Would you burn hit points to hit harder?

“The man gasped agonizedly and went to his knees, but his tall mate lunged in, in ferocious silence, raining blow on blow so furiously that Valeria had no opportunity to counter. She stepped back coolly, parrying the strokes and watching for her chance to thrust home. He could not long keep up that flailing whirlwind. His arm would tire, his wind would fail; he would weaken, falter, and then her blade would slide smoothly into his heart.”
 — Red Nails by Robert E. Howard, 1936

What if you could burn hit points to get an attack bonus for one mêlee attack? How much would you burn? 1 hit point? 2 hit points?

What if you could burn hit points to get a damage bonus for one hit with a mêlee weapon? How much would you burn? 2 hit points? 4 hit points?

What if you could burn hit points to get an additional attack that round with a mêlee weapon, subject to a maximum no. of total attacks that round equal to your level? 2 hit points? 4 hit points?

What if you could burn hit points to improve your AC against a single attack (mêlee or missile)? How many hit points would you burn? 1 hit point? 2 hit points?

What if special combat manœuvres such as disarm, knockdown, bullrush, et cetera cost hit points instead of coming free at certain levels?

In this way, players can make tactical choices of whether or not to play it safe or try to end a combat quickly.

After all, hit points represent stamina and luck as well as combat skill.

Torches through the editions & Real World

In this post I will examine the various ways that D&D handles torches (flambeaux & firebrands) from Chainmail up to 5th edition as well as examining historical real-world sources. I am doing this because I have always freely took rules that I like from any game to use in my D&D campaign, regardless of what edition I ran. And as a bonus I am including original content on torch-staves and brazier-staves suitable for any Old School game.

Night of the Walking Dead in Averoigne Part 8

This is Part VIII of my series on adapting the AD&D 2nd Edition Ravenloft module RQ1 Night of the Walking Dead to Clark Ashton Smith’s Averoigne setting, Rober E. Howard’s Cormac Fitzgeoffrey’s setting, early–to–mid 14th Century France, and using the NWN/D&D 3rd edition ruleset. In this post I will be looking at the Lair of the Zombie Lord section of the module. To read Part I of this series, click here.

LAIR OF THE ZOMBIE LORD

According to the module, this section occurs after the PCs have destroyed Jean sieur de Crapaud and crazed killer and of course have not broken into the Old Cemetery (or located the secret entrance) and dispatched Marcel. Like all good stories, the tension must recede before the epic zombie attack. The villagers are thrilled that the crazed killer is dead and throw a party for the party that night. If the PCs sneak out before the party, Luc (or his ghost) still follows them and just when they are out of sight and earshot of the village, Luc repeats a new verse:

“Look for the scroll where the old rest fine,
behind the stone where six stars shine.
The finding, however, will cause much pain,
beware the time of the falling rain.”

Whoa! Luke is lucid! I guess the adventure is not done after all. Actually I would think that crazy Luc still following the party would make that obvious but….

The Storm

That night during the party at the Full Moon Inn, the clouds burst with a torrential rainfail! Concidentally, that is also exactly when Luc starts reciting the Hiscosa verses correctly (see the module).

Finally the vicar, Father Brucian comes clean and tells how Jean brought Marcel’s corpse to him, how he prayed to Our Lady for a miracle but none came, and how heartbroken Jean became.

Fr. Brucian finally connects the dots and realises that their troubles began only after Marcel died and therefore Marcel is behind it all! And it took a guy with an Intelligence of 14 and a Wisdom of 16 this long to figure it out?!? Once again, Slavicsek stretches credibility quite thin in an attempt to be dramatic.

Naturally, the very moment that the vicar completes his tale, a villager at the party keels over dead and then rises up 1d4 minutes later as a zombie and “rushes” (a zombie rushes?!? Seriously?!?) over to grab Luc. If Luc is dead, then the zombie goes for the PC holding the Hiscosa scroll or the one who wrote down Luc’s verse. Once the zombie is dispatched, Luc repeats the Fay admonition to find Marcel (see above).

Zombies on the Move

Conviently, the door to the inn bursts open at the right dramatic moment and a villagers soaked to the bone and frightened out of his whits still manages to say:

“The dead are approaching the village! An army of the walking dead!”

Gremin le Bailif bolts out the door. If the PCs join him, the the following happens otherwise Gremin returns to tell everyone the following:

“At the eastern edge of the village, more than two dozen zombies are coming!”

Gremin implores the PCs to help him setup barricades. The vicar (who must have come along) urges the PCs to instead find Marcel.

“Find Marcel’s body. I am certain that it holds the key to the terrors which have befallen us.”

If the PCs head for the old cemetery, they can get there without molestation. If on the other hands, they head back for the Inn first, or if stayed at the end they must get through the zombies before the cemetery. For the Grym Zombie™ game statistics, please see the end of this post.

Lair of the Zombie Master Lord

As I detailed earlier, the PCs can break the lock, climb the wall, or search the hillside behind the old cemetery. If they search carefully (no roll, make the players explain how they are searching), they will find the stone slab with the six stars. Apparently the stone slab is easy to move because zombies have been moving hit. Looking at the map, it appears to be a tunnel that ends under a statue.

Why is this tunnel here? It is not like Marcel dug it out and then covered it with a stone slab and carved six stars into it. The six stars are supposed to represent the six verses of the Hiscosa prophesy, but why? And how in the world is a zombie (or anyone for that matter) going to get past the statue from below? I can understand a statue concealing the tunnel, but that makes it a one-way tunnel. It is going to be hard enough to move a presumably stone statue out of the way, but from below?!? Oh man, sometimes this module gives me a splitting headache! Hopefully I can fix this “tunnel” before I write up the inevitable pdf.

Note that I am not going to reproduce every building in the module, just the ones that merit a comment.

Ancient Gate: Two gargouille statues guard the gate. Are they just statues? Close examination reveals the name of the sculptor, Blaise Reynard (from The Maker of Gargoyles by Clark Ashton Smith). If the party is only 1st level, I would leave these gargouilles as statues but just give hints like ‘with each flash of lightning, the statues turn their gaze to you’ or something like that. If the party is higher level with enchaunted weapons, then absolutely have the gargouilles attack. And as for the heavy iron chains and padlock… this is supposed to be the Middle Ages, right? So instead of very expensive iron gate, chains, and padlock the “gate” is a heavy wooden door with a heavy wooden beam across it. The beam is swollen with moisture and stuck.

Nota bene: The following is — in my opinion — a pointless cemetery crawl because the Crapaud Tomb is quite visible no matter where the PCs enter.

Decrepit Mausoleum: The bats are not giant, they are in fact undead (thanks to Jean’s farts)!. Change the hit points to 1d3, damage is 1, and give them zombie immunities. The idea here is to annoy and slow down the PCs, giving Marcel and his gang to catch the PCs.

Flooded Mausoleum: Cool imagery but there is no way that enough rain has fallen to make a pool several feet deep. And the fact that the cemetery is built high above the water table also makes it very unlikely. And why does this mausoleum have three skeletons in it? I have to think about this one….

Tomb of Rats: For some reason a family of rats live here despite the fact that there have been no interments in a very long time. For the moment, they shall be zombie rats with 1d3 hit points, bite for 1 point of damage, and have zombie immunities.

The Crypt of Stars: Despite the fact that this is where Marcel died and Luc went crazy… there is nothing of significance at all. Just like there is no reason why a ju-ju zombie was created by an arch-mage and left here. Slavicsek!!!

The Final Battle

Consider the following read-aloud text:

“The ceiling is a glass dome, through which you can see the storm clouds parting to unleash a stream of moonlight.

A platform of bones lies in the middle of the chamber, flanked by two flaming braziers that are fashioned from stacked skulls. Atop the platform is a finely-crafted throne.”

While this is all very evocative of pulp horror, it is not at all appropriate. First off, a glass dome is an anachronism due to the expense and difficulty of getting such quality glass and supporting steel. Second, due to the age and neglect the glass dome would be highly damaged. Third, two flaming brazier made from stacked, presumably human skulls is there because Marcel wanted a pair of braziers? Because he is cold? Or it looks cool? And where did he get the throne? Is Marcel actually an expert at crafting braziers and thrones out of bones and skulls? This scene is described like the lair of a Pulp necromancer which is cool and all except that Marcel is not a necromancer and has only had three weeks to decorate the family tomb. I cannot imagine that the family tomb was originally laid out like this. As a side point, gothic architecure was quite uncommon in the Occitan region of Southern France, and given the age of this mausoleum (more than two centuries), the architectural style is most likely going to be First Romanesque, a.k.a Lombard Romanesque.

So there can be stained glass windows revealing the moonlight, but not a glass dome. And we have to dispense with the necromancer decor because it is silly in this context.

On the 6th round of combat or just before Marcel is destroyed, the eclipse must happen. After all, the PCs are fate magnets. Yes, it is contrived but the PCs are fulfilling a prophesy here after all.

The Eclipse

A lightning bolt shatters one of the stained glass windows and the moonlight turns crimson. Luc immediately changes his chant to:

“The light of the sky shining over the dead
shall gutter and fail, turning all to crimson.”

In spite of not knowing the Hiscosa prophesies, Marcel freaks out at the crimson moonlight and then he and his minions cower for 1d4 rounds:

“The character is frozen in fear and can take no actions. A cowering character takes a -2 penalty to Armor Class and loses her Dexterity bonus (if any).”

Note that Marcel et alia are not helpless nor paralysed, they are simply cowering.

According to the module, when Marcel is destroyed all remaining zombies wander off. Instead, I shall have the zombies who left their vaults return to them. All of the other zombies and ghouls collapse into a heap of rotting flesh (cf. The Thing on the Doorstep).

The Sun Returns

The storm has passed and the pleasant late Octobre weather of the Camargue returns. If Luc is alive, he comes out of his trance and if dead then his spirit is now at rest.

The PCs are given fresh food and supplies by the villagers. If Luc is alive, he is now the new Lord of the Crapaud Manoir and if dead, then Bailif Gremin will be the interim castellan. Fr. Brucian will contact Aigas Mòrtas to inform the council of Jean’s and Marcel’s deaths. He is not sure how to explain such deaths but will figure out some sort of explanation that will not warrant an investigation.

If Luc is alive, he will be extraorinarily grateful and offer the PCs their own plot and cottage rent-free, so long as they reside in the village.

FIN

Or is it? In the next post I am going to re-visit some of the NPCs and consider incorporating some ideas & imagery from Gothic literature, Clark Ashton Smith’s Averoigne, Robert E. Howard’s Cormac Fitzgeoffrey, and H.P. Lovecraft’s Shadow Over Innsmouth, Statement of Randolph Carter, & Call of Cthulhu. In the meantime, here are the promised stats for Grym Zombies™.

GRYM ZOMBIES™

Walking Dead

Size/Race: Medium Undead Construct
Hit Dice: 1d12 (12 hit points)
Initiative: -4
Speed: 20 ft. (no run)
Armour Class: 6 (-4 Dex), touch 6, flat-footed 6
Base Attack: -4
Attack: 2 Slams -3 mêlée (1d6)
Space/Reach: 5 ft. / 5 ft.
Special Attacks: —
Special Qualities: Single actions only, Undead/Construct qualities, Immune to Piercing damage, 75% resistant to Bludgeoning damage, Turn resistance +3
Vulnerabilities: Divine magic (2×), Positive energy (2×)
Saves: Fortitude auto success, Reflex -4, Will auto success
Abilities: Str 10, Dex 3, Con 10, Int —, Wis —, Cha —
Skills: —
Feats: Ambidexterity, Blind-fight, Blindsight, Weapon focus (natural)
Environment: Any
Organisation: None
Challenge Rating: 1
Treasure: None
Alignment/Intent: Usually Chaotic/Evil (see note below)
Advancement: See below
Level Adjustment: —
Faction: Hostile

The Walking Dead cannot fail concentration checks.

The Walking Dead can Sense Living Creatures 120' away. This prevents living creatures from moving silently or hiding from them within 120 feet.

As Grym Zombies age, they become more powerful. Walking Dead become the Risen Dead who become Rotting Skeletons, who become Bloody Skeletons, who finally become true Skeletons. Sages speculate that skeletons eventually become some kind of spectre.

Types & Causes of Walking Dead: Animating a corpse through the necromantic spell, animate dead, is not the only way of creating the Walking Dead. A person could be cursed to walk the earth after death or have unfinished business. In which case, those zombies are free-willed and have an intelligence, wisdom, and charisma ability scores.

Nota Bene: The animation rite (spell or ability) involves either summoning the shade from the underworld to return to its corpse or to summon a lost soul (one who didn’t receive a proper funereal). From a “rationalist” perspective, the lost soul posesses the corpse only when the original shade is not in the underworld, i.e. in heaven/paradise/elysium, et cetera. However, Christianity for most part suggests that the posessing spirit is almost always a malevolent spirit — a demon. Implying that the wicked are getting punished and the nigromauncer cannot snatch those souls, therefore a demon is enslaved instead. What I like to do is have a rule is that if the nigromauncer animates the corpse within three days of death, the soul is enslaved within its own corpse; otherwise it goes on to its just reward.

Necromancy (Gr. nekromanteia, L. necromantia) is the divination from corpses (e.g. speak with dead) whereas nigromauncie (L. nigromantia) is black magick. In 3e terms, spells with the Evil descriptor is nigromauncie but not all necromancy is nigromauncie. Confused? Do not be concerned as very few non-spellcasters understand the difference either.

On a related note, maleficium is harmful magick and veneficium is venomous magick. In Roman times up through Early Modern Europe, veneficium was highly feared and incurred the consquence of the most painful deaths imaginable. The modern term ‘voodoo dolls’ is an example of veneficium — magical pain & death from an unknown source.

So we end up with speak with dead is necromantia, animate dead is both nigromantia and necromantia but neither are maleficium or veneficium. Whereas a spell such as magick jar is necromantia, nekromantia, maleficium, and veneficium because it involves the transference of a spirits (necromantia), which is evil (nigromantia), harmful (maleficium), and done secretly from a distance (veneficium).

For Part IX, click here.

Night of the Walking Dead in Averoigne Part 7

This is Part VII of my series on adapting the AD&D 2nd Edition Ravenloft module RQ1 Night of the Walking Dead to Clark Ashton Smith’s Averoigne setting, Rober E. Howard’s Cormac Fitzgeoffrey’s setting, early–to–mid 14th Century France, and using the NWN/D&D 3rd edition ruleset. In this post I will be looking at the Village Events section of the module. To read Part I of this series, click here.

VILLAGE EVENTS

Bill Slavicsek writes in this adventure module:

“Speed or slow the events to match the pace of your players.”

Now perhaps it is because I started with the OD&D Whitebox + Greyhawk rules that I refuse to speed up or slow down events. I believe that the game world lives independent of Player Characters. PCs can most certainly influence events, but the world does not wait for the players to act. This is Grymwurld™ and not Schrödinger’s World. In other words, ‘you snooze, you lose.’

However, I also believe that all PCs have the Lucky trait from the AD&D 2nd Edition Skills & Powers book. “Lucky” in this case is a matter of ‘being in the right place at the right time.’ But I also believe that all PCs are also Unlucky and have a knack for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. One might say that the party has a ‘reality distortion field’ around them. In this module there are several encounters that almost always happen to the PCs regardless of what they do or where they are. I am perfectly fine with this precisely because of them being both Lucky and Unlucky at the same time. Weird things always happen to PCs — that is one of the things that makes them PCs.

Day I: The Funeral (Rite)

The PCs basically have no choice but to attend the funeral simply because the entire village has shut down for this event. The way this scenario is setup, the PCs are expected to react as if the village was burying a man alive. The adventure does not explictly state that the PCs do react that way and it does describe what happens if they do not. Consider the following:

“The priest continues his liturgy, even though a muffled bang causes him a moment’s pause. The villagers flinch but quickly regain their composure. The bang sounds again from within the coffin. The coffin rocks back and forth, but the priest and the crowd ignore it.”

How can any first level characters react in that situation without metagaming? The characters are going to naturally assume that the villagers are burying a man alive whereas the players (other than truly novice ones) are going to assume that it is a zombie — especially if they know the name of the module or have seen the cover. I am very tempted to change this scenario to burying people alive rather than zombies! That of course would drastically change this module, but one of these days I will have an adventure like that just to mess with the Players!

There is also an interesting line that I bet all of us GMs have ignored or forgotten about:

“Once free, he [the zombie] attacks the party and tries to escape into the fields east of the village.”

Has any party ever let the zombie escape so as to follow him? Where in the fields does the zombie amble off to? The great house? The secret tunnel on the northeast side of the old cemetery? Here is what Slavicsek wrote:

“If at any time the PCs decide to follow a fleeing ghoul or zombie, they can easily track the undead creature to the fields beyond the Tarascon plantation. After that, the creature loses them in the rows of crops and backtracks to the passage in the side of the cemetery hill. Do not allow the PCs to discover the passage yet.”

Seriously?!? Bad game designer, bad! I really cannot believe that the party cannot follow a zombie. The ghouls are based in the manoir house and therefore would not lead the PCs to the secret tunnel. And why would the PCs discovering the tunnel early ‘mess up’ the adventure? After all, they could climb over the walls of the old cemetery!

So my ruling is thus: I will allow the PCs to follow the zombie to the secret tunnel.

Day II: Scene of the Crime

No matter where the PCs are in the village, at some point they will notice Gremin the Baillif (Constable or Reeve) kneeling in an “alley.” But as I mentioned above, I am okay with this because the PCs are ‘fate magnets.’ In the midst of the blood splatter is the réglisse sanguine (blood-red liquorice). The PCs can offer to help and the Baillif reluctantly accepts (unless the PCs roll a natural 1).

Night II: The Odour of Death (l’odeur de mort)

Some time during the second night while the PCs are relaxing in the common room of the Hospitale de Pleine Lune, Marcel comes up the window and lets out an epic fart! No, seriously!

“…a vile stench wafts into the building. It is the odor of the zombie lord.”

All PCs must pass a Fortitude saving throw versus Poison (DC 14). However for plot reasons, nothing untowards happens if they fail. A success indicates the direction of the miasma. Whereas a Hardcore Old School GM such as myself should never use plot to save the Player Characters. Here are the rules from the module:

“…the odor of death that surrounds Marcel affects all living beings who come within 30 yards [90' radius!] of him. Characters must save vs. poison [DC 14] or suffer one of the following effects:”

Please see the module for the six different possible effects, which range from Weakness to Dying instantly & Rising as a zombie under Marcel’s control. Note that this is a continual effect! Every single round that a living creature is within 90 feet of Marcel, they have to pass a DC 14 Fortitude saving throw versus poison!

Which begs the question, ‘how is it that the entire village has not succumbed to Marcel’s foul emanations?’ The DC for a 0-level character is 16 which guarantees that within 24 seconds (4 rounds) more than 99% of the victims will fail their saving throw. Furthermore, within 54 seconds (9 rounds), 99% of the victims will die and rise up as a zombie under Marcel’s control! So all Marcel has to do is stand next to a cottage for one minute and everyone inside that huge fart will die and turn into a zombie! Over the course of eight hours, the zombie lord can enslave the entire f!@#$%g village! Am I missing something here? Or did Bill Slavicsek and his editor Andria Hayday miss something?!?

One possibility is that once “poisoned,” the victim cannot be “poisoned” again until the effect wears off. For example, if the PC fails their saving throw and rolls a 5, they will be “unable to act for 1d4 rounds due to nausea and vomiting.” But what if the PC rolls a 3 (-1 Point of Constitution)? What is the duration for that ability score loss? In the 3rd Edition rules, PCs regain ability score loss at a rate of 1/day or 2/day if having full bed rest. (I couldn’t find the corresponding rule in the AD&D 2nd Ed. DMG.) So does that mean if a PC loses a point of Con, they are immune to Marcel’s farting for 24 hours?!?

I think it is better to treat repeated “poisonings” as making the effect worse, much like getting bit by multiple venomous snakes. However, this does not solve the problem of Marcel killing off and then enslaving the entire village in one night.

While ruminating on this, we should keep in mind another of Marcel’s abilities:

“Three times per day, Marcel can cast animate dead to create zombies. By using this power on living beings, he can also turn them into zombies. In either case, the range of this innate power is 100 yards [300' range]. If a living target fails a saving throw vs. death, he is instantly slain and rises in 1d4 rounds as a zombie under Marcel’s control.”

By comparison, the AD&D 2nd Edition spell finger of death is 7th level. Only after performing a necromantic ceremony and spending 1,000 gp + 500 gp/corpse, the wizard is able to animate the cadaver as a ju-ju zombie. The range is 60 yards (180'). So Marcel’s ability is perhaps 6th level, since slay living (reverse of raise dead) is 5th level and does not create a zombie. That means, that Marcel can cast a 6th level spell three times per day in addition to all of his other abilities. But why have both the necromantic miasma as well as the super animate dead? Does he animate the dead when he does not want to get within 90 feet and/or does not want to wait the one minute (10 minutes in AD&D 2nd Ed.)?

Now recall that the zombie lord monster first appeared in the AD&D 2nd Edition Monstrous Compendium Ravenloft Appendix in 1991 which predates this module which was published in 1992 and that

“Some of these powers have been enhanced by the Land of Ravenloft…”

In that appendix, a zombie lord’s odor of death only takes effect during the first round of combat. Did Slavicsek & Hayday intentionally remove the ‘first round of combat’ part of the effect or was it an editorial oversight? The special animate dead is only once per day in the appendix whereas Marcel has it thrice a day. I can see where changing from once to thrice per day is the Ravenloft enhancement. There is a long and storied history of D&D abilities being useable thrice per day.

In the Ravenloft 3rd & ½ Edition book Denizens of Dread (2004), the zombie lord’s emanations become the following:

“Aura of Death (Su): The first round that a living creature comes within 90 feet of a zombie lord, it must make a Fortitude save [DC 13] or be affected as if a contagion spell had been cast on it, inflicting a disease of the zombie lord’s choice. Those who fail their save by more than 10 [or roll a natural 1] die instantly and become zombies under the zombie lord’s control. This is a continuous effect that the zombie lord cannot suppress.”

So the zombie lord can choose the disease but cannot suppress the aura?!? While it retains the initial round of the AD&D 2nd Ed. rules, it loses the wild & woolly randomness quality that helps define Old School D&D.

So my ruling is thus: Marcel’s Odour of Death only takes effect during the 1st round of contact rather than be a continuous effect. The original 1–6 possible effects remain. The reasoning behind this ruling is A) too powerful if continous and B) Andria Hayday the editor probably missed this.

So does Marcel go around the cemetery and animate three zombies and then goes into the village each night? Under the AD&D 2nd Edition rules, out of the 300 inhabitants, 225 fail their saving throw the first night (0-level save vs. poison 16). Out of those 225 people, 37 or 38 die and turn into zombies! [Under the 3½ Ed. rules, 45 become a zombie each night.] Hokey smokes, Bullwinkle! After three nights, 1/3 of the ‘300’ are zombies!

This has been happening for three weeks?!? That means that there approximately 5,000 inhabitants three weeks ago for the population to drop to 300!!! Obviously the village was not 5,000 souls three weeks ago, so what is the controlling factor? It must be Jean. He must have been doing a great job of appeasing Marcel to prevent him from creating zombies from the villagers… for the most part. Marcel took Gremin’s son two weeks ago and François a week ago. Perhaps Marcel must create at least one zombie each week regardless of the victims Jean brings to him? Or rather, deposits the victims at least 90' away from Marcel’s tomb. I doubt very much that Jean is immune to Marcel’s farting.

Getting back to the Full Moon Inn, Duncan the Red Shirt (d’Lute) is sacrificed to the Plot God so that the PCs can see him rising as a zombie if they check his room (why?) or merely hear of his missing the next morning. And yet, if they are in the common room, they get to see one of the patrons sacrificed to the Plot God. So why is Duncan sacrificed? When I ran this adventure back in 1994, I changed Duncan’s name to Philippe and made him a troubadour [bard] and most certainly did not kill him off because he made his saving throw (I honestly don’t recall if I fudged the die roll or not). Naturally, he joined the party afterwards because it would be completely natural for him to do so, given the imminent threat. All elite/heroic NPCs would join the PCs to fight this scourge becaues that is what they do (or run away to save their skins…!).

So my ruling is thus: Everyone in Hospitale de Pleine Lune makes their fortitude saving throw versus poison and if they fail, roll a d6 for the effect. Nobody will have plot armour nor will anyone be sacrificed to the Plot God. The story will emerge on its own!

Night Evenfall III: The Madman Strikes

“Late in the afternoon…”

Ah, so this even happens during dusk or twilight and not at night. (*Sigh* Insert yet another snarky comment about editors.)

While this appears as a railroad/story to knee-jerk OSR true believers, let me assure you that it is not! If I wanted to be slavishly OSR, I would create an event table and then roll each day and night to see what happens. But that is just being slavish to a preconceived notion of what Old School “truly” is (cf. No True Scotsman). The purpose of tables with random events/monsters/et cetera is to aid the GM in weaving together the events of a story and not to have a completely random adventure! Nor is this a “quantum ogre,” meaning an encounter that the PCs cannot avoid no matter which direction they take because sooner or later the party will hear a victim screaming.

On Day Two, the PCs discover the scene of the crime. Now on (Day) Three they get a chance to confront the perpetrator. This allows for the build-up of tension. The GM is free make this encounter happen sooner or later which I wholeheartedly support. A very important skill for the GM is to manage the pacing. When the game bogs down, throw in a wandering monster or in this case a murder! Likewise, the players have to catch their breath between dramatic events (e.g. combats) else the game becomes a slog. So while Jean murdering Lillin the hostler’s daughter during evenfall is in the module, the GM is free to change the timing and the victim. And or course if the PCs caught Jean in the townhouse then this event would never happen.

What I also like about this write-up is that Jean does not automatically get away with murder. If the PCs pass the GM rolled listen check (DC 10), they get to stop Jean. If they fail, they hear a second scream but by the time they get there it is too late. Had this been a railroad, the PCs would always get there too late (AD&D 2e) or just in the nick of time (D&D 5e).

However, what I do not like is that Slavicsek gives Jean plot armour. While there is supposed to be an exciting chase scene if the PCs caught Jean in the act, it is impossible for them to catch him. The reasoning is that Jean knows the village better than the PCs, he drops the sanguine liquorice to distract them, and is skilled at hiding. In other words, Jacque le Ripper. There is one problem here and that is that Jean is statted out as a 4th level fighter/Madman but the only abilities beyond that of a fighter are the following:

“Jean is a convincing actor [Skill focus (Bluff) gives +3]. If he attempts to give the PCs a false sense of security, they suffer a -2 penalty to their surprise rolls. Victims thus surprised take triple damage, as if they had been backstabbed by a 5th-level thief.”

Perhaps the Ravenloft Powers (or Anton Misroi le Seigneur du Souragne) gave Jean a +5 to his bluff, hide, and move silently checks. However, he is decked out in studded leather armour which gives him a -3 to his stealth checks. And that is assuming that he simply hides behind a rainbarrel or something. If he slips into an abandoned cottage and closes the door, the PCs might hear the door shut and then Jean is trapped inside.

So my ruling is thus: Hearing Lillin scream is a DC 5 because this encounter will only occur when the PCs are inside a building. If they catch Jean in the act, he will do his best to run away and hide but success if not automatic.

ARISTOCRAT 4 (CR 4): Chaotic/Evil Human Crazed Killer
DETECTION: Listen +2, Spot +2; Init +3; Languages: Common, French, & Occitan
DEFENCES: AC 14 (heavy maille jack), touch 11, flat-footed 14; hp 36 (4d8+4);
ACTIONS: Spd 30 ft.; Mêlée Short-spear +6 (1d6+3; 20/×2); Space 5 ft.; Reach 5 ft.; Base Atk +3
STR 14, DEX 10, CON 12, INT 11, WIS 9, CHA 9
FORT +5, REF +1, WILL +3
FEATS: Armour proficiency (All), Combat reflexes, Skill focus (Bluff, Hide, Listen, Move silently, & Spot), Stealthy &c.
SKILLS: Bluff +9, Discipline +8, Hide +2, Move Silently +2, Parry +7, Sense Motive +6
SPECIAL ABILITIES: Sneak attack +3d6
MAGICK ITEMS: Ring of Deflection +1, Short spear +1 (walking stick), & (2) Potions of Cure minor wounds

Event: The Dinner Party

This is not really an event per se, rather it is what happens if the PCs go to the manoir house around supper time. Note that Luc will not follow the party and stays far away. Yet I can think of no reason for Luc to avoid the house other then it reminds him of who he is but the village would do that as well, right? His traumatic event happened at the Old Cemetery so I can understand his staying away from the entire cemetery, but the manoir house? Luc must somehow know about the servants who became ghouls.

One of the things I like about the Ravenloft Ghouls is that they were once humans who became cannibals. The sin of cannibalism is what transformed them into ghouls!

The module states that Jean insisted that his servants eat human flesh, thus becoming ghouls. I think that in fact, he was much more subtle. After co-opting the local boucher, the cook was told to cook the “veal.” Once the servants had eaten the “veal” upon three different occassions, they became enamoured of it and began the descent into ‘ghouldom.’

The module further states that Jean’s motivation is to emulate his twin’s desire for rotting human flesh (and we finally learn the reason why Marcel goes hunting) yet he lacks the courage to do so. This strikes me as odd. Jean has gone mad with grief over his twin brother becoming a Zombie Lord and resorts to killing off the villagers to feed him yet also corrupts the house servants into ghouls as a twisted empathy with his brother. And yet, he will not taste the “veal”!

Lon Chaney, Sr. in London After Midnight

The way Jean is depicted in this module is a combination of Jack the Ripper and The Hypnotist from London After Midnight. In the latter, Chaney’s hypnotist is actually a vampire or a ghoul. What if Jean had in fact tasted human flesh? After all, he shares a very strong empathy if not sympathy with now–undead–twin, Marcel. And if Marcel lusts for rotting human flesh, then would not Jean feel Marcel’s hunger? Would not that hunger affect him as well? Perhaps when (or if) the PCs find Jean slaughtering Lillin the hostler’s daughter, the notice him hesitating as if to decide whether or not to taste her? Or would it be more horrible to find Jean actually tasting her instead? Perhaps there is an intermediate state between humankind and ghouldom, where the semi-ghoul has the taste for flesh but not the undead qualities of a ghoul? Perhaps a bite for 1d6 damage and two claws for 1d3 damage each but no disease, paralysis, or undead qualities? And also grant an extra hit die to represent the semi-inhuman resistance to pain and burning hunger? But in this case, does it make Jean any more powerful? He uses his cane-spear +1 which is more effective than a bite although without the cane, he gets three attacks (bite, claw, claw) with the multiattack feat. Perhaps he carries the cane during the day but at night eschews it? Something to chew on…! (Sorry, I could not resist!)

Day IV: Facing the Madman (Crazed Killer)

Yeah, his garb is anachronistic but man, it’s cool!

By this point, Jean is fed up… [We apologise for the bad puns in this blog. Those responsible have been sacked] with the PCs’ meddling and decides to kill Luc…? I think it more like Jean is afraid that Luc is close to dropping enough cryptic hints for the PCs to figure out that Marcel is in the ancient… crypt. [We apologise again for the fault in this blog. Those responsible for sacking the people who have just been sacked have been sacked.] Finally Jean pursues the party around town, waiting for an opportunity to pick them off one by one. And yet, his stealth skill is actually pretty bad because he is not a thief er rogue. But the Plot God shall not let such minor details get in the way, because it has been decreed that there will be the following dramatic moment:

The madman stands before you, completely enshrouded by a black, hooded cloak. Only the curved dagger in his pale right hand is visible. Then he tosses back the hood, revealing a face twisted by madness and eyes lit by the fire of insanity. That fire is clearly consuming him, burning away what is left of his mind and humanity.

“You should not have come to Marais d’Tarascon,” the madman hisses. “And you should not have brought that whelp of a brother with you!” he shouts, waving his dagger at Luc. “You have forced this confrontation! Let the blood be on your hands as you taste the blade of Jean Tarascon!”

With that, the madman attacks.

I have to wonder if after Jean became crazed, he approached Toma Levi and requested a ‘night-black travelling cloak’ be made? And how convenient is it that before becoming traumatised, he just happened to posess a magical dagger concealable within a walking stick?

Honestly, this whole Jean le Ripper shtick has bugged me from the very beginning. I get that Jean and Marcel have the whole ‘twins empathy trope’ and that Jean is traumatised from Marcel’s horrible undeath. I also like the desperation of Jean bringing a victim to Marcel in order to both keep Marcel “alive” and also to protect the village from Marcel’s predation. But would it not make more sense for Jean to lure the victim to Marcel instead of butchering them in the village? And turning the household staff into ghouls as a sort of twisted sympathy for Marcel yet not “courageous” enough to taste human flesh himself? I have a very hard time buying that. As I mentioned earlier, I think that Jean developing a craving for human flesh certainly ties in with the ‘my–twin–is–undead empathy’. And if Jean did indeed in that taste for human flesh, then he has become some kind of a transitional ghoul — a goule, perhaps. How about the following:

Goule (maneaters)

Goules are creatures who have acquired a taste for the flesh of their own kind and thus have become cursed for comitting the sin of cannibalism. Once a goule dies, it rises three days later as an undead ghoul.

Creating a Goule

“Goule” is an acquired template that can be applied to any living, sentient creature (referred to hereafter as the base creature).

Hit Dice: Add one additional hit die of the base creature’s type. For example, humanoids get an additional d8.

Attacks: Goules retains all the natural weapons, manufactured weapon attacks, and weapon proficiencies of the base creature. A creature with hands gains one claw attack per hand as well as a bite; the goule can strike with each of its claw attacks at its full attack bonus.

Damage: Natural and manufactured weapons deal damage normally. Bite and claw attacks deal damage depending on the goule’s size. (If the base creature already had claw attacks with its hands, use the goule claw damage only if it’s better.) Exempli gratis, a medium-sized goule does claw damage of 1d4 each and a bite of 1d6.

Special Attacks: A goule retains all of the base creature’s special attacks.

Special Qualities: A goule retains all of the base creature’s special qualities.

Saves: A goule gains a +1 bonus to Fort, Ref, & Will saving throws over and above that of the base creature’s.

Abilities: No change.

Skills: Bluff, Climb, Hide, Listen, Move silently, & Spot become class skills and the goule gains 1 additional rank in each of those skills.

Feats: A goule gains the following feats — Alertness, Multiattack, Skill focus (Bluff, Climb, Hide, Listen, Move silently, & Spot), Stealthy, and Toughness.

Environment: Same as the base creature.

Organisation: Solitary.

Challenge Rating: Depends on Hit Dice.

Treasure: Depends on the base creature

Alignment/Intent: Always chaotic/ evil.

Advancement: As base creature.

Level Adjustment: None.

Jean, Sieur de Crapaud (Crazed Human Goule)

Size/Type: Medium Aristocrat 3/Humanoid 1 (Human)
Hit Dice: 4d8+8 (40 hp)
Initiative: +3
Speed: 30 ft. (6 squares)
Armour Class: 14 (+1 ring, +3 heavy maille jack), touch 11, flat-footed 14
Base Attack/Grapple: +5/+3
Attack: 2 claws +3 mêlée (1d4+2 / 20 × 2)
Full Attack: Bite +3 mêlée (1d6+2 /20 × 2) and 2 claws +1 mêlée (1d4+2 / 20 × 2)
Space/Reach: 5 ft. / 5 ft.
Special Attacks: Sneak attack (+1d6)
Special Qualities: Rise as a ghoul 3 days post mortem
Saves: Fort +4, Ref +2, Will +4
Abilities: Str 14, Dex 10, Con 12, Int 11, Wis 9, Cha 9
Skills: Bluff +9, Climb +6, Hide +6, Intimidate +9, Listen +5, Move silently +6, Persuade +5, Spot +5
Feats: Alertness, Armour proficiency (Light), Multiattack, Skill focus (Bluff, Climb, Hide, Intimidate, Listen, Move silently, & Spot), Stealthy, and Toughness.
Environment: Le Village des Crapauds
Organisation: Solitary
Challenge Rating: 4
Treasure: Ring of Deflection +1, (3) Potions of Cure Minor Wounds
Alignment: Always chaotic/evil

Jean prefers to use his bluff skill to lure unspecting victims and then attack them while they are flat-footed.

Nota bene: In the Neverwinter Nights videogame, the toughness feat adds +1 hit point/die rather than a flat +3.

POST SCRIPT

After sitting on this for a couple of days, I am still not comfortable with the depiction of Jean. In the original module, he acquires 5 levels of thief (for all intents & purposes) over the course of three weeks. Perhaps we can hand-wave that away by calling it a gift from the Ravenloft Dark Powers. In the pseudo-historical world of Averoigne and Cormac Fitzgeoffrey, I suppose we could call it a gift from Satan — but in both of these instances, it feels like a cheap excuse. So then I created a Crazed Human Goule as an interim step between Human and Ghoul with a bite, claws, and 1st level Rogue abilities. It does not feel as contrived but it still stretches credibility a bit. So I reserve the right to change Jean’s statistics later.

Next up: Night of the Walking Dead in Averoigne Part VIII.

D&D is NOT Sword & Sorcery

 A lot of OSR game companies and their legion of GMs like to tell the world how their game is based on Appendix N of the AD&D DMG. Likewise there are a lot of Old Schoolers who yell that (insert favourite version of D&D) is true Sword & Sorcery unlike (insert disliked version of D&D) which is Epic Fantasy. In most cases, they are WRONG and LYING to everyone. But not intentionally, at least I hope! Herein this post I explain what Sword & Sorcery really is, why D&D never was and never will be, and how to make your game closer to the S&S genre, if you choose.

Now that you have read the ‘clickbait,’ I wish to note that prior to the release of Dungeons & Dragons 3rd Edition, I was not concerned with being faithful to the Sword & Sorcery genre. In fact back in the ‘90s I ran a very successful campaign that simulated a Heavy Metal perspective of the Late Middle Ages. The AD&D 2nd Edition game provided a very flexible method of handling priests with their spheres, the Historical Campaigns added good advice on historical, epic, and legendary campaigns, and the Player’s Option books also provided some very interesting customisation options. More on that era in a future post. Suffice to say that since 2002, I have been compelled to find a way to be as faithful to the Sword & Sorcery as possible.

In a future post, I shall detail the ways in which D&D can hew closer to Sword & Sorcery.

What is Sword & Sorcery?

In 1961 Fritz Leiber (Fafhrd & the Gray Mouser) in a response to Michael Moorcock (Elric) in the Conan fanzine Amra, wrote:

“I feel more certain than ever that this field should be called the sword-and-sorcery story. This accurately describes the points of culture-level and supernatural element and also immediately distinguishes it from the cloak-and-sword (historical adventure) story — and (quite incidentally) from the cloak-and-dagger (international espionage) story too!”

Thus, Robert E. Howard is credited with inventing the genre with his stories of Bran Mac Morn, Conan, Kull, Cormac Mac Airt, Solomon Kane, and Turlogh Dubh O'Brien. His work stands as the gold standard for which all others are judged. However, he did not invent it out of whole cloth. Rather, he built it upon a very long history of the ballads, sagas, and legends of Europe and the Greater Middle East. In effect, Sword & Sorcery is about swords versus sorcery. In “Literary Swordsmen and Sorcerers: the Makers of Heroic Fantasy” published in 1976, editor Lin Carter came much to the same conclusion.

Sword & Sorcery Characteristics

What then are the particular characteristics that we should be concerned about? For purposes of this essay, I am not going to discuss the literary style of picaresque, swashbuckling, or episodic versus long-form storytelling. Those elements are germane to the type of adventures which I believe should be left entirely in the hands of the individual Game Masters. Instead, we must look at the characteristics that directly contradict D&D.

Sorcerers, Not Clerics, Druids, or Paladins

The D&D cleric class is the proverbial dead elephant in the room. Prior to the Blackmoor campaign, there have been no stories of armoured clergy invoking miracles. None, nada, zilch. Go ahead and look at the pulp stories of the 20th century, Tolkein, C.S. Lewis, gothic literature, mediæval literature, hagiographies, legends, ballads, myths, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. And do not forget to search Non-Western sources as well.

Previously when I raised this issue on the Internet, some of the objections were the following:

“But surely Archbishop Turpin, one of the paladins of Charlemagne….” Not according to the actual stories. He may or may not have been armoured when he conducted mass before the troops but he most certainly never invoked any miracles in any of the stories.

“Knights Templar?” Nope. Not a single crusading saint in armour.

“But what about Bishop Odo of Beyeux?” First off, Odo was a historical figure but none of the fiction written about him ever depicted him working miracles while armoured.

“Any saints at all?” Nope. There were some former soldiers who later became saints, but they forswore arms and armour before working miracles.

“Priests of Mars or Ares?” Nope. They stayed far, far away from battle.

“Vikings?” Not even the Vikings. The closest would be chieftains officiating at a religious ceremony before battle, but none of the stories have them invoking miracles during battle.

“Chinese, Indian, Mesoamerican, Islamic, Judaic, et cetera?” Nope.

In fact the only depiction, fictional or otherwise, of an armoured spell-caster was Elric of Melnibone and he was not religious in any way at all.

But please do your own research. I would be thrilled to be proven wrong. Until then, we must deal with the fact that in ANY literary genre prior to 1970, divine spellcasters never wore armour while working their miracles. Clerics, Druids, and Paladins as we know them are inventions of Dungeons and Dragons.

Tombs, Not Dungeons

Dungeons as defined by D&D likewise do not exist in the Sword & Sorcery genre. Certainly there are stories of Conan and other S&S heroes looting tombs and encountering supernatural horrors but nowhere near the scale of the typical D&D dungeon. The “dungeon clean-up crew,” disintegrating corridors, the all other mega-dungeon weirdness is an invention of D&D

No Demi-Humans & Humanoids

Were there any dwarves, elves, gnomes, goblins, halflings, hobgoblins, or orcs in any of Howard’s work? What about Leiber or Moorcock? Looking at the world’s literature, there have certainly been stories about fairies but with the exception of a handful of half-elves, none of the protagonists have been non-Human. Moorcock’s Elric was a Melnibonean who was certainly not human but he stands as a famous exception. Except for Elric, all of the protagonists of S&S have been humans who moved through human societies. Secret societies of hidden folk such as serpent people were by definition secret and no effect on the day to day goings on.

Remember that in 1974, The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit both by J.R.R. Tolkein were extraordinarily popular. And just about every D&Der I met back in the ‘70s assumed that all of the dwarves, elves, halflings, orcs, wights, Type VI demons (balrogs), and Treeants (ents) were exactly as Tolkein described them. Not only that, but there were arguments about how Trolls were supposed to be ogres and not rubbery regenerating monstrosities because the Oxford professor said so. So it should be no surprise at all that Gygax & Arneson included a strong Middle Earth element in the ruleset. After all, D&D was designed to be broad enough to encompass Sword & Planet (John Carter of Mars) and Gothic Horror (Hammer Films, et al.).

Now a case could be made that the LotR is indeed Sword & Sorcery since it is swords versus sorcery, but the general consensus in literary circles is that it is Heroic Fiction rather than S&S for a number of literary reasons. My argument is that Middle Earth is not S&S precisely because of the non-Humans nations living side-by-side with Human nations, trading and warring, et cetera. Prior to Tolkein, such depictions were relegated to children’s stories and not tales of derring-do.

Only incorporeal need magic to hit

In all of Robert E. Howard’s stories, the only creatures unaffected by non-magical weapons were incorporeal. The Wolf-Man movie does not belong in the Sword & Sorcery genre because there were neither swords nor sorcery. But as I noted above, the popular conceptions of werewolves was that they could only be hit by silver.

As an aside, in the Dark Shadows TV series, vampires could also be killed by silver bullets. Did Lake Geneva and the Twin Cities’ campaigns allow that also? I do not recall any of my players attempting that.

Minimal Magic Items

Why does D&D have so many magic items and why do DMs feel the need to sprinkle them liberally throughout their dungeons? Prior to D&D, have there been any characters in any form of media, carrying as much magic items as your typical mid-level D&D adventurer? No there has not.

And while the pre-D&D 3e rules discouraged the placement of Ye Olde Magick Shoppe, a lot of campaigns have them. Needless to say, Sword & Sorcery protagonists do not go shopping for magic items!

But Does D&D have to be S & S?

Given that it is now obvious that D&D is NOT Sword and Sorcery, is that okay? Of course it is!!! It is still YOUR game! YOU get to decide what kind of campaign you are going to run. Your players and you will agree on the genre(s), tropes, et cetera. That is the true beauty of Dungeons & Dragons unlike all other games in the world — you are encouraged to make it your own.

“As with any other set of miniatures rules they are guidelines to follow in designing your own fantastic-medieval campaign.”

— Dungeons & Dragons Book 1 Men & Magic, Gary Gygax & Dave Arneson

Next up: How to make your D&D game better fit the Sword & Sorcery genre.

Memorable Critical Hits

One of the oldest house rules in D&D has been the critical hit. That is, on a “natural” 20 not only does the character hit but does additional damage and/or some type of maiming. Current research shows that it was in the Empire of the Petal Throne (1975) that on a natural 20, the combatant does double damage. Earlier in the year there was a set of rules for hit location in the Blackmoor supplement but that was clumsy and lacked the elegance of double damage on a natural 20. Starting in 1976 or ’77 we start to see the marriage of hit location and extra damage. So when D&D was but one year old there was a double damage on a natural 20 and by it’s second or third year was the addition of aggravated damage.

However, Gary Gygax was opposed to using critical hits and thus kept them out of the official rules. His vision of combat was much more cinematic, that is more like the fight between Robin Hood and the Sheriff of Nottingham in the 1938 classic Adventures of Robin Hood with Errol Flynn and Basil Rathbone respectively.

In 1989 with the publishing of the AD&D 2nd Edition Dungeon Master’s Guide, there is an optional rule for critical hits with two methods — double damage on a natural 20 or an additional attack on a natural 20. Note that this was an optional rule and Zeb Cook recommended against using it.

In Grymurld,™ I tried out the hit location rules from Blackmoor and soon the players and I came to dislike them quite a bit. It was too easy to kill monsters and characters with head shots (15% chance of a success hit going to the head which had 15% of the total hit points). Inspired by the AD&D Monster Manual Giant Lizard which would bite for double damage on a natural 20, I allowed both PCs and monsters to do the same.

The players loved it! In spite of the risk of being on the receiving end of a critical hit, the players enjoyed the chance of scoring a critical hit. Even though it was only a matter of luck to roll a 20, the players felt a keen sense of satisfaction when doing so. Did this violate the spirit if not the letter of Gygax & Arneson’s D&D? Who cares?!? If players and the GM alike enjoy the rule then by all means “damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead!”

And so I present to you, memorable critical hits:

Exploding Dice = Exploding Undead

Once upon a time there was a knyghte who tried to be a conventional paladin but just could not quite pull it off who was known as Syr Stephen d’Essexe. One of the many things that Syr Stephen was reputed for was always giving first strike to his opponents as well as never striking an opponent who was disadvantaged (stunned, prone, helpless, &c.). Now he could get away with this because the player rolled so well. Syr Stephen’s player rolled better than anyone I have ever seen in 30+ years of gaming. In the particular campaign that Syr Stephen was in, the rules I used for critical hits were borrowed from MERP (Middle Earth Role Playing) — upon rolling a natural 20, roll again. A result of 1–19 meant double damage while a natural 20 meant roll again. The third result would be triple damage or roll again and so on ad infinitum. Given Syr Stephen’s reputation, it was not surprising that he scored critical hits often and usually did triple damage (two natural 20s) with the occasional quadruple damage (three natural 20s).

One day Syr Stephen and his fellows encountered a powerful spectre (drain 2 life levels on a successful hit!). Syr Stephen was nervous but his sword was enchaunted versus the undead (more so v. incorporeal). I reminded the player that only the magical bonus of the weapon would damage the spectre and the not the physical part nor the strength or skill bonus. I think the sword was +12 versus incorporeal which meant that each hit would do 12 points of damage. At this point you are no doubt wondering why I give a combat with incorporeal undead as an example of critical hits when the rules clearly state that undead, especially incoporeal undead have no vital organs thus are immune to critical hits. In Grymwurld,™ I allow critical hits against the undead because it is fun! However, the undead in Grymwurld are stronger than standard D&D (AD&D was only a d8 whereas I used a d12). At any rate, as you might have guessed by now, Syr Stephen allowed the spectre to take a swing at him first. The spectre punched right through Syr Stephen’s shield and armour taking two energy levels away. The other players howled at Syr Stephen for being “chivalrous” but the good knyghte was not daunted. He responded by rolling a natural 20, followed by a natural 20, and then a third natural 20, and then a fourth natural 20, and then a fifth natural 20, and then… a 4. Still, five natural 20s in a row which gave him sextuple (6×) damage or 72 points of damage! The spectre had 52 hit points and went to -20 in one shot. All of us at the table were aghast (pun intended) at what Syr Stephen had wrought!

And just to complete the story, once the spectre was destroyed, all of the life levels it had drained returned to their owners. “There can only be one!”

Smart D&D Players, Stupid Actions

I first started playing Dungeons & Dragons in 1977 and took on the mantle of the Dungeon Master in 1978. In that time, I have seen some really stupid and oftentimes hilarious actions by otherwise smart players. In this edition of the Hall of the Grymlorde,™ here are three examples of foolish actions.

Ivar the Boneless

During a “Viking” themed campaign that I ran, the party chanced to meet a fellow named Ivar the Boneless. Now before you start snickering, do note that there really was a Viking by that name quite active in the 9th Century. So here’s the setup: The PCs go into a mead hall and notice a big tough looking guy drinking by himself. They ask the nearest guy who the big guy is and find out he’s called ‘Ivar the Boneless’ — but don’t call him that to his face. Now most of you reading this have already figured out what’s going to happen, and indeed it does. What could possibly be the dumbest thing the PCs could do right now? Call Ivar “boneless” to his face? Right. And that is exactly what they did. Smart-arse PC taunts Ivar and Ivar punches PC in the face. The Jarl’s men break up the fight and Ivar challenges the PC to a holmgang, that is to say a duel. Next day they meet on a small island in the river, stripped to the waist and armed only with a dagger in hand. What the PCs didn’t know is that A) Ivar is a higher level warrior, B) he uses a magical dueling dagger, and C) he is specialized in dagger fighting. Long story short, Ivar kills the PC. Second PC jumps onto the island to avenge his “brother.” Ivar kills him. Third PC jumps onto the island and promptly dies. Fourth PC apologizes, offers up all the possessions of the first three PCs (as is custom) and leaves while the three players roll up new characters.

One of the players starting going on about how I screwed them and set them up to die. I pointed out that they were the ones foolish enough to provoke Ivar. I learned my craft from OD&D (c.1974) — stupid actions bring stupid deaths. The other players suddenly understood and joked about how they did act foolish and deserved it. The first player refused to take responsibility and that was not the first nor the last that he acted foolishly and denied it but that is another story.

Lambda the Lawful/Good Ranger

In the fall of 1978, the party was returning to town after a harrowing adventure in a dungeon when they met a man wearing plate mail, carrying a flail, no helmet, no shield (sounds like a cleric, right?) mounted on a red dragon. He hailed the party and introduced himself as Nommis-En. The party caller introduced himself as ‘Lambda the Lawful Good Ranger.’ You should have seen the look on the other player’s faces! A weird mixture of horror and laughter! I rolled for Nommis-En’s reaction and … well, he laughed so hard, he fell off the dragon! The party seized this good fortune and doubled-timed it out of there!

Always carry a Hold Portal spell

OD&D and AD&D Ghouls can be devastating to an unlucky party. Every hit with a claw will cause paralyzation unless a saving throw is made. Each ghoul gets two claw attacks per round plus a bite. During one dungeon adventure the party was massively unlucky. The cleric rolled poorly on his attempt to turn the ghouls and got paralyzed. Then the fighter and the ranger got paralyzed. And then the dwarven fighter and the hobbit thief were hit and failed their saving throws. Only the magic-user was unscathed because he was in the back rank. The M-U ran at the nearest opportunity and the ghouls chased him. I rolled to see which ones stayed behind to feast on the paralyzed victims but most decided to give chase. Now the magic-user’s base movement was 12" while the ghould only move at 9," which gave him a speed advantage. However, the ghouls knew the layout of the dungeon much better than the magic-user and herded him into a blind corridor. The other players kept telling the M-U to cast a Hold Portal spell. But he could not. He had not memorized that spell nor Wizard Lock for that matter. He did not have those spells on scrolls either. Nor did he have a potion of speed. I will grant him this — he managed to kill on of the ghouls with his dagger before the other two paralyzed him and literally ate him alive. TPK for want of a Hold Portal.