Quote from: Crusader X on April 22, 2023, 06:30:20 AM

Quote from: cavalier973 on April 21, 2023, 06:52:26 PM
I remember what I heard, now; if a monster joins the party, the it loses its night vision ability.

Yeah, that is strange.  Goblin is a PC race in Shadowdark.  So a Goblin PC can't see in the dark, but a Goblin non-PC can?  Is there any explanation for that in the rules?

Only thing I've found is that the monsters don't actually have dark vision. According to the RAW:

QuoteDARK-ADAPTED
All non-humanoid monsters are dark-adapted. Their powerful senses allow them to ignore the penalties of total darkness (see pg. 84). Blinding or deafening a monster still hinders it.

Quote from: Crusader X on April 22, 2023, 06:30:20 AM

Quote from: cavalier973 on April 21, 2023, 06:52:26 PM
I remember what I heard, now; if a monster joins the party, the it loses its night vision ability.

Yeah, that is strange.  Goblin is a PC race in Shadowdark.  So a Goblin PC can't see in the dark, but a Goblin non-PC can?  Is there any explanation for that in the rules?

no and i think we all have been reading the rules wrong.


Page 189:

Quote
DARK-ADAPTED
All non-humanoid monsters are
dark-adapted. Their powerful
senses allow them to ignore the
penalties of total darkness (see
pg. 84). Blinding or deafening
a monster still hinders it.

Humanoids don't get darkvision automatically either, they need light to move around.   That's not to say you can't have deep dwarves have dark vision as they've transgressed from humanoid to 'monster' status.

Quote from: THE_Leopold on April 21, 2023, 06:44:17 PM

We are slowly moving our 5E game to a version of Shadowdark rules that we can integrate with our much larger tactical type play.  We have a good months worth of work ahead of us and many more playtests to iron things out. Our goal is to be off of 5E/DNDBeyond by Q3/23.

Looking to do the same. In particular, I want to add in discrete movement and range instead of close, near, far. I'd be very interested to hear about your experience with that transition.

Quote from: Festus on April 25, 2023, 03:05:24 PM

Quote from: THE_Leopold on April 21, 2023, 06:44:17 PM

We are slowly moving our 5E game to a version of Shadowdark rules that we can integrate with our much larger tactical type play.  We have a good months worth of work ahead of us and many more playtests to iron things out. Our goal is to be off of 5E/DNDBeyond by Q3/23.

Looking to do the same. In particular, I want to add in discrete movement and range instead of close, near, far. I'd be very interested to hear about your experience with that transition.

Close=5' radius
Close=UPTO 30'
Far=31-120'

overall it's worked just fine. The nebulous tagging drove us nuts so we found where it states those type of ranges and repalced them with "In a 5' area around you".  There are some spells that are Double Cubed Close and those needed to be redone.

Quote from: SHARK on April 21, 2023, 07:09:45 PM
Greetings!

YAY! SHADOWDARK has dropped on me now! Fucking outstanding!

And OOH RAH!!!

Geesus, the game is delicious. I love how it remains easy, and simple, and straightforward. It is also fucking SWEET how when I have been reviewing the three Cursed Scroll Zines, each of them includes more rules for climate and travel, new spells, newclasses, new weapons and gear, as well as new monsters.

And--there are always more awesome fucking random tables of stuff.

All of these optional elements really combine to make the basic game *deep*. I am thrilled with contemplating creating new adventures, locations, and more using all of these elements!

The Cursed Scrolls, geesus, are awesome! Cursed Scroll (1) talks about Witches, Warlocks, Demons, and Witchcraft. Cursed Scroll (2) talks about Desert environments, Desert tribes, weird Desert Assassins, and fucking cool Camels. Silver-furry Camels! Cursed Scroll (3) talks about Nordic Sea Raiders! Vikings, baby! Seers, Sea Raiders, sea travel, cold weather, and fucking OLD NORSE Paganism! All kinds of weird curses and Norns spinning fate, and fucking awesome OATHS!

Add all this sweetness to the huge main rulebook, oh, DAYUM!

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

Amen! the Cursed Scroll zines turn 300+ pages of content into 500+. The desert stuff from #2 is going to see immediate use in my game!

Quote from: THE_Leopold on April 25, 2023, 03:09:32 PM

Quote from: Festus on April 25, 2023, 03:05:24 PM

Quote from: THE_Leopold on April 21, 2023, 06:44:17 PM

We are slowly moving our 5E game to a version of Shadowdark rules that we can integrate with our much larger tactical type play.  We have a good months worth of work ahead of us and many more playtests to iron things out. Our goal is to be off of 5E/DNDBeyond by Q3/23.

Looking to do the same. In particular, I want to add in discrete movement and range instead of close, near, far. I'd be very interested to hear about your experience with that transition.

Close=5' radius
Close=UPTO 30'
Far=31-120'

overall it's worked just fine. The nebulous tagging drove us nuts so we found where it states those type of ranges and repalced them with "In a 5' area around you".  There are some spells that are Double Cubed Close and those needed to be redone.

So far I've also found:

half near - PC swimming/climbing is half speed
double near - e.g. MV for giants, dragons, etc.

Given the game has 5', 10', 15', 30', 60', and 120' distances as written, I'm not sure what the benefit of the tagging even is...

Quote from: Festus on April 25, 2023, 03:40:53 PM

Quote from: THE_Leopold on April 25, 2023, 03:09:32 PM

Quote from: Festus on April 25, 2023, 03:05:24 PM

Quote from: THE_Leopold on April 21, 2023, 06:44:17 PM

We are slowly moving our 5E game to a version of Shadowdark rules that we can integrate with our much larger tactical type play.  We have a good months worth of work ahead of us and many more playtests to iron things out. Our goal is to be off of 5E/DNDBeyond by Q3/23.

Looking to do the same. In particular, I want to add in discrete movement and range instead of close, near, far. I'd be very interested to hear about your experience with that transition.

Close=5' radius
Close=UPTO 30'
Far=31-120'

overall it's worked just fine. The nebulous tagging drove us nuts so we found where it states those type of ranges and repalced them with "In a 5' area around you".  There are some spells that are Double Cubed Close and those needed to be redone.

So far I've also found:

half near - PC swimming/climbing is half speed
double near - e.g. MV for giants, dragons, etc.

Given the game has 5', 10', 15', 30', 60', and 120' distances as written, I'm not sure what the benefit of the tagging even is...

They are aiming for more Theatre of the Mind and less tactical.

This is one of the weaker areas of Shadowdark : consistency

 This topic is getting way too many posts in a forum devoted to the OSR. I'm very disappointed in you guys.

I'm reading the rulebook at the moment. So far I like it a lot. Full assessment when I've finished it.

For me, this is an ORS game with some newer 5e stuff added. And not the other way around. But YMMV.

EDIT: As I said before I had the game, I'm not mad about the 'timer' countdown in real time for torches. Because I find real-time and meta-time during a game too fiddly. But I like the whole darkness thing and will definitely use it more as a concept for adding pressure to PC than i ever did before.

One other thing. I'm not mad about is rolling random encounters at very 'specific' intervals. But that's an old-school thing. I didn't like it back in the day as I always prefer to plan my encounters. Not a criticism per se more of a personal play style.

Quote from: Rob Necronomicon on April 25, 2023, 10:18:28 PM


For me, this is an ORS game

Old Rule Survival?

Quote from: Rob Necronomicon on April 25, 2023, 10:18:28 PM
I'm reading the rulebook at the moment. So far I like it a lot. Full assessment when I've finished it.

For me, this is an ORS game with some newer 5e stuff added. And not the other way around. But YMMV.

EDIT: As I said before I had the game, I'm not mad about the 'timer' countdown in real time for torches. Because I find real-time and meta-time during a game too fiddly. But I like the whole darkness thing and will definitely use it more as a concept for adding pressure to PC than i ever did before.

One other thing. I'm not mad about is rolling random encounters at very 'specific' intervals. But that's an old-school thing. I didn't like it back in the day as I always prefer to plan my encounters. Not a criticism per se more of a personal play style.

Rolling for encounters is something I do for wilderness travel mostly (rare exception the players decided to explore a cave/dungeon/ruin/tower they found after chasing squirrels), my DM of my AD&D2e campaign does the same.

But for the most part it's planed.

Quote from: Timothe on April 25, 2023, 09:54:41 PM
This topic is getting way too many posts in a forum devoted to the OSR. I'm very disappointed in you guys.

Oh snap.

Shut er down boys!

So now that it's simmered a while, what's the consensus? From what I've heard and seen, it appears to be a collection of mechanics from various OSR games and 'zines, put the in a hard back with a slip case (which I don't get. I like boxed sets, but do you need a box if it's just a single book?) with some nice black and white art.

My real question is does it have staying power. Seeing as how the creator made a name for herself writing modules, it will probably get some first party support, but I feel like people who like the OSR bits will stay with or move onto games that a more true to the source material, and the 5E fans will move back to 5E (if they ever really left). 
Only time will tell, I suppose.

Quote from: Tasty_Wind on April 30, 2023, 11:34:10 AM
So now that it's simmered a while, what's the consensus? From what I've heard and seen, it appears to be a collection of mechanics from various OSR games and 'zines, put the in a hard back with a slip case (which I don't get. I like boxed sets, but do you need a box if it's just a single book?) with some nice black and white art.

My real question is does it have staying power. Seeing as how the creator made a name for herself writing modules, it will probably get some first party support, but I feel like people who like the OSR bits will stay with or move onto games that a more true to the source material, and the 5E fans will move back to 5E (if they ever really left). 
Only time will tell, I suppose.

Id say check back in a year for full results and to see who has made products for it 3pp help keep new games alive and this is the New Shiney on the block.  Her licensing is modeled off Mork Borg so its very open and flexible.

Will it eclipse 5e? Hell no.  PF or OSE? Perhaps give them a run for their money by 2025.

Quote from: Tasty_Wind on April 30, 2023, 11:34:10 AM
So now that it's simmered a while, what's the consensus? From what I've heard and seen, it appears to be a collection of mechanics from various OSR games and 'zines, put the in a hard back with a slip case (which I don't get. I like boxed sets, but do you need a box if it's just a single book?) with some nice black and white art.

My real question is does it have staying power. Seeing as how the creator made a name for herself writing modules, it will probably get some first party support, but I feel like people who like the OSR bits will stay with or move onto games that a more true to the source material, and the 5E fans will move back to 5E (if they ever really left). 
Only time will tell, I suppose.

No slip case as I recall. Just a hardback book, but with add ons/stretch goals for 3 issues of her zine, GM screen, pre-made character sheets with art, etc. It's a beefy sucker tho - 300+ pages and the zines 64 pages each. So well over 500 pages of material overall with half a dozen dungeons/adventures.

DriveThru already has about 60 products listed as designed for Shadowdark by folks other than the creator. So I don't think support is an issue. Whether that pace is sustainable, let alone likely to increase ... well as THE_Leopold says time will tell.