Locksmith with a Dagger

Once in a while, just for fun, I like to generate a 0-level character using the 0-Level Party Generator from Purple Sorcerer Games. Usually, I use the The Crawler's Companion app on my smartphone. In any event, if I use a character, I use it as is. I take the good with the bad and see how the character's life unfolds. I play the hand I was dealt, as it were. Take a look at this character I generated on 29 December 2025:

Occupation: Locksmith
Strength: 10 (0)
Agility: 14 (+1)
Stamina: 12 (0)
Personality: 12 (0)
Intelligence: 12 (0)
Luck: 8 (−1)
AC: 11; HP: 2
Weapon: Dagger −1 (1d40)
Speed: 30; Init: +1; Ref: +1; Fort: 0; Will: 0
Equipment: Chest—empty (2 gp)
Trade Good: Fine tools
Starting Funds: 30cp
Lucky Sign: Harsh Winter (All attack rolls)
Languages: Common

A locksmith. An average locksmith who is marginally more agile and marginally less lucky, with 2 hit points, an empty chest, fine tools, 30 copper pieces, and a dagger that causes 1d40 points of damage. 1d40... points of damage. True, his "lucky" sign is Harsh Winter, which means he suffers a −1 penalty to all attack rolls because his Luck score is 8, but if he does hit something, he causes 1d40 points of damage. I don't know if this an Easter egg, a glitch, or a mission from the gods, but this locksmith wields a dagger with a damage die that hasn't been invented yet, and I'm willing to make that work!

I could be satisfied with a simple 1d4 × 10 damage scheme, but just in case I face a judge who is a stickler for the full range of 1–40, I offer the following alternative for rolling 1d40 without a 40-sided die:

1d40 Substitute

Roll 1d10, then 1d4.
If you roll 1 on the d4, keep the d10 result.
If you roll 2 on the d4, add 10 to the d10 result.
If you roll 3 on the d4, add 20 to the d10 result.
If you roll 4 on the d4, add 30 to the d10 result.

Beasties Forever

"Print Versions of the Cyclopedia of Common Animals" by Daniel J. Bishop are now available.

This is at the top of my RPG shopping list.

RPGaDay 2025: Day 18

18. Sign

In 2020, I addressed the subject of zodiacal signs and the Birth Augur rules of Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG in "Zodiac Birth Augur." I have also written a short article about adapting the Sumerian Zodiac to the Birth Augur rules. I can't quite remember why I never posted it. Maybe I should revisit it.

Aside from birth signs, perhaps adventures could profit from the addition of more prophets and the appearance of more signs and omens...

[For more information on #RPGaDay (or #RPGaDay2025 specifically), read this.]

Animal Crackers

We interrupt this #RPGaDay2025 to inform you that the Cyclopedia of Common Animals by Daniel J. Bishop is "Now Available!" on DriveThruRPG.com. These are the DCC RPG stats you need for the real animals in your imaginary world.

Duck, Duck, Goose?

Does your old school fantasy role-playing game lack stats for common domesticated animals? Daniel J. Bishop has the solution with the Cyclopedia Domestica. Compatible with OSR games generally and Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG specifically, it provides the details you need whether you are a 0-level character braving the funnel with your farm animal, an adventurer with a secondary skill in animal husbandry, or a spellcaster dabbling in polymorph spells.

Cyclopedia Domestica: Being a Compendium of Common Domesticated Animals is available now at DriveThruRPG.com.

"Don't Have a Cow, Man!"

Back to the Table

The last gaming session I participated in was probably last year as a player in the playtest of a Mutant Crawl Classics RPG adventure via Zoom. Until a week ago, my last in-person gaming session was two years ago when I ran "Temple Siege!" for Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG. It is a short adventure by Julian Bernick included in the DCC Day 2021 Adventure Pack. As it states in the beginning, "This adventure is for 5 to 6 1st-level PCs (Some playtesters found that the adventure provided plenty of challenge for 4 to 5 2nd-level PCs as well.)" Well, we had three 2nd level player characters, and we were only halfway through the adventure when the session ended. Two years later (on 31 August 2024, to be precise), we finally met again to complete the adventure. Joe played Billie the Once Risen, formerly Billie the Squire (2nd level warrior), Sarah (my wife) played Francis the Creep (2nd level thief), and Leslie played George the Pupil (2nd level cleric). I re-described the circumstances of the adventure, what they had done, and where they had been, and they gradually recaptured the mood and party dynamics as if we had last played a mere week ago. The band was back! I would love to meet every week, but the schedules of adults are notoriously difficult to coordinate, and I'll consider us lucky if we can meet once or twice a month. It has been left to my discretion to pick the next adventure, so at least I'll have plenty of time to make a good choice and thoroughly prepare. I will be planning a mini-unmodule to lead into the adventure as I think we need more development of the player characters' local community and home bases. Their previous adventures, incidentally, have been Sailors on the Starless Sea, Doom of the Savage King, Frozen in Time, and, as I mentioned, "Temple Siege!"

Meanwhile, I will be running Mutant Crawl Classics RPG weekly for Mary (my mother) and Linnville, starting with the 0 level funnel, "Assault on the Sky-High Tower." I will be giving them eight 0 levels each (generated by the Mutant Crawl Classics 0-Level Party Generator by Purple Sorcerer Games). I have been developing a rich background for their tribe and location, which I hope will lend a feeling of community and shared history to the player characters. I think this is especially important to a far future postapocalyptic setting, which can sometimes be more difficult to visualize and relate to than more popular genres. I know it was one of the factors that dissuaded me from running Gamma World when I was a lad, despite a great desire to do so. Thankfully, I've learned how to surmount that inhibition.

I would very much like to run the new edition of Knave for some friends. I'm not sure who, where, or when, but I would like to try it as soon as possible.

I really need to get back on the phantom steed of running Ghostbusters. I can't remember when our last session was, but I really miss the wacky looseness of it. And I must run Teenagers from Outer Space! Either (or both) of these might be a good project for Halloween.

What games are you running, playing, or planning?

RPGaDay 2024: Day 29

29. Awesome app

The answer to this prompt is The Crawler's Companion (for Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG and Mutant Crawl Classics RPG) from Purple Sorcerer Games. I highly recommend both the app and the HTML version.

[For more information on #RPGaDay (or #RPGaDay2024 specifically), read this.]

Luck and the Dice Chain

I think it would be an interesting experiment to alter the Luck rules for Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG as follows: Instead of a Luck point giving the player character a +1 modifier to an action, it grants a +1d. After all, if Luck is Chance (and it is), shouldn't it have a random element itself instead of a direct modifier that subverts the very concept? Besides, the dice chain is one of the best ideas in DCC RPG and it is woefully underused.

I think I'll try it the next time I judge. A report will be forthcoming.

RPGaDay 2023: Day 13

13. Most memorable character DEMISE

The winner of "Most Memorable Character Demise" goes to one of my wife's 0 level characters in Sanctum of the Snail, a Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG adventure included in the first issue of Crepuscular (obtainable here). I can't reveal the cause of death, as it would be a spoiler (and that's the problem with this question), but I can say that her character had two options. Upon taking the correct option, which yielded something beneficial, she then decided to take the second option also (over the objections of her fellow player) and paid the fatal consequence. Those who have played or run the adventure might know the situation to which I am referring, and can well imagine the facial expressions of onlookers. I wish I could say more. Rest in Peace, 0 level daredevil who knew no fear and took every risk that confronted her. If we ever find her character sheet, I'll post it here.*

[For more information on #RPGaDay (or #RPGaDay2023 specifically), read this.]

[Edit: I previously stated that the name of the adventure was Sailors on the Starless Sea, but I had misremembered.]

* I found her character sheet and realized I can't post it due to spoilers, but I can share her non-spoilery character generation info.

Name: Zip
0 level Rutabega Farmer (she/her)
Strength: 14 (+1)
Agility: 16 (+2)
Stamina: 4 (-2)
Personality: 13 (+1)
Intelligence: 15 (+1)
Luck: 14 (+1)
Armor Class: 12
Hit Points: 1
Lucky Sign: Bountiful Harvest (+1 hit points per level)
Weapon: pitchfork
Equipment: hen, holy symbol
Starting Funds: 42 copper pieces

Reflecting on Fantasy Bestiaries

One of the best and worst things about Advanced Dungeons & Dragons was the Monster Manual and the Fiend Folio. They provided hours of entertainment to my younger brother and me outside of role-playing. My brother's copy of the Monster Manual was our very first exposure to role-playing games years before we knew what a role-playing game was. If it was a book filled with illustrations of monsters, we were fascinated by it. Once we started role-playing, it was a double-edged sword. It was a useful and inspiring resource for me as a Dungeon Master, but for my players (and for me when I was a player) it was an unintentional source of cheating. Hours of poring through monster descriptions is bound to give players an advantage and spoil the surprise. Alas, as in most forms of fiction, the surprise is at least half the fun. Even the new monsters introduced in adventure modules were destined to reappear in the Monster Manual 2, which would be devoured by DMs and players alike. Some were lucky enough to encounter the monsters as players before the book was published, but as more and more players discovered the hobby, they were destined to have their surprises spoiled by the availability of published statistics.

When Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG was first published, it asserted the importance of monsters as an element of the unknown. They were to be the subject of rumors if they were known at all, and player characters would be encountering them with little to no prior knowledge. This preserved the spirit of adventure prevalent in sword & sorcery fiction (one of the main inspirations of DCC RPG), and it enabled many players to relive the thrill of fantasy role-playing when they were first introduced to it and everything was new. Only a few monsters were included in the rule book to be used as a benchmark for judges to create their own. It seemed that manuals of monsters were antithetical to the spirit of DCC RPG, and yet its publisher, Goodman Games, is running a Kickstarter project for just such a tome entitled Dungeon Denizens, and I have backed it. Why? Am I suddenly feeling the grip of Ye Olde Fear of Missing Out? It may be a bit of that, but I think the more pertinent reason is that, unlike D&D, DCC RPG has less clearly defined levels of challenge in regard to monsters. I need more of these benchmarks mentioned in the rule book to help guide me in creating foes for this system. Regardless of which monsters from Dungeon Denizens I decide to use in the adventures I design, I will keep in mind the excellent advice from Chapter 9 (of DCC RPG) under the heading "Keeping Monsters Mysterious."

So, go ahead and back the Dungeon Denizens Kickstarter project, but if you're playing in one of my games, expect the unexpected.

Click here for information.

Fight or Fright

I just read "Morale, Fear, and Madness" in Archade's Tower, and I think it has some ideas worth testing at the table. I tend to avoid (or neglect using) rules that impose or restrict player character behavior, as I believe situations and the manner in which they are presented ought to be enough to motivate a player's actions, but this article reflects a similar desire to preserve player agency—albeit in a mechanical fashion—and I think it might be a useful alternative. I'll be rereading the relevant section in the Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG rule book and pondering the topic.

Completely Unfathomable Completely Available

Behold!

The magnificent monstrosity that is Completely Unfathomable, consisting of Jason Sholtis' Operation Unfathomable and Odious Uplands, adapted and expanded for use with DCC RPG by Paul Wolfe, is now available in print and PDF right now, right here.

Complete!

Crawling Toward New Spellcasting Options

For those who are interested in alternative interpretations of magic in Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG, Reverend Dak of Crawl! has posted Practicable Magic: Reliable Spell Casting for DCC RPG. I think it's worth a try.

Last Minute DCC RPG News

Happy DCC Day! For those fortunate to live near participating stores, DCC Day is a Goodman Games holiday celebrating Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG. And it's today!

Today is also the last day to support the 2022 Purple Sorcerer Games Free Tools Pledge. It's a free resource highly valued by the DCC RPG community. You, too, can be a supporter, so act now!

Alternate Spellburn and Glowburn Rules 2

Suppose I wish to incorporate the incompetence spiral of spellburn and glowburn without resorting to the reviled recalculation of modifiers. How would I go about it? It's time to pull out the dice chain...

Whether you burn attribute points normally or use Burn points, each instance of burning causes you to suffer a −1d penalty to all physical actions, Fortitude saves, and Reflex saves until you rest. The penalty is cumulative. For example, if you spellburn twice during a battle, your penalty is −2d until you rest. Rest, in this case, means a cessation of physical activity for at least one hour per instance of burning. Or, to put it another way, the penalty is reduced by 1d per hour of rest.

So, if you like your spellburn or glowburn to reflect physical sacrifice or hardship, but you dislike taking the time to fiddle with a character's established modifiers, just use the dice chain.

Again, this may require some playtesting.

Alternate Spellburn and Glowburn Rules

What would I do to improve my enjoyment of Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG and Mutant Crawl Classics RPG (besides using DCC Lankhmar)? I would change spellburn and glowburn. One of things I have always disliked about fluctuating attributes in games that do not utilize dice pools is that it becomes necessary to adjust modifiers and derived attributes (and their modifiers). This slows down the game (if the players even remember to do it) and I hate slowing down the game for the purpose of crunching numbers.

So, what would I do differently? I would create a separate characteristic called Burn, which is calculated by adding Strength, Agility, and Stamina and dividing the sum by 3. If you want to spellburn or glowburn, you spend Burn points, not attribute points. If you fall below 1 Burn, you may continue by directly spending hit points. Hit points thus spent may be regained normally. Burn points are regained at the rate of 1 point per day during which no burning has occurred.

This solves my problem with recalculating modifiers, but retains the significance of the physical attributes and transforms the risk of high intensity burning from an incompetence spiral to actual wounds.

I think this is worth playtesting.

Dungeons & Dragons My Way

If I were to revise Basic/Expert D&D or Old School Essentials for my own purposes (and that's the "edition" I favor), these are the changes I would make:

• The players roll their own dice for attacks, skills, and damage.
• Alignment only exists for supernatural beings. These beings embody their alignment. Some supernatural beings are non-aligned. Listed alignments for monsters and NPCs reflect tendencies to side with the forces of that alignment, but are not mandatory.
• Experience points are awarded for experiences in the adventure, not treasure and body count. (I'd probably use a variant of the system in DCC RPG.)
• All classes advance at the same rate.
• The value of precious metals is akin to that of Europe's actual medieval period. All price lists must change. (Also: coin sizes and weights are based on historical coins.)
• Combat sequence: Each side rolls 1d6. The side that rolls highest acts first. Individuals on a side act in the order of their choosing.
• Ascending Armor Class.
• Classes use "To Hit" bonuses. No attack matrices. (See Swords & Wizardry.)
• Unified saving throws with possible modifiers based on class or other factors. (See Swords & Wizardry.)
• There is no total dark vision except via magic. Some creatures can see better in low light conditions, but none can see in total darkness.
• Revise weapons and armor lists to be historically accurate in nature and nomenclature.
• Weapons made for smaller folk (dwarves, halflings) are reduced 1 die step. Weapons made for giant folk are raised by 1 or more die steps (ogres, giants).
• Any class can use any weapon, although clerics might be restricted according to their religion. Player characters may choose to specialize in one weapon appropriate to their class for which they get a +1 bonus to attack and damage.
• Revise spell advancement.
• Revise thief skills.
• Class hit dice as follows: d6 for magic-users, thieves; d8 for clerics; d10 for fighters.
• No level limits.
• No minimum attribute requirements for classes.
• Any player character kindred can be any class, but each kindred has both advantages and disadvantages. Some classes will be more common to some kindreds than others, e.g., thieves (or scouts) are the commonest class amongst halflings, whereas fighters are the commonest amongst dwarves, and elves have a higher proportion of magic-users than any other kindred. (Yes, I use "kindred" from Tunnels & Trolls to denote different species that can be played.)

O.K., this sounds almost like a completely different game (and a heresy to some), but tailoring the game to suit a group's preferences has been how many (if not most) people have played D&D throughout much of its existence. I spent most of my AD&D years resenting its limitations, but if I am to run D&D again, this will be the way I run it — part D&D, part Swords & Wizardry, part DCC RPG, part Applied Phantasticality. That's the way I like it.

(Incidentally, I made many of these changes a few years ago when I started running Basic/Expert D&D again and it morphed into a modified Swords & Wizardry White Box, but I'm just trying to organize my thoughts for my own optimal D&D.)

DCC RPG Thought of the Day 2022-01-12

I've mentioned my dissatisfaction with the standard Luck rules in DCC RPG and how I think fleeting Luck is a vast improvement (q.v.), but I can't shake this feeling that the Luck attribute itself needs to be modified. The simplest thing to do would be to allow Luck to regenerate for all classes. For thieves and halflings (and other classes in MCC RPG), the rules would remain unchanged, but all other classes would regenerate spent Luck at the same rate as spellburned attributes: 1 point per day. The only other solution I would consider would be to eliminate Luck as an attribute. Just pluck it right out and let luck reside where it truly always has — in every roll of the dice.

First Place: Fleeting Luck

It may sound like the name of a racehorse, but fleeting Luck is a rule from DCC Lankhmar that is so good I shall be using it with all future games of DCC RPG and MCC RPG I run. I was never fully satisfied with the Luck rules in DCC RPG, but fleeting Luck solves the problem I had.

What problem? The problem is threefold.

1. For the price of 1 Luck point, all you get is a +1 modifier to one roll.
2. For non-thieves and non-halflings, regaining Luck occurs rarely.
3. Luck is capped at character generation. If you are awarded Luck, but you are at your maximum, you get nothing.

If the judge awards Luck sparingly, the cost of using Luck is too great to justify unless you are a thief or a halfling. If the judge awards Luck generously, then only those who spend Luck will ever benefit from it, and those whose starting Luck is low will not be easily persuaded to spend what little they have when Luck may be all that saves them when it comes to "rolling the body."

I think the problem could have been avoided by separating Luck from other ability scores in the first place. Luck isn't an "ability." It's just something you have. It ought to be fluid, with no upper limit, and it ought to be spent freely to a point. But that issue is moot. Luck is entrenched as an ability.

Luckily... DCC Lankhmar introduces the concept of fleeting Luck, which is a compromise between Luck as a mostly static ability and Luck as a fluid resource. To summarize, player characters have the traditional Luck ability, but they also start with 1 point of fleeting Luck. Fleeting Luck is gained far more easily and often, but if anyone in the party rolls a 1 during an attack, spell check, or ability check, then everyone in the party loses all of their fleeting Luck, which must be gained anew. Every player character starts each new adventure with 1 point of fleeting Luck as it cannot be saved.

This makes Luck far more interesting to use. It still carries risk, but it also makes it worth the risk. It also enables the player characters cursed with low Luck scores to take riskier actions when necessary without hobbling them for the rest of their adventuring careers.

So, fleeting Luck will be standard in my games from now on, but I do have another alternative, which I may or may not use, but I'll save it for a future article.

DCC Dying Earth on Kickstarter

Jack Vance's Dying Earth stories, adapted as a setting with expanded rules for Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG, is currently in progress as a Kickstarter project. This new boxed set promises to be as glorious as the Lankhmar boxed set, and has already surpassed it in pledges. For more details, see the DCC Dying Earth Kickstarter project.