But I rolled it!

From page X59:

"A common mistake most DMs make is to rely too much on random die rolls. An entire evening can be spoiled if an unplanned wilderness encounter on the way to the dungeon goes badly for the party. The DM must use good judgment in addition to random tables. Encounters should be scaled to the strength of the party and should be in harmony with the theme of the adventure." (Emphasis mine.)

Okay, I am guilty as charged. I love die rolls and randomness. Not simply for randomness' sake but instead for the creative muse they provide. Trying to figure out why there are ghouls in the elven forest is part of the fun.

I also found the emphasized portion of the quote interesting. My impression is that one of the cornerstones of the OSR is that encounters should not be scaled to the strength of the party. I also rarely worry about scaling encounter difficulty relative to party strength.

However, I do try to scale difficulty relative to depth (for dungeons) or distance (for wilderness). That way players can make logical decisions and their actions have meaningful effects.

Desperate Nobles

The PCs are all connected in one way or another to a noble house - either family members, trusted advisors, generals, etc.

All of the noble families are in attendance at the King's Palace - Castle Wisteria - for summer court. There are six major noble families:
- House Kimbertos (the King's house)
- House Van de Kamp
- House Scavo
- House Mayer
- House Solis
- And the PC's house

The following events take place during the first 36 hours of summer court:
1. The Queen commits suicide
2. Rel Van de Kamp (the head of the house) is poisoned - he may or may not survive
3. The Scavo residence in the capital city burns down
4. Bishop Kaul, a son of the King, is seen late at night digging in the church's graveyard
5. Lady Solis is seen leaving the stables with straw in her hair followed shortly by a young stablehand.

Now turn the PCs loose!

A Future Sandbox?

The other day I was thinking about a sandbox campaign starting with the venerable Keep on the Borderlands and then surrounding it with Judges Guild adventures. Here is what I came up with...
Of course, some adjustments would have to be made to maps, including orientation and scale.

In the beginning hex is the Keep, the Caves of Chaos and I would use Prey of Darkness for the Cave of the Unknown.

"Prey of Darkness is a Universal Playing aid which details a force of brigands and their advisors, followers, and slaves. Each of the brigands has a price on his or her head. You have been charged with their capture! Can you bring them back to face trial alive, or must you kill them in order to collect the reward? Can you even survive the attempt? Send your heroes and heroines in search of Red Honohon and Black M'Dabb. This scenario can also be used for evil characters that need manpower to accomplish their goals. Join Red and Black in their endeavors to become rich and powerful. Become a brigand and terrorize the countryside! Challenge Red and Black for the leadership of the brigand force! All this and more await you!"
- Acaeum.com

The river that flows out of the SE corner of the B2 Wilderness Map would turn south and be the river that goes north to south on the Wilderness Map from the Illhiedrin Book.

"A search by a beautiful Wizardress involves the recovery of the fabulous Illhiedrin Book, lost during a raging storm amid bolts of lightning in a titanic battle between an inhuman creature and a now-dead Wizard who was the former possessor of the Book. They party must recover the Book, defeat the Creature, and stay alive in the process. This Scenario is designed for use with low-level characters and includes wilderness maps, dungeon maps and inhabitants, plus the dangers of a lost city."
- Acaeum.com

The road that exits at the NE corner of the B2 Wilderness Map would lead to Fortress Badabaskor.

"An adventure in the wilderness stronghold of a band of brigands that includes the background and statistics of an evil local deity, plus history, maps, and keyed room descriptions of a five-level dungeon carved out of the side of a mountain. The first three levels are fairly easy and suitable for breaking in new and inexperienced players; but the lower two are far tougher, and include a cavern that has a series of four dragon dens, indicative of the difficulty of the lower levels."
- Acaeum.com

Beyond the Valley of Fixation would be the Citadel of Fire.

"This is the ancient stronghold of Yrammag with six tower levels and five dungeon levels. It is designed for very advanced characters, and includes encounters with everything from giant rats to a minotaur and a demon. Tables have been provided for the random location and activity of the great Trammag, so that it will be a surprise each time the dungeon is entered by the adventurers. The surrounding wilderness is mapped out according to our Campaign Hexagon System, and Yrammag's spells are listed to provide a complete and detailed dungeon adventure, created and officially approved for use with D&D."
- Acaeum.com

I could then round it out using the Book of Treasure Maps.

The next question would be, "What ruleset?"
B/X?
OD&D (or S&W)?
Maybe Holmes? I kinda like this idea...

Building a Wilderness for the Northern Marches

I have been working on the Northern Marches campaign I am hoping to start. I have worked through Wilderness Architect articles from Fight On! written by Victor Raymond. The maps have worked out wonderfully! I have placed a handful of low level and a few high level modules I want to use. I have begun establishing some details about the small town that will be the "homebase" for the characters. And I have pretty much done some random encounter/event tables for some of the nearby regions.

I have settled on a homebrew setting. As I mentioned, the homebase is a small coastal town with a very close-by ruined castle (think early-Blackmoor) and an untamed wilderness.

Now I just need players.

Verbosh

After I put my kids to bed lastnight, I pulled out my copy of Verbosh and read it through. It reminded me what a great accessory it is. Next to the Keep on the Borderlands, Verbosh is one of my favorite D&D items. I think Verbosh is one of the great examples for new DMs of how to develop an open-ended sandbox setting of limited scope for OD&D, B/X and/or AD&D.

The book cover states, "Approved for use with Dungeons & Dragons" and it makes use of all of the supplements.

The first section of the book has information on the "homebase" town of Verbosh giving on average about 6 lines of detail for about 55 locations for the walled city and adjacent village. Some of the details are a bit goofy or humourous which some DMs may not take to but many of the details, especially the rumours, are great for developing adventure ideas. It also includes brief encounter tables and information on the garrison.

A typical entry is:

Flying Falcon Inn - Marish the Mangy, AL LE, Fighter, Level 4; Marish has the ability to communicate with birds. A very nice place actually, prices are reasonable. One of the present visisotrs in this inn is Broar the Bear, friend, AL CG, Berzerker, Level 10; Broar is a were-bear. Rumors: 1) Fisherman claim to have seen a sunken ship off the point just down river; 2) A wererat was seen crawling out of the well. (I omitted stats because I didn't feel like typing them).

The next section is about the sewers and crypts below the city. It uses the now-common trope of were-rats under the city. It is an old-school dungeon but I think that it is lacking a bit in terms of the "Empty-Room Principal" as nearly every room has an encounter of some kind and most of them are likely to develop into combats.

The third section is a great underwater location, "The Wreck of the Iron Griffon".

The next section is the beginning of the wilderness descriptions. This has brief descriptions of a number of encounters, lairs, strongholds and settlements. A DM can look at these and pull out numerous adventure ideas but many of them will require some work on maps and numbered keys to flesh them out.

The remainder of the book covers the fortress of Warrenberg, the Tower of Balthon the Phantasamist, the Dead City of Haygaras, and the deadly Schuwang-Nau Tower. My only real complaint is the same as I made for the sewers below Verbosh in that there is a likely combat encounter in nearly every room.

I think that for what Verbosh does, it does very well. I can see in a alternate universe a scenario where an OD&D boxed set was published with Verbosh as the B/X box set was done with the Keep on the Borderlands. I am going to use Verbosh as a template for my development of my Northern Marches if I can ever get it going. I can picture a DM sitting over his copies of Monsters & Treasure and The Underworld & Wilderness Adventures and using the tables therein to develop the wilderness descriptions. It makes me want to play OD&D/Swords & Wizardry: Whitebox.

I am going to start looking for a game

In addition to my current C&C campaign I am going to start looking for a group for a B/X or S&W White Box game. Taking a queue from Chgowiz and LotFP I have put together the flyer and I am going to go around this weekend and post it at a few places. I have been talking to a few people that have contacted me after seeing this blog, I am talking to my current C&C group and I am hoping to meet a few people interested in old school games at the upcoming convention.

Get in touch with me if you are interested and in the Calgary area. p_armstrong[at]email[dot]com

Fingers Crossed!

What Type of Sand for My Sandbox?

If I were to get a chance to run a B/X sandbox game which setting would I use for a base? Understanding that I would change a bunch of stuff no matter what the source.

The first three that came to mind are:

1. Blackmoor - as a standalone - no Mystara or or Greyhawk or anything. I would go back to the beginning where Blackmoor is a village, the Castle is unexplored as is the surrounding wilderness also no Svenny, Blue Rider, etc. I like the fact that adventurers have the option of exploring the Castle/Dungeons or the wilderness.

2. The Elphand Lands from the Wilderlands. I would likely treat it as an 'explore the wilderness' campaign where civilization is the City-State of the World Emperor and the wilderness is everything north of the Sharryn River. Where could the adventurers' homebase be? Along the river or on the coast of Uther Pentwegern Sea?

3. Thunder Rift. I would change the scale of the map to make the rift larger. It would give me a place to put the Pit of Tortured Souls - the Dark Pit. I would also rewrite the history.

What do you think? Any other suggestions?

EDIT: As I went back through some previous posts to put tags on them, I saw my post about Barbarian Prince. I am going to take another look at that and see if that might work for a setting.