For six teenagers no less.
Three are regulars at my store and three were recruits from the D&D club my regulars started at their high school.
So, anyhow, we've got three dwarf fighters, an elf wizard, a human cleric and a human fighter.
We started with just the three regulars, character creation was pretty slow between my balky printer and my slow computer. I wound up with a pretty messed up printout but the bulk of the book is semi usable. What a waste of ink.
So I'm in a bit of a bad mood to start with. I'm fudging the adventure and the monsters but that's nothing new, the regulars change their minds about what they want to play during the week so even if I'm prepared I'm not prepared.
I tell them that they're investigating the ruined temple of the god of love that lies near their village. The temple was destroyed during a moral panic involving a cuckold king two hundred years ago. The architecture is the height of elven craftsmanship with graceful statues and bas-reliefs covering the ruin. There are few places with a roof or more than two walls standing and much of the bigger marble rubble has long since been carted away.
The scholarly human cleric is taking notes and studying the ruins and the dwarf fighter is complaining about shoddy elven workmanship. The human fighter stands around. Suddenly an orc appears out of the rubble, he greets the cleric and points out some finer points of the architecture. As they talk he tells them that there is a dragon that hoards the treasures of the wealthy cult deep in the dungeons beneath the ruins. He offers to show them the way in. As he is unarmed and friendly they agree.
The entrance is a steep shaft, formerly a chimney that plunges deep into the earth, once the heroes have clambered in, he waves this friends and they dislodge a large slab so it blocks the entrance. Then they go to their usual entrance and wait with loaded crossbows. Just in case.
At the bottom of the shaft is a narrow, crooked corridor. The sounds of gibbering and foot falls are approaching. The dwarf fighter hides behind some rubble and the other two draw their weapons. Soon they see six hunched and hairy humanoid figures dressed in rags and armed with rocks and crude clubs. Seeing the intruders their vacant white eyes narrow and hooting and screaming they attack. (AC 10, 2HD Morlocks)
Only to be struck down by a guiding bolt and some sharp rolls on the fighter's part. The cleric searches the bodies and finds fleas, which decide to immigrate immediately.
Moving down the corridor they come to a T intersection and take a left which leads to a room with a beautiful spiral staircase in the corner. The human cleric starts down and the dwarf fighter decides to roll down the stairs. He misses his target and rolls down past him. The human fighter shrugs, sighs and proceeds to follow his companions.
The new players show up and we take a break to generate characters.
Once that's done we get back to the action. These bold souls, two dwarf fighters and an elf wizard have come exploring and looking for gold and come through the entrance the orcs usually use. They've just discovered this room with an incredible spiral staircase carved from a single gigantic slab of marble. When a strange dwarf rolls into their midst, cackling madly. The dwarf fighters raise their great axe and warhammer to strike but the elf wizard shouts at them to stop. Soon the two groups have met, shared information, and decided to proceed downwards together heedlessly ignorant of the idea that dungeon levels are progressively deadlier.
Dwarf fighter B and C decide to race down the stairs. C wins and runs straight into a massive, shaggy figure armed with a club. (AC 13, 6 HD Morlock) The heroes work their way down the stairs and into the fight taking a few minor wounds until dwarf fighter C finally brings it down with a weak blow. (Only 4 damage)
The Dwarves choose to ignore the three passages out of the chamber and continue down. Dwarf B notices that the step ahead of him is unusually reflective but fails to stop dwarf C who flails wildly but avoids slipping on the well oiled stairs. Dwarf B tries to push him but he manages to grab a hold of his treacherous pal and neither of them fall. Looking to tie a rope to the railing they discover that razor sharp bits of metal have been worked into the cracks on it so anyone who slipped and grabbed it would have badly cut up their hands.
Carefully proceeding the party worked its way down to the next chamber. Here the stairs end on a dais in a large room with a tall ceiling and beautiful fluted pillars and bas-reliefs. A lone Kobold stood in the third of six passages exiting across a ninety degree arc. The bolt narrowly missed dwarf B and the Kobold turned and fled. Dwarf A was the only one to pursue the little fiend but Dwarf B followed more cautiously. Neither paid any attention to the oil soaked wooden planks that had been placed along the passages floor, so when flames burst out behind them they were nearly cut off from the party. Dwarf B turned back and leapt the growing inferno and Dwarf A charged down the corridor pursued by the hungry flames.
The gods of gaming bless you for running a group of teens!
How'd the system feel in play? Did it flow well? How long did rolling up characters take?
At this point the group proceeded to use all their skills to find which way they should go. The elf wizard cast comprehend languages to read the inscriptions above the doors and learned that they were star signs. The bull, the wolf, the stag, the lizard, the bear, and the spider. The passage of the lizard was burning. As smoke billowed into the chamber the party began to cough and be short of breath. The stair was acting as a chimney and drawing up the smoke.
The human cleric and dwarf B opted to try the passage of the lizard feeling it must have burned out. The cleric cast a spell of resistance before charging in and arrived fresh and clear just after the wheezing, coughing dwarf.
Now, Dwarf A had fled the burning hall and discovered a room that contained a large steel grinder with a hopper, a bin, and three interlocking grinding wheels. Additional bins in the room were found to contain fine white dust with the occasional bit of bone mixed in. The hopper contained a few human bones and the bin below the grinder was about half full of the same powder. Dwarf A spilled a couple bins and filled a sack with some of the powder before the human cleric and Dwarf B arrived in the room of the bone grinder.
The remaining party members (dwarf C, elf wizard, human fighter) chose to take the path of the spider and soon came into a chamber containing a red brown stained press that fed into a brown stained bucket. There was an open barrel full of rags in the corner. The door on the other side of the room lead to a room with a door that went ahead and a door to the right.
The dwarf and wizard went back to the stair room, which was filled with smoke but they decided to take the next passage. The passage of the bull.
The human fighter went right and found himself confronted by two kobolds with long spears. He charged and struck them down.
Meanwhile the dwarf and the wizard passed through a room where dozens of skeletons hung from hooks and desiccated flesh and skin covered the floor. The wizard turned to dwarf C and asked "What kind of temple of love was this?" To him the machinery spoke more of manufacturing than religion. Actually they were manufacturing the love potions and elixers of prowess they were famed for, who said the cult of love had to be lawful good clerics?
Hearing fighting out the other door from the room they looked and saw the human fighter strike down two kobolds. They decided to return to the stair room. The human fighter didn't even notice they were there.
The human cleric, Dwarf A, and Dwarf B came out of their corridor to the sound of running water, a ten foot wide stream lay before them with a narrow ledge along its edge. Following the flow of the water to the left they. Soon came to a treacherous looking stair along the side of a fast flowing waterfall. Behind them came the horrible squeaking of a spiked wall that was rolling towards them.
The human fighter came out on the ledge along the stream behind the six kobolds who were pushing the spiked wall. He opted to explore to the right.
Back on the ledge Dwarf A dove into the shallow stream with a yell and vanished down the cataract. The human cleric and dwarf B clambered onto the spray slick stairs.
At this point it was closing time and I needed to pick up my son from his scout camp so we, left it there.
Okay, bearing in mind that I was disinclined to like 5e and didn't plan to carry it in my store, here's my thoughts.
First off the good. I like the proficiency bonus. It's a bit one size fits all but it's quick and clean which is what D&D should be. I like the core basic game being pared down to the core four classes and races. I like that the alignments are back. I'm okay with the weapons and armor, though I haven't delved into encumbrance yet. I like that weapons and skills are finally run the same way.
The bad. Actually so far, I really don't like this game. That's a bit unfair maybe, I liked the beefy first level characters of RMSS but here we've got first level spells doing 4d6 damage, three magic missiles, at will attack spells on par with swords, at will light, at will comprehend languages, at will mage hand. And the fighters are pretty brutal too. Six two hit dice monsters dead in three rounds, brutal. 20 Strength dwarves for the win. Also, fighters can heal themselves which is smart and dumb at the same time. Why not just give them 2d10 hp at first level?
I think character creation is too cumbersome for a basic set and you have to watch out for overlaps between background and class skills.
My guess is that WotC will hold onto some of the 4e fans, win back some of the Pathfinder fans but fail to dent the OSR at all. Previously I thought the OSR had something to worry about but now I don't. There's nothing for them here.
Quote from: David Johansen;764993My guess is that WotC will hold onto some of the 4e fans, win back some of the Pathfinder fans but fail to dent the OSR at all. Previously I thought the OSR had something to worry about but now I don't. There's nothing for them here.
Ouch, well honest opinion, be prepared to be set upon, of course.
The weird thing is though, they have a really good sound Basic system - that they couldn't help themselves in shitting up with stuff that should have been optional.
I mean you start with the basic, absolute core, then add - how fucking hard was that? 3isms - options. 4isms - options, storycrap - options. Instead we got representative elements of all in Basic.
Cue Haffrung saying no one on earth has every cared what an old schooler will buy. :D
Still, they would be fools to OGL this thing, because again, they've proven themselves incapable of writing a piece of descriptive fluff to save their souls. Nearly everyone would take their quite excellent core mechanics, scrape the what should have been optional shit off it, and resell it under 100 names.
Quote from: David Johansen;764993My guess is that WotC will hold onto some of the 4e fans, win back some of the Pathfinder fans but fail to dent the OSR at all. Previously I thought the OSR had something to worry about but now I don't. There's nothing for them here.
It's not a bad guess.
Interesting read, thanks, David. :)
Thank you David for being honest and also to CRK for being you as usual. It looks like it's solid and will get people playing not pissing and moaning about their favorite edition/version that nobody actually plays on a wide scale.
And by actually playing something with the same language as 0-3e or the OSR.....be the lingua franca which is their actual goal. So in the conversation for real.
Not that you or CR are a bit biased? No, that's silly given you had three walk ins playing pure chargen players on top of 3 others the very same? Naw.. ..never happen.
Quote from: Endless Flight;764999It's not a bad guess.
except for all of us who play mostly only old school games who have really enjoyed 5e that is. Man's welcome to his opinion of course, but it doesn't jive with the feedback I've gotten from a lot of old schoolers, both IRL and online
The proof will be in the pudding. Either people will play it or not, but it seems off to a good start, plenty of games starting, and a lot of old-schoolers playing. That could be just some initial exuberance though, so who knows?
Quote from: Sacrosanct;765010except for all of us who play mostly only old school games who have really enjoyed 5e that is. Man's welcome to his opinion of course, but it doesn't jive with the feedback I've gotten from a lot of old schoolers, both IRL and online
The thing I will say in their defense is that even though they constantly annoy me to no end with WTF moments, WotC still have put out an edition of D&D, which is a refreshing change, and I haven't seen a WTF that is going to cost me more then a second's work, unlike 3e and 4e, which required substantial rewrites to make a RPG that didn't make my teeth itch.
OP will soon be dead to me I expect except for "Basic Only" events, but that was too much to hope for anyway.
Quote from: CRKrueger;765015The thing I will say in their defense is that even though they constantly annoy me to no end with WTF moments, WotC still have put out an edition of D&D, which is a refreshing change, and I haven't seen a WTF that is cost me more then a second's work, unlike 3e and 4e, which required substantial rewrites to make a RPG that didn't make my teeth itch.
same here
Quote from: CRKrueger;765015OP will soon be dead to me I expect except for "Basic Only" events, but that was too much to hope for anyway.
OP? :confused:
Quote from: dragoner;765018OP? :confused:
Organized Play.
Quote from: CRKrueger;765019Organized Play.
Ah, ok. That is a bummer anyways.
Open Play or Original Poster, not quite sure :D
Anyhow, it would be good for the industry if the D&D community united energetically under a single banner.
The reason I say that the old school crowd won't go for it is that it really clutters up the clean core mechanic with feats, class abilities, at will +1d4 saving throw or AC spells (or was Resistance first, no I'm pretty sure it was a Cantrip, curse my useless printer(not my printer skills, surely not!), there were times when it drew two pages and so the back of a page didn't get printed and there are pages missing I can't account for.) It also loses the stark harshness of old school play.
Still for all that I think it's pretty functional and resolves many complaints people have about D&D ranging from weak low level characters to weaker low level wizards, and probably strong high level wizards as well. Fighters have more stuff to write on their character sheets (thus losing their elegant simplicity)
I think I'm going to go with a level per week with new players starting on par with regular players. Normally I don't agree with that but it's a fairly open group and I could see it growing faster than I can handle.
I don't think it brings anything to the table for us GURPS, Rolemaster, FATE, TFT, HERO, or even Palladium fans. At least it's a little cleaner and more consistent. Well, Palladium Fantasy Roleplay might suffer a bit but I suspect a surge in Rift sales will come along a few years down the line as now new D&D 5 fans drift away looking for something new and shiny in the way of a Glitter Boy Suit.
Quote from: CRKrueger;765019Organized Play.
I had hopes also but I agree.:(
Quote from: David Johansen;765021Open Play or Original Poster, not quite sure :D
Anyhow, it would be good for the industry if the D&D community united energetically under a single banner.
The reason I say that the old school crowd won't go for it is that it really clutters up the clean core mechanic with feats, class abilities, at will +1d4 saving throw or AC spells (or was Resistance first, no I'm pretty sure it was a Cantrip, curse my useless printer(not my printer skills, surely not!), there were times when it drew two pages and so the back of a page didn't get printed and there are pages missing I can't account for.) It also loses the stark harshness of old school play.
Still for all that I think it's pretty functional and resolves many complaints people have about D&D ranging from weak low level characters to weaker low level wizards, and probably strong high level wizards as well. Fighters have more stuff to write on their character sheets (thus losing their elegant simplicity)
I think I'm going to go with a level per week with new players starting on par with regular players. Normally I don't agree with that but it's a fairly open group and I could see it growing faster than I can handle.
I don't think it brings anything to the table for us GURPS, Rolemaster, FATE, TFT, HERO, or even Palladium fans. At least it's a little cleaner and more consistent. Well, Palladium Fantasy Roleplay might suffer a bit but I suspect a surge in Rift sales will come along a few years down the line as now new D&D 5 fans drift away looking for something new and shiny in the way of a Glitter Boy Suit.
I really think that is their core goal. People will play it, it's not hard to mod, it's middle school or just middle road like most RPGer's. Just let us have fun and shine now and again when we sit down for 2 hours outside RL.
I figure I'll keep running games for people at my store and encourage people to run games at my store. I might have to get more chairs and cut down the legs on one of the wargaming tables a couple inches to make them better to sit at.
But I've got no interest at all in running Encounters sessions.
Mind you I'd run GURPS 4e or BRP over D&D 5e any day of the week but people want what they want and I'm leaning towards wanting the store to make money so selling D&D books is probably something I should be trying to do. Good grief, at this rate I might even start carrying Magic (nah!)
Quote from: Marleycat;765027I really think that is their core goal. People will play it, it's not hard to mod, it's middle school or just middle road like most RPGer's.
To quote The Life of Brian "What Jesus of Nazareth doesn't understand is that the poor in spirit are the problem."
Quote from: David Johansen;765029To quote The Life of Brian "What Jesus of Nazareth doesn't understand is that the poor in spirit are the problem."
Maybe but how about teaching them? I know what I like for Dnd but I've actually played 1-4e and ran Palladium. 5e looks like an awesome gateway game or a game for me who has no time, a daughter that loves the concept of magic and dragons.. .and Zsna and Gabrielle....:)
Quote from: CRKrueger;765019Organized Play.
You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy.
Quote from: CRKrueger;765019Organized Play.
I had hopes also but I agree.:(
Quote from: Marleycat;765038Maybe but how about teaching them? I know what I like for Dnd but I've actually played 1-4e and ran Palladium. 5e looks like an awesome gateway game or a game for me who has no time, a daughter that loves the concept of magic and dragons.. .and Zsna and Gabrielle....:)
Well, I've spent two years trying to push other things and encourage people to play other games and I've had some successes and some failures. But when it comes down to it, second tier companies do a poor job of supporting their products.
Every time D&D has a new edition, GURPS (and everyone else really) has a chance to scoop up some newly disgruntled D&D fans and yet there isn't a single book GURPS Fantasy game or even a 32 page GURPS Lite supplement that could be cut and pasted out of GURPS Basic Set Book I and GURPS Bane Storm in about half an hour. The same is basically true of every other game out there. They aren't trying very hard to make their games accessible to new players. They aren't doing much of anything to help me sell their games. It gets discouraging. Miniatures companies are better about making entry level products but they tend to fall down on other support issues, like getting out the models that are in the army lists.
Quote from: David Johansen;765044Well, I've spent two years trying to push other things and encourage people to play other games and I've had some successes and some failures. But when it comes down to it, second tier companies do a poor job of supporting their products.
Every time D&D has a new edition, GURPS (and everyone else really) has a chance to scoop up some newly disgruntled D&D fans and yet there isn't a single book GURPS Fantasy game or even a 32 page GURPS Lite supplement that could be cut and pasted out of GURPS Basic Set Book I and GURPS Bane Storm in about half an hour. The same is basically true of every other game out there. They aren't trying very hard to make their games accessible to new players. They aren't doing much of anything to help me sell their games. It gets discouraging. Miniatures companies are better about making entry level products but they tend to fall down on other support issues, like getting out the models that are in the army lists.
I see that also but I don't understand the "why". I love GURPS but the entry is beyond hardcore, why? It's supposed to be generic.
A couple buddies and I made characters and tried to play a bit today. I like the Backgrounds (they were good in 4e too) and I am glad they're a standard part of the game now.
I am most looking forward to Backgrounds tied to settings.
I made a sword & board human fighter and it was ho hum. Nothing bad - more complicated than my 0e-2e fighter, about the same as a 3e fighter, and less interesting than my 4e fighter.
My buddies were less happy - especially about the cleric. None of us were fans of the 4e laser cleric and the 5e cleric - in Basic - just feels cobbled together wrong.
The other guys were interested in a lower powered D&D than 4e, but the damage output of the spells for them just screamed the problems we've had in high level play with HP inflation. We had HP inflation and damage inflation problems in the playtest when we did 11th-13th level adventures last fall and it looks like that's now ingrained in the system.
I need to make a Rogue/Thief and see how he feels in play. Based on the playtest, that was an interesting class and if Organized Play will be less about combats, then it may be fun to try a Human Thief.
Quote from: David Johansen;764993Okay, bearing in mind that I was disinclined to like 5e and didn't plan to carry it in my store, here's my thoughts.
You gotta carry a few copies regardless. It's D&D.
Quote from: David Johansen;764993Also, fighters can heal themselves which is smart and dumb at the same time. Why not just give them 2d10 hp at first level?
And that's why I like the 4e Gamma World solution that drops all pretense about the concept of HP as meat wounds. 4e GW says fuck it. At the end of the fight, did you live? Great, regain all your HP. Oh you're dead? Go roll up a new character.
The whole problem with CR / balance is trying to match challenges to full heal / 75% heal / 50% heal parties and the whole concept of "balanced combats" is baked too deep in D&D now since 3e. So the designers create these various self-heal work arounds or free/easy/copious heal magic to deal with the CR issue.
Quote from: David Johansen;764993I think character creation is too cumbersome for a basic set and you have to watch out for overlaps between background and class skills.
It moved quick for our crew, but we didn't have noobs. All DMs who ran the playtests.
Quote from: David Johansen;764993My guess is that WotC will hold onto some of the 4e fans, win back some of the Pathfinder fans but fail to dent the OSR at all.
I have a burger bet with a friend that Paizo is going to put out a 4e clone by next GenCon. I may be crazy, but Paizo sells so much stuff usable by 4e players (figs, maps, etc) and since 5e is not map/minis based, I am thinking Paizo makes a move for the 4e fans.
Again, I may be crazy.
As for Pathfinder fans, I can't see many of them leaving Paizo who really gives 3e fans lots of love.
As for the OSR, there will be a dent but not in players, I expect publisher will try to convert their OSR stuff to 5e to grab customers which is smart. Frog God is already on the move.
Quote from: David Johansen;764993Previously I thought the OSR had something to worry about but now I don't. There's nothing for them here.
I think in 2-3 years into the edition, 5e will actually help OSR recruitment. Wanna play D&D with even less rules? Great, roll 3D6 down the line and let's rock.
Quote from: David Johansen;765028Good grief, at this rate I might even start carrying Magic (nah!)
If you like money, sell Magic and Pokemon.
Ye Gods! An actual play report? And here I thought we were all here for a circle jerk.
Thank you for the actual play report. Excellent recount! The player characters don't seem to really like each other, do they? All running around and not sticking by one another?
Quote from: CRKrueger;765015OP will soon be dead to me I expect except for "Basic Only" events, but that was too much to hope for anyway.
I am not writing off Organized Play yet. I did not like Encounters (too little danger), but I loved the Battle Interactives for 4e which were so freaking awesome.
I am going to give OP a chance as I am not really interested in running 5e based on what I've seen in Basic (its not different enough from the playtests), but I want to play some OP to see if its more like Living City adventures back in 2e than the 3e/4e RPGA events.
We will see.
Quote from: Spinachcat;765050You gotta carry a few copies regardless. It's D&D.
If you like money, sell Magic and Pokemon.
Maybe, the market here is saturated because we've got a population of 80 000 and four stores here. When I opened the two that were here were both just barely carrying games any more. The one guy had a bit of D&D, some old roleplaying stock, and a lot of Magic. The other guy was mainly comics with a couple shelves of D&D and a shelf of Warhammer. I mainly wanted a decent gaming space with access to a washroom. And I wanted it to pay for itself. I wanted to push the boundaries. A year later a new store opened up that wanted to lose money hand over foot and drive all the competition under. That woke up the other two stores and got them trying again, where I'd largely managed to avoid doing so while I was building up. With Warhammer selling at 30% off and Magic selling at 30% off and Pokémon selling at Toys R Us and Walmart. I just don't see it.
Where I plan to move is towards toys and model railroads. I might get a box of whatever is out for Magic just to have it. But I might also move into books or cosplay stuff. I'll probably start doing some gaming mail order on lines that are hard to get here in Canada to broaden my market but I don't have the capital to carry everything for every game so that would be a more focussed out reach.
Quote from: Scott Anderson;765054Ye Gods! An actual play report? And here I thought we were all here for a circle jerk.
Thank you for the actual play report. Excellent recount! The player characters don't seem to really like each other, do they? All running around and not sticking by one another?
Yeah, the concept of focused tactical play is totally lost on these guys.
The three regulars' group dynamic has gotten really bad lately, I was thrilled to see some new blood. We've got the guy who only wants to do second edition D&D because it's what his dad plays (my least favorite, yes even after 4th). We've got the guy who always wants to do sick stuff like hitting babies with baseball bats for laughs. And we've got the guy who started out goofing off and scuttling games for his own amusement but who has grown into a much better player over time. Except the baby hitter who is mad about all the scuttled games and trying to get even. Never mind all the swearing and anti-gay, anti-religion, misogynist stuff they spew. Oh well, I was seventeen once and I understand the lure of the transgressive. I've worked to adjust some of their attitudes but what they really need is a few more of their peers to tell them "no that's not acceptable in any venue."
Hm. Four stores in 80,000 people. That seems like an embarrassment of riches.
Greater Providence, RI has but one store, and one about 20 miles outside of town. They both make money I think.
One thing that's really hurt me is the price war. I focused on stuff that could proxy for Warhammer units cheaply, like Mantic's Kings of War and Warlord Games but when guys are getting 30% off on GW the price break isn't as tempting. Even if Mantic's skeletons, orcs, and men at arms are coming in at a buck a figure. Oh okay, fair enough, the men at arms should come in a bag of a hundred for a dollar but that's the learning curve involved in producing plastics in China.
But with Mutant Chronicles and Dead Zone I think I'll be better able to hook some ex-Warhammer 40k guys, nice scenery nice models, nice rules. The competition is heating up.