Houses of Stone: Turning it Into a Setting?

I posted this on G+ the other day but want to put it out there in a more permanent form.

As of this week, I'm working on turning my Houses of Stone world into a publishable (and hopefully, eventually, a published) setting book.

My plan is to do a brief book or booklet for all this.

Here's what I want to include:

• Intro (Thematic details, how to utilize the book)
• Thematic Hooks (Ideas, samples of how to hook PCs into African style adventures)
• Map (Abstract showing types of locations that should/could be included)
• Location type descriptions
• Equipment (Specific gear, weapons, etc and how some might differ mechanically from traditional)
• Alternate XP system (stories instead of gold--playing up the oral history preference )
• NPCs
• Adversaries
• Allies
• WM tables
• Wilderness
• Dungeons
• Sample dungeon

FLGS Game -- Second Session Recap

I ended up with 6 players for the second session. They are as follows...
Steve, from last time
Scott, from last time
Cale, from last time
Dave, from last time
Jordan, a complete novice to RPGs (he plays Magic regularly and is probably 18)
Chase, another complete novice to RPGs (he also plays Magic and is 16)


The Setup:
We helped the two new guys roll up characters--they ended up with a Ranger and a Magic User. Good additions to the party.
I had the novices arrive via another "regularly scheduled caravan" of reinforcements for their encampment (thanks to Lord Jameson) and they had a near miss with some bandits on the road in. This gave the party another hook to the area near where they slayed the Ogre last time, and allowed me to showcase more content in the area.

The Adventure:
The group ventured forth and found the tracks of the bandits who attacked a recent caravan. They set a pretty interesting trap (trip wire to drop oil into a big fire) and had the Dwarf and a Cleric "pull" the bandits in. The bandits weren't that big of a threat, so were dispatched quite quickly. After the fight the adventurers had tied up the bandit captain and took him back to town. After questioning him, they discovered that the bandits kept their big stash of loot on a small mountainside to the west of where they found him--due north from the town.

After a good bit of roleplay in town regarding whether or not to subdue the Dwarf and steal the mysterious gem (see session 1) to have it destroyed/cleansed/secured... basically the Dwarf (Cale) has failed a saving throw or two against its effects, so he can't resist keeping it, and it's corrupting him slowly to Chaos's purposes.
I had some good chances to pull aside players and talk to them separately to see how they are handling this. Ended with Cale burying a rock in a bag to make them think it was the gem. The other PCs had someone follow him and tell the local high priest. Their plan for next week is to pay the innkeeper to retrieve the gem out of his room with the Priest's help. They are DETERMINED to get it out of his hands...

After this, they discovered that the small mountainside where they expected a bandit stash also contained a young black dragon. They talked the new guy out of fighting it.

On their way back, another Ogre (apparently this is their territory) attacked. They put this one to sleep and followed his tracks back to his lair, in a large gorge full of caves. (These Caves seem a bit Chaotic... *cough*)

After a night of rest they dove into the Ogre's cave, killed the large Ogre brute they found inside (again with a Sleep spell--I need to see what I can do about that...  ) and found a secret door into a section of worked tunnels!

That's where we wrapped, as it was almost 4pm.

Highlights:
- The new guys really got into it without much help
- I loved getting to pull a player away from the table for secret actions, then getting to ask the rest of the table for theirs
- They are still being *very* cautious all the time, and PARANOID. The more paranoid they are, the more they feed my world creation. I love seeing what they're afraid of so I can expand it. Especially when they're afraid of something that is actually *good* ;D


Disappointments:
- Not enough time. We burned through our four hour slot in no time!

FLGS Game -- First Session Recap

I'm running a game at my FLGS now. It's my way of introducing everyone to the OSR, as the only RPGs going on there seem to all be 3.5 and newer. Variety, after all, is the spice of life!
(Disclaimer: I run old games, new games, storygames, OSR games... everything. This isn't a slight against or a stance for any one game. Just a thought that it would be fun to introduce these people to OD&D via Swords & Wizardry.)

I ended up with 7 players for the first session. They are as follows...
Steve, who lives just down the road from me, apparently, but I've known him on the Alehouse for a while.
Scott, having played since BECMI-ish time frame. I met Scott three years ago playing Pathfinder, and invited him to NTRPGCon.
Cale, who is the FLGS's Events Coordinator. He DMs 3.5/PF a lot, and has no Old School experience.
Garrett, also a DM of 3.5/PF, and a really creative guy. He plays Warhammer 40k with me from time to time. Recent high school graduate.
John, also a recent HS grad. He's played in lots of 3.5/PF games, but I don't think he's a DM.
Dave, one of my closest friends. Started playing and DMing with 2e.
and... Joel, bane of my existence for 2.5 hours. More on Joel shortly.

The Setup:
I had everyone roll 3d6 in order, but allowed one swap, so they can feel like they have some control
Everyone started with 3d6x10gp for gear, as the conceit of this world is that they are hired by a Baron to go on a long-term expedition. So the little extra starting gold helped a bit.

They ended up with two Clerics, two Dwarfs, one Fighter, one Thief, and one MU.

I walked them through a bit of the history of the game--what OD&D is, what B/X is, what AD&D is... apparently a lot of people who have no experience with Old School games think that 1e was the first D&D ever. x_x

The Adventure:
The PCs were all hired/summoned by a Baron--the Lord Jameson--to mount a long term expedition into the Chaos-infested wild lands. My world is very points-of-light... and the light is rapidly diminishing... so the PCs come from far away cities. Jameson wants to recapture part of the wild--centred around the village Grimmsgate--from the forces of darkness and Chaos that have ruled there.
After days of hand-waved travel, they arrived in town and set up a small camp on the outskirts.

Highlights:
- Players enjoyed it.
- They found a mysterious gem in a trick column in a cave and were so very cautious and so very paranoid (rightly so, as it turned out to be a daemonic influenced artifact).
- The local priest is suspected of collusion with Chaos by the PCs... in reality, he may or may not be. Remains to be seen.
- A quick defeat of a 4HD Ogre, thanks to the MU casting Sleep on it before the fighters (novices to Old School) could foolishly rush in.
- They spent time exploring the wilderness and enjoyed it!
- PCs found one of the big dungeons, The Elder Temple, and scouted appropriately to find it's entrances
- Within one room of the dungeon they encountered a guardian spirit of a tomb and, instead of rushing into combat, they talked to him and actually made more progress than if they had tried to fight (and they would have died--no question.)
- Excellent use of oil and FIRE!

Disappointments:
- The aforementioned Joel... Joel is an odd duck. His past gaming experiences include some light-storygaming and some Pathfinder. He was *shocked* and a bit appalled that I would roll dice behind the screen when HIS character was checking for traps. (Yes, he played the Thief.)
We had to spend a good 5 minutes explaining why the DM should roll privately to maintain the suspense of the player not knowing whether or not the PC was successful in finding a trap. He complained that he might as well not have brought dice or some such.
Later, when the players decided to toss oil and a torch at a giant ant (WM) group, Joel declared he would throw a flask of oil. Knowing he had just re-fueled his lantern, I asked where his flask was (pack, pouch, or strapped to a belt somehow).
He spent at least a minute going back and forth with me saying "I don't know" and then "I DON"T KNOW" because "I don't know enough about the situation to be able to say."
All the other players at the table were aghast, honestly. I was giving him a chance to, essentially, retcon a flask of oil onto his belt so he could actually throw it this turn instead of fumbling in his pack.
We painstakingly explained that I really was asking for information. It's his character--only he knows where his gear is stored.


Honestly, that was my only disappointment.
Yes, they wasted a lot of time investigating the farmhouse of the disappeared couple, looking for clue leading to abduction or some such, but that's fine. It's a sandbox-ish world--they are free to waste time. I'll lay hooks into where they go, but I'm not bringing the dungeon or the adventure to them.

Everyone left on an upbeat note and said they were eager to play again on July 6th!
Joel will not be there on the 6th (yay) but may return after that.

I am very much looking forward to continuing this game.

Hollow World: Torn Asunder

The Sundering

Our beautiful world was torn in half.

Once, the world was calm, peaceful, fully known. We had no questions about the world we lived in--certainly, philosophers waxed eloquent about the possibilities of afterlife, the old superstitious concepts of an Outworld, full of daemons, but it was more an academic exercise. In the last two years, though, we have realised how wrong we were to ignore those wise ones.

Though a small world it was, its smallness gave us safety, security, and peace. These last two years have ravaged our world: the climate now varies two or three times a year, there are regions of the world that are always cold, farms no longer produce crops year round... Worst of all, though, are the phantasmagorical phenomenae. The gulf of void that separates the Lower World and the Upper World is, we fear, a gateway from the Outworld.

Strange things happen daily. People disappear, bodies are found sacrificed on strange altars, animals scatter when nothing is present, birds take flight in strange new patterns, and some even claim they see blood in the sky. These are read as omens by most people; they consider them signs of pending doom from Outworld. Meanwhile, others claim that the sundering of the world is a time of excitement, of opportunity for exploration, redemption, salvation.

Art shamelessly borrowed from a Google Image search. I think maybe it's from the MMO, Aion.

Review: Zogorion, Lord of the HIppogriffs

No spoilers here.

Last night, I had the opportunity to run a pickup game of LotFP for some lovely folks on G+. I had been itching for a chance to run +Jason Sholtis's little micro-module, Zogorion: Lord of the Hippogriffs, and decided this was the perfect chance.

The Good: Brevity! This micro-module can be read in about 15-20 minutes. That's really all the prep you need, unless you want to add some more customized hooks, or reskin something.
Jason injected just enough character and personality into Zog, the main NPC, to make him a fantastically interesting character, but left a lot of the little details up to the Referee to nit pick or hand wave.
This is in no way a railroady module. You can lay the hook(s) and see how the players take them. The location described is openly laid out in the module so that a Referee can allow the players to approach the challenge however they wish. Within there are even several major items that could be drawing factors or goals for PCs besides the obvious interactions with Zog.

The Bad: I honestly can't say much about it that isn't good. Maybe the fact that he hasn't written another like this yet?
I suppose there are a few little details left out regarding Zog's lair. They are easily filled in by a good Referee, of course, so it's not a real problem. I can't lay out the details here without spoilers, so I'll leave it at that.

The Ugly: Nothing. Seriously, I can't find anything that I just scoffed at. This was easy to read, easy to tweak and tailor, and a blast to run.

Where can you acquire such a delightful module, you ask? Why at Jason's blog, of course: http://roll1d12.blogspot.com/

How Big is Your Sandbox? aka Player Decision Leeway

I started a discussion last night on G+, where I simply asked the question "how big is your sandbox?" I also clarified that I wasn't referring to geography.
Some great responses were posted, but no one really mined the vein I was thinking, because I wasn't very specific.

How much leeway or freedom do your players have in the sandbox?

I have recently decided to think of sandboxes as varying in size. Here is a rough breakdown:

• Infinite breadth of options
• In this type of sandbox, players are given a literal "anything goes" card. The DM either has invested a ton of time in preparation, or is (like me) relying on his ability to build on the fly.
• Players are not given any scenario or issue to consider. They are merely placed in a world, given descriptions of that world, and asked "What do you do?"
• There is no starting point or ending point for adventures in this type of world.
• Limited breadth of options
• While the DM may have a world planned (or created on the fly) that can accommodate the "infinite options" type of game, for some reason he or she has chosen to limit the PCs in some way.
• Examples of this include my recent Savage SciFi game-- I created a world, gave the PCs vast input in its creation, but set up a specific starting scenario. No goals were laid out by me, but there were a few more obvious possible outcomes of the initial scenario. Because I gave the players full freedom at every turn, though, they surprised me at every game session.
• There is a definite starting point for adventures in this world, which naturally precludes some options, but can help set up a particular style of adventure. No end point is laid out.
• Railroad with options
• I think of this as analogous to most RPG video games, like Final Fantasy. While there is freedom to explore the world, level up, pursue side quests, the DM still has a definite "win scenario" in mind (or maybe two or three scenarios.)
• I hesitate to use the term railroad for this type because it is still not a set in stone type of plot. It is probably much more flexible than the stereotypical railroad.
• You can think of this type of sandbox as having a line laid in it, showing a start AND end point.
• Railroad (aka Not a Sandbox)
• Do I really need to define this one?

"Post-Dungeon" People

The other night, while discussing the upcoming game for Monday nights, I had a spark of thought, and wanted to share it. Credit for the spark goes to +Kyrinn S. Eis, though I cannot say if the thoughts I present below are in line with hers.

The term Kyrinn used was "a post-dungeon person." I like this term, it has a nice ring to it, and gets to the point: a post-dungeon person is someone who does not play RPGs thinking that a dungeon crawl is the only type of game out there, or (more likely) they avoid dungeon crawls altogether.

My disclaimer here is that, I think, everyone enjoys a crawl every now and then. I probably don't crawl as often as some of the old grognards, but I do love a good dungeon crawl. Emphasis on "good." The other thing about me is that I enjoy more types of games than a dungeon crawl.

So what's my point? Well, I think a key distinction between gamers should be less about "old school" and "new school" styles, and more about what game we are playing.
I often hear haters, on all sides of every fence, complaining that "such and such just isn't D&D" or "<xyz> ruins <abc> about the game." What if, instead, we recognized that we are playing different games with the same name? D&D, and all RPGs, really, are usually more versatile than we give them credit for being. Yes, the original D&D games were written for dungeon crawls and wilderness hex crawls. That means that "dungeon crawl" and "hexploration" are the games you are playing--not D&D! (Rather, it's more important to identify what game you are playing outside of the name of the rule set.)

This is a big part of why I try to name every campaign or game I run, even if that is a name just for me. It allows me to separate MY game from the rules set I"m using to facilitate the game. So, if you choose to only play a "traditional" or "old school" game, that's great. Use D&D, use a retroclone, use True20--whatever you want. But keep in mind that no matter what rules you use, someone else is using those same books to accomplish a different goal; they are trying to play a different game.


My point here is not to cause dissent or to upset and offend. These are thoughts I have, and you are free to respond to help me reshape them, and I am free to keep/discard/change them during the discussion.

The World Within

Limits, boundaries, borders, barriers, limits--all can be summed up in the word definition. Our world is well defined: centuries ago, explorers ventured forth from the City and found the ends of the world, the curve of the sphere, creating the pocket that we live within.

The red magma sphere we call the sun spins in the centre of our world, and we are warmed by its glow. We know when it will shine, and when it will dim. We know how much light, darkness, heat, cold, wind, and water will be available to us next season and next year.

This world is finite.

Though we have an abundance of resources (food, metals, water, animals, plants,) we are bound and our hands tied by the limit of space. The ground is impenetrable, no matter how far we dig, and no matter how ardently we wish for more, we all know that some day soon we will be a people too numerous to dwell within this pocket world.

- from the pen of the Grand Master Librarian, Tykus IV

NTRPGCon: An After Action Report (of Sorts)

So, NTRPGCon was this weekend, and it was legen... wait for it...
...dairy.

(Note: I have thrown out my ability to write properly this evening. I'll find it again tomorrow.)

What I played:
- 30 minutes of austinjimm's (of K&K:A) OD&D game with home brewed stout
- B1 run by Mike Badolato (one of the convention founders)
- More OD&D run by Chainsaw (of K&K:A) with more of the stout
- LotFP (Tower of the Stargazer) run by Lars Larsen (a local)
- More LotFP with Lars (Death Frost Doom) in the lobby
- EPT run by Dr. Victor Raymond
- Continued the LotFP with Lars after midnight

Breakdown by day-time..
Thursday Night
The best thing about a convention? Talking to people. Within minutes of checking in at the hotel I had run into a couple people I knew on G+ and K&K:A. We talked up a storm and had a few beers at the bar.
I was able to hang out for a bit at the K&K:Alehouse social up in a hospitality suite and roll up an MU for austinjimm's game. Jim brought a home brewed stout up from Austin that was, quite frankly, amazing. We played for a bit before I had to bail, since Mike B's B1 game started later. Mike runs a great game and we all had a blast.
When I returned to the Alehouse Social, Chainsaw was running some level 5 OD&D. We played, we talked, we drank. It was excellent.

Friday Morning
I had no games scheduled for Friday morning, but had signed up for Kyrinn's Urutsk game starting at about noon. Since Kyrinn (sadly) couldn't make it to the con at the last minute, I had free time. I met Lars Larsen the night before in Mike's B1 game, and he had said I was welcome to join his LotFP game--great choice.
Lars ran us through Tower of the Stargazer and we completely DESTROYED the module. Yes, it is a dungeon or location-limited module... but it is non-linear. We grabbed enough treasure to make level 3 without even confronting the big bad!
Naturally, we went back, and fought the Wizard. More than fought, in fact, we ended up blowing him, and his tower, to bits, narrowly escaping. Nick Mizer's MU had to Spider Climb out the top of the building and rode the roof as it collapsed down--epic.

Friday Afternoon
After lunch, Nick Mizer and I were going to put together a pickup game for one of us to run, but found Lars was willing to keep running LotFP for us! We gathered a few at the big table in the lobby and played Death Frost Doom.
Best surprise of the session? Jeff Dee walked up to the table and just said "Sure, I'll play." I hope he enjoyed it. We liked having him there, even though he was also working his table.

Friday Evening
EPT! Dr. Victor Raymond is a delightful person to talk to, and to have run EPT. Due to some people being unable to travel to the convention, we had only two players, Duke Barclay and me.
We learned a lot about Tekumel, and Professor Barker, and had a ton of fun. Duke lost three characters, but we made it out of the Jakallan underworld alive!
After we wrapped that game, at about 11:30, we rounded up the LotFP group plus a few extra, and resumed the Death Frost Doom adventure!
Let's just say we got out alive, but doomed a large part of the countryside. Woops? Maybe.

Saturday Morning
I got in bed at 1:40am, rolled out at 6:15am, and went to Buon Giorno--the best coffee shop in the metroplex. Chris Cain, Marshal Mahurin, and I enjoyed coffee and breakfast.
At 8:00am I was able to play in Matt Finch's megadungeon: Mythrus Tower. Our group ran from 9 to 11 players, depending on the time. We had several from K&K:A as well as G+ and even Dennis Sustare (creator of the original Druid class for D&D!)
We were the first group to reach the fifth level of Matt's dungeon! Shenanigans were had and PCs were turned to stone.
Tons of fun. Matt signed my S&W: Complete book (so did Bill Webb a bit later) and noted on all our character sheets that we were the first ones to reach level five!


All in all, it was a phenomenal weekend, and I wish it could have gone on forever.

Savage SciFi: Sit-rep

We've played a few sessions of the Savage SciFi game, and I've been out of town for a couple weeks, but things are looking good now...

I have been more than pleased with everyone's ability to dive in to world creation. My goal at first was to create a small scenario and let the players work their way through it, and then call it quits. The problem with that? They ate it up. Every bit of lore I was creating (on the fly, by the way, *gulp*) the players devoured and asked for more.
Within the first session they were taking the lore I had given them and using it to try and figure out what was going on "behind the curtain." I love this kind of game!

The key, I think, has been to minimize pressure on myself as a GM. I'm relying on what I think is my best skill: improvisation. It was a bit rough at first, but by the second session I had a list of random-ish names, locations, ships, etc (no stats, of course) that I could draw on at a moment's notice if needed.

My players have been integral in the whole process, too. At the character creation session I asked them, based on the one-page world background I wrote, what they wanted to do and where they wanted to fit into the world. Each player contributed something monumental and integral to the world and its history, whether they realized it or not. This allowed me to build their characters into the scenario nicely.

Now, they have navigated their way beyond my initial idea, and I'm trying to do some by-post roleplay on G+ to see how they fill their in game down time and to see what leads and hooks they will chase down.
I'm not sure how many more sessions we will play, but I'm eager to keep these players around, and they may (if willing) turn into "my" group for the next game or games.

And yes, to my players, I have a nice way to wrap up the whole thing. I think you'll love and hate it. Mwa ha ha ha ha. Etc.

Limited Series: Savage SciFi

It's dark as you open your eyes, straining to make out the motion and faint lights that woke you. Heavy isn't the right word for how your head feels--stagnant, like water that hasn't moved in years, yes, that's it.
Light attacks your eyes, harsh, and abrasive. Someone is walking into the room, beyond the plasteel covering your cryo-pod. It is a cryo-pod, isn't it? The last thing you remember is the technician attaching a tube to the shunt in your arm, telling you to count back from one hundred. Yes, this must be a cryo-pod--you can see your breath now as your lungs warm up.

The movement is a man. Or maybe a woman. But not like any you've seen before: deep cerulean skin, black as tar hair, lizard-like movements. You think it's a male, assuming its species has a biology anything like your own, and watch him through barely open eyes, hoping he won't notice you're awake.
Where are the technicians? Why haven't you woken up for your maintenance rotation on the ship? You were supposed to be woken up by the ship every five years to check the ship. Everyone gets woken up, in shifts, to make sure the ship is sailing smoothly.
There are no humans in the room, but now there are two of the blue people, and one of similar build and biology but with a deep, emerald coloured skin. This one seems to be giving orders, barking something in a language full of clicks, pops, and buzzes. All the while, the green one is staring at you and the other pods in the room.

Only five pods in this room. You can see all of them, and you know that's standard thawing procedure--five at a time, in a room just off the main cryo-hall on the ship. There are two thaw rooms, actually, so it's a total of ten at a time. Not that it matters: these probably aren't friendlies thawing you out.

You have spent the last three years preparing for this expedition. The team was put together by Phoenix Corporation, a company contracted by the United Earth Defense Organisation--UEDO. Phoenix is a privately held company, but then all groups capable of interstellar flight are, as governments have other things to spend money on. Like contracts with those companies. This arrangement allows the innovations of the private sector to benefit the federal governments of earth directly, and leaves the private firms open to private customers, too.
The expedition launched, the ship left the station orbiting Earth, and made only a stop at Mars for a send-off from the colonists. After that, it was down for cryo-sleep, with the last sleeper having to plug herself in and let the computers pump in the drugs.

How long has it been? Where are we?

The Sci Fi Game

While Houses of Stone is on hiatus and I am a bit burned out on its creative flow, I have decided to run at least one game of Savage Worlds in a sci fi setting. It'll last 5 sessions.
I already have players lined up (in excess, surprisingly) for this game but I need to iron out world details.

The plan is to have one game session for world description from me and group character creation. Savage Worlds is fairly lightweight but has more to it than OD&D or B/X, and those are the only systems I've done character creation on G+ with. At a real table, it's fairly easy to talk to three or four people at once, pass around books, notes, and sheets of paper, and so on. I'm hoping that, with good people and patience, we'll be able to create characters as a group and establish the world properly on a G+ Hangout.

Right now I'm debating and designing the world. It's not going to be fantasy in space (i.e. Star Wars), but it definitely won't be hard sci fi, either. I tend to lean a bit toward the Mass Effect style--it's not about inter-ship combat, it's about people, doing stuff, on stations, planets, and ships. Interactions and shootouts.

Today's idea is that in the late 21st century, humanity is visited by a dying race, on their last pilgrimage across the universe before evolving into non-corporeal beings. Some handful of millions of them travel in convoy/flotilla. They were visited by a race from our solar system 50,000 years before, and that is how they gained the ability to travel the stars.
I'm also thinking that not long after this visit, humans realise they need to leave Earth, and are planning for the fact that a few hundred years later they will need a planet to settle. Perhaps the players will take on the role of a party scouting the galaxy for a New Earth. Or maybe they finished scouting and have been in stasis for the journey home--arriving on Earth 200 years or more later.

The thoughts... they drown out everything else in my brain. It's a good thing.

Play Report: Cain's Game

So, the venerable DM, Chris "Flambeaux" Cain, ran another game on Saturday morning. This is the game that has, to this point, been AD&D. Several of our players, due to real life concerns, were to be absent, and Chris's kids all had various infections, so he suggested we play on a G+ Hangout.
We ended up with four players--one of whom had not played any D&D in 30 years.

Chris decided to dial back our AD&D ruleset to a S&W and B/X hybrid to help keep the rules out of the way as the two completely-new-to-RPGs players learned the ropes of gaming.

So... here's the in character report...

From the pen of Murdoch the Medium, a young wielder of the arcane.
I find myself in the company of several excellent people--a warrior named Karl, and two clerics named Bit and Alexiel. We had all heard rumours of several locales ripe with treasure and adventure, and therefore set out to find claim it as our own.


We set forth and travelled toward the hills, hoping to find the caves, which I had heard to be filled with scrolls, spellbooks, and items of a magical nature. On the second evening of our journey, we made camp and noticed a campfire nearby. Erring on the side of caution, Bit moved toward the strange fire under the cover of darkness, and sans armour. He returned to us shortly after with a report of two large, ugly, guttural-speaking humanoids roasting meat on a spit, and drinking from casks of some brew.
Within moments we hatched a plot to subdue these strange creatures, hoping they had something of value, and that dispatching them would be a service to the general good. We tied a rope between two trees, as a trip line, and I moved forward, casting a spell of Irresistible Slumber. One of the strange creatures slumped forward, spilling his drink, and the other merely reached for it. Eschewing our trip line plan, we unleashed a volley of missiles--two spears and numerous sling stones. Within moments the brute had fallen. Moving in quickly we slit the first one's throat, and pulled the second from the fire. We found on each a pouch of silver coins and nearby stood a broken wagon and several casks of ale and wine.


Choosing caution, we went back to our own camp and slept through the night, planning to return the next day to find the brutes' lair. What a find, indeed! We found a tunnel into a small cave with bed mats and a small chest. Within the chest we found several ingots of silver and gold, along with coins, gems, and a false bottom. Beneath the false bottom we found a wooden puzzle box, which would be the focus of our next few nights around the campfire. Before leaving, though, we noted the location of a hatch under one of the bed mats, for further investigation later.


After selling our new found gems to a discreet jeweler at the Keep, we spent an inordinate amount of time experimenting with the contents of the puzzle box--three wands. The box also contained cards with runes on each, and we found that the word on each card corresponded to a particular wand.


Our attempts at uncovering their purpose were futile.


We ventured a half-day's walk from the Keep to the home of Max, a sage and "miracle worker" of note in the area. Max, while a bit eccentric, was a pleasant host who offered tea and toast, and freely identified the wands for us. Apparently his cousins, Marley & Marley, manufactured these wands (en masse) in the nearby city. We conversed with him for a while, and I offered our services in return for having identified the wands. Max asked that, given the chance, we would retrieve some Humblebee Honey from a nearby valley. An old friend of Max's from school keeps the bees in a hidden valley, and Max requested we bring him some dozen jars of the sweet treat, so he could create his potions, unguents, poultices, et cetera. We gladly agreed, as Max had already done us a great service, and the adventure could be quite enjoyable.


After adjourning our meeting with Max, we decided it best to investigate the Ogre's lair further--specifically the hatch under the bed mat. Spending some time down there, we found criss-crossing tunnels upon criss-crossing tunnels.
Exploration was enjoyable, but we decided it was above our pay grade, so we moved back the way we came. Unfortunately, a large purple worm-like creature decided we might need to be its lunch. Bit set down some rations, and we quickly set some oil on the ground and lit it, to cover our retreat.
I believe I saw the worm devour the rations, but what happened when it reached the fire, I do not know--we made all haste for the ladder back up into the cave above.


What will happen next is open for speculation. Our intrepid little troupe will probably expand--I hear some of my comrades have friends and family who would be swayed by the lure of adventure, treasure, fame. The next foray into the wild will include further hunting for the cave system of rumour and myth.

HoS: What Needs to Improve

Yesterday I outlined a couple of elements of Houses of Stone which, I think, made it particularly enjoyable. Today, I want to talk about a few things I need to do better when the game launches again in a few weeks...

• Planning:
• Normally, I shoot from the hip. This works impeccably well with NPC interactions, events, reactions of the world, etc. Shooting from the hip works best, though, within pre-established geographical and architectural locations. By this I mean that I need the city, buildings, caves, underground cities, etc all laid out and stocked. The NPCs should have one-liner personality, motive, and objective descriptions. This will make shooting from the hip more effective and allow me the comfort of knowing what's in the sandbox before the PCs get there.
• Turning it up to 11:
• Houses of Stone, as it existed for five game sessions, was barely a level 1 world, in terms of challenge and lethality. Being more proactive in planning and design will allow me to add to the challenge, difficulty, and potential lethality that players will see as they play. This will also help me establish baselines for what PC capabilities players will be disallowed, allowed, etc.
• Puzzling:
• The unanimous response I got in every bit of feedback about the game was that people loved the puzzles, the questions, the mysteries. A lot of these were off the cuff ideas I had or moments where I said to myself "I know there should be a trap, puzzle, or mystery here but I didn't plan it out... let's see what the PCs try and assign odds to how likely each solution is." I call this "quantum mechanics of DMing" or as one player put it "Schrodinger's puzzle."
• I don't want to remove this method of DMing and design. It works very well and is a lot of fun. However, I do want to temper it with real design. If the sandbox contains all sorts of things for players to discover, it needs to have some things that will confound them, as well as things that adapt to their attempts.

HoS: What Made it Fun?

Let's talk about what has gone really well in my five-session Houses of Stone game.
Quick recap of essential info if you didn't play:
- Swords & Wizardry Core rules (mostly)
- Sub-Saharan Africa in an alternate timeline
- History coming out the ears of every NPC, location, and item

I have run five sessions of this game so far, and enjoyed every one, and I believe the players did, as well. The first and foremost thing I think we all enjoyed was history.
The history in this world--the things the PCs had no knowledge of but uncovered by role-playing interactions with NPCs, by exploring locations, by investigating events, by inquiring about items and events--was pretty well laid out, if I do say so myself.
We only really "delved" into dungeons/caves in two of the sessions. Even then, though, only one was a real delve, where the PCs spent almost the entire session exploring the turns and twists of the underground complex. The very first session had about 45% of the time spent in the dungeon, but with a considerable amount of investigation and interaction happening before and after, arguably being the more enjoyable part of the game.
So, my point is, I think the players enjoyed learning by exploring, inquiring, and investigating what the history of the world was.

Second, I think everyone enjoyed puzzling items and contraptions. The simplest things, like a panel of buttons on a purely granite wall in an iron age world, activated by the Fibonacci sequence, was incredibly fun to see players work through.
The puzzles and contraptions, too, contribute to the history-delving of the world. Even though these are classic dungeon puzzles/traps/contraptions/conventions, they played right into the mystery of the ancient race who built the city.

HoS: Hiatus / Reorganisation

I have now run a total of five sessions of the Houses of Stone game on Google+ Hangouts.
It has been a blast. Every session has been a ton of fun and has revealed a lot to me about how to make the HoS world better.

However...

I need a little break from running the Houses of Stone game.
I still love the ConstantCon and FLAILSNAILS concepts and community. I'm not going to stop DMing forever. I'm not going to stop playing on G+.

tl;dr version: I'm taking a break for a couple of weeks so I can reorganise Houses of Stone as a more traditional campaign. I want one, possibly two, discreet groups of PCs playing on a regular basis, with characters that belong in the world.


Why are you pulling HoS from the FLAILSNAILS multiverse?
Because it's a world that doesn't belong in the mix of dimension-hopping. HoS is a standalone world, even though I intended to create it as a FLAILSNAILS compatible one, and the way I want to run it involves continuity of PCs, events, etc. The big selling point has been that every delve and adventure reveals the history of the world, but if each week I have characters who have never been there before, how do I maintain that?
(Yes, there are easy hand-wave ways around that. I have just decided that I would prefer to not use them for this game.)
I love FLAILSNAILS and may continue to run some pickup games here and there for FPCs... they just won't happen in the HoS world.

How long will the break be?
At least a week but I can't really say for sure. I need to rewrite the house rules doc, as the last 5 sessions have revealed a lot to me about how I want to DM the game, and I need to continue designing content, as a regularly playing group will cover territory more quickly.

What resources will new players have to get acclimated?
I will be writing a much more extensive document to introduce players to the game world. However, I will still rely heavily on players' abilities to draw on real history. After all, this is a historical fantasy / alternate timeline world.

Do I have to roll a brand new character?
Probably. FPCs that have spent a lot of time in HoS already might be cloned at level 1 or re-created with new stats but the same history/background. If you are picked to play and want to make a new character, go for it. If you are picked to play and want to do something other than a brand new character, we'll handle it on a case by case basis, at my discretion.


Who will play?
Not sure yet. Many have expressed great interest in continuing to play in HoS and I've even had some tell me that they'd love to play but are looking for a more traditional campaign. I will have to spend some time considering how to pick players, and hope I don't offend anyone by not inviting them.

When will it be played?
Probably still on Mondays at 20:30 CDT and possibly Tuesdays at the same time. If I have two groups, each one will get one night.

HoS: Recent Events

Recent happenings in Houses of Stone...
- A daring group of adventurers found evidence of foul play in the cave where an ancient n'anga (shaman) was supposed to have been staying. A seemingly-magical book, written in San, was left with the witch doctor, Mudiwa, for translation.

- Discovery of an underground passage to a cave system underneath what seems to be the largest baobab anyone has seen. Ever.

- A group of European mercenaries, explorers, and traders have set up camp on the edge of the village. Most believe they are here to scour the complex underneath the Ruined City.

- Whispers have been heard of strange and ancient magic-like devices deep down under the Ruined City. The monk, Rubro, has expressed an interest in these things.

Houses of Stone: Player Reports (Session II)

Below are two player reports on the pickup game last night. We had 5 players--a Finn, two Canadians, an Aussie, an American, and me, the DM from Africa living in the US. Quite the international group, no?

Adventure and chicanery included testing random spells for a witch doctor, slaying giant millipede fiends (aka "millifiends,") receiving rewards of wife and crazy psychic stones.

Reports after the jump...

Houses of Stone: Player Report (Session I)

Thanks to Christian Akacro for writing this report. Yes, he got a bonus of 100xp for this.

Houses of Stone ~ The Puzzle, the Vermin, and the Spectre

Dramatis Personae
Farley ~ Dwarf
Tobias ~ Shaman (Wizard)
The Slip ~ Thief
Rubro ~ Monk
Madyn ~ Cleric
Donnatalus ~ Fighter

Our intrepid heroes, having trekked in the jungles of the Dark Continent in search of rumoured ruins untouched by sword or spell for generations, began their quest in a small unnamed village. Speaking first with the headman they learned that the Spirit of his great great grandfather had been haunting the village after dark every fortnight. It was seen wandering aimlessly within the village for a short time before setting down near the headman's hut to reflect upon its ruminations. Finally at dawn it could be seen wandering off in the direction of the old ruins. The headman told them their timing was fortuitous, if it holds true to form the spirit should make an appearance that night after dusk. According to the headman the ruins were discovered a couple generations ago. After an ill-fated quest by a group, whom never returned, no one dared go near the crumbling structures for fear of being lost forever.


[More after the jump]

Houses of Stone: News / Events / Rumours for 5 March

Some of the interesting news, events, and rumours floating around the village for tonight's Houses of Stone game...

- The spirit of the headman's great-grandfather has been seen wandering the village every fortnight. Some say they see him walking toward the old stone city ruins after he leaves.

- People in the Mchlanga farm valley are disappearing. Reports of giant creatures carrying them off at dawn abound, but no one can substantiate these. (See below for an "approximation" of these creatures.)

 

- One of the local witch doctors has put out a call for brave souls to test a new spell. Does not care if volunteers test on themselves or others.

- A shaman has been holed up in a cave for 100 years. The village headman will pay well if someone can get him to tell stories of the village's past.