AD&D 2e Play Report: Sessions 6 and 7

Last week, we played the sixth session of our ongoing AD&D 2e campaign, but I went on vacation the day immediately after and didn't have a chance to write a play report. Last night, we played our seventh session. This post will serve as the play report for both sessions. The play report from our fifth session is here.

To briefly recap, in our fifth session, the player characters set out on their journey from the Warlord's Tower back to Spiritbrook, with a bunch of armed and armored civilian stonemasons in tow. This was another session of primarily random encounters - a mirror image of our first session. 

The party re-encountered a tribe of nefarious forest people which they met on their initial ascent, and at the urging of the tribe's druid, handed them the evil sword they recovered from the tower. Shortly after, the party encountered another party of very high-level adventurers, the Gladiators of Patience, who told them that they Shouldn't Have Done That, then parted ways with them to go clean up the mess. The party avoided some wolves and owlbears, then ran afoul of a kobold ambush.

Almost every player character nearly died, and the party's hireling, Terris, ran off into the woods. Eventually, Bernhardt Dalton, the cleric, rallied the stonemasons to take up arms against the remaining kobolds, and the party was narrowly victorious.

Decisions, Decisions

With the party barely hanging onto consciousness, they had two immediate decisions to make at the beginning of session 6. Terris had run off during the fight with the kobolds and hadn't returned. Would they go looking for him, wait for him, or push on without him, and risk stumbling into another fight down one hireling? 

The kobolds had attacked in the morning, so the party still had another four hours' worth of traveling time for the day, but they were badly wounded. They could push on, and by the end of the day they'd finally be out of the forest. Or, they could stay put and recover their hit points first.

These decisions prompted a good bit of debate amongst the players, and this is why I really enjoy the complications introduced by using NPC party members, morale, random encounter checks, and varying terrain types (each with their own chance of random encounters). 

Decisions like these are what make wilderness exploration fun and interesting. If the party hadn't included any NPCs, and if I didn't use morale rules, the players wouldn't have to account for their companions acting irrationally, unpredictably, or sub-optimally. They wouldn't have to decide whether or not to risk danger by looking for their lost companion. If I didn't use random encounter checks, none of this would have happened to begin with (unless I arbitrarily decided that it "should" happen, for one reason or another). If settled farmland and forests were treated as interchangeable terrain types, the decision to camp in the forest or push on to its edge would be meaningless.

In this case, I simply told the players out-of-character that there was a greater chance of having an encounter in the forest than in the settled hexes (2-in-10 versus 1-in-10), and that the encounters in the forest were generally more dangerous than in the settled region (in settled territory, there's a chance of encountering a patrol from the nearby town, which is more likely than not to be friendly - not so in the forest). In situations like these, I like to make the mechanics player-facing so that they can make an informed decision.

Ultimately, the players decided to wait and see if Terris would return - but not for too long. They would wait an hour and no more. That was plenty of time for him to wander back. If he didn't, well, they decided he wasn't worth going after. After an hour, they'd press on through the forest until they reached its edge, then they'd make camp.

Terris did not return - I used 2e's rules for getting lost and made a roll for Terris, and it turned out that he was hopelessly lost out there and couldn't find his way back. Poor guy. After waiting the agreed-upon amount of time, the party collected themselves and moved on. They escaped the forest without further incident.

After an uneventful night camping within eyesight of the little farms and hamlets surrounding Spiritbrook, the party traveled the remaining five hours to town - again, without incident - and made their triumphant return.

Town Business

Bernhardt was curious as to whether any priests in town might be able to resurrect the stonemasons who had died on the journey. Keeping in mind my conception of "tiers of play" in 2e, I had decided that the highest-level NPCs in town would be medium-level (levels 4-7), so I told Bernhardt's player that this was not possible. Higher-level priests and other NPCs could be found in the big fantasy city at the south of the regional map, creatively named Southreach.

The party returned to the stonemason's guild and received their reward in gold. The guildmaster expressed his gratitude, and promised that any business the party had with the guild in the future could be done at a discount. My hope is that the players will take the bait and inquire with the guild should they eventually decide to build strongholds, temples, and thieves' dens in the future.

Bernhardt and Karven Stone, being 3rd-level, were now able to have 1st-level henchmen. The party offered to keep Yinvalur onboard, so he became a henchman of Bernhardt's. Karven looked around town for henchmen and recruited a human thief named Sheyla.

It was at this point that the player of Rozidien Stoneskull, the paladin, decided to remove their character from the game and replace them with Ash, an elf fighter. I wrote in an earlier play report about my approach to switching characters. We hand-waved the tradeoff, quickly arriving at an explanation for one character's departure and the other's arrival. It doesn't really matter to me. We're here to play the game - the players should play the characters they want to play, and my goal is to facilitate that and move on as quickly and easily as possible.

After this, the players wanted to cash in their salvaged equipment and plundered gems for gold. They divvied up their respective shares and converted their assorted coins into more portable platinum coins. Then, they of course wanted to shop.

Adventurers Be Shopping

Whenever my players bring up shopping, I tell them "We're not going to do that now, but think about what you want to buy between sessions, use the PHB for prices, and message me if there's anything you're not sure of." I'm not going to spend game time shopping. I usually offer a one-session grace period after the party has been in town for players to retroactively say "I would have bought that in town" or whatever. Anything to keep the game moving.

The players were curious about buying magic items, and I'm admittedly still on the fence about this. The 2e DMG specifically cautions against (or perhaps more accurately, attempts to forbid entirely) the possibility of player characters purchasing magic items. Unlike 5e, for example, there is not even an attempt made to suggest prices or price ranges for magic items. The DMG points out that player characters probably aren't selling their magic items, so why would anyone else be doing so?

I certainly like the idea that magic items are incredible and that no one in their right mind would ever sell them, but realistically, in my experience, players do sell magic items, all the time. They probably would have sold the evil sword I gave them, if they hadn't handed it over to the NPCs last session. And, I am somewhat sympathetic to the common refrain among D&D players that "We have so much gold, but there isn't anything to spend it on!"

I personally think there are plenty of things to spend gold on, besides magic items - armies, expensive clothes, followers, influence, strongholds, and the like. But, this is a game, and for better or worse, most players like to spend their character's hard-earned gold on things that make their numbers go up or make their characters more fun or interesting to play, and I'm generally okay with that.

So, the question is, how much should magic items cost in 2e? To get a general idea, I referenced the XP values associated with magic items in the back of the DMG (starting on page 183). These values are how much XP a character gets for creating a magic item. Generally, in old-school D&D, 1 XP = 1 Gold. However, in the 2e DMG, in Chapter 8: Experience, it's recommended that rogues (and rogues only) get 2 XP for each gold piece of treasure (page 70), suggesting that in 2e, one could say that 2 XP = 1 Gold (or maybe that's just for rogues).

So, what if we take the XP values for magic items in the DMG and divide them by 2 to get their market value? In that case, a potion of healing costs 100 gold, which sounds right. However, a ring of three wishes costs 1,500 gold, which is absurd.

Luckily, I recently learned about an exhaustive four-volume collection from TSR called Encyclopedia Magica, which seems to catalogue every single magic item from all of the splat books, supplements, and the like, and assigns them gold piece values. In Encyclopedia Magica, a potion of healing is worth 400 gold (which is a bit high) and a ring of three wishes is 20,000 gold (which still sounds low). Well, it's what we've got.

I'll likely use my own judgment to finesse these values a little bit, and in any case, I'm certainly not going to let my players buy items that grant wishes, so that's something of a moot point. I don't want to mess with things too much until I get a good idea of how much treasure the player characters are actually going to accumulate over time - as with many things, 2e gives little to no guidance as to how much treasure to award, so I'm using guidelines from 1e to fill in the gaps (for example, a typical treasure hoard of gold in 1e contains 250 gold per level of the dungeon).

I decided that the players could buy potions and the like in towns and villages, but for anything else, they'd have to return to the big city. Despite finding a bunch of treasure on their most recent adventure, the players were too cheap to buy healing potions for 400 gold a pop. They simultaneously complained about having a bunch of gold and nothing to buy, and also about how things were too expensive. 

A DM just can't win.

You Can Go Your Own Way: Rumors in the Sandbox

The next item on the agenda was to determine what the player characters would do next. 

The player characters currently knew of two other quests from our first session - one quest involved an evil wizard in another town who wanted adventurers to kill some pegasi and steal their babies and eggs, which three-quarters of the party had already decided was far too sinister for them, and the other quest was to go to a nearby ruin and put an angry spirit to rest on behalf of a local priest, which sounded more palatable.

At this point, I gave the players the option of spending a week of downtime in town to recuperate and gather rumors about other quests, which they opted to do. Each of them received a rumor about a new quest. Ash and Haymond Baler, being 2nd-level, received two 2nd-level quest hooks:

• Grimerun and Shimmerhollow, a pair of villages to the north and east, need adventurers to root out a forest beast which has been preying on foresters from both villages.
• Pondwick, a town to the north, needs adventurers to clear out a nest of giant spiders which have settled on the outskirts of the surrounding farmland, eating livestock and the occasional farmer.

Bernhardt and Karven Stone, being 3rd-level, received two 3rd-level quest hooks:

• Grasshold, a town to the north, needs adventurers to deal with a band of ogres which has settled on the outskirts of the surrounding farmlands and has been carrying off farmers to their lair.
• Houndrun, a town to the south, needs adventurers to deal with a tribe of barbarians who have been raiding and torching the town's logging camps.

A section of the regional map showing Spiritbrook in the far south and Pondwick in the far north. Just above Spiritbrook is Grasshold (with the Ogre Den revealed, since it's close enough to be spotted by locals). Grimerun and Shimmerhollow are roughly in the middle.

Another section of the regional map showing Spiritbrook in the far north and Houndrun in the far south. In between is the Whispering Tomb and Southreach, the big city.

The way I plan quests like these is I have a general idea of what they're about and what level range they're for (again, referring to my "tiers of play" post, either levels 1-3, 4-7, 7-12, or 9-20). Players receive rumors based on what level their characters are, and once they receive the rumor, the quest is "locked-in" at that level, and I begin prepping in detail for when the players eventually decide to pursue it. 

This keeps me from prepping, say, five 1st-level adventures (so that the players have a variety to choose from) when they'll likely only need one or two to get to 2nd-level, meaning that either half the adventures go unused, or the now 2nd-level characters spend an inordinate amount of game time "mopping up" now somewhat trivial 1st-level quests.

Ultimately, the players decided to first pursue the quest involving the ghost in the ruin (because the ruin is right outside Spiritbrook), then deal with the barbarians terrorizing Houndrun (because they want to go to Southreach, the big city, and Houndrun is just south of that).

The Priest of the Crying God

The party met with Reinald, a human priest of the Crying God (store brand name of Ilmater, the Forgotten Realms deity of suffering and martyrdom). Reinald gave them some history about what's known as the Whispering Tomb. 

The tomb was once a burial ground used by a tribe of barbarians to inter their honored dead. More recently, the barbarians came under the supernatural influence of some other entity, who employed them in capturing travelers and farmers upon which the entity performed mysterious experiments. There were rumors that the entity was a wizard, demon, angel, or something else from outside this world.

Eventually, the barbarians rose up against their master, but found the tomb haunted by some lingering manifestation of the horrors done there. They abandoned the tomb again, and now those who venture near it hear cloying whispers in their minds. Reinald believes this to be the spirit of an individual upon whom much pain was inflicted, and he seeks to put it to rest. The party can help by retrieving the individual's bones from the ruin and bringing them to Reinald for a proper burial and blessing, which he hopes will put the spirit to rest.

If the party should encounter the spirit, Reinald warned them that it will do more harm than good to fight it, but he provided them with holy water and blessed their weapons, should they need to defend themselves. He also warned them that they might encounter some remnants of the barbarian tribe, who more likely than not have come under the spirit's maddening influence.

With that, the party thanked the priest and planned to set out for the ruin. To get there, they will make a short day-and-a-half journey along the road south of Spiritbrook, briefly crossing some barren scrub at the edge of a withered forest. This is where we wrapped session 6.

Plains Walkers and Dirt Talkers

We began session 7 with the journey to the Whispering Tomb. They weren't far from town when they had their first random encounter - a pack of three wolves, which were friendly. Since the party was still in the settled region outside town, I decided that these were the remains of a pack which had fallen on hard times - they were emaciated and desperate, and trying to steal chickens from a local farmer's coop.

The party saw a farmer in the distance yelling insults and throwing stones at the wolves, who fled in their direction. The party avoided the wolves, but noticed their sorry state. The farmer, Pryor, told them that these wolves had been harassing him for days. Haymond, a farmer himself, recognized that the wolves were hungry - unlikely to attack a large group of armed adventurers, but not above attacking a civilian if it seemed like an easy meal. 

The party loosed missile weapons at the wolves at range, chasing them off into the forest. They had more pressing business to attend to, so they recommended that the farmer talk to someone in town who might be able to help him root them out in their den. Then, they continued on their way.

The party's second random encounter came that night, when Bernhardt and Yinvalur Sparkguard were on watch. Both of them were surprised as a band of fourteen orcs stumbled into their camp.

The orcs were indifferent, so I decided that they were just passing through, and would exchange information. Unfortunately, the orcs did not speak common, and none of the player characters or NPCs spoke orc. 

In my post on languages, I advocated for a less binary system which allows player characters to engage in rudimentary communications with creatures with which they don't share a language. Keeping this in mind, I allowed the players to attempt Intelligence checks (to see if they recognized any of the vocabulary the orcs were using) and Wisdom checks (to see if they could determine the orcs' intentions). Hilariously, everyone failed both checks.

Bernhardt and Karven began communicating with the orcs by drawing pictures in the dirt. The orcs drew a rough image of a ruin speaking to them, then drew warriors in horned helmets emerging from the ruin and attacking them with spears. The party correctly concluded that the orcs had been drawn to the Whispering Tomb, encountered a band of barbarians (which the party expected would be there), were attacked, and fled. 

Surprisingly, Haymond, of all people, once he awoke, managed to pass both his Intelligence and Wisdom checks. He didn't know any orcish, but he connected with what they were saying on some level, and was able to more or less confirm the rest of the party's interpretation of things, and also concluded that the orcs were not likely to attack the party.

There was some debate about sharing their fire with the orcs, but Ash, Karven, and Yinvalur (the dwarf and two elves) noticed that some among the orcs were eyeing them with sinister intent, and decided against it. The party exchanged respectful but wary pleasantries, and the orcs went on their way.

The Whispering Tomb

The rest of the night passed uneventfully, and the next day, the party reached the ruin without further incident. Immediately, once they were in the tomb's vicinity, they could hear cloying whispers in their mind.

For this dungeon, I'm using Dyson Logos's Black Skulls Tomb.

As the party approached the tomb, they spotted a humanoid figure with a horned helm watching them. Before they could get close, the figure disappeared into the hillside (on the map, the figure was in front of the northern entrance to the tomb - the crumbling stairway descending down).

Karven successfully snuck over to the entrance into which the figure had disappeared. In the room below, he spotted a group of ten barbarians, who looked like they were preparing for a fight. He informed the rest of the group, and they decided to avoid the barbarians and try the other entrance.

The other entrance had an unadorned stone slab for a door, flanked by a semicircle of four standing stones. Karven saw no means of opening the door, and began to search the area. He found that each standing stone had a lever on the back side of it. After some experimentation, the party concluded that they needed to pull all four levers at once, and the door opened.

The room beyond was carved with frescoes depicting barbarians in battle with humanoid and monstrous enemies. Among the frescoes were carvings of screaming barbarian heads, their mouths a yawning void. In the center of the room was an arrow-riddled human corpse on the floor.

The party correctly concluded that the room was trapped, but neither Karven nor his thief follower, Sheyla, could find the source of the trap. Bernhardt tried rolling a barrel of pickled fish across the floor to no effect. Karven carefully removed the corpse from its place on the floor and found that doing so reset a pressure plate. Concluding that this was the source of the trap, Karven pointed it out to the rest of the party and they navigated around it.

Opening the door at the far side of the room, the party was met with a trio of glowering barbarians. Sheyla, who had been told to stay back and watch for enemies coming up on the party's rear, let out a whistle as the remaining seven barbarians emerged from the ruin's other entrance to cut off the party's escape. In seconds, they were surrounded.

The barbarians' leader, Niclaus, accused the party of coming to despoil his ancestors' resting place and plunder their grave goods. The barbarians looked maddened and ready to attack (their reaction was unfriendly). The party did their best to convince Niclaus that this was not the case, and that they intended to remove the bones of someone who was not of the barbarians' tribe, in order to put an angry spirit to rest.

In order to placate them, Bernhardt offered to prepare the barbarians and wholesome meal of pickled fish, rice, herbs, and cheese. The barbarians, who had been living in a ruin drinking old grog and eating desert food like reptiles and bugs, were uncertain, but intrigued by the offer (I rolled an indifferent/neutral reaction). They would tentatively indulge in the party's food, but they would watch Bernhardt to ensure he did not poison them, and if they weren't satisfied, they would settle the issue with trial by combat.

At 3rd-level, Bernhardt took the cooking proficiency, which allows him to prepare "a truly magnificent meal worthy of a master chef". He put that to use here. The barbarians indulged, and the savory meal sobered them somewhat. They would allow the party to proceed, but would be waiting when they emerged from the tomb, to make sure they didn't take anything they weren't supposed to. 

Niclaus suggested that what they were looking for was probably in the secret vaults in the depths of the tomb - that's where the outsider entity made its lair ages ago, before Niclaus was born. He took them to the tomb's other entrance (the room where the barbarians had originally been), where the skeleton of a barbarian king sat upon a throne. Under the skeleton's hand was a switch, which opened the secret door in the middle of the stairway connecting the two entrance rooms. With the secret door opened, the party proceeded cautiously inside.

There, they found a grotesque scene - the room had been modified to suit some alien or monstrous entity. The air was musty and damp, a mist floated above the floor, and the floor, walls, and ceiling had been covered with a papery, slimy crust (think like a wasp nest or a xenomorph's lair). In the middle of the north wall was another featureless stone slab - a "secret" door (not really "secret", but with no discernable way of opening it).

When the party approached the door, the whispers began to intensify. Ash and Haymond both tried to push the door open. The whispers reached a deafening crescendo. Haymond had to make a saving throw and failed, taking psychic damage and recoiling from the door. Ash, being an elf, had a 90% chance to be unaffected by the psychic effect. He centered himself and blocked out the whispers, felt a psychic connection with the door, and willed it to open.

Beyond, the party found a skeleton hung from the ceiling with iron shackles. The skeleton wore a helmet on its head which looked like an alien device, with an array of lights, widgets, and doodads. At the skeleton's feet was a pile of gold coins, gems, and potions. 

The party concluded that this was the body they were looking for, and thought better of touching any of the treasure. Bernhardt said a prayer and laid out a fine cloth on the floor. Karven worked on carefully freeing the skeleton and gently laid it down on the cloth. Bernhardt bundled the skeleton in the cloth, and the party turned to leave the room.

As they exited, the whispers intensified again. The mist along the floor and shadows in the corners began to coalesce into spectral figures. The whispers finally became coherent, and made an accusation of the party: "Madness! Thieves! You have come to steal my knowledge! My secrets! You will die like the rest!"

This is where we ended the session. Ash reached 3rd-level this session. He gets a THAC0 improvement, more hit points, a weapon proficiency, and nonweapon proficiency, and improved saving throws.

Next session, the party will have to make a run for it, try to placate the angry spirit, or stand and fight. If they make it out alive, they'll return the bones to Reinald in Spiritbrook and complete the quest. Then, they'll be on their way on a long journey south.

On Being the Player I'd Want in My Game

I recently started playing in a new D&D 5e campaign, which is being DMed by one of the players in my ongoing AD&D 2e campaign. Most of my blog ideas come from being a DM, so this got me thinking about what I could write as the result of being a player.

I enjoy being a player, but I'm primarily a DM because I truly love DMing. Prep is an enjoyable solo game for me. I like the process of meticulously detailing things and the resulting feeling that I have everything figured out well ahead of the players interacting with it, meaning that I can confidently adjudicate my sessions.

Most of the time when I'm a player, the DM is not that style of DM. They might not have the same attention to detail, grasp of the rules, or sensibilities when it comes to making rulings. This can lead to disappointment, or a feeling that I could "do it better". I recognize this as a problematic attitude to have as a player, and try to keep in mind that the DM is doing what works for them, and that my DMing style is for my games. The DM is giving me the opportunity to play, so I have to make the most of it.

So, I try to be the best player I can be. I try to be the player I'd want in my game. What does that look like?

Be An Adventurer

This is probably the most obvious one, but it's a problem I've encountered more times than I'd like as a DM. The player character is a merchant, or a politician, or a farmer. They expect to start the campaign in a tavern, or a caravan, or on a ship, and for the adventure to somehow happen to them.

Professions and backgrounds are all well and good, but first and foremost, I want my players to make characters that are primarily adventurers - people who, for one reason or another, are willing and eager to trek across the wilderness, go into a dark hole, and potentially be disintegrated, eaten, or hacked to pieces by monsters, spells, and traps. 

It can be for gold, for Good, or simply an unshakeable death wish, but the player characters should want to band together with a weird group of misfits and go risk dying in a hole.

So, my characters are always adventurers. They might also be an outlander on a coming-of-age quest required by their clan, or a sage cataloguing monsters and antiquity sites, or an urchin trying to earn enough money to finally own a home, but their principle motivation is to go out and adventure to achieve those other goals. Along the way, they usually find that they like adventuring for some reason, and once they start, they just can't stop.

Take Risks

This is related to being an adventurer, but slightly more specific. It makes sense that players are conservative in the face of danger - they spent a lot of time making and playing a character, and they don't want that character to die and need to be replaced. They don't want to spend all that time acquiring magic items and social capital all over again. "Surviving" feels a lot like "winning".

My players often don't want to interact with mysterious altars, obelisks, and plinths. They avoid certain monsters by reputation, don't trust unsavory NPCs, and do their best in general to avoid trouble unless it stands in the way of their goals. These are all aspects of "good" play, but I'll admit that as a DM I'm always a little disappointed when the players decide not to interact with some nefarious element of the game which I've deviously concocted for them, not because they've concluded that it's dangerous necessarily, but simply because they're afraid of what might happen.

As a player, I try to be the devil on my fellow players' shoulders, convincing them that surely, this obviously bad idea isn't that bad. My player characters jump at the chance to try on cursed rings, make bald-faced lies to NPCs that will clearly come back to bite them, and open doors they shouldn't.

Sometimes, this works in our favor. In a past campaign, we had a random encounter with a chimera at 1st-level. My fellow players wanted to run in the opposite direction, but based on the distance at which the chimera was encountered, the size of our party, and certain spells I had prepared, I was confident we could take it. If not, dying seemed like a better story than running away.

We ended up killing the chimera, and obviously, I still remember that encounter to this day. A few sessions later, my character picked a fight with an evil high-level knight. He killed my character, and his evil sword raised my character as a zombie, bound to do his bidding. Win some, lose some. It was an opportunity to make another character, which as a DM primarily, I'm always eager to do.

Have a Plan, Have Intentions

I'm always asking my players what they want to do. I don't wait for them to tell me - I ask. "So and so is looking for secret doors. So and so is searching for traps. What are you doing while they do that?" Sometimes, the answer is, "I'm waiting until they do the thing they're doing," and that's fine! The important thing is everyone had a chance to do something. 

Ideally, the DM will go around the table and give everyone a chance for input, but as I said before, this isn't always the DM's style. Sometimes, I have to chime in: "While they're doing that, I'm doing this." I'm always thinking about what I want to do while listening to what everyone else is doing. I'm trying to come up with a way to get in on that or contribute in some other way.

More than just having a plan as to what I want to do, this is about knowing why I'm doing it. I don't say "I search the room," I say "I'm searching the desk for the wizard's spellbook," or "I'm searching the room for signs that monsters have been here." I don't say "I want to roll Charisma (Persuasion)," I say "My character says 'blah blah blah'. I want to try to convince the goblins that attacking us is a bad idea because our wizard knows a death spell."

This goes for combat, as well. Part of the reason combat takes so long is because players often have no idea what they're doing when their turn comes around. I never want to be that player. I'm thinking about my turn while listening as everyone else takes theirs. I have an idea of what I want to do in an ideal situation when my turn comes around, as well as a backup plan in case my target moves out of range or is killed, and another backup plan in case a fellow player character is wounded or needs an assist.

Intentions are important in combat, too. I keep in mind whether I want to kill the monster, subdue it, distract it, or convince it to run away. Communicating my intentions as clearly as possible allows the DM to adjudicate my actions more quickly and easily, and in a way I find satisfying, because I'm not being surprised by a "gotcha - you said you were doing this, but you weren't specific enough, so this unintended thing is how I'm going to interpret your words".

Rope Other Players In

As a DM, I find it enjoyable when players have motivations that are at odds with one another, and delight in moments when they split the party to pursue their own objectives. As a player, I find it boring when myself and many others are sidelined while the DM interacts with just a single player for a long time.

As a player, I do my best to include others in my schemes. If my rogue is sneaking off to scout the dungeon, I ask if anyone can come along via an invisibility or pass without trace spell. Maybe the wizard can send their familiar with my character. Maybe the fighter can follow a bit behind my character, far enough to not alert potential enemies, but close enough that they can assist my character if they're attacked.

If my character needs to do some research, they ask the wizard to help them find what they're looking for in the library. If my character needs to see a priest, they bring the cleric or paladin.

Sometimes, this is for no in-game benefit at all. Often, it feels like player characters don't interact unless they're making a decision or working together in combat. Players might feel that in-character interactions will only slow the game down, but sometimes slowing down makes the game more enjoyable.

As a DM, I love it when players chew up some time riffing off of each other. It makes the group feel more cohesive, gives me time to prep or think ahead, and puts the players in the headspace of their characters. A DM can prompt their players into having interactions like this, but that sometimes feels forced. I enjoy it much more when the players take the initiative.

If the party is staying in a tavern, my character will try to find another character to bunk with, and I'll devise some way to share little details about my character and tease details about the other player's character out of them during our little slumber party. If we're on a journey, I'll roll a die and strike up a conversation with a randomly-determined character, ask them how they feel about this wretched swamp we're trekking through, and oh, maybe they'd be so kind at to let my little halfling ride on their character's shoulders?

Be the Encyclopedia, but Only if Someone Chooses to Reference You

As someone who runs a lot of games and knows a lot about the game's rules, it can sometimes be frustrating when players don't know how their characters work or when the DM gets a rule "wrong", isn't aware that a rule exists or doesn't use it, or makes a different ruling than I would make. 

However, I know how annoying it can be as a DM to be interrupted by players. Sometimes it is helpful, such as when I'm genuinely unsure or mistaken about something, but often, I have my own ideas about how something "should" work, and am bringing that perspective to my style of adjudication. I know the rules, I've made a ruling - I don't want to spend 20 minutes arguing about it.

As a player, I resist the urge to "Well, actually..." other players and the DM during the game. I don't think it's my place to correct other players, and it certainly isn't my place to correct the DM. However, since I often play with the same people for whom I DM, my DM and fellow players know that I have a near-encyclopedic knowledge of the rules (particularly 5e, but also, to a lesser extent, AD&D 2e, 1e, and OD&D, in that order). Often, the DM will ask me, "Is there a rule for this?" or "What's your ruling in this situation?" In that case, I'm happy to share my input.

As a general guideline, I assume that the DM knows the rules, is confident in their rulings, and is going off-book on purpose when they do so. If the players make a mistake, it's the DM's job to catch it, unless they specifically ask a player to assist them in being a rules adjudicator, which is sometimes the case, and often a good idea. 

It's not my place to point out that attacks made with lances have disadvantage when the target is within 5 feet of the attacker, or to go on a diatribe about the mechanics for firing missile weapons into a melee. If the DM asks me if I know, or seems unaware and disappointed that there isn't a rule for something (that they know of), or is struggling with a ruling, then I know I can contribute.

Arguing about rules often slows the game down, but being able to confidently and concisely clarify them, when appropriate, can often speed things up.

The Other Side of the Screen

That's all I've got for now, but I may post more of these as new topics occur to me in play - sort of the opposite of my regular play reports, which are from the DM perspective. These posts, by comparison, will consist of my reflections as a player: things I enjoy doing as a player, things I don't, things other players did that I liked, things I want to see from my players - that kind of stuff. Hopefully, it's illuminating in some way.

Character Progression and Tiers of Play in AD&D 2e

Greetings from Mexico! I'm not in Mexico at the time of writing this, but will be when this post is published. I am communicating from the past, anticipating the future.

Anticipating the future is some part of the reason for this post. My AD&D 2e game is going smoothly - though we will miss playing this coming week, and my play report for this past week will have to wait until I return from Mexico - did I mention I'm going to Mexico? 

As a way of looking towards the future, I thought it would be fun to look at the different character classes in 2e and how their abilities progress as they gain levels. 

Level progression in 2e is much different than in modern D&D. Every class in D&D 5e, for example, gains a little something on a level up - a class or subclass feature, spells and/or spell slots, ability score improvements and feats, and the like. Nonetheless, there continues to be much consternation in the 5e community over "dead levels". What do you mean my 15th-level monk only never again has to eat or drink, or worry about magical aging? Boooring!

By comparison, I think most modern players would find 2e's level advancement "boring" - some classes gain access to new spell levels or other magical and pseudo-magical abilities at certain levels, but for the most part a character's numbers are just going up or down occasionally. 

I love how different every class feels in AD&D, compared to the standardization approach used in modern D&D. The classes don't feel "equal", and they're not supposed to - the thief advances through levels faster than every other class because it's less powerful than every other class, just as the paladin and ranger advance slower than the fighter because they're more powerful than the fighter. Designing classes this way isn't for everyone, but the asymmetry is more interesting to me.

Another reason I wanted to look at this is because I really like 5e's approach to "tiers of play" - levels 1-4 are Tier 1, levels 5-10 are Tier 2, levels 11-16 are Tier 3, and levels 17+ are Tier 4. The level of the player characters determines what sorts of people approach them and what sorts of problems they should be solving. This is a really useful framework for the DM to have in mind when running a game in which it feels like the PCs' reputation and the stakes of their escapades are increasing along with the PCs' level.

The levels associated with each tier are not arbitrary - at 5th-level, spellcasters can cast 3rd-level spells (fireball, lightning bolt, revivify!), and non-spellcasters increase their damage output via extra attacks. At 11th-level, 6th-level spells come into play (chain lightning, mass suggestion, sunbeam!), most non-spellcasters get another damage uptick, barbarians can rage against death, and rogues become reliable good at all the things they're already really good at. At 17th-level, spellcasters gain 9th-level spells (power word kill, timestop, wish!), and most other classes get another damage boost.

When I started to revisit 2e in preparation to run my current campaign, I noticed that the Monstrous Manual, in the human section, under adventurers (page 196) similarly breaks adventurers into four groups based on their level! "Low level" adventurers are levels 1-3, "medium level" adventurers are levels 4-7, "high level" adventurers are levels 7-12, and "very high level" adventurers are levels 9-20. Are these the hidden "tiers of play" baked into 2e? Does the game fundamentally change at levels 4, 7, and 9?

Let's find out.

Fighter (PHB, pages 36-38)

Fighters are of the warrior group, which also includes paladins and rangers. A warrior's THAC0 improves by one at every level (page 121), their saving throws improve at every odd-numbered level (maxing out at 17th-level, page 134), and they gain a weapon proficiency and nonweapon proficiency at each level divisible by three (page 71).

Warriors also gain additional melee attacks depending on their level, beginning at 7th-level:

Warrior Level    Melee Attacks/Round
1-6                       1/round
7-12                     3/2 rounds
13+                      2/round

Fighters who specialize in a weapon (page 73) gain additional attacks at these levels (3/2 rounds at levels 1-6, 2/round at levels 7-12, and 5/2 rounds at levels 13+). They are the only class that can specialize in this way - not even paladins and rangers can do it.

At 9th-level, fighters attract loyal men-at-arms and an elite bodyguard, if the fighter has built a stronghold, which they can do at any time, so long as they have the money and land to do so.

Beyond 9th-level, warriors stop gaining additional hit dice and bonus hit points from Constitution - instead, they gain 3 hit points per level thereafter.

Paladin (pages 38-40)

Paladins are in the warrior group, so they have the same hit die, THAC0, attacks per round, saving throw, and proficiency progression as fighters. 

On top of the usual progression from being warriors, paladins get additional benefits at certain levels.

Paladins can heal two additional hit points using their lay on hands ability each time they gain a level. 

Paladins with a holy sword (which I take to mean a holy avenger or similarly potent, paladin-specific magic weapon) can dispel hostile magic in a 10-foot radius equal to their experience level, so if the paladin has a holy sword, their ability to dispel magic improves with each level, up to 9th-level (unless the "level" of the spell in this case is determined by the level of the caster - the PHB is not clear on this point). 

Paladins can turn undead as if they were a priest two levels lower starting at 3rd-level, so their turning ability improves each level after this.

A paladin can go on a quest to acquire a "war horse" (a faithful steed that needn't actually be a horse) anytime from 4th-level onward.

A paladin can also cure diseases once per week for every five levels of experience, meaning they gain an additional use at levels 6, 11, and 16.

Finally, a paladin can cast priest spells once they reach 9th-level. They use their own spell progression, distinct from that of other priests, such as clerics and druids. They gain 2nd-level slots at 11th-level, 3rd-level slots at 13th-level, and 4th-level slots at 15th-level. They max out at a spellcasting level of 9 at 17th-level.

Paladins do not automatically attract followers as a fighter does.

Ranger (pages 40-42)

Rangers, again, are members of the warrior group, so they have a progression similar to fighters and paladins.

Rangers have a thief-like ability to move silently and hide in shadows (depending on the armor they wear, and with a worse chance to do so in non-wilderness environments). Unlike the thief, they don't earn and spend points to improve these abilities. Instead, the abilities improve by a fixed amount at each level. Hide in shadows improves by 5% at levels 2-4, 6% at levels 5-8, 7% at levels 9-12, 8% at levels 13 and 14, and maxes out at 99% at 15th-level (a 6% improvement). Move silently improves by 6% at levels 2-4, 7% at levels 5-6, 8% at level 7, 7% again at level 8, 8% again at levels 9-12, and maxes out at 99% at level 13 (a 5% improvement).

Rangers are automatically proficient in tracking (page 86) - even if the optional proficiency rules are not used! At every level divisible by three (levels 3, 6, 9, 12, 15, and 18), the ranger gains a +1 to their tracking ability checks.

Rangers can manipulate the reaction rolls of wild and hostile animals in either direction (i.e., the ranger can choose to make the animal more friendly or more hostile). The animal must make a saving throw versus rods (for some reason!), and receives a -1 penalty to the saving throw for every three levels of the ranger. So, the ranger's ability to influence animals improves at levels 4, 7, 10, 13, 16, and 19.

Rangers can cast priest spells from the animal and plant spheres (so druid spells, sort of) beginning at 8th-level. Like paladins, they use their own spell progression, gaining 2nd-level spell slots at 10th-level, and 3rd-level spell slots at 12th-level. I don't know why they get to cast spells before paladins but, unlike paladins, don't get 4th-level spells. Like paladins, they max out at a spellcasting level of 9, but do so at 16th-level instead of 17th.

Finally, at 10th-level, rangers attract followers. Unlike fighters, they don't need a stronghold to do so. Also unlike fighters, the followers they attract are buck wild - animals, adventurers, fey creatures, lycanthropes, treants, and more! Table 19 in the PHB is seriously worth a look.

Wizard (pages 42-47)

The wizard group consists of generalist mages and specialists. The two classes don't have any progression-specific distinctions (specialists are just mages with a more narrow focus - they are better at casting, learning, researching, and resisting spells from their chosen school of magic, and don't have access to spells from their "schools of opposition", all of which makes them feel thematically distinct and unique in comparison to their modern D&D counterparts). For this post, I'll simply refer to both mages and specialists as wizards.

Wizards gain a nonweapon proficiency at each level divisible by three, their THAC0 improves by one at every third level gained (4th, 7th, 10th, etc.), their saving throws improve at every fifth level gained (6th, 11th, 16th, etc.), and they gain a weapon proficiency at each level divisible by six.

The wizard's main form of progression is the acquisition of higher-level spells. They can cast 2nd-level spells at 3rd-level, 3rd-level spells at 5th-level, 4th-level spells at 7th-level, 5th-level spells at 9th-level, 6th-level spells at 12th-level, 7th-level spells at 14th-level, 8th-level spells at 16th-level, and 9th-level spells at 18th-level. In short, they gain access to a new level of spells every other time they gain a level, except at 11th-level - maybe because 6th-level spells are considered significantly more powerful than 5th-level spells?

At 9th-level, wizards can create spell scrolls and brew magic potions - spell scrolls require special quills and inks, as well as the wizard's knowledge of the spell being scribed, and potions require expensive laboratories (DMG, pages 118-120).

Unlike warriors, wizards continue to gain hit dice and bonus hit points from Constitution up to and including 10th-level. After 10th-level, wizards gain 1 hit point per level.

At 11th-level, wizards can create magic items besides scrolls and potions (DMG, pages 120-122). Like making scrolls and potions, this requires expensive materials and knowledge of specific spells - enchant an item (a 6th-level spell, meaning the wizard must be at least 12th-level), permanency (an 8th-level spell, meaning the wizard must be 16th-level), and any spells which are relevant to the item being created (lightning bolt if the wizard is creating a wand of lightning, for example). 

It stands out as strange that a wizard can allegedly create magic items at 11th-level, but can't know the enchant an item spell necessary to actually do so until 12th-level.

Cleric (PHB, pages 47-51)

Clerics are in the priest group, which also includes druids. Priests gain a nonweapon proficiency at every level divisible by three, their THAC0 improves by two at every third level gained (4th, 7th, 10th, etc.), and their saving throws improve at those levels as well. They gain a weapon proficiency at every level divisible by four.

Like wizards, the priest's main form of progression is by gaining access to higher level spells. Also like wizards, they can cast 2nd-level spells at 3rd-level, 3rd-level spells at 5th-level, 7th-level spells at 4th-level, and 5th-level spells at 9th-level. Unlike wizards, they can cast 6th-level spells at 11th-level. Like wizards once again, they can cast 7th-level spells (their most powerful spells) at 14th-level. 

They end up with many more spells than wizards overall - 49 total slots versus the wizard's 37, and they gain additional spell slots for having a high Wisdom score, which is not true for wizards with regards to Intelligence.

Clerics have the ability to turn undead, which improves at every level, allowing the cleric to turn stronger undead over time, and to automatically turn or destroy weaker undead.

Like the wizard, clerics can create spell scrolls, potions, and magic items. Unlike the wizard, they can make spell scrolls beginning at 7th-level (DMG, page 117). Like the wizard, they must wait until 9th-level to make potions, and until 11th-level to make other magical items. Unlike the wizard, they need only a sacred altar to create these items (no expensive laboratory or specific spells, pages 120-121), so they can start creating these items immediately once they reach the requisite level.

At 8th-level, the cleric attracts loyal followers, like the fighter. Also like the fighter, the cleric does not attract followers until they have built a stronghold, which they can do at any time, if they have the means to do so.

At 9th-level, the cleric can receive approval from their church to build a sanctioned stronghold, which costs half as much as building a stronghold without the church's approval.

Like warriors, priests stop gaining hit dice and bonus hit points from Constitution after 9th-level. From 10th-level onward, they gain 2 hit points per level.

Druid (PHB, pages 51-53)

Druids are in the priest group, so they use the same hit die, proficiency, saving throw, and THAC0 progression as clerics.

3rd-level is loaded for druids. At that time, they can identify plants, animals, and pure water with perfect accuracy, can pass through overgrown areas without leaving a trail and at their normal movement rate, and begin learning the languages of woodland creatures ("centaurs, dryads, elves, fauns, gnomes, dragons, giants, lizard men, manticores, nixies, pixies, sprites, and treants"). The druid learns one of these languages at 3rd-level, and another every time they gain a level thereafter.

7th-level is also loaded. The druid becomes immune to charm spells cast by woodland creatures and gains the ability to shapechange into a reptile, bird, or mammal up to three times per day.

At 12th-level, the druid's advancement becomes very weird. To actually reach 12th-level, the druid must defeat one of nine 12th-level druids in the region in magical or hand-to-hand combat in order to gain the official title of "druid". The druid then receives three druid initiates as followers. The level of these followers is determined by the druid's XP total in comparison to the other eight druids in the region - the least experienced of the nine receives 1st-level initiates, the next most experienced receives 2nd-level initiates, and so on, up to the most experienced druid, who receives 9th-level initiates.

To reach 13th-level the druid must defeat one of three archdruids in the region, and receives three initiates of 10th-level for doing so. To reach 14th-level, the druid must defeat the sole Great Druid in the region, and receives three initiates of 11th-level for doing so.

To reach 15th-level, the druid must be chosen as the successor to the sole Grand Druid in the entire world (the position cannot be won through combat). Their spell progression completely changes at this point - the Grand Druid has six spells of each level and can cast six additional spell levels per day (one 6th-level spell, or two 3rd-level spells, or three 2nd-level spells, etc.). The Grand Druid is served by nine druids, three of them 13th-level archdruids, and the remaining six typically levels 7 to 11.

The Grand Druid reaches 16th-level after only 500,000 XP are gained (compared to 1.5 million to go from 14th- to 15th-level). The Grand Druid loses all but 1 XP and begins advancing anew - this symbolizes the Grand Druid stepping down. They are now a hierophant druid, and require just 500,000 XP each to reach levels 17-20.

At 16th-level, the hierophant druid becomes immune to natural poisons, no longer suffers ability score penalties due to aging, and can alter their appearance at will.

At 17th-level, the hierophant druid gains the ability to hibernate, and can travel to the Elemental Plane of Earth and back to the Prime Material Plane at will, and gains the means to survive in the Plane of Earth.

At levels 18-20, the hierophant gains the ability to travel to and from and survive on the Elemental Planes of Fire, Water, and Air, respectively.

Thief (pages 54-58)

Thieves are part of the rogue group, which also includes bards. Rogues gain a THAC0 improvement of one at every odd-numbered level, a weapon and nonweapon proficiency at every level divisible by four, and saving throw improvements at every fourth level gained (5th, 9th, 13th, etc.).

At every level after 1st-level, thieves gain 30 percentage points to distribute among their thieving skills, with the caveat that no skill can exceed 95% (meaning that rangers at the highest levels are actually slightly better at hiding in shadows and moving silently in natural surroundings, since their skills cap at 99%).

A thief's chance of being noticed when picking someone's pocket can also be affected by the thief's level, relative to the target's, so to some extent the thief's chance not to get caught picking pockets improves with every level:

If the DM wishes, he can rule that a thief of higher level than his victim is less likely to be caught pilfering. The chance that the victim notices the attempt can be modified by subtracting the victim's level from the thief's level, and then adding this number to the percentage chance the thief is detected. For example, Ragnar, a 15th-level thief, tries to pick the pocket of Horace, a 9th-level fighter. Normally, Ragnar would be detected if his pick pockets roll was 73 or more (100-[3×9]=73). Using this optional system, since Ragnar is six levels higher than Horace, this number is increased by six to 79 (73+6=79). This option only applies if the thief is higher level than his victim.

At 4th-level, the thief can begin spending thieving skill points on the read languages skill, which gives the thief a chance to read any nonmagical writing.

The thief's damage multiplier when backstabbing improves by one at every fourth level gained, up to x5 at 13th-level.

At 10th-level, the thief can cast wizard and priest spells from scrolls, with a 25% chance of failure.

Also at 10th-level, the thief attracts followers in the form of other single- and multiclassed thieves. Like the ranger, and unlike the fighter and cleric, they do not need a stronghold to do so.

Like wizards, rogues continue gaining hit dice and bonus hit points from Constitution through 10th-level. After 10th-level, they gain 2 hit points per level.

Bard (pages 58-61)

The bard is part of the rogue group, so bards use the same hit die, proficiency, saving throw, and THAC0 progression as thieves.

The bard has a selection of abilities similar to those of the thief, but they are limited to climb walls, detect noise, pick pockets, and read languages. The bard can distribute 15 percentage points among these skills whenever they gain a level.

The bard can perform to inspire allies, improving their attack rolls, saving throws, or morale. The range of this ability improves by 10 feet per level gained, and the duration improves by one round per level gained.

The bard can attempt to identify magic items with a base chance of success of 5% at 1st-level. The chance of success improves by an additional 5% for each level gained.

The bard can cast wizard spells up to 6th-level. They gain 1st-level spell slots at 2nd-level, 2nd-level slots at 4th-level, 3rd-level slots at 7th-level, 4th-level slots at 10th-level, 5th-level slots at 13th-level, and 6th-level slots at 16th-level.

Like the ranger with animals, bards can use performance to influence the reactions of NPCs by one category in a direction of the bard's choosing. NPCs must save vs paralyzation (not rods, as with the ranger) to resist the effect. NPCs receive a -1 to their saving throw for every three levels of the bard, so the bard's ability to influence NPCs improves by one at every third level gained (4th, 7th, 10th, etc.).

Like the fighter and cleric, the bard attracts followers at 9th-level, but only if the bard has a stronghold.

At 10th-level, the bard can attempt to use magic items of written nature, such as scrolls and books, with a 15% chance of failure.

AD&D 2e's Tiers of Play

So, is there anything to this idea that AD&D 2e has secret "tiers of play" starting at or around 4th-, 7th-, and 9th-level? Let's summarize. I'm going to ignore hit dice, proficiency, saving throw, and THAC0 advancements, since they happen fairly often, and focus instead on the "flashy" abilities which seem most significant.

• 3rd-level: Paladins can turn undead, and druids can identify plants, animals, and pure water, pass through overgrown areas, and speak the languages of woodland creatures.
• 4th-level: Paladins can acquire a "war horse", and thieves can read languages.
• 7th-level: Warriors gain an extra attack (3/2 rounds or 2/round for specialists), clerics can create priest scrolls, and druids become immune to charm spells cast by woodland creatures and can shapechange.
• 8th-level: Rangers can cast priest spells, and clerics can attract followers.
• 9th-level: Fighters can attract followers, paladins can cast priest spells, wizards can create wizard scrolls and potions, clerics can create potions and can receive approval to build a sanctioned stronghold, and bards can attract followers.
• 10th-level: Rangers can attract followers, thieves can attempt to cast spells from wizard and priest scrolls and attract followers, and bards can attempt to use magic items of a written nature.
• 11th-level: Wizards and clerics can create more powerful magic items.
• 12th-level: Druids begin advancing through the druid hierarchy and gain initiate followers.
• 13th-level: Warriors gain an extra attack (2/round or 5/2 rounds for specialists).

Looking at the list above, it seems clear to me that (excluding extra attacks for warriors and a smattering of special abilities gained by paladins, druids, and thieves) there's really only two "tiers", distinguished by - and this should be pretty obvious to anyone familiar with old-school D&D - whether the characters have strongholds and followers, or can create magic items. This begins as early at 7th-level for clerics and as late as 10th-level for rangers and thieves, making 8th- or 9th-level a decent sweet spot.

I suspected as much when I set out to write this post, but thought it'd be fun to go through the process anyway. Sometimes you have a hunch and go digging in the text for evidence supporting that hunch, and the evidence isn't there. This is normal and good, and the process is often still illuminating.

Although the only substantial and somewhat-universal break in power seems to be around 8th- or 9th-level, I still really like the idea of breaking up the earlier levels into levels 1-3 and 4-9, at least, and will probably continue to keep those distinctions in mind when running my 2e game. For example, larger settlements are more likely to have higher-level adventurers as NPCs, and adventure locations further away from settlements are more likely to be designed with higher-level player characters in mind.

As I continue to run my AD&D game, it might become apparent that there are significant leaps in player character power and abilities at certain levels, which aren't immediately identifiable just by looking at character progression on paper. I'll keep all this in mind and update this post if I discover anything significant.

AD&D 2e Monsters By Dungeon Level

I didn't have a big post prepared for today, and might not for a while (I'm going to Mexico next week!), but felt the need to share something on a Friday. 

For my AD&D 2e game, I wanted to create a list of monsters in the Monstrous Manual sorted by "level" (or more accurately, dungeon level). 

When I'm designing a dungeon, I usually have an idea as to what level the PCs "should" be when they attempt the dungeon. I make a note as to whether the dungeon is 1st-level, 2nd-level, 3rd-level etc. 

When placing monsters in the dungeon, I refer to AD&D 1e's DUNGEON RANDOM MONSTER LEVLE DETERMINATION MATRIX, below (page 174):

Click to embiggen. 

So, a 1st-level dungeon can have monsters which are appropriate for levels 1, 2, or 3, and so on. Why don't I use the version of this table from 2e? Well, because there isn't one, for some reason.

At this point, I could simply use 1e's DUNGEON RANDOM MONSTER TABLES to populate my 1st-level dungeons with 1d4 giant ants, 1d4 badgers, 1d4 fire beetles, and the like. The problem is that these tables are far from comprehensive (and I demand comprehensiveness), and they're also not totally compatible with AD&D 2e. There are plenty of monsters in AD&D 2e which aren't in 1e, and a few from 1e which are more or less powerful in 2e (I'll get to that in a minute).

2e, as far as I can tell, doesn't have DUNGEON RANDOM MONSTER TABLES of its own (again, for some reason). Instead, on page 135 of the DMG, it has Table 55: Dungeon Level, which lists the XP ranges of creatures and their corresponding "level". A 1st-level creature is worth 1-20 XP, a 2nd-level creature is worth 21-50 XP, and so on, all the way up to 10th-level creatures, which are worth 10,001+ XP. 

So, using this table, I went through the whole 2e Monstrous Manual and sorted all the monsters into the level 1-10 categories as laid out by Table 55. The result is here. 

The work was arduous. Many times I pushed back from my desk and held my head in my hands and asked myself what I was doing, namely when I got to the dragons, or the fish, or the humans, or the insects, or the giants, or the mammals, or the whales...

But I powered through it, for some reason. Now, when I use 1e's DUNGEON RANDOM MONSTER LEVEL DETERMINATION MATRIX  to determine what level the monster should be, I can use my own reference document to find an appropriate monster according to 2e.

If someone has done this already, please don't tell me. I looked for a really long time, asked around, got many completely unhelpful answers and spreadsheets with way too much information, and finally just decided to do it myself. Don't tell me if all that work was in vain.

It was validating, sort of. I suspected that the DUNGEON RANDOM MONSTER TABLES from 1e weren't 1:1 compatible with 2e, and I was right, in my opinion. 

Halflings, hobgoblins, and piercers (1st-level in 1e, with 9-16, 2-8, and 1-3 appearing, respectively) are 2nd-level in 2e (35 XP). Assuming a party of 6-10 1st-level PCs with henchmen and hirelings, I'd probably only include 3-5 of any of these creatures in a 1st-level 2e dungeon (so the hobgoblin and piercer numbers are pretty close, admittedly).

The weakest dwarf in 2e, the hill dwarf, (1st-level in 1e, with 4-14 appearing) is a 3rd-level creature in 2e (175 XP). I'd probably only include 2-3 hill dwarfs in a 1st-level 2e dungeon. Gnomes, skeletons, and zombies are similarly 3rd-level in 2e (65-120 XP), but the skeletons and zombies in 1e at least appear in groups of 1-4 or 1-3, respectively, which is very close.

Elves are also 1st-level creatures in 1e, with 3-11 appearing. In 2e, the weakest elf (regular or aquatic) is a 5th-level creature (420 XP)! I probably wouldn't include an elf at all if I was designing a dungeon for 1st-level 2e characters.

There are some drawbacks to the tables I'm using. The only really interesting 1st-level creatures are goblins, gremlins, humans, kobolds, orcs, and giant rats. The early dungeons are kind of same-y as a result, but they can be spiced up with the occasional 2nd- or 3rd-level monster. My players are already past 1st-level, and almost at 3rd-level, so the options have already opened up, allowing me to use up to 5th-level monsters, which is really where the juice is (carrion crawlers, dopplegangers, gargoyles, hellhounds, werewolves, ogres, owlbears, shadows, etc.).

The fact that monsters above 10,000 XP are all categorized simply as 10th-level is a bit of a letdown. I can't imagine an 8th-level party (which is when 10th-level monsters can theoretically start showing up) will be equally capable of handling an Age 6 white dragon as well as an Age 12 red dragon, or a 72 HD leviathan whale, but I know that the power scaling of characters in 2e (and especially spellcasters) is much steeper than in modern D&D, so we'll see what happens.

Overall, that's why I'm playing 2e, and trying to play in as systematized a way as possible (which is why I'm looping in resources from 1e as much as possible - 2e seems to be the dawn of the "just figure it out" school of DM advice, whereas 1e is more concrete and instructional). I want to see what happens when I run the game the way I think I'm supposed to run it.

AD&D 2e Play Report: Session 5

We played the fifth session of our ongoing AD&D 2e game last night. The summary of our last session is here. To recap briefly: The party had mostly cleared out the Warlord's Tower and freed the stonemasons they'd been sent to find. They searched the rest of the tower, found the remaining cultists and their leader, and retreated to rest. The cultists attacked them in the night and the party defeated them. The party spent a day resting to regain hit points, fought some giant rats of no consequence, and looted the tower, finding a magic greatsword in the process.

We began the session with the party's journey back to Spiritbrook. The journey would take roughly three and half days, and the party would follow the river so as to avoid getting lost. They would descend forested mountains and hills and cross some farmland before arriving back in town.

More on Encounter Checks

I've written about how I check for random encounters in the past, but wanted to expand on it here. On page 138 of the AD&D 2e DMG, there's a table like this:

I think this one is actually from the 1e DMG, but I can't find an image of the 2e one online (and don't have a PDF of the 2e DMG). This table largely the same as the 2e version, except that the 2e one includes jungle, ocean, and arctic, as well as the encounter chance for each type of terrain (expressed as an X-in-10 chance).

I like using this table for two reasons:

1. The day is broken up into six four-hour windows, which is how long my wilderness travel turns are. Usually, two turns are spent traveling, two are spent making camp and foraging, and two are spent resting/keeping watch.
2. The table doesn't require a check every single turn (except in forests and marshes), which speeds things up a bit. I'm not going to claim it's "realistic", but there's some element of realism to it - the party won't encounter monsters in the desert during the hottest and coldest periods of the day, for example.

When terrain types mix (i.e. forested mountains and hills), I use the least advantageous of the terrain types, so although no encounter checks are called for in the mountains during the noon, evening, midnight, and pre-dawn turns, I still check for forest encounters if the party is traveling through forested mountains. 

When I roll an encounter, I use the result on the d10 to determine if I should use the forest (2-in-10 chance) or mountain (3-in-10 chance) encounter tables. If the result is 3, I know to use the mountain encounter table. On a result of 1 or 2, I roll d2 to determine which table to consult.

The Hanged Men

I rolled an encounter on the party's very first travel turn. I had decided ahead of time what the first encounter of the session would be. The party was just a few hours out from the tower when they found the mercenaries whose lives they had spared, riddled with arrows and strung up in the trees.

The party had no great fondness for the mercenaries, and concluded (correctly) that they had run afoul of the forest people which the party had encountered on their original ascent. The players remembered that the forest people had mistaken them for mercenaries and nearly attacked them because of it. I felt like I had done a great job of illustrating the enmity between the two groups and felt validated that my players had been paying attention. Not wanting to meet a similar fate, the party proceeded cautiously.

They didn't go far before the forest people emerged to confront them. There were ten warriors, led by a 2nd-level fighter and a 4th-level druid (one bit of information which AD&D's Monstrous Manuals included and which has been lost to time is detailed information about what types of leaders are found among large groups of monsters - I would consider this mandatory were I ever to make my own monster manual).

No image or flavor text has ever made me want to play a druid as much as this guy.

The forest people were, again, unfriendly (reaction roll: 4). They had surrounded the party, and were ready to attack. Haymond Baler, cluelessly amicable, exclaimed "Oh hey guys!" The druid stepped forward, eyeing the greatsword carried by Bernhardt Dalton. He introduced himself as Valdemar, of the Burned Earth Tribe, and suggested that the party relinquish the sword to him.

A tense negotiation followed, with the party asking questions about the sword's nature and history. The druid told them that the sword, Infamy, had been wielded by an evil tyrant in the past to slaughter their people (true), that they had been seeking it so as to prevent it from falling into the wrong hands (true), and that they planned to destroy it (false).

Rozidien Stoneskull used his ability to detect evil, detecting evil from the sword and a more subtle evil intent in the forest people (the kind of evil that resides in the hearts of most mortals). Since the druid didn't register as evil (druids are by nature True Neutral in AD&D), Rozidien was okay with handing over the sword.

There was some protest from Terris, who used a greatsword as his preferred weapon, and had no qualms about wielding an evil sword - perhaps he had already begun to fall under its sway? The party put their hireling in place, asked the forest people for information about the surrounding area (they were reminded to avoid strange lights in the woods at night, which could be signs of an evil spirit nearby), and went on their way.

Greetings, Fellow Adventurers!

The rest of the day passed without incident, and the party made camp. I rolled another random encounter on the first watch of the evening. At first I rolled something very unexpected - a sphinx. On the sphinx subtable, I rolled something very bad - a hieracosphinx, the only Chaotic Evil sphinx, and a 7th-level monster. TPK, here we come! Looking at the monster's entry in the MM (page 324), I found that it dwells only in deserts. Crisis averted.

Rerolling, I got men. On the men subtable, I rolled characters, meaning an adventuring party. The section on humans in the MM (pages 196-7) divides adventurers into low level (1-3), mid level (4-7), high level (7-12), and very high level (9-20). Rolling d100, I got a result of 98 - very high level adventurers!

Quickly referencing Appendix III: NPCs (which should be titled "NPC Parties", page 379), I quickly generated a party of four very high level adventurers with four henchmen of 3rd- to 11th-level. They were mostly elves and halflings, with four fighters, three clerics, and led by a Chaotic Good half-elf ranger. They were friendly (reaction roll: 9).

In the future, I'll probably take some time to generate a handful of adventuring parties ahead of time (one low level, one mid level, one high level, and this one, albeit more fleshed-out) for this sort of situation. Generating a party on the fly is easy enough if I just want to determine general power level and race and class composition, but takes considerably longer if I want to factor in specifics like magic items, spells, and the like.

In my last campaign, my players had a hated rival adventuring party, the Gladiators of Patience. The Gladiators betrayed and nearly TPK'd the party, and from then on the party would stop at nothing to hunt them down and kill them. For a laugh, I decided that the first party of adventurers the group encountered in this campaign would also be the Gladiators of Patience. Little did I know they would be this world's Avengers!

I decided that the Gladiators had come from Spiritbrook after hearing about some missing stonemasons and a party of inexperienced adventurers who had gone looking for them about a week ago. They were delighted to see that the party was alright and that they had rescued the masons. 

"Only...you didn't happen to find an evil sword, did you? Oh, alright then. At least you didn't run into that evil Burned Earth Tribe and give them the sword. You did? Ah well, you'll learn. Yeah, they're going to reunite the sword with the evil spirit they worship, which unbeknownst to them is actually the spirit of the evil warlord who once ruled here. If the spirit is reunited with the sword, the warlord will return to the world, and he'll bring back the Bone Lord. That's fine, we've fought the Bone Lord before. Damn Bone Lord cult. We should have gone to his divine realm and finished him when we had the chance. Don't worry about it. There's a harpy nesting at the tower? We'll take care of that too. Thanks for the tip!"

This was a delight to run. The Gladiators recognized Haymond as a farmer-turned-adventurer and told him what a great career path it was - half of them were former farmers themselves! They warned the party that the farmers near Spiritbrook must be feeding the giant toad in the river, because it followed them for some time before they gave it some food to leave them alone. They recommended always carrying a dagger in case they get swallowed by a monster, since only daggers can be used effectively when swallowed. The Gladiators have a guildhall in the city, called the Fighting Pit, which they invited the party to come visit some time. The Gladiators throw legendary parties.

Terris, hearing that the Gladiators intended to go after the sword, wanted to go with them. The party reminded him that he was still on their payroll. The Gladiators said they didn't mind if he tagged along, but didn't want to get in the middle of hireling business. 

Don't Feed the Wildlife

The following day's travel passed without incident, with Terris grumbling about how he should have gone with the Gladiators. The party heard a pack of wolves howling somewhere in the distance, but they were indifferent (reaction roll: 6) and left the party alone. The party had a similar encounter with a pack of wild dogs on their way up to the tower in our first session, so they dubbed the area "the Wolfhowl Hills".

While setting camp, the party spied a mated pair of adult owlbears with two cubs, foraging for food. The owlbears smelled the party, and started heading in their direction - the owlbears were friendly (reaction roll: 9), so similar to the brown bear the party encountered on their ascent, I decided that they were looking for food. 

The party quickly broke down their camp and made an effort to evade the owlbears, leaving some food to distract them. They made camp again somewhere far away, but still in earshot of the river so that they could find their way back.

My girlfriend gets so mad whenever I relate these encounters to her. Don't the players realize that they're teaching these dangerous animals to associate people with food?

Gumbo's Kobolds

The party was on the edge of the hills, entering into flatland forest, when they were attacked. I rolled an encounter, got 18 kobolds, and determined that they were hostile, attacking on sight (reaction roll: 3). The kobolds were 120 feet away, so at medium range with their javelins. Bernhardt and the hirelings were surprised as a cry of "Bree-yark!" erupted from the forest, and missiles rained down on them from bushes lining the rocky outcroppings above the path. The stonemasons, though armed, were noncombatants by nature, and failed their morale check. They took cover and cowered as the fight began.

I decided that three kobolds were attacking each party member. Rozidien charged towards the nearest group. Haymond closed distance while firing with his sling. Karven Stone started Dark Souls rolling towards the nearest source of cover. 

We argued for about 20 minutes over whether or not Karven's tumbling proficiency (which grants +4 to his AC) allows him to move at full speed, which I ruled it doesn't. The description of the proficiency (PHB, page 87), isn't clear on this point, the way many mechanics in AD&D lack clarity, so I explained that the group is going to have to get used to my making rulings like this. The description specifies that the character must forego attacking, and attacking normally only allows the character to move at half speed, so I ruled that tumbling is done at half speed as well, or else the character would simply tumble everywhere if they weren't otherwise able to attack. This is certainly 20 minutes of game time I wish I could get back.

Yinvalur Sparkguard went down during the first round, while still surprised, and Bernhardt moved in to cure him with cure light wounds. Bernhardt was struck by a javelin before the casting was finished, and so the spell fizzled. This came as a shock to Bernhardt's player, who with each session is learning more and more about the restrictions placed on spellcasters in AD&D, such as needing to remain completely still during any round that a spell is cast.

The fight was a bit of mess, as we use theater of the mind combat for random encounters, rather than a grid. I had to keep track of all 18 kobolds, approximately where everyone was, who had cover or concealment, the degree of cover or concealment, and attack roll modifiers due to cover, concealment, and range. I'm not afraid to admit that I often forgot about attack roll penalties, and that at times made the fight more difficult for the players. All of this definitely made the fight more difficult to run, but I also found it more engaging and interesting, so I'm hoping I just get used to tracking the modifiers with more experience.

The kobolds were critting like crazy - almost every player took at least one or two critical hits. It was brutal. In the end, Haymond, Karven, and Rozidien were all unconscious, along with Yinvalur. Terris's morale broke and he ran off into the forest, yelling about how he should have joined the Gladiators when he had the chance. Bernhardt did his best to tend to the wounded, but eventually he was alone against the eight surviving kobolds, who time after time succeeded on their increasingly difficult morale checks.

As a last ditch effort, Bernhardt, in cover, beseeched the stonemasons to take up arms against the kobolds. Bernhardt has a -2 to reaction rolls due to his low Charisma, but this was cancelled out by the masons' +2 due to their friendly disposition towards the party. I made a reaction roll, and for once luck was on the party's side - I rolled a 9. The masons, inspired by Bernhardt's words and the dire straits their saviors were in, rattled their sabers and broke cover to charge the remaining kobolds.

I don't have a great procedure for mass combat, so I made one up on the fly. The masons and kobolds were each approximately level 1 creatures, so I rolled one die for each fighter on each side. The masons have a d6 hit die, and the kobolds have d4, so I rolled 8d6 (for eight masons) against 8d4 (for eight kobolds) and compared the results. A success of one die versus another meant that individual was killed, and a tie indicated an ongoing struggle. Bernhardt brought up the rear, tending the wounds of any injured masons.

The first round, five kobolds and one mason were killed. The following round, another mason and the remaining kobolds were killed. Another TPK averted, and it didn't require DM fiat or a deus ex machina, just quick thinking from the players and a lucky roll! 

Despite the difficulties, this might be my favorite combat encounter I've run so far. The kobolds had 18 hit dice worth of combatants on their side, whereas the party had just 10 (four 2nd-level characters plus two 1 HD hirelings). They were at a disadvantage due to the terrain, and had some terrible rolls working against them, but they persevered. 

Bernhardt used a few spell slots to cast cure light wounds and revive those who remained unconscious, and that's where we wrapped. The party earned experience for the encounters with the forest people and with the kobolds, and both Bernhardt and Karven leveled up again - they're now 3rd-level. They both gain some hit points, Bernhardt gains a nonweapon proficiency and access to 2nd-level priest spells, and Karven's THAC0 improves to 19.

With luck, next session the party will finally arrive back in town. They'll get a nice chunk of experience and gold for completing their quest. There, they can decide if they want to take on the other 1st-level quest they've heard about, or if they'd like to spend downtime gathering information about 2nd- or even 3rd-level adventures to try their hands at.