Firefly: What's Yours is Mine

Another month, another game session, and more fun had. This time we had a full complement of five players, plus myself, and it turns out that even with the revised seating arrangements that's the maximum that can comfortably be handled - indeed, even that number is perhaps a little tight.

The game itself went quite well, except that once again there was a pacing issue that led to the finale being very rushed and also heavily compressing Act Three (and omitting Act Four entirely!). Still, everyone seemed to have fun, so that was good.

For the next session, "Shooting Fish", I'm going to spend a bit more time in preparation and see what I can edit out of the session. It does look like the adventures as-written are slightly too long to fit comfortably in three hours, so some adaptation is probably in order. Which is no bad thing, just something to keep in mind.

I'm also starting to consider going "off book" with these "Lost Episodes". There's absolutely nothing wrong with the pre-gen adventures, and indeed it's quite nice to actually be using some of the many adventures I've acquired, rather than having them just taking up space, but I do wonder if it might be better to start writing my own custom episodes, and thus building them to fit in the three-hour slot I have available?

Anyway, something to think about, for now. The next session is scheduled for four weeks from now, and is the next adventure from "Thrillin' Heroics" - "Shooting Fish".

Another Hack at Encumbrance Rules

The best version of encumbrance rules that I've yet seen come from the "Lamentations of the Flame Princess" retroclone. They're pretty damn simple, but they also provide the difficult choices I'm looking for. They're also reasonably adaptable to other systems.

They're also a variant of my "minor, major, conditional" split for items that I've mentioned before... or rather, my version is a variant of those rules.

Firstly, count up the number of encumbrance points your character is carrying, as follows:

• If your character is wearing Medium armour: +1
• If your character is wearing Heavy armour: +2
• For every 'oversized' item your character is carrying: +1
• For every 5 other different things your character is carrying (round down): +1

An 'oversized' item is any two-handed or great weapon, anything that requires two hands to carry, or anything taller in height than your character. A sack full of loot counts as an oversized item in addition to the weight of the treasure itself.

As noted above, several small, similar items count as a single 'thing' - that is, a pouch of iron spikes, several torches or flasks of oil, several potions, several scrolls. A pouch of up to 100 coins counts as a 'thing'. Any single weapon counts as a 'thing'. Four bunches of ammunition (arrows, bolts, sling stones, throwing knives, plus the appropriate quiver or other holder) counts as a 'thing'. Food and water for three days counts as a 'thing'.

Worn items, excluding armour, do not count. Likewise, assorted treasure items carried in a sack don't count, as these are part of the sack's value. A backpack, when worn, does not count towards encumbrance. If a backpack is being lifted but not worn, perhaps by a strap, it is considered an oversized item.

A character is considered unencumbered if he is carrying a number of encumbrance points less than 3 + Str Mod (minimum 2). A character is considered encumbered if he is carrying more than that and less than 5 + Str Mod (minimum 3). And a character is considered heavily encumbered if he is carrying more than that less than 7 + Str Mod (minimum 4) encumbrance points. A character carrying 7 + Str Mod or more encumbrance points cannot move and falls prone in his space.

In addition to those items a character can reasonably wear, each character has 6 arbitrary "quick access" spaces about his person, each of which can contain a weapon or a single small item (a pouch of coin or gems, a single potion or scroll, concealed thieves' tools, or whatever). Any of these items can be accessed using a swift/minor/bonus action.

The remainder of the character's adventuring gear must be stored in a backpack, haversack, or similar container. Items stored in a pack of this sort can be accessed only with a full minute spent readying them. (Effectively, this means they cannot be accessed while in combat - so pick your 6 quick accesses carefully!) A normal backpack can carry 10 'things', a small backpack can carry 6, and a masterwork backpack can carry 15 (10 for a masterwork small backpack!).

Treasure items must be carried in a sack or similar container. Items stored in a sack can be accessed only with a full minute spent readying the item. A normal sack can carry 10 'things', a small sack can carry 6, and a masterwork sack 15.

A sack can be dropped as a swift/minor/bonus item, and picked up in the same way. A worn pack can likewise be dropped as a swift/minor/bonus item, and can be donned as a standard action. Furthermore, a character can only drop/don a backpack if his hands are empty. (A backpack that is merely held in-hand is equivalent to a sack.)

And that's about it. The rules are, hopefully, simple enough to allow for quick recalculations where needed (though that shouldn't be too often anyway), while the "difficult choice" aspect lies in choosing which items need to go in those 6 quick access slots and which for the backpack, and also in whether to drop the pack at start of combat (and have to therefore spend time readying weapons) or to fight on while encumbered.

Value Add

Something I was musing on last night:

Any rule in a game, but most especially peripheral rules such as encumbrance, alignment, or spell components, will necessarily add a certain amount of Hassle to the running of the game - if only by virtue of you needing to remember that rule. I'm going to label that H.

Any rule is also going to add a certain amount of Value to the game, by improving immersion, by adding fun, or whatever. I'm going to label that V. (It's worth noting that V could in fact be negative - a really bad rule could actually make the game worse - see the "Free Parking" house rule in Monopoly.)

And, of course, different people will see H and V differently. That's life.

Ideally, when designing rules you should aim to maximise V and minimise H. That way, you get the best bang for your buck - rules that add a great deal to the game with a minimum of fuss. But more often it's a trade-off, where you can choose between simpler rules that add less or more complex rules that add more.

For encumbrance, for example, some people might regard that the tracking of equipment just isn't fun, no matter what. So H >> V for pretty much any set of encumbrance rules, and so they should simply drop the rules entirely and have done. There's just no value-add.

Other people might take the view that encumbrance rules are absolutely necessary - that without them the imagined space loses all integrity and the whole thing becomes a joke. As such, they'll find that virtually any encumbrance rules are worth the effort of applying, because V >> H. (But, of course, they may well still be better trying to find a better set of rules, because while bad rules may be better than no rules, good rules would be better still.)

And then there's the third group, which in the case of encumbrance actually includes me: for the right type of game, I'm in favour of the use of encumbrance rules in principle, but I find that virtually every RPG ever manages to strike almost exactly the wrong balance - the rules generally expect you to micro-manage a set of lovingly detailed weights and then compare them against limits that are far too generous, and potentially apply some penalties that are too damn fiddly to bother with anyway.

So the concept works for me, but the ratio of H to V doesn't.

Consider another example: spell components.

In theory, these are quite cool: some spells require verbal components, some actions, some special materials. This gives a nice bit of flavour to the game.

Only it doesn't, because keeping track of those material components is just a pain, so the Wizard has a "spell component pouch" on his character sheet and thereafter gives it not a moment's thought. Well, until he finds himself without that pouch, of course, when he's completely screwed. (Not to mention that it makes the silence spell vastly overpowered - what should have been a minor stealth spell becomes an anti-spellcaster bomb. Not good.)

So, with the rule as originally formulated, H was very high and V was moderate - too much hassle to be worth. In attempting a fix, by adding the spell component pouch, H was reduced... and V reduced to effectively nothing.

And yet the concept remains somewhat interesting. So, is there a better way?

Well, I'm going to suggest something. The baseline here will be the 3e rules, as those are the ones I'm most familiar with.

1) Ignore the Spell Components listed for the spells. Instead, every spell requires a Verbal and Somatic component, and every spellcaster requires a Focus component for all his spells. (A wand or crystal for Wizards, a holy symbol for Clerics, or similar.) Any spells that require a 'costly' material component or an XP cost should be increased in level by 1, with [i]wish[/i] therefore being bumped to 10th level and being out of reach of mortal spellcasters. (This would need a further fix, except I never expect to play at that level again.)

2) If a spellcaster ever needs to cast a spell while missing one of the required components (Verbal, Mental, Focus), he must make a Spellcraft check (DC 10 + spell level + 5 per 'missing' component). And the casting time increases by one step - Swift -> Standard -> Full-round -> 1 round -> 1 minute -> 10 minutes -> 1 hour -> 1 day -> 1 more day.

3) The Still Spell metamagic feat allows the caster to simply remove the Somatic component from his spells (no change in casting time, and no Spellcraft check). The Silent Spell metamagic feat does the same, removing the Verbal component. The Eschew Materials feat is renamed Unfocussed Spell, and removes the Focus component.

So far, so good. Now...

4) When casting a spell, the player can optionally add a description of a material component. This must be thematically-appropriate to the spell in question. If the player does so, he gains a +1 bonus to caster level for this spell (including all repeat castings until he takes a short rest - otherwise, it's going to get really tedious!)

5) In addition, the game can then introduce a number of special components (unicorn horn, dragon scales, demon's blood...) which are both rare and powerful - important enough to bother tracking on the character sheet. If the player chooses to use one of these components in a thematically-appropriate way, he gets a +2 bonus to caster level for this spell (again, including repeat castings). However, doing so exhausts his entire stock of the special component - such things are good for one shot only.

As far as I can see, this has several advantages:

• It actually requires less book-keeping than the existing mechanism, because all spells require the same components. (H is reduced)
• It applies a much-needed reduction to the power of silence - it's still a worthwhile spell, but not the magekiller it is as written. (V is increased)
• It likewise prevents the Wizard from being crippled by a few easy steps - losing his spell component pouch, gagging him, or tying him up doesn't automatically eliminate 90% of his effectiveness. (Of course, 3e Wizards are vastly over-powered, but that's another issue.) (V is increased)
• It injects the desired flavour into material components, but without any need to micro-manage what the Wizard is carrying. In particular, because the player has to declare which component he is using when he casts, this ensures that these get mentioned. (V is increased)
• It allows the further enhancement of the special components. Of course, these can (and in some games do) coexist with the existing material component rules, but by having them used in the same way as 'regular' components they should see more use. (V is increased)

So, as far as I can see, we've reduced H while increasing V quite a bit. Which shifts the ratio quite a bit and should hopefully make for a better game.

And, of course, anyone who isn't interested can easily enough just ignore such rules entirely.

Some Random Stuff About Campaign Design

I've found that a 3-4 hour game session makes for a good equivalent of a single episode of a TV series - something in the region of 40-45 minutes. This gives a good amount of time for a beginning, middle, and end. However, this definitely works better in a reasonably rules-lite game; something like D&D tends to quickly bog down in combat in a manner that inhibits storytelling.

Most TV series have a season of about 20-26 episodes, with 22 still being the most common. I've found that this also gives a pretty good format, allowing a fairly well-developed story to be told over the course of a year, without squeezing it unduly or stretching it beyond interest.

Conveniently, a bi-weekly schedule should allow 26 game sessions in the year. Even if you drop several sessions due to Christmas and other breaks, there's still plenty of room for 20 sessions in year.

But: When watching "The Clone Wars", and also when running SWSE, I found that something that also works well is if a few episodes are chained together into a mini-arc. (I found 3 sessions to be ideal here, with the added bonus that in SWSE and/or D&D it made sense to have the PCs level up after each 3-session arc. Though in 5e I would be inclined to have a single-session intro, have the PCs level from 1st to 2nd at the end of that, and then kick off the first 'real' arc.)

When it comes to Adventure Path products then, what I probably don't want are six largeish adventures that the PCs will get through at whatever speed they get through, nor do I really want 17 'episodes' that don't actually have any concept of how they tie into individual sessions. What would be better would actually be a presentation of about 6 mini-arcs each split into three 'chunks', with each chunk designed to fit into a single session, plus a 2-part finale for the game. (In 5e, add a single-episode introduction.)

Furthermore, it would be beneficial if each session were then written in such a way that there's a stripped down version that contains only the minimal set of events required to progress the plot (ideally playable in 2 hours), followed by a number of additional elements (further encounters, or side-quests, or similar) to allow the session to be expanded out to 3-, 4-, or more hours of play. That would be exceptionally useful, as it would allow me to pick up the campaign and just use it as-is, without concern that the whole of one session would be blown on a hugely-wasteful throwaway encounter ("Tomb of Horrors" 4e, I'm looking at you!).

But then, that would involve much more scripting than even an Adventure Path really benefits from. Though perhaps if the campaign were then presented in some sort of matrix format, so that elements could be encountered in different orders, or not at all...

Rise of Tiamat

Like "Hoard of the Dragon Queen", this adventure surprised me. Unlike HotDQ, this was not a pleasant surprise. I had heard good things about this adventure, and in particular opinion was near-unanimous that this was better than it's predecessor.

It isn't.

Reading through the introduction, I had high hopes to see them present lots of factions and lots of "moving parts" in the adventure. That boded very well, I thought - this would be a very open adventure with lots of opportunity for scheming, role-play, and various shenanigans. My one concern was that surely there must be better ways to present this data - some sort of org chart for the evil cult, really. But never mind, maybe it was omitted due to reasons of space.

But then I read through the nine episodes of the adventure... and it became apparent that this actually was quite tightly scripted. Yes, after each of the four departmental meetings that anchored the adventure (no, really) there was a choice of what the PCs did next... sort of. The caveat to that was that at each point they had two choices, and the choice was which of the two to do first (and, consequently, which to do second).

Worse, where "Hoard of the Dragon Queen" offered the PCs plenty of scope to choose their approach within most of the individual episodes, here the PCs have a clear objective and a clear 'best' way to complete the challenge. It's not the same solution in every case, but the scope for PC action is actually more constrained here than in the previous adventure.

And the adventure did have the Cult of the Dragon react to PC actions... again, sort of. Three times, the cult sends assassins against the PCs, but there are two issues there. Firstly, the first set of assassins is deliberately pitched to not really have a chance against the PCs. I guess that's okay, but it's frankly an annoying cliche at this point. But the second was that even a TPK was stated as not being the end of the campaign - the PCs would just be resurrected and carry on. Death, where is your sting?

Worst of all, the climax of the adventure features the PCs desperately struggling to prevent the Cult of the Dragon from bringing Tiamat back into the world. If the Cult succeeds, that's pretty much guaranteed to be a TPK... and that would be the end of the campaign. Which means that at the climax of the campaign, the PCs are desperately struggling to bring about an anti-climax. Not ideal.

Finally, I was struck by something. This campaign features a flying castle. It features an effort by extensive dragon-themed armies to bring the Queen of Dragons back into the world. It features an undead warrior who is allied with that dragon-themed army, but not absolute in his alliance. It features red robed wizards whose betrayal at a key time can weaken the Cult. It features a crown that is absolutely key in the ritual to free that Dragon Queen. It even features a secret council with the metallic dragons to bring them on-side in the final struggle, plus a venture into an artic citadel.

All of which were very reminiscent of something else. I vastly preferred this campaign when I read it twenty-five years ago and it was called Dragonlance.

Ultimately, I'm really disappointed in this adventure, and by consequence am very disappointed in the "Tyranny of Dragons" storyline. Such a shame.

GM Appreciation

March 4th is International GM's Day, and in preparation for this, Wizards of the Coast have published a list of 28 ways players could show their appreciation.

Hmm.

Well, I appreciate the sentiment, but it's frankly unnecessary. The reason is simple: I GM because I enjoy it. If I didn't enjoy it, I wouldn't do it; it's as simple as that.

As far as I'm concerned, players should show their 'appreciation' by consistently doing three things:

• Show up when and where you say you will.
• Have a good time.
• Do what you can to assure that everyone else at the table (including the GM) has as good a time as possible.

And that's basically it.

Of course, the occasional "thank you" is, of course, well received, and the gifts my players got me at the end of "The Eberron Code" were great (and very much unexpected). But while those are nice, they're not why I GM, nor would they be enough to persuade me to GM if I wasn't otherwise enjoying it. (There is an amount of money that would persuade me to GM a game without needing to enjoy it. You probably can't afford it.)

Fortunately, I don't think the three things I do ask are particularly onerous responsibilities, nor entirely unreasonable.