/osrg/ Old School Renaissance General

>Why do dungeons accumulate beholders?
Illusionist Wizards fuck around with the Mirror Realms a lot. Mirror Realms are great if you can get them to work properly because they can duplicate any item, including big chunks of gold. They aren't so great because things keep sneaking in from the other side.

Take two large, very expensive mirrors. Face them towards each other, carefully aligning them to create an endless hallway. Under normal light the effect remarkable but not dangerous. But when the weather is just right, and the sun sets, and 7 out of the 8 colours of light are blocked, the mirrors can change. Wizards can also create pure Octarine light instead of relying on the sun. It rarely ends well.

Beholders are from a reality that's not quite like ours. They split off sometime after cellular life but well before mammals. They like our reality better than their own. It's far less dangerous.

>crapping beholders in the depths of caves requires extensive periscoping
Neat.

From this, we can probably safely assume that the natural environment of the Beholder is probably not actually the swamp. Beholders seem to actively flourish in the absolutely lowest depths of the megadungeons, being by far most common on level 16+.

If I'd have to guess why, using no other material, I'd point at the word "avaricious". The Dungeon has treasure.

Beholders have Treasure Type I, S, T in the wilderness.
I is 30% chance of 10,500pp, 55% chance of 11 gems, 50% chance of 6.5 pieces of jewelry.
S is a 40% chance for 5 potions.
T is a 50% chance for 2.5 scrolls.

They're rich fuckers, and accumulate treasure and expendable magic items.

Interestingly, though, the ones outside are much more rich than the ones in the dungeon - Appendix A only gives them at most 3,200pp at dungeon level 16. (Rolling 32 pieces of jewelry would far outstrip that, though.) Perhaps they waste away their wealth in bribing Asmodeus whenever he shows up to steal their lunch money.
Or perhaps they retire to the marshes when they tire of the tough competition.

The answer is probably just that "a wizard did it", though, since that seems to be such a popular excuse for the really old-school megadungeons. Bargle pays them to guard the lower floors, basically, and they accept because being in a leadership position is pretty attractive to them.

>crapping beholders in the depths of caves requires extensive periscoping
WAT

Why are the beholders crapping?

These puzzles steal themselves!

>They've existed since Greyhawk, but the OD&D supplemental encounter tables are spotty at best.
Alright, so the OD&D supplemental encounter tables.

God, these things are weird.

The only relevant description Greyhawk gives is
>These monsters are avaricious. They are neutral in nature, although they tend to be chaotic.
I repeat: Beholders are Neutral/Chaotic. They're greedy fuckers, but can probably be negotiated with even if you're, like, a Paladin. But this is also the book that introduced Chaotic Stupid as an alignment, with them being just as likely to backstab their friends for all the loot as they are to attack the PCs.

Beholders are Monster Level 6, alongside Balrogs and Rust Monsters and Master Thieves and all kinds of fun stuff. It's a 1d20 table with unique entries, so a 5% chance.

In the Eldritch Wizardry wilderness tables it's a Miscellaneous Monster, appearing two times in the table for 10% total. No, wait, 11.25% because they had to pad the table with a 1d8 reroll.
Anyway, Miscellaneous Monsters appear literally anywhere except cities on a 1d12 roll of 9 - so 8.33%. Combine with the other, and you get an ~1.04% encounter chance in any non-city environment.

This is kind of similar to the 1% chance in AD&D's marshes, except everywhere. They're slightly more common than Tiamat in deserts, the most common Miscellaneous Monster (beating out Blink Dogs and Rust Monsters), and I don't know what more to say.

The Eldritch Wizardry tables are literally just taking every single monster released and dumping them into big subtables, and there's clearly not all that much thought put into them.

I guess in OD&D they're just one of those monsters that you can see almost anywhere?

I made another thing. 0-level funnel set in 199x Japan when suddenly fantasy. Feel free to heap praise, queries, and crap upon me.

They hate normies.

Is this a system or a module?
Why is your blog in our list with no description?
Have you read the JG Ready Ref sheets?

I kinda sorta made a dungeon. Am I doing alright?

Why not both?

extra stairs would be nice. That's fine as long as the scale is not 5"/square

>Is this a system or a module?
Yes

>Why is your blog in our list with no description?
Reply hazy

>Have you read the JG Ready Ref sheets?
No

The lack of doors and inconsistent size of squares triggers y autism but it's off to a good start.

Both of these guys look like they're staggering around drunk while trying to fight.

Partially because the homebrew rules of getting experience from finishing a 'dungeon goal' simplifies a lot of the stuff relating to finding, grabbing, and spending gold. For example, rescue the stolen noble maiden and you get 3 points per character who participated. It also allows for the "get in and get out" gameplay, since you're going for a goal.

However I also see why people may want xp = gold recovered or spent. I'm just trying to find out if the extra effort of doing the XP = gold and figuring out how to fluff it in the game to justify why people are going into these dungeons is worth it compared to just running a slightly more modernized "actually have a heroic/quest reason to go here" while using the OSR gameplay.

Who built it, and why like that?

>inconsistent size of squares
I think that's great.

Hmm, that /is/ a good question!

Are your characters too normal? Does everything they do make sense? Well, worry no longer! For no good reason, I've copied 500 backstory events from the Toast and put them into a table.

coinsandscrolls.blogspot.ca/2017/11/1d500-backstories-to-inflict-on-your.html

It's very random and very gonzo, but by gumby, if you've got nice normal sensible backstories, this table will sort that out in a hurry.

Very nice overview. Thanks,
It does make player-led mapping more interesting because they are more likely to make mistakes, I guess.

It means you can basically take a caravan of shields into a dungeon and be immune to pretty much everything. Especially if you have hirelings giving you new shields. It's also an entirely disconnected mechanic. Not to mention that the "problem" that it "fixes" doesn't exist.

Alright, so the basic structure of your dungeon is a big ol' loop with an exit branching off the end. In the middle, there's a linear path that bridges the loop through a secret passage.

Assuming that you enter through the top and exit through the bottom, there's only three or so notable choices available: to go through the left or right side of the loop, to go through the center or not, and whether or not to enter the room in the bottom left.

One suggestion I'd make is to take those smaller loops (e.g. the circle just below the big room in the upper right) and make them actually skip the room they're connected to rather than, well, just being two paths that lead to the same place.

It's just one teeny-tiny floor, though, so it's hard to make many comments on it beyond that. There's, like, nine rooms? Ten, perhaps a dozen if you put something into those tiny alcoves?

>What's the shittiest houserule?
"Wizards suck in this game, I'm going to give them more spells and change the saves back to the ones in 3E that make sense."

I was mostly using it as a way to play around in the Mipui editor and to try my hand at creating something similar to a "traditional" dungeon with square rooms and halls and such. I've created Dungeons before but mostly without grids and not very "well" more or less.

I was certainly going to add more floors/rooms to that dungeon, but I appreciate the feedback. So you think there should be more dead ends/rooms off the main paths and more loops?

>Not to mention that the "problem" that it "fixes" doesn't exist.
It "fixes" first-level characters being one-shot, I suppose. However, it does so by making them more vulnerable to future attacks.

Not to mention how, well, you could probably just solve it entirely by giving them +6HP instead.

The worst is when you combine all those variants and get splintered shields, split helms and broken armor. Seriously, man, either buff starting hit points or introduce some death spiral mechanics if that's what you're after.

The "fun" part is when you start letting Kobolds use shields.

And here's the write up for this dungeon in case anyone is curious.

It's busy enough for its scale. If you feel like making the pathing fancy, do it with extra staircases/pitfalls/etc.

>It "fixes" first-level characters being one-shot, I suppose.
If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

I'm working on post-apocalyptic mutations for BFRPG. All are based off the Mutant Future/Ruinations mutation list. Any input would be cool.

>It means you can basically take a caravan of shields into a dungeon and be immune to pretty much everything. Especially if you have hirelings giving you new shields.
Quick question; how many deaths have you had in a dungeon where HP loss in combat was the prime factor, in a way shields would have helped?

In my games, I'd say it's about 15%. Most deaths are caused by traps, stupidity, poison, magic, characteristic drain, drowning, falling, or sandwiches. Shields are handy but they don't make you "immune to pretty much everything".

Plus, a bunch of shield-carrying hirelings makes you vulnerable in new and exciting ways (like dopplegangers!)

>So you think there should be more dead ends/rooms off the main paths and more loops?
I figure that you generally want meaningful choice, you know? If the players ever get the choice to go left or right, those should generally lead to different places. (Unless you're making a maze that's intentionally confusing.)

Loops help with this, since they make the dungeon less linear. Rooms off the main path also help, since they are necessarily optional.

The dungeon you just posted has a bunch of loops, I guess, although it also has a bunch of colored doors that I honestly don't understand so it could be more linear. If they're keys, I recommend that they open locked doors they've already passed by and also either open up shortcuts past vast stretches of dungeon (possibly completing a greater loop!) or open up new stuff.

I suppose the yellow-green key opens the similarly colored doors, and that brown is unlocked, but what's the deal with purple? Yellow seems a bit useless in that case, since all it does is open the door from T2->h which you get to immediately after getting the key and thus could just as well be unlocked for all it matters.

First thought is too much crunch, not enough fluff. Needs more description.

I believe the wrote up explains it since the picture direct have a key but-
>Brown is standard door
>Green is locked
>Purple is hidden/secret door
>Red is trapped door

Weird color system that works in my head, but thanks for feedback on the newer dungeon!

Sure. But that doesn't mean that the deadliness of combat should be taken away entirely, does it? Players avoid combat because it's deadly and a waste of their resources. If you take the deadliness away, suddenly they won't need to avoid combat as much. Imagine getting a free turn from every member of the party against every encounter.

In that case, I still have to complain about the location of the locked doors. d->g is particularly useless, as passing through e is barely longer (and required, to boot).

With that information in hand, the dungeon is suddenly extremely linear. a->b->(optional c), d->e->f.

Oh boy. Are we posting dungeons

It's basically a weird trident - path 1 is 1->7->8->9, path 2 is 1->2->5->6, and then there's two offshoots from 2->3 and 2->4.

Since 7->8 is secret, it's mostly just path 2.

Very linear map, 2/5. Nice art design, though.

Anything small is linear or random access.

Maybe Beholders have a small chance to hatch from random dead eyeballs.

Yeah. I plan on moving the entrance to 7,8,9 to the east side of 5

So if basically every monster can see in the dark, but humans can't, what's the point of bringing in torches? Obviously so you can see, but how do you stop the monsters from noticing you miles away?

Because basically every dungeon monster can see in the dark.
They see you coming either way, may as well level the playing field a bit.

True, I suppose. It'll probably work just fine as a single path on a larger map, to be honest.

At least this one has optional rooms and possibly backtracking, which is more than I could say for some small linear dungeons. There's way too many people that take the "five room dungeon" literally.

>So if basically every monster can see in the dark, but humans can't, what's the point of bringing in torches?
???
>how do you stop the monsters from noticing you miles away?
Have someone scout ahead or bust down the door before they have a chance to react.

>Obviously so you can see, but how do you stop the monsters from noticing you miles away?
Hence why in OD&D in the dungeon you could get surprised by monsters but generally not surprise them unless you just opened a door.

It's explicitly putting you on the back foot, really. An extra bit of challenge - you need light to see, but the Grues don't.

This is also why the Infravision spell exists, since it lets you go without a torch and actually surprise the monsters, and why demihumans getting infravision in Supplement I: Greyhawk was a somewhat big deal.

And also, of course, why all monsters can see in the dark but the moment they become your hirelings they lost that ability. They don't want to make things easy for you.

Mirrors aren't something you want to fuck with

Am I allowed to play OSR and have fun? A lot of the people here don't seem to like fun

>Am I allowed to play OSR and have fun?
Fuck no, get out.

That's nothing to do with OSR and everything to do with

Pretty much just ignore everyone's suggestions here, ignore the "one true way", and run your game as you want and you'll have a kickass time.

Does anyone have any reference sheet for ACKs about common scenarios of when to roll what? Like for players and the GM?

Elaborate.

Does that mean I'm allowed to to play 2e?

Don't get carried away.

>Letting nameless people you will never meet dictate what you can and can't play.

>Am I allowed to play OSR and have fun?
Yes you are! If you read this post: coinsandscrolls.blogspot.com/2017/03/osr-glog-review.html

user you do what makes your table happy.

As long as you have fun

Wow, this blogger seems like a really cool guy! Does he have any other articles you'd recommend, anonymous?

Go ahead it is perhaps the best roleplaying game ever made imo

Holy shit the tryhard of this post.

Referencing what roll you have to do when in certain situations. Like "To do X in situation Y, Roll d20 + Str".

Absolutely. That meme is so dank it vanishes beyond the thread.
Has not been, is not, will not be OSR. >muh 4d4 stat rolling

That sounds like a "ruling instead of rule" sort of thing.
If stuff like that comes up just do whatever you think makes sense.

How do I pitch AD&D to a modern D&D group who watch Critical Roll and the like?

It's the Dark Souls of TTRPGs.

Tell them that it's easier to learn and better supports roleplaying.

Then crush them with boulders. Haha.

Modern RPGs are the $60 base game, DLC heavy version of gaming.
OSR is pumping quarters into an old arcade machine trying to get out alive.

Not who asked but
This, this collection of crunch was the thing I was looking for that I didn’t even know I wanted.

I do some quick research into this ACKs and find it is exactly what I’ve been wanting to run for a my group. I was slaveing over how I was going to adjust the rules cyclopedia in small ways to accommodate some semblance of modern sensibilities but low and behold I find this that has done it already.

It took what I wanted (henchmen, strongholds, mass combat) changed what needed it (shitty non human classes). I was just checking this thread cause I was bored and I found the thing I needed.

Still need to go through the main rules to see if it really works for me but I got a good feeling about this.

>slaveing
>low and behold
user, I hate to be the baron of bad news but . . .

C'mon man.
Mistakes like that are a diamond dozen in this doggy dog world.

How to you distinguish the gerund for being a slave from the gerund for being a slav?

Well that's just a general catch-all question. The specifics ones would be too long: what to roll when a player does a melee attack; what to roll when a monster rolls a melee; what to roll when casting a spell; what to roll when doing a special maneuver; what to roll when looking for something, etc.

Would you allow your wizard to tell whether items are magical or not by licking them?

Play the nostalgia card

Tell them about the simplicity

Tell them how it's uniquely different from modern D&D (more about rad adventures in weird places and getting loot than yet another high fantasy epic adventure)

Tell them they're either playing AD&D or finding a new DM

I would give them some fancy description of how it tastes to give subtle hints. Then again I'm an uncreative fuck

> "My wizard licks the ring, what does it taste like"
> "Uh, yknow, magical n stuff"

Only if there are lots of weird side-effects.

Dungeon I dreamed of last night after reading Skerples' lich post and Death Frost Doom:

The lich is a transhuman astronaut who crash landed on a primitive planet. He's effectively immortal as long as he stays cold at all times. Delving into his lair is like stepping into a walk-in freezer. To prevent invaders from killing him with fire, the lich circulates CO2 through dungeon instead of air (he's undead so he doesn't need to breath). The entire place is built out of a combination of stone blocks and salvaged pieces of his wrecked ship.

I thought it was bad because it focuses on combat rather than dungeon crawling tho

that dungeon sucked and the only saving grace is bird gf

I used to do level design for shooters and looking at dungeon maps from tabletop RPGs always makes me a little upset. There's no rhyme or reason to them, it's just squiggles and needless dead ends.

Yeah but shooters are shallow and ultimately linear.

Realism doesn't always make for interesting or fun games, you should know that.

I wouldn't say shooters are "shallow" but they aren't exploration focused games. You're supposed to be moving in a specific direction to encounter the enemy and fights the developers want you to go towards. In a dungeon crawling game you're slowly mapping out a confusing labyrinth trying to find secret paths and treasures. They're totally incomparable types of game.

How about this house rule- Classes use their hit die as their damage die, regardless of the weapon they are using.

Fighters run around using throwing knives, still deal 1d10 damage. Wizards can use halberds and swords, but still only deal 1d4 damage, etc.

And if you want to argue about equipment potentially unbalancing it, just say that magic weapons are designed in such a way where it's still best to give them to the Fighters, or some weapons may simply refuse to serve anyone who isn't a Fighter of a certain minimum level.

I like this DESU, though you should still add some minuses for smaller weapons (a fighter running around dealing 1d10 with darts is kinda dumb).

It does fix the problem of stupid weapon restrictions, and allows people to flavor their characters however they want without needing to sacrifice character balance.

Hey /osrg/, odd question but, is it higher-brow to watch cats or to watch cat videos?
Combat was an important part of dungeon crawling as far back as the little brown books.
2e's sin is apparent in its modules. The rules are clean, if a bit too squeaky.
Hobbits, maybe. Wizards would need to know a mouth-related spell for me to even consider it.
You shouldn't be wrong, but you are because of your filename. wind temple was great though
I'm OK with this only if attack bonuses are uniform between classes.

What's wrong with the modules? I know lots of people have a hate on for most of the AD&D settings for being too "Snowflakey", but I haven't heard many people talk about hating on modules (Except for that one section talking about trying to make D&D more like diablo)

Is this loss?

They're about acting out stories instead of exploring interesting locations.

Yes, it's always loss.