Gaiscioch Select Chapter
POPULAR ADVENTURES:



ACTIVE ADVENTURES:





ADVENTURES:
Enshrouded
Ashes of Creation
Once Human
Conan Exiles
Guild Wars
Valheim
Baldur's Gate 3
Throne and Liberty
Pax Dei
Dune Awakening
Soulmask
- Full List -
CHAPTERS:
Chapter 8:
Conqueror's Blade (2019)
Chapter 7:
New World (2021)
Chapter 6:
World of Warcraft: Classic (2019)
Chapter 5:
Elder Scrolls Online (2014)
Chapter 4:
Guild Wars 2 (2012)
Chapter 3:
RIFT (2011)
Chapter 2:
Warhammer Online (2008)
Chapter 1:
Dark Age of Camelot (2001)
Community
Events
CHARITY:

LEGACY EVENTS:


Search Gaiscioch.com:
137 Tuatha Guilds:
8,328 Members:
14,047 Characters:
11,709 Items:
  • Views: 4,387
  • Replies: 5

Dark Sun and New D&D

Fine
Fox1440
Fine
Posted On: 01/18/2014 at 06:40 AM

I am old school, Third Edition pushed many of my boundaries and led me and my old group to many a homebrew "ignore that rule", yet somehow since I moved cruel fate has given me a batch of people in this town born and raised on 4e.  My desire is to run them through a Dark Sun "story", I have an amazing backstory/synopsis, but looking at pregen content I have run them through before I can't help but see the prominence of "combat".  To me Dark Sun has short vicious combat, and I treat the whole deal a lot like Walking Dead meets "diminishing resources".  How do I get this across to my players short of having minions that hit like mack trucks and more "find food and water" skill challenges? 

Thanks!

Also, would people be interested in me posting synopses of my games/fantasy settings as a blog or should blogs stay on topic with our division since they give super secret forum points?

 

Awards & Achievements
Devotion Rank 20Fellowship Rank 2

Response:

Caomhnoir de na Aracos Oráiste
Kalla
Caomhnoir de na Aracos Oráiste
  • GW2: Kalla.4290
  • ESO: @Kalla
Replied On: 01/18/2014 at 07:17 AM PST
  • Steam
  • Twitch
  • Twitch
  • Extra-Life

You could always introduce something along the lines of weapon/armor durability tables. Say, every critical failure they roll to see if their blade was dulled from banging on the rocks instead of through an enemy, and every time an enemy crits them they do the same to their armor, mayhap two rolls to see what piece of armor was damaged. With these rolls you could say each failure takes away 1 armor or 1 damage delt or set up a system that X number of failures will irreversibly break the equipment. Other things could be tied into this concept, such as being able to repair said damaged weapons if they can could find necessary materials and someone who was skilled enough to do it (say if they have one of their party mates attempt it it might repair or it might make it worse). I dunno, there are various ways to include some sort of simple or complex mechanic into your story to make things feel less permanent. Also, just for clarification, I have never played an RP pen and paper game in my life, so take any proposals with a grain of salt.

You could also play with the water and food such that finding food and water in town would be fine but say for instance the food is some animal they don't have the ability to identify then if could have some harmful affects when eaten, and the water could be tainted if say you came across a well in the middle of a war-zone or an abandoned village (Flowing water will always be safe but standing water will usually have something growing in it, it may be harmful or helpful, say that thick layer of scum on top of the water was enough to be considered a meal as well as a drink or perhaps if gives them a bad case of the old soldiers disease and their strength is decrease for a day). As long as you consider the circumstances in which they find the food or water then this might add a bit more unpredictability to adventuring away from civilization.

Puzzles don't always have to be obvious either. You could make a hightened path loose enough such that each person to successfully move across the area increases the difficulty for the next person, and if they do fall it doesn't kill them but it may harm them or the party may have to figure out how to get them back or simple go down with their fallen comrade and continue on from there.

Also, maybe rewarding them more for avoiding combat than winning it so that they might not always seek out combat. Perhaps making each 'miss' in combat open up to a counterattack from the opponent (only one if facing a horde) for both the players and NPC's. That is one way of really reducing length of comabat that sees a lot of 'bad' rolls. Sorry, I got to rambling and thinking. I don't even know if any of this is on topic with your question.

I would love reading your synopses here in a blog. I am not an Officer but the points are merely to denote activity since the community has its fingers in several games as well as a long history of games. They engage you enough to learn about everything on the website and how to navigate the community. You will get to a point where you no longer pay any attention to any of the points or ranks.



» Edited on: 2014-01-18 07:37:47

Awards & Achievements
Devotion Rank 20Valor Rank 7Fellowship Rank 15Scholar Rank 3Artisan Rank 9Social Rank 4
Tiarna de na Ulchabhan Dearg
Booie
Tiarna de na Ulchabhan Dearg
  • GW2: Booie.9567
Replied On: 01/18/2014 at 07:32 AM PST
  • Twitch
  • Twitch

I haven't played AD&D in ages, literally, but I love reading stuff about it, and it was my introduction into this universe that has held me captive since then.

Take this from someone that has made it all the way up to paper tiger in rank, gaining ranks thru making forum posts are probably the slowest and most tedious way to rank, so I suggest that you do it because you want too.  Also as Kalla said, after you have been here awhile, ranks and points means less than what person you are.

"A delayed game is eventually good, a bad game is bad forever" - Shigeru Miyamoto
Awards & Achievements
Devotion Rank 20Valor Rank 20Fellowship Rank 13Scholar Rank 5Artisan Rank 6
Fine
Fox1440
Fine
Replied On: 01/18/2014 at 07:38 AM PST

Kalla, for never having played this is an amazing idea!  I will be using it as a house rule, albeit a tad edited to fit 4e's tier system and spare giving armor complex toughnesses.  

Critical Failures "damage the implement to the point it needs repair".  In 4e there are three tiers Heroic, Paragon, and Epic, I would give magical weapons Tier+1 toughness, and normal weapon would have 1, so 1 crit failure breaks them, heroic magical would have 1+1, so if you keep using that magical weapon without repairing after failing once, you risk breaking it if you fail again, 2+1 for paragon, 3+1 epic.  

Crit Attacks can have 1 of 2 results, either you can deal max damage to the enemy (or they deal it to you) or you can sunder their armor.  This follows the same rules as above, mundane armor is sundered on the first crit, magical by tier. (out of character i would conveniently never let minions crit, but let the PCs worry)

 I plan to make loot rain like candy, it encourages players, so having in longer fights having to hide somewhere and put on a new harness/robe or change your weapon sounds good to me, and it encourages players to rush to kill enemies because even a lowly sandmite could break that piece of armor, and 1 bad roll could break your favorite weapon.

As for the blogs, maybe I will do that for games I run here, or for my character journals if I join any currently going games, but I'll hold off on posting my Dark Sun ramblings until I have a few members wrangled into my spider's web.

Awards & Achievements
Devotion Rank 20Fellowship Rank 2
Caomhnoir de na Aracos Oráiste
Kalla
Caomhnoir de na Aracos Oráiste
  • GW2: Kalla.4290
  • ESO: @Kalla
Replied On: 01/18/2014 at 07:42 AM PST
  • Steam
  • Twitch
  • Twitch
  • Extra-Life

Yea, sorry I kept editing my post as I thought of things.

Awards & Achievements
Devotion Rank 20Valor Rank 7Fellowship Rank 15Scholar Rank 3Artisan Rank 9Social Rank 4
Fine
Fox1440
Fine
Replied On: 01/18/2014 at 07:56 AM PST

LOL Kalla, I type then see you changed something, prepare to edit mine and you edit again, how about I just say here "you are amazing, your ideas are amazing, and I will be using quite a few of them" :D

Awards & Achievements
Devotion Rank 20Fellowship Rank 2
[0.2035]