Strength, shields and spears - my house rules for Basic D&D

While in lockdown, I've been running D&D for my kids and some friends. We've got a seven-strong party with player ages ranging from nine to a fair few decades past that. And it's been great - not only as a way for the kids to see their friends every day but also as a gaming experience. I've been taking them through The Keep on the Borderlands, which I've never run or played before, and it's been a blast.

We're using Basic D&D (as contained in the Rules Cyclopedia). Although the red-box Basic set was probably the second RPG I ever read (after Runequest), I don't think I ever played it. I did play a bit of AD&D, but - as children - we disdained Basic as childish!

Clearly, that was absurd. The rules contained in the Cyclopedia are well constructed and sturdy, and they seem nicely modular. In choosing them over the superb Whitehack, I wanted three things: a proper 'rules as written' game of D&D with simple choices (against Whitehack's more freeform approach), an instantly available common reference for the players and a very well-defined system of character progression. After all, who knows how long lockdown will last?

Nevertheless, I had to tweak a few rules. We're now eight or so sessions in, and I'm quite pleased with the tweaks. So here they are.

1. STR as HP/STR and HP
I've blogged about this before, but I've never been able to get over the possibility that a first-level fighter might have STR 18 and HP 1. The Fantasy Trip's use of ST(R) as HP gets round this elegantly. And Into the Odd takes a similar approach by combining HP and STR as HP. When characters run out of HP, they take wounds off STR and have to save under their remaining STR to stay in the fight/conscious/alive. I love this system. As in The Fantasy Trip, I have characters take STR damage off a running total that leaves the 'true' STR stat unaffected for lifting portcullises, 'to hit' and damage bonuses, and so on.

It works really well because it preserves HP as the classic Robin Hood vs the Sheriff of Nottingham store of cunning parries, shaken-off light wounds and narrow dodging of death. And it means that characters who roll 1 for HP don't feel too aggrieved. Perhaps they're just green, clumsy or plain unlucky - all conditions that can be cured through advancement. And it means that the STR 18/HP1 fighter is still much hardier than the average fighter; even after taking a 6HP blow, he'll be much more likely to stay in the fight than the STR 6, HP 4 magician would. That's just as it should be, I think.

At the same time, the fragility of first-level characters (and others) is preserved. There's no need at all to fudge your initial HP roll (my son's thief has 1HP and only 10 STR, but has made both his STR saves so far!).  Low HP mean that you'll be taking STR saves sooner rather than later. But they don't mean that you'll always die or pass out on being struck by a goblin slingshot or hit with a kobold cudgel. Combat becomes less predictable, which can't be bad.

2. PC and NPC deaths
Now, the chances of a PC death with this system are reduced somewhat. I've generally ruled that if you fail your STR check, you're out of the fight (not necessarily unconscious, but groaning and unable to do anything useful), but if your comrades rescue you, you can be revived with proper care (say, a week of rest and the attendance of physicians or equivalents). If your friends get you back to base immediately, you'll probably be OK.

That helps with party continuity and plausibility, and also with forcing the PCs to adjust their plans. If someone breaks their leg in a fight, you can't take them with you. And if you leave them, they'll die. Decisions, decisions ...

Similarly, if you're forced to retreat from combat without rescuing your friend, he's dead. So far, such injuries have made our campaign more episodic, which is a good thing. Raids on the Caves of Chaos are all fun and games until someone gets hurt ...

And there's also a risk of immediate death in certain situations. Our sole death so far came when a PC tried to leap through the gnashing portcullis-mouth of a living tower (pinched from Return to the Keep on the Borderlands). I warned him that this was a DEX save with death as the consequence, and he still attempted - and failed - his roll. Splat!

I'd apply the same warning in a focused combat like a duel to the death with a master swordsman, but not to a sudden skirmish with orcs. It means that the battlefield is strewn with the dying as much with the dead; the orcs don't get the STR save, but their leader might. Important NPCs get STR saves, but faceless minions don't.

In proper wilderness adventures (the Caves of Chaos are too close to the keep to count!), a failed STR save probably entails death. So running out of HP is no laughing matter - but it's something that the strong can usually shrug off.

All in all, this system makes combat more interesting. Maimed companions demand decisions - and death always threatens but isn't always instant.

3. Target 20
I've shamelessly stolen this from Delta. It's great - no need for THAC0 and all that. It makes combat and other stuff much faster. Hooray!

4. Shields shall be splintered
And I've nicked this from Trollsmyth too. I have a more complex house rule for Whitehack, but it doesn't work in a roll-high system. The point is that shields should be valuable in combat - just as they were historically. And I just love the heraldry-driven complications that can arise from carrying the Broken Skull's tokens into the Bloody Tusk's territory ...

5. Spears go first - and polearms can be spears
I'm just about OK with Basic's individual-initiative system, in which two-handed weapons attack after others. I can rationalise certain things with reference to cramped dungeons and sudden ambushes. But it becomes laughable when a dagger-wielder takes on a halberdier in the open and goes first. So, the way I fix this is to allow spears to win individual initiative (whether wielded in one hand or two), which makes them the natural weapon of choice for soldiers. And of course they can be thrown too. So the archetypal spear-and-shield-wielding guardsman makes a lot of tactical sense.

On top of that, I allow polearms to be used as spears or as two-handed weapons in any given round. So, if you want to hold your foe at bay with the pointy bit of your halberd, you'll win initiative against a foe with a sword, axe or knife, but you'll only do d6 damage. If you want to swing it for the full d10, you lose initiative.

I'm well aware that this isn't strictly accurate - you can swing a polearm at a foe long before they get a chance to close with you. But there might be a glimmer of truth in it for a 'killing blow' - especially if we're assuming that most fights take place in fairly cramped conditions. And it makes for nicely balanced decisions.

I'm not quite sure what to do about poleaxes. It's fairly clear that the authors of Basic had little idea of what a poleaxe actually was (up to 15' long? And no spike? Cheaper than other polearms? Really?). As the poleaxe is the descendant of the Danish axe, they might both be covered by the battle-axe category - but then the poleaxe was the weapon of choice of the heavily armoured knight, so it should be the best thing on the battlefield! I suspect it's easiest for now just to group it with other polearms - although poleaxes are generally significantly shorter than halberds, so would be more wieldy in close and less good at the speary stuff. I probably have to accept that D&D just doesn't do that level of detail!

6. Magicians are rare
This is less of a rule than a tonal note. The only magician in our party is an elf. I'm keen to have sleep spells and magic missiles be awe-inducing interventions - not something that most bandits or guardsmen will have seen before. So magic-users are rare, distrusted and generally keen to conceal their powers.

Into the Odd - the best RPG for kids?

An eclectic band of intrepid adventurers

We had friends staying last weekend. After introducing their kids to Song of Blades and Heroes last time they were up, I'd promised my kids that we'd do a bit of roleplaying with them this time. So, after a jaunt up the hill on Sunday, we settled down for a spot of dungeon-crawling.

I'd planned on using Whitehack or the Black Hack. Then I thought about one of the fantasy variants on Into the Odd. But then I decided just to use Into the Odd itself. And I'm very glad I did: it made for the perfect introduction to RPGs. 

Why? Well, the game's loose setting and brilliant character-generation system made for a very easy set-up. We rolled characters, and then the kids chose miniatures to represent them from the Cabinet of Shame. That gave us a space marine in corroded bronze armour, a 'space monkey' and an orc with an axe that fairly approximated the shovel in the player's 'starting package'. And that eclectic mix worked just fine as we laid out dungeon tiles and explored the underground complex I'd sketched out half an hour earlier.

The scenario was simple: the PCs were desperadoes, short of cash, and the authorities had put a price on the tentacled head of an evil sorcerer. So the PCs were raiding his underground fastness. No other background was needed.

And we had a blast. The new players grasped the concepts of ability saves on a D20 very quickly. And the no-messing combat (rolling damage, with no time wasted on fripperies such as rolling to hit) was equally clear - as were its risks. 

But best of all was the way that the players instinctively made use of their starting equipment (determined by cross-referencing a character's hit points and highest stat on a table of 'packages'). One character had a pistol, a smoke bomb and some wire. Another had a dog, a pistol and a shovel. The use of this limited gear led to all manner of interesting situations. Best of all was the final encounter with the octopus-headed wizard. The PCs filled the chamber with smoke, then dashed down the stairs to improvise a trip wire. They pulled off their rolls, swiftly dispatched the fiend and made off with this head. The dog, alas, did not make it out, but all of the PCs did, though only by dint of a couple of successful saves to avoid critical damage. 

I ran another session on Friday evening for my son and one of his schoolfriends (both RPG veterans). This time, we played through The Iron Coral, the introductory adventure that comes with the rules. With most of the 'dungeon' explored, both characters met a sticky - but undeniably fitting - end. This time, I was struck by the speed at which the game runs. We played it quite a bit last year, but I'd forgotten quite how quick and decisive combat encounters can be, and how much time that frees up for exploration and role-playing.

Of course, games in which combat is a game in itself can be tremendous too. We've played The Fantasy Trip a lot this year, and it's excellent - because every time there's a fight, you get an engrossing board/skirmish game to resolve it. And in TFT, every fight can be deadly for the PCs, which adds tension and suspense even if the party are just facing a few goblins.

For games in which all players are familiar with the rules, TFT is tremendous. And its rules are clear, logical and relatively simple, which helps. It's also perhaps the best RPF for very large parties, because the tactical aspects of fighting give everyone lots to consider as you go round the table.

But for smaller games in which the players are not familiar with all the combat options they can take and just need a sense that "fighting is dangerous", Into the Odd is very hard to beat.

And as an introductory game for kids, it's the best. Start with a pistol, a smokebomb and a length of wire - and watch as imagination does the rest.

The Fantasy Trip

Last year, I found my curiosity piqued by The Fantasy Trip and looked into a couple of the retroclones. I resolved to get hold of it when it was republished - in part, because I couldn't remember if I'd ever played the minigames on which it's based: Melee and Wizards. Steven Jackson Games were popular as lunchtime diversions when I was at primary school; we played Car Wars and OGRE quite a bit, but I'm not sure about Melee.

Having bought the Legacy Edition of The Fantasy Trip, I'm still not sure. The rules seem familiar, as do some of the counters. But it was a long time ago - and if we did play it back then, we played Car Wars and OGRE much more. I never owned any of them, and I do remember designing some grid-based combat games shortly after I moved schools - possibly to recapture the counter-and-grid thrills of those lunchtime sessions.

Anyway, the kids and I played four games of Melee over the weekend. It's terrific. I'm planning to use it for most RPG sessions with the kids and their friends from now on, simply because it'll make combat encounters so much more compelling than the various D&D clones we've tried. Whitehack will doubtless remain a go-to for small, focused groups, and I'm playing Tunnels & Trolls with some old friends next weekend, but for dungeon-crawling with the kids, The Fantasy Trip/Melee appears perfect.

So why is that? Well, the sheer amount of decisions to be made - formalised in the game as options - gives a tremendous range of outcomes. I can't think of any one-figure-per-player skirmish game that offers quite so many options in combat situations.

And yet the game is very simple. For Melee (the TFT combat system as a freestanding game), characters have three stats: strength (ST), dexterity (DX) and movement allowance (MA). You design your character(s) by deciding the balance of their ST and DX and then choose whatever weapons and armour you like.

And that's where the real genius of the game comes in. It combines a reasonable amount of realism with a tremendous amount of game balance. Strong characters can take and hand out more punishment: ST acts as your hit points, and allows you to use nastier weapons) But DX decides who attacks first - and the higher your DX, the higher your chance of landing a roll. Armour absorbs damage - but also reduces DX and MA.

So sufficient ST to wield a grisly weapon like a two-handed axe will impair your DX when you initially assign points between them - and heavy armour will impair it still further. But you will be appropriately tank-like and able to deal terrible damage on those rare occasions when you hit.

Alternatively, you could choose high DX to allow you to hit quickly and often. But against heavily armoured foes, you'll be relying on lucky shots to get through the armour.

You can see how this is perfect for gladiatorial combat: secutor v retiarius, or whatever.

And then you've got the hand-to-hand option - grappling, essentially, in which no weapon larger than a dagger is useful, but a dagger is very useful indeed. That creates a whole extra dimension. If you're determined to grapple with a foe, you'll probably want to drop your main weapons and draw a dagger - but there's a chance that they'll be able to do the same when you close, or even just clobber you with their main weapon and step back.

It's a fantastically elegant combat system. There are certainly lapses in realism; I suspect armour wasn't quite so constricting/slowing, at least initially, and of course many strong people are very dextrous too. YOu don't need to be terribly strong to use a two-handed sword or battleaxe; a two-handed sword isn't usually twice the weight of a regular sword. And the weapons list has some oddities (a pike axe?). But for a balanced game, it's just right.

Incidentally, while the RPG rules (In the Labyrinth) give a whole list of real-world weapons that might fit into the various categories, these make very little sense. The glaive and the naginata - essentially the same thing - are in different slots, for example. None of this matters, though - it's very easy to look at a miniature and decide that its big fantasy polearm is the very quintessence of pike axe.

After an initial one-on-one run through the rules, we played three lizardmen against three orcs, then a couple of games with two burly, armoured hobgoblins and a smallish giant against five orcs: two heavily armoured types and three skirmishers (two with javelins and one with a light crossbow). Both times, the orcs won, because they were able to surround the unsupported giant and pierce it with many weapons. There was something of the mammoth hunt about it, which seemed quite appropriate.

We're eager to play more, and to try the wizard rules. There are printable hex papers of appropriate size available online, so drawing out some floorplans on those will be no more onerous than drawing them out on traditional grid paper.

The labyrinth beckons ...

Wargames vs RPGs: RuneQuest, The Fantasy Trip and The Dolorous Stroke

I got into RuneQuest when I was at primary school. A friend's older brother had it, his younger brother inherited his books, and I asked for the rules for my next birthday. And that led to many glorious encounters, though very little in the way of campaigns; characters were very short-lived, and fights often ended badly.

In retrospect and despite all the glories of its setting, RuneQuest probably functioned for us as much as a brilliant skirmish wargame as an RPG. The roleplaying happened before the fighting - and then the fighting typically ended things. 

A year or two ago, a Lead Adventurer Forum regular, LeadAsbestos, noted that he'd often used RuneQuest simply as a low-figure skirmish game. My son and I tried out RQ2 in that way a while back and had a pretty good session pitting one crested dragonewt against a few trollkin. 

In the past, the big problem with RuneQuest was generating NPCs and monsters, as this took almost as long as creating PCs from scratch. So we tended to use stat blocks from scenarios (those Rainbow Mounds trollkin from Apple Lane must have been slaughtered again and again and again ...) and from FANGS, a supplement consisting of nothing but pre-generated monsters, many of whom were much more powerful than starting PCs. 

These days, though, there are automatic generators for NPCs (or at least for Mythras, the non-Chaosium incarnation of the RQ system). So statting up a few broo or dragonewts for a quick skirmish has never been easier. That's something I intend to do shortly, once I've properly digested the Mythras rules. 

The Fantasy Trip is another example of the way RPGs and skirmish games can intersect, with game being derived from the Melee microgame (I seem to dimly remember playing it; certainly, those plastic-boxed board games were in vogue at lunchtime when I was at primary school: Car Wars and Ogre in particular).

Then there's Song of Blades and Heroes and its mechanically similar RPG version, Tales of Blades and Heroes, which is great for one-off, miniature-based games and certainly enlivens combat. I've never played Savage Worlds, but I gather it performs the skirmish and RPG roles well.

It's probably true, though, that most RPG combat systems don't make for great skirmish games, because the fights are too long - too much hit-point attrition - or insufficiently tactical without GM input. Or because they're too complex. Song of Blades certainly handles 12 broo vs 5 adventurers much more smoothly than RuneQuest. And D&D-type systems can get a bit boring in symmetrical fights (two groups of three third-level fighters facing off, for example).

Conversely, most good skirmish systems aren't that great for RPGs, because they're too realistic - death can come too suddenly - or insufficiently flexible to allow for the creative ploys a group of D&D players might come up with (spilling oil on the floor, shouting "look behind you!", feigning death or whatever).

Anyway, I've been thinking about this today because I bought The Dolorous Stroke last night. It's a new skirmish game with RPGish elements from Emmy Allen, whose blog is trove of delights (add-on duelling systems for D&D, tables of hideous wounds, discussion of Machen's The White People ...). The kids and I have just given it a run-through, on which I shall report shortly.