancient church which the cathedral was built around, and in the basement of this church they find a stone seal with a terrible warning, beyond this seal, placed by Saint Sabaldus himself, is the Witch of Belalp, however this seal is unbroken.

The players return to Old Belalp and spend the night in an old inn hoping that the scholar and the rest of their party get bored and just go away, or something; which doesn't happen. In the morning they find the scholar feeling betrayed which she is taking pictures of this amazing place.

Long story short, the players finally discover the cave system in the area, they exited the cave on the other side of the Massa River, traveling in hours what would normally take days. The scholar is pissed, she wants to go back to Old Belalp and further study the medieval village for her next book. The players agree but this time they exit the cave all the way back at one of the abandoned mines just outside of current Belalp. The Scholar is pissed, after all of that work, she got a few pictures but the village of Old Belalp is still lost! This pleases the party. She might have pictures, but she has still been bamboozled.

They now know that they can reach the church through the Belalp #2 mine, now it is just making some decisions about what to do. Breaking the seal and entering the tomb of the Belalp Witch is going to be incredibly risky, this dungeon is the meanest and most difficult that I have ever designed, I don't know if they are ready for it yet, but we'll see what happens.

Game wise, I was lazy. I had to work overtime the night before, and I was exhausted. I rolled for random encounters but we had no combat at all. We still had a blast though! I did run off script, changed the look and feel of the old Medieval village, originally it was supposed to be open air but I think that the last minute change was a lot more fun.

I have no idea what is going to happen next game, the secret BBS that my players use is buzzing, and the spell casters are getting together tonight to come up with some ideas on how to best manage their spells. I'm excited!

Global Trade made Easy

The Rug Merchant: Arnedeo Simonetti

There is a class in D&D that your players aren't necessarily interested in playing, but they are a big piece of what makes our worlds work. The Merchant class! This stuff doesn't sound like it effects the players, but it does. It effects them a great deal. It is they who the roads were built for, and it is they that allow civilizations to become empires. Only by working together as a whole is civilization possible.

I have already written an article about basic trade and gave a brief outline of how it functions on a local and national level. What it does is it helps you develop color, and purpose to your NPCs which in turn makes them easier to run. It is a little game that you get to play all by yourself during prep.

It will tell you what kinds of things will be in the stores, give you a quick NPC template so you can keep things both fast and consistent when inventing on the fly, and make the world seem viable.

Naturally, in D&D, we aren't playing a real Medieval world, but a glamorized and modern take on what we wish that the world was like. We needn't be overly focused on Social Studies, but if we add just a few basics to our games it adds a psychological element which helps everyone at the table suspend their disbelief, not to mention that it does give us some solid adventure hooks to work with.

In brief, locals trade with locals so that everyone can live better. Small populations supply large populations with raw materials needed for finished goods, these finished goods move out and other finished goods from other communities move in, which improves the quality of life for everyone.

There are limitations. A region can grow the best peaches in the realm, but fruit is a difficult product to move because it rots, this restricts how far away the peaches can be moved. The farmer loads up the peaches and sells them in town, that is now the problem of somebody else. Technology dictates how far away the product can get, rivers can move product faster than roads, but these peaches are good sellers!

The town takes a good load of peaches into a city, and sells them to a merchant who has developed a new technology; he can turn those peaches into brandy which is no longer a perishable item, in fact, this brandy is highly prized and everybody wants some, which draws attention to the regions peaches. The royals who live far away will pay a lot of gold to have special orders of peaches quickly carried to them, and will do whatever it takes to keep this supply line open. The merchants will be making a killing on this product and take care of the people all the way down the line. This translates into power, and from a DM stand point, this stuff writes itself.

Naturally, most rural places won't have these peaches, but they will have other things. If we look at the area, we can generally decide how this network makes its living. A town high up in the mountains mining metal will have to have a lot of stuff shipped in just to survive up there.

FOOD, WATER, SHELTER these are the basics of survival. Grain and ancient mans ability to master it is what gave birth to culture. It isn't glamorous, but without grain the nation starves. Society is also dependent on water and man's ability to move it where it needs to go. Irrigation, supplying enough water for everyone in a city and moving dirty water out is required. There can be a rich supply of gold somewhere, but unless there is water for the miners it is going to stay there.

Then you have trees, this is a finite resource that had to be planned wisely. A large castle out in the boonies, though it looks like it is a stone structure, requires entire forests of timber to build. We don't need to go all realistic on our game, but timber is definitely a valuable resource, everybody wants it! All of our fancy cities and towns need wood to expand, it is used for everything from barrels, to carts, to ships, not to mention providing fuel. There is never enough wood, but what if a northern nation who can't grow grain has a huge surplus of lumber? This is when our worlds can expand!

Via: Pinterest

Global trade helps us on an even larger scale. Just as trade can help us figure out local politics, find adventure hooks, and provide color on a local level, this helps us color places that may not even be on our maps! We never have to draw them, either, they are just out there.

Lets say that the barbarians of the north exist. They have large cuts of meat, a surplus of fir, and wood. Now lets say that one of the tribes has become almost civilized, well, civilized enough to want to trade for some of our Iron. Politics will tell us that chances are that this brute is making steel, but we out number him and eating nothing but goat and fish is boring.

We also know that the other barbarian tribes aren't going to just stop attacking our northern border, but this union might give us a foothold and allow us to make some threats. We'll tell the barbarian “King” that we'll trade. We know he is planning an attack, but so are we. We covet those trees and eventually we'll push the barbarians back, and give more power to this so called King as long as he is behaving.

None of this will matter to the folks who have to live on the norther border, but we DMs will know it, and use this information to help us figure out what is going on.

Politics! Politics is a hard concept to grasp, but if we use global trade this abstract idea is easier to manage.

Lets get to the lists, shall we?

I don't care if you use Greyhawk, Forgotten Realms, or whatever; this stuff will be present. I'm going to use real world terms and let you figure out where this stuff goes. These products are a sampling of global trade during the medieval ages, now keep in mind that these resources are large enough that a nation or region can afford to trade them off for stuff that they don't have, so at least one of these items will appear on a detailed play map. You don't want the country that the players are actively in trading something like tin without ever seeing a single community dedicated to extracting this resource. It is meant to be a tool to help you world build faster.

BRITISH ISLES

Coal
Textiles
Tin

SCANDINAVIA

Copper
Iron
Tallow
Timber

NORTHERN EUROPE

Iron
Copper
Lead
Silver
Wine
Textiles
Coal

EASTERN RUSSIA

Amber
Flax
Fur
Hemp
Honey
Slaves
Tallow
Timber
Wax
Whalebone

THE BALKANS

Carpets
Copper
Gold
Horses
Iron
Mercury
Paper
Precious Stones
Silver
Slaves
Textiles

NORTH AFRICA

Cotton
Gold
Ivory
Salt
Slaves

WEST AFRICA

Gold
Ivory
Precious Woods
Slaves

MIDDLE EAST

Animals
Carpets
Copper
Iron
Naphtha
Paper
Textiles

WESTERN CHINA

Carpets
Copper
Drugs
Gold
Indigo
Iron
Precious Stones
Precious Woods
Textiles

EASTERN CHINA

Brocade
Fine Textiles
Jade
Rhubarb
Silk
Slaves

SOUTH EAST ASIA/PHILIPPINES

Brocade
Camphor
Porcelain
Satin
Silk
Sugar
Taffeta
Tea

INDONESIA

Aromatics
Drugs
Gold
Precious Wood
Spices
Tin

INDIA

Ambergris
Aromatics
Cowries
Drugs
Indigo
Ivory
Precious Stones
Spices
Textiles
Tortoise Shell

SOURCE: Copied from pulse.pharmacy.arizona.edu/ggg/…/trade_medieval_handout.doc