I’m a bad perfectionist when it comes to designing things or running games for other people, so I decided to start immediately – I’m using OSE from the SRD website and I’ll be playing The Haunted Halls of Eveningstar, an adventure that I’ve read once but haven’t wasted a bunch of time thinking about what I’d like to improve.
I know I’ll be using a couple of house rules:
- Max HP at 1st level.
- Ascending AC.
- The “Smoothed Attack Progression” table from Tales of the Rambling Bumbler.
- Slot-based encumbrance of 10 +/- STR
- My own Tolkien/Iron Age Armor, which lives on the Notes app on my phone:
- Leather: +1 (can be worn under mail)
- Mail: +2
- Helm: +2
- Shield: +2
- Elves progress as Clerics but without any weapon or armor restrictions. They still get the Elf’s incidental class features and use the Magic-User’s experience chart.
- For easy bookkeeping I'm giving bonus XP from prime requisites at the start of each level up, rather than modifying XP yields in each adventure.
Where appropriate I’ll use a simple “Yes/No” oracle on a d6 (high for yes, low for no). To simulate group discussions I’ll roll the oracle die for each character to get a “party vote”.
Now to generate some characters. I wanted to use a party of six PCs, and I wanted a Fighter, Magic-User, Thief, Elf, Dwarf, and Halfling, so I decided to roll six sets of 3d6-in-order attributes and then assign the classes. I then distributed equipment based on a vague sense of balance and aesthetics. I didn’t use any of my prized name generators, instead inventing names by drawing from my own ideas of light-hearted vernacular fantasy. I started with pretty basic sketches of these guys, but their character bios have been fleshed out over a few sessions of play by now.
Fighter 1 HP: 9 AC: 15 XP: 200
STR 16, DEX 10, CON 13, INT 11, WIS 11, CHA 15
Gear:
Sword
Shield
Leather Armor
Helm
Strong and handsome, young Trigg is an aspiring hero. He belongs to the Sunflower Order, an informal brotherhood sworn to serve the Hare King and the common folk. Those in need can identify these so-called "Sunflower Knights" by the shining golden medals that they wear (more often made of polished copper). The Sunflower Order is not a recognized order of knights however, and Trigg's adventuring career to date is more like an itinerant day-laborer than a questing hero.
Dwarf 1 HP: 9 AC: 15 XP: 110
STR 14, DEX 14, CON 14, INT 11, WIS 10, CHA 10
Gear:
Axe
Shield
Helm
Rope
Tinder Box
Greydelve is a relatively new dwarfhold, known for its rock crystal and groves of phosphorescent mushrooms, and Gimwort is a young dwarf. A former mushroom grove-warden, he knows a fair amount about hunting underground vermin. As one of the Exiles (dwarves from clans that have lost their ancestral dwarfholds and had to found new ones), Common is his native language, although he knows a smattering of Old Dwarvish for ritual use and certain place names.
Elf 1 HP: 6 AC: 14/15 XP: 0
STR 11, DEX 17, CON 10, INT 7, WIS 11, CHA 5
Gear:
Longbow
Arrows (20/20)
Shortsword
Buckler
Helmet
Wine
Flute
I interpreted Sassaran’s “native only” language as meaning that she only speaks Elvish, and that that along with her height and severe, impassive features accounts for her low Charisma score. As the party’s Magic-User is the only character who speaks Elvish, he’s the only one who can talk to her. She’s not very communicative though: he thinks she said something about “following her star,” but isn’t sure he properly understood her woodland dialect. I like to imagine that they wouldn’t naturally be good friends but are sort of stuck talking to each other a lot for work.
Magic-User 1 HP: 2 AC: 11 XP: 125
STR 5, DEX 13, CON 4, INT 15, WIS 15, CHA 15
Gear:
Staff
Spellbook: Dancing Lights, Color Spray
Scroll: Sleep
Lantern
Oil Flask
Tinder Box
I decided to use the Illusionist spell list from OSE Advanced Fantasy. I’m not sure if this makes Eldred a member of the Illusionist class, and haven’t bothered to look up any other differences between Illusionists and standard Magic-Users.
Eldred has spent his life as a wandering entertainer and conjuror of cheap tricks. Trigg believes that Eldred is a wise wizardly mentor, however, and Eldred is doing his best to live up to the role. Eldred wears a green cloak and learned Elvish as part of his studies – his inherited spellbook contains a lot of old Elvish poetry.
Halfling 1 HP: 5 AC: 15 XP: 0
STR 9, DEX 13, CON 9, INT 9, WIS 8, CHA 10
Gear:
Dagger
Helm
Shield
Cooking Gear
A young Halfling who was raised on tales of her adventurous great-uncle and longs to live up to them. Her weapon and armor were all dug out of a dusty chest that the old burrower kept under his bed, and the helmet is a little too large for her.
Thief 1 HP: 3 AC: 10 XP: 0
STR 7, DEX 10, CON 8, INT 6, WIS 9, CHA 8
Gear:
Stick
Lockpicks
Lantern
Oil Flask
Tinder Box
Rope
Bedroll
Dagger
A tramp and failed prospector, it’s frankly a wonder that Old Dolf isn’t dead yet. His health is poor, his breath stinks, his plans are bad, and his manner is unconvincing. He tried scamming the party with the offer of a map to the dungeon and his services as a guide about town but somehow bungled the pitch and found himself agreeing to guide them through the dungeon rather than to it. He’s never been past the entrance and is trying to just brazen it out.
No comments:
Post a Comment