"Roaring fires, malt beer, red meat off the bone"

I've just been accused of having a healthy lunch, mostly because I dared to have carrots.

One of the multitude of details the Tolkien used to craft his world was in the dietary habits of the various peoples. I've quoted Gimli from the movie, above. We also know that the elves have their lembas, the hobbits have a multitude of meals, and the difference between Sam and Gollum is that the former likes to cook his food.

Life on-board ship was a rather unpleasant experience. At the start of the voyage, the food was mostly quite fresh, and a medium-sized ship would carry live animals to provide some fresh meat. As the voyage went on, these stocks would gradually give way to less and less pleasant foodstuffs. The meat would be replaced by salted meat, and weevils and maggots might well get into the other foods. It should hardly be surprising that scurvy, dysentry, and other dietary problems were rampant.

Napoleon famously said "an army marches on its stomach", and it's well established that armies often had their supply lines attacked in times of war. Even in the most recent conflict in Iraq, the length of the American supply lines was a matter of some concern to those involved.

Finally, I wasn't able to get a decent curry when I was on the continent (probably because I just wasn't looking in the right places). And, the very first meal I got in the hotel in which we were staying was my old nemesis, fish. This was due to it being Friday, of course.

I've provided a whole bunch of examples since they allow me to demonstrate one of the ways I try to provide some flavour to game worlds I design. By simply varying the foods available in different regions, a lot of setting information can be given quite quickly.

Here's another benefit I hadn't previously considered: the typical adventuring group will live off iron rations, which are almost certain to consist of dried jerky and hard biscuits, washed down with water, or perhaps sour wine. This can hardly be considered nutritious. One might argue that adventurers would know about such things, and be sure to get lots of fruit and vegetables, but if one looks to history, that seems unlikely. Hell, if one looks to Scotland, one sees health problems caused by improper nutrition.

Anyway, one can assume that a group with someone with ranks in Wilderness Lore will supplement their diet with freshly-caught meats, and foraged vegetables. However, a group lacking this same (as many groups do), may suffer from scurvy (or equivalent). In D&D terms, this can be modelled as a disease, requiring a Fortitude save every month, with a damage of 1d4 Constitution. This damage cannot be healed normally until the character is provided with proper nutrition. The symptoms of such diseases are left as an exercise for the reader.

Naturally, cure disease would remove the symptoms of such diseases. However, one wonders whether the gods would be pleased at providing this service to their followers so often, for something that can be fixed easily enough.

This detail also answers the question of why famine hasn;t been wiped out, given the availability of create food and water spells. One need only assume that the foodstuffs created by these spells are sufficient to keep someone alive, but not particularly nutritious, and so over-reliance on them would cause the same problems outlined above.

What I did on my Holidays. Or, "dark in here, isn't it?"

Okay, this is rather thin, but it's the best I've got. And, it seems this thing has been a tad quiet while I've been away, so here goes:

While I was on holiday, we went on two trips that have some tenuous link to gaming. The first was a trip to Drachenfels castle (in Germany), where there is a local legend about a dragon that some bloke killed. Alas, my German is non-existant, which made it impossible for me to learn any more about the legend than that: big dragon, killed by some bloke.

The second trip is, however, of a bit more relevance. We were staying in a hotel in Valkenburg, and spent one morning visiting the catacombs under the town. These were an old stone mine, but were, to all intents and purposes, an actual dungeon.

Now, I've been underground before, visiting salt mines in Austria, slate mines in (I think) Switzerland, and so forth. However, this was the first time I've visited a mine which was not artificially lit throughout. The only light source our party carried was a single lantern carried by the tour guide. In D&D terms, it would qualify as a hooded lantern - it even used oil rather than batteries.

Anyway, my overwhelming memory of the trip was that it was dark. No, sorry, it was DARK. Now, partly this was due to the tour guide being at the front of our group of 30, while my role was to ensure that no-one fell behind, so I was right at the back, but partly it was just that a single lantern doesn't shed a whole lot of light.

The lack of light also had a couple of interesting side effects. One was when a member of our group did manage to slip behind me (I think he dropped back to get a photo of one of the sculptures in the place - I'll get back to those). When I turned round and saw him rapidly catching up, though, it was impossible to identify him as being part of our group, and not just a random Orc. Secondly, there was the time when the tour guide turned a corner, and proceeded rather quickly in her new direction. Those of us who were at the back suffered several seconds of walking in total darkness until we too reached the corner, and could see again. (I'm not even remotely scared of the dark - it you want to hear my tales of fear on this trip, ask me about Fantasialand sometime. However, those few seconds of stumbling in total darkness, without any source of light, nor any idea of how to get back were somewhat disconcerting.)

The walls of the mines had also been decorated in several places. Some of these were drawings, many from around the time of the 2nd World War, when the catacombs were used by resistance groups. Others were religious images, largely connected with Easter. Finally, there were the monsters. In addition to the tiny fruit bats that made the mines their home, there were sculptures of a dragon, a large turtle, and several dinosaurs, all carved into the wall. What was noticable was that the lack of light made these things hugely more impressive than they would have been out in the open.

Anyway, I came away from this dungeon crawl with the impression that a certain popular role-playing game doesn't pay enough attention to the effects of vision and light, particularly in the underground environments from which it takes part of its name. Even as close to the surface as we were, the darkness was total, and the eye just does not adjust to total darkness. Even low-light made things a lot more interesting. Just a thought.

Oh, also, I should point out that the thought of using a longbow in such an environment is faintly ridiculous. Although the ranges encountered would easily fall within the range increment of the weapon, the height of the ceiling, and the necessary firing arc for a longbow would make such a thing impractical. Just thought I'd mention it.

Aaaargh! Hurty Brane!

So, I was thinking about multiclass spellcaster combinations, and all the odd things that can result. And I thought to myself, "you know, this really needs me to sit down and work through it all, to get it all exactly balanced." Then, I moved on to thinking idly about re-balancing for a low-magic system (remove most Item Creation Feats, add defense bonuses to the classes, reduce Damage Reduction values, etc). Then, I got back to thinking about all the multiclassing tweaks I've been looking at, and decided that the way to go was to write a fully-fleshed out point-buy system for character development.

Then I realised that I was getting back to my old 2nd Edition ways, where I was considering doing a near-total re-write of the whole system.

At this point, I'm hoping to just get through the day without starting on my revised Player's Handbook :-(

Big Books of Stuff

Speaking of boring, I've also been wading through "Ultimate Feats" from Mongoose publishing. A big collection of thousands of feats from lots of different sources. They've also done books of Prestige Classes and Equipment. Other companies have put out similar works, compiling feats, equipment, spells, and so on from other sources. These are books that, by their very nature, are fairly monotonous reads, but they are also extremely useful. If nothing else, it's a thick, hard-cover book that I can throw at Roger when he's being too much of a munchkin :-)

Of course, they'd be even more useful if (a) Wizards of the Coast would release the material from Sword & Fist and the like into the SRD and (b) Wizards of the Coast weren't in the process of invalidating huge chunks of what's gone before with their version 3.5. But then, (a) it's their right to release as much or as little material as they want, and (b) I guess that's what post-it notes are for.

Shadowrun, and the presentation of rules

For about six weeks now, I've been reading the Shadowrun 3rd Edition core rulebook. Currently, I'm mid-way through the Vehicles chapter, and have chapters on Magic and the Matrix to read, and then I'm done (I skipped ahead and read the rest out of sequence). In all, there are some 90 pages that I've still to get to.

Unfortunately, I realised last night that I'd rather gouge my eyes out than go back to reading it.

It's not that Shadowrun is a bad game - hell, I've played it (way back in 1st Edition days); I know it's a good game. It's not even that the rules are overly complex, although there are a lot of special cases and exceptions. In terms of difficulty, Shadowrun is around Warhammer Fantasy Battles. It's definately easier than AD&D 2nd Edition with it's mess of supplements and contradictions, and I had few problems with that.

It's just that Shadowrun 3rd Edition is boring. Big blocks of monotonous text, very little illustration, and examples that only show base cases, rather than the corner cases where examples are most needed (but that's a flaw I've seen in every RPG I've ever read). There doesn't seem to be any excitement to it - and this is from someone who had no problem wading through the D&D Epic Level Handbook.

I hate to call for a new edition of any game, since that usually means the existing player network have to go out en masse and buy all-new supplements, but if Shadowrun were to survive, I think one is badly needed.

I'm rambling, as per usual, but I think that my point is that how you present something in a game is at least as important as, if not more important than, what you're actually presenting. And, if you can't even present your core rulebook well, you're stuffed (since the prevailing wisdom is that that is the only book you can rely on selling in decent numbers).

Skill focus feat

Note: This thread was started by Mort. In order to retain the thread, I've archived the OP:

Oh, while I remember it, I read this little rule change document someone had cobbled together and one thing struck me as being really nifty.

The skill focus feat, which gives you a +2 to any skill, is totally pants, +2 is such a paltry reward that I can't really see anyone bothering with a feat like that, most certainly not if the GM allows feats from random splat books. So this guy came up with a different version of the feat, which looked a bit like this:

Skill Focus

Select one skill. This feat allows you to roll 3d20's and select one to use every time you use this skill.

Now, that is something I might consider taking...

Comments?

Multiclass Spellcasters

Returning to the Mystic Theurge, I have an alternative (partial) solution to the problem of multiclass spell-casters. The basic issue is that when a character multi-classes, all of his non-magical abilities stack, while the various magical abilities are tracked seperately. What this means, in practical terms, is that you can construct a character out of any combination of Fighter, Barbarian and Rogue (and add up to 3 levels each of Paladin and Ranger), and have a character who is about equal to any other combination of these same classes. However, combining Wizard and Sorcerer, for instance, requires you to track both lots of spells seperately, and cast them seperately. Better just to follow the Wizard path exclusively.

To this end, I suggest allowing multi-class characters with two or more divine spellcasting classes to stack those classes together for the purpose of gaining spells, and characters with two or more arcane spellcasting classes to do the same.

My system would work as follows: When the character selects the first level of a new spell-casting class of the same type as an existing class, he has a one-time only choice whether to continue casting spells as his previous class, start casting spells as his new class, or to track both classes seperately.

Taking the cases in reverse order, then, if he elects to track both classes seperately, the character operates exactly as he does now. In general, this is an inefficient way to proceed, but it is also the only means by which a character can gain access to two or more spell lists.

If the character elects to cast spells exclusively as the new class, you should total up his caster level from all classes of the type (see the table below) to determine an eventual caster level. Then, use this caster level to index into the spells per day table of the chosen class. In all respects, the character casts spells as though he had only a single class at the level indicated. *

If the character elects to cast spells exclusively as his old class, you should total up his caster level from all classes of the type (see the table below) to determine an eventual caster level. Then, use this caster level to index into the spells per day table of the chosen class. In all respects, the character casts spells as though he had only a single class at the level indicated. *

Example 1: Bob is a 5th level Wizard. He takes a level of Bard, and elects to continue casting as a Wizard. According to the table, his 5 Wizard levels give a caster level of 5, while the 1 level of Bard gives a level of 0.75, for a total of 5.75. This is rounded down to 5. Bob now casts spells as a 5th level Wizard in all respects. When Bob reaches 7th (character) level, he gains another level of Bard, becoming Wizard 5/Bard 2. This adds another 0.75 to his caster level, bringing it to 6.5, which rounds down to 6. Bob now casts spells as a 6th level Wizard.

Example 2: Jeff is a 3rd level Druid. He takes a level of Cleric, and elects to cast spells as a Cleric. According to the table, both Clerics and Druids have a caster level of 1, which gives him a total caster level of 4. Jeff now casts spells as a 4th level Cleric. He loses all Druidic spell ability. *

Example 3: Richard is a 2nd level Wizard. He takes a level of Cleric. However, Wizard and Cleric are different types of caster, and so do not combine. Richard has no choice but to track each class seperately.

The caster levels of the classes are as follows:

Class	Arcane Caster Adjustment	Divine Caster Adjustment	Psionic Adjustment
Barbarian	0	0	0
Bard	0.75 (Edit: Change to 0.6)	0	0
Cleric *	0	1	0
Druid	0	1	0
Fighter	0	0	0
Monk	0	0	0
Paladin	0	0.5 (Edit: 0.33)	0
Psion	0	0	1
Psychic Warrior	0	0	0.75 (Edit: 0.8)
Ranger	0	0.5 (Edit: 0.33)	0
Rogue	0	0	0
Sorcerer	1	0	0
Wizard	1	0	0

* Since no true rule would be complete without an exception, here it is: A Cleric's domain spells are not counted with the rest of his spell-casting ability. A character will gain domain spells as indicated by his Cleric level, ignoring levels in all other classes.

Spontaneous Casting: A character has the ability to cast spontaneously if and only if he is casting as a class that can cast spontaneously. In the examples above, Bob has no ability to cast spontaneously (Wizard), Jeff can cast cure spells spontaneously (Cleric), and Richard can cast cure spells spontaneously with his Cleric spells.

Spells Known: A character who changes spell-casting class will change his list of spells known. As far as it is possible, such a character should keep as great an overlap between his old and new lists of spells known. So, a Wizard who becomes a Sorcerer may lose access to a lot of spells. Those he does have the ability to cast should be selected from the list of Wizard spells he knew before the change. A Sorcerer who becomes a Wizard loses no spells - all his existing spells are added to his spellbook.

Metamagic Feats: A character who changes casting class retains all his metamagic feats. This may leave him with useless feats (Quicken Spell). He gains no compensation for this deficit.

What This Rule Doesn't Cover

This rule is entirely untested. I have no idea how it would work in actual play. I suspect, however, that it won't break the classes too badly.

This rule also fails to address the crossover between Arcane and Divine magic, which was precisely the problem faced by the Mystic Theurge. Off the top of my head, I might allow such characters to combine levels in these classes (and to select spells from both spell-lists), but have them calculate their eventual caster level at 0.8 of the total normally generated. Spells taken from the Wizard list are subject to arcane spell failure, while spells from the Cleric list are not, and so on. I have even less confident in this ruling than the one above, though.

This rule fails to address any cross-over between Magic and Psionics. Oh, dear.

This rule doesn't allow for a Fighter/Wizard multi-class to be effective. I might counter this by giving the Ranger and Paladin a 0.5 Arcane Spell Adjustment (Edit: 0.33). As the game stands, there should be feats that reduce the spell failure chances (actually, there are already, but Wizards didn't publish them).

The Monk suffers from a similar problem. I haven't faced that one yet, either.

Comments?

Experience Points

I've decided I don't like the XP system. Mostly because it only rewards the "kill things and take their stuff" mode of play, because role-playing awards are tacked-on, and because heavy use of the same rapidly unbalances the game.

So, here's the system I'm now advocating (lifted almost wholesale from Star Wars):

Each session, award a number of XP equal to 1,000 times the average party level. Divide this total between the surviving PCs, as always.

And that's it. This means, of course, that an average group will take an average of 4 sessions to go up, regardless of level. Bigger groups go up more slowly, and smaller ones more quickly. You can, of course, tune the numbers to suit yourself.

Comments?

The Mystic Theurge

Note: A tricky one this - the original post in the thread was by Mort. In order to preserve the thread, I'm preserving this OP...

So, wizards come up with a new prestige class.

Looks like they'll start with the super munchkin classes a bit earlier than I expected.

This surely has to be the most bs prestige class ever? Even though most people at rpg.net seems to disagree. But those people are total muppets anyway, so it doesn't mean much.

So what if you sacrifice your highest level spells, fifth level wizard spells are totally poo anyway. I'd happily settle without ninth level spells, I've got more healing than I can shake a stick at with this class.

Not to mention the utterly horrible combat munchkin you could create with the cleric buffs together with the wizard protection spells.