Destroy the Humanoid

Thinking about ATARI. How a relatively simple device prompted in my young braincase such wonder and joy and tension and excitement.  Adventure has prompted a series of posts in here: I am fairly certain I knew it well before any contact with Moldvay Basic or the Fiend Folio.  I think I think about RPGs to satisfy some inner Player 1 more than any other reason. My imagination zone looks like the cover of Adventure plus the cover of Warlords, mixed liberally with confusion about the Swordquest game, and a million million horror comics that I cannot fully recall.

The logic escaped my 7 year old brain.

Pitfall and Pitfall 2 are another thing: On its own, the first is a somewhat lackadaisical stroll to the East.  Monotonous.  The second one gave me fits in terms of sheer maddening difficulty. Sometimes in moments of duress I can still hear the music (switching over when I ride the balloon) and feel the urge to duck under the swooping Cave Condors. Once, I got all the way to the end where you get the rat and the cat that Yoohoos you (I know full well it does not make this sound) and I accidentally jumped over the rat and it pushed me into the always-flowing underground river and my mouth hung agape and I never again played it and I may have smashed my controller and got a stern talking-to from the folks about anger and frustration.

Berserk!  A simple, easy-to-understand premise, evoking a mildly heightened heartbeat at just the thought of it.  No wonder that guy(s) died!  A mark of pride was to maneuver my man-atar to a spot where the bolts of Berzerker-hate would pass harmlessly through the empty sprite-less neck zone of me.

To return: there is much to love about the mere idea of Berzerk, and I only recently found out that it was prompted by a rich fictional history that was well-developed by the time the 2600 and arcade games came on the scene.  Sabre-hagen something or other. Anyways, the Berzerkers are the height of life-killing machines, turned even on their own creators and marching across the galaxies in a never-ending quest for Nihil and Calm. They are filled with so much contempt that they even destroy each other upon contact!

I think they must have inspired the Necrons from 40K (a relentlessly gruesome and boring army to my mind but terribly Metal and relaxing to paint)

Aside: the wiki for 40K stuff is an exercise in dreary sameness, lacking the phun of Rogue Trader

Dave Otto: Security Guard, Music Lover, Authoritarian (actual picture!)

Return: Berzerkers!  Evil Otto!  are they machines in the customary sense?  androids? Synthetic beings?  mere bipedal gun platforms?  why does Otto smile relentlessly? (the real story of this is almost as frightening as any fiction)  Why are the walls of the never-ending maze (edit: it is possible for it to end) electrified?

Why can't the actual future/now look like this?

Herein lies stats for them for the few systems I know, as well as meagre ways to tweak them for your setting.  Also, a DCC Maze-Curse, or spell, or something.

L/L-SW-CLONES

Berserker (Based on the Clay Golem - I think a standard L/L character will be summarily trounced by this monster so exercise caution)
Hit Dice: 10 (15 hit points - brutally imposing, easy to kill!)
Armor Class: 7 [12]
Attacks: 1 electrified fist/grasp/hug (3d10) or 1 lazer bolt (1d20)
Saving Throw: 5
Special: Immune to slashing and piercing weapons, immune to mind affecting spells, double damage from lazer blasters and friendly fire
Move: 6
Alignment: (Lawful) Neutrality
Challenge Level/XP: 14/2,600

DCC

Berserker (Skeleton/Hulker Type): Init -5; Atk sizzling grasp -4 melee (1d14) or lazer blaster -2 missile fire (range 120’, 2d8+2); AC 13; HD 4d8+10; MV 20’; Act 1d20; SP faultless tracking 100’, immune to mind-altering spells, heal 2 hp per round, duoble damage from friendly fire; SV Fort +10, Ref -7, Will +10; AL N.

(Maybe I make an Evil Otto Patron Later for s'n'g's - you'd like that wouldn't ya, humanoid?)

DW

Berzerker
Tags:  Group, (Dis)organized, Dauntless, Slow, Messy (variation: sizzling), Terrifying, Construct, Mindless, Large
Blaster (d10+5 damage), Electrified Grasp (d10 damage)
6 HP, 3 Armor
Reach, Forceful
Instincts:
* DESTROY THE HUMANOID
* Move swiftly toward foes without thought of collision

Some Berserker-related moves

High Scorer
When you deftly evade a group of Berzerkers in close quarters, Roll +DEX:
On a 1 or less, SUMMON EVIL OTTO, at some distance
On a 2-7, Hesitate and the Berzerkers move into close combat range
On an 8-10, the Berzerkers stand dazed - guidance AIs must recompute
On an 11+, 1d3 Berzerkers crash into each other and are destroyed outright

That's all I got for the moment.  Cross one frozen post from March off my list!

Also: now it's posted, I think I promised more at the start than I've actually delivered, so MOAR SOON

Dungeon Master M.O. - what works for me (longish so sue me)

A discussion on G+ prompted me to think about what has worked and what hasn't for my online play via Hangouts (thanks to +Claytonian JP  for the idea).  I've run lots of DCC this way, and sprinkled in some Dungeon World-y bits, with a couple of mutants and a black streak of Carcosa.

1. Keep it to less than 5 people, DM included, if possible.  In an OSR game with lots of henchies, or a 5 person funnel, this can get pretty wild and hard to keep track of with more. If you happen to like a VTT like Roll20.net this can really bog down when everybody's moving their little icons.  In that case, you better just scrap the icon thing altogether, although it does have benefits (dice, chat stuff). I think Roll20'd be better if users could save personal macros, which (fuck if I know) they might be able to do, but I never think of it - even when I was dropping the fee every month.
2. Keeping track.  I go right across the little name bar at the bottom.  Divide one piece of paper into columns corresponding to player.  Then...
3. For each player, have them introduce their characters by name and occupation (for funnels), or by name and class and a blurb.  Nothing too elaborate, just enough for me to jot down in the player's column the name and class and (possibly) Luck score, just in case.  If the Wizard is evil or something, and Chaotic, then I make a note of it.  Dogs and familiars and companion animals go in the column.  Henchies don't get a Luck score, but I try to get a feel for how fast I want them to die (men-at-arms and cultists may as well paint a target on the front, unless they are particularly fun or you can and will do a funny voice)
4. I like games in which resource management is an issue, especially torches and lanterns.  One, when the lights go out naturally or on purpose due to water or wind or darkness spells, and only the demihumans can see and the random encounter roll says the cultists are herding a group of undead your way, well, a brief pause can motivate players. Do you want to relight the torches?  Hunker down and ready for combat in the darkness?  Gygax said that no meaningful campaign can happen without time tracking - I use the Labyrinth Lord one that's out there with the little check boxes but there are more elaborate ways.  Two, I mean, that shit costs money and my dungeons are generally stingy as all hell.  Your guy is gonna work his ass off for full plate in this thing and I'm gonna soak you for gold like a Cathayan Silk Trader.
5. I try to keep it to 1 night = 1 delve and back to town, unless multiple delves happen owing to briefness/serious casualties/need for more flasks of oil.  This usually turns into about 5 or 6 good encounters in 3 or 4 hours of play.
6. I try to keep the game calendar and the real-world calendar aligned, and the weather in the game is for the most part what my weather looked like today.  This saves me a couple of charts and shit, and if a guy Spellburns 25 hit points, we all know when he'll be back to full strength - I ask that the players remember this stuff and be honest (I have a vague memory for this stuff and like to say O PODRICK YOUR STRENGTH IS STILL LOW SINCE YOU BURNED IT ALL ON THAT COLOR SPRAY LAST WEEK, RIGHT? MINUS THREE TO YOUR ATTACKS HURR HURR HURR)
7. Never forget to check for wandering monsters!  Even if it's a little old school, the clatter of dice every other turn or when Frilbo and Dergolips the Elf bump into the empty cask or when PCs (i.e. players) are arguing, I mean, that's magic.  That's motivation, right there.  Unity, as one stand together.  No quibbling and/or pouting.  There are some schools of thought that say "ITS AN ART!  THE DM SHOULD PLAN ALL THE ENCOUNTERS!"  I say, and you can quote me, fuck that.  
8. If I have a group of folks I trust and that are good roleplayers, I'm almost always inclined to go Dungeon Scout's Honor on rolls.  I used to say that St. Issek abhors a fudger, but Ygg and Justicia forgive when the fudge is for the sake of dramatic tension and epic awesomeness.  On the other hand, that fucker that pulls the Mighty Deed off every goddamn round, or regularly gets 19s and 20s on the spellcheck roll gets to use the online dice roller in Roll 20.  Nobody's dice are that good, and I trust and love the players but Death and Judgment are Omnipresent and waiting like Vultures for those that cheat their friends of drama.  This is a little paradoxical, but hey.  I have recently begun to fudge dice DOWNWARD when I'm not running things, so that this one green d20 I have doesn't irritate people (I mean, I got like 4 18s and 19s in a row the other night and it looked suspicious to me, also).  For DCC, the Clerical Disapproval and Wizard Corruption is (to my mind) nothing to be afraid of and is just as good - if not better than - straight exemplary successes.
9. You gotta put up with a rules lawyer every so often - it is good for the Spirit and builds character. Hold on there, Squire.  We'll get back to this.
10. Turns are turns.  You go in order from left to right, according to the icon I have at the bottom of the Hangout.  I try to be firm.  We announce the turn, I give a description (maybe longer if I have been drinking) of what's happening, mark my little hashmark on the light/spell duration thingamabob, and I try to do my best to keep shit flowing smoothly.  If a person is droning on and on and sucking up the spotlight the whole time, I try to snip it a little and keep everybody in the game.  If that one guy is not talking too much and his cleric seems sad or whatever, "Hey Goodbert the Wise, what are you doing this turn?"  Communing with Justicia, asking for guidance?  Poking/gently caressing that sarcophagus?  Day dreaming of the elven thief lass with the fiery hair and regretting your vows of celibacy?  Awesome!  +1 Luck, sir.  Now look lively.  It's the DM's gig to keep everybody in the game and participating, and to keep it moving.  If some fucker that wandered in to the game is running over everybody's good time, then you gotta be in a leadership position to quell it.  I mean, nobody likes a tyrannical overlord asshole, but it's not telephone conversation: it's for groups (with obvious exceptions)
11. If I can roll a bunch of dice at once, I try to. For example, we discuss that 5 turns pass, requiring 3 encounter rolls, I roll 3d6 instead of one at a time.  Similarly, it's a good idea in big upbeat combats to try to do an attack and damage (and deed die) together, just to move the thing along.  When you are a player, be ready to shout out your shit and the result and pipe down unless you've been slain or something., in which case gurgle feebly for help.  Nobody likes that guy "MMMMMMMMMM.   OKKAAYYYY.  WELL, CAN I GET TO THAT ONE RATICENTIBLIN, THE ONE WITH 1HP?  IS IT IN RANGE OF MY LONGBOW FROM HERE?  OR CAN I RUN UP AND WHACK IT AND THEN RETREAT ANdronedronedronedronedronedronezzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz".  I mean, your Barbarian is frothing at the lips in a swansong of hellfury, and this guy is mincing about asking about how many actions is uncorking his potion and string his bow and shooting?  I mean, come on, man (NEXT ROUND YOU ARE AT THE END OF THE INITIATIVE CHAIN).  Lately, I have weighed asking everyone to roll initiative every turn like in the old days but that's generally too much work for my players and we... You know what, I'm droning.  Sorry.
12. I don't think DCC calls for a screen, since I put the onus on players that have the game to refer to their own charts, but I do have a rarely-used binder that has some random treasure things and I made a couple of easy-to-refer to monster charts for Barrowmaze.  DCC has lots of random charts and I think maybe the handiest one would be the Turning Undead since I can never remember that stuff. The core mechanic's pretty simple at the heart of it.  YMMV if you have some big and bogged down thing with bloaty tentacles and such - I tried to hack a 3.5 version Shaman into a L/L Druid the other day and fuck, I don't know what an Awareness Feet is.  Fuck it, like a +3 to listen for goblins or something?
13. We've taken to using the chat bar in all the online games to post initiative rolls, names of characters and NPCs, important loot (and unimportant loot), whatever needs a temporary record to refer back to.
14. In combat, not every miss needs an edit - that is, not all the shots need be described.  I say "A solid blow.  A ringing blow.  It's staggered."  Keep the players guessing the AC, since you know they are keeping track on the other side of the screen over there.  A particularly dramatic slaying ought to be optioned to the player "Okay Parthenus the Warrior, how do you slay this thing?"  If somebody won't do it (but why?  this is an RPG!) then it's your cool.  A droog or minion can just crumple into a puddle of blood, moaning.  But serious deaths need some gore and shrieking.
15. I like to not tell players NO and use a simple Improv approach to things.  I try not to say what players are doing unless no one says anything, or else their declared actions don't take up the allotted passed time.  I will work with you as hard as I can to get that thing to go if it's fun, except if you are breaking the implicit or explicit rules - even then if you can give a plausible explanation, or a fun roleplayed one that fleshes out the shared narrative or your character, or the relationship with other characters, fuck it, let's see what happens.  We have dice and time and we are ADVENTURING, lets go out on a limb a little bit and bend these rules to cracking so that we can see what kinda fun comes through.
16. What I said about rules-lawyers before, I mean, for some folks the rules-lawyers thing IS the game, and I try to be friendly and accommodating but all it takes is for you to squeeze my balls or pout or back track to an earlier scene to recover a couple of hit points or experience or copper pieces, and then (I hate to be a dick this way) I take a business-like, hard-boundary thing.  I try not to bullshit and I like to think I can back down when I am being a rat-fuck asshole, but if it comes to it next time maybe you're welcome to join but I won't tap you a couple of times before the game starts because we already have 5 players, man, and you said you might have something else going on.
17. On the other hand, you sort of need to let more charismatic PLAYERS be good leaders, also.  It's a magical thing to watch when everybody is polite and funny and having a good time and everybody steps up and zings and riffs and I don't have to be some field marshal but rather a conductor.  I don't give a fuck how many XP you got or gold or whatever.  When the stories and jokes flow like cheap wine and we can all give each other a knowing wink down the road, that's why I run games.  Also, I'm a power-hungry ego maniac, but I mean, that's a given a priori thing we all agree.
18. I don't like FLAILSNAILSing, as a matter of preference.  One reality at a time ought to be pretty exciting for your average low-magic grungy dungeon murderhobo.  I think it's poor form for a guy to have a pack of comrades scrabbling for iron rations and go off to Dimension X and come back 30 XP on with a Vorpal Hammer and Plate Armor of Goldbricking.  Causes bad feelings.  In me.  When I see all my hordes of monsters laid low I just get bitchy.  I had a pretty good discussion some months back when some guys schooled me and set me straight and called me out on my narrow-mindedness about it.  For this I thank them, and the odd guy with nothing to do that comes wandering in, as long as you're existentially compatible and not Mann Rider when we are malnourished dungeon raiders (actually happened once), I mean, hey.  Cling to your long-developed narrative if you like.  Ahem.  God Bless Mann Rider, BTW.  I am trying to stay true to my "try a new random character every play session thing" - it's working out lately.  I think people ought to try it.  Anyways, more on that some other time.
19. Lastly, stinginess with treasure and magic makes for a richer experience, in my humble opinion.  A glut of gains easily gotten becomes under-appreciated and the next thing you know, you've written some droning awful high-minded treatise...  I mean, if you're gonna give a magic-item, make it one the PCs are loathe to use except in the most dire of circumstances (they always sell this shit when they get back to town rather than try to seduce the bound murderous water nymph, but hey, it woulda been fucking awesome to watch in play).  This is a Gygaxian truism but it's not going to hold for all games. That's it, I'm out.  

Also, tonight I found a bunch of cool Gamma World shit at:

http://www.paforge.com/

Which I think can easily become part of the ASE/Carcosa/DCC/Star Frontiers/Mutant Future thing that is dribbling around in my ears.  I've sucked up so much OSR stuff that now I am stuck in some pastiche of 1981,which is okay I guess but I really need to check FIASCO and Monsterhearts off the old list.

Downward! into Barrowmaze Again... ?

Coming up on the anniversary of the Scourge of the Barrowmaze campaign - a thing that lasted 6 or 7 months last year and brought me a good deal of fun times.  At that time, I was inspired by +Dave Younce 's IRON CANYONS campaign (soon to be rebooted?) - I was struck by the simple return into a relatively easy format of a game I loved.  You may say that the "Dungeon Crawl Hack and Slash" is a bit crusty - well, you oughtn't to say it but I guess you could.

But there is unlife in those bones, yet.

Witness the nextest iteration of BARROWMAZE

I hope this becomes funded - I am unable to fund it at the "Little Guys" level, and I probably can't even do it at the lowest level until maybe early next month, but it's a great setting and always ratcheted up the tension.  As much as I want a box of all those little plastic (or metal? some alien alloy?) figs, almost the entirety of my RPG'ing these days comes over the G+ pipes and the figs would be frowned upon by my wife (she still doesn't like the box of Space Marines taking up square footage in the back bedroom).  Also, my latest favoritest all-consumingest game lately is "DADDY" in which my levels are fairly low but quest opportunities abound.

If you've come here looking for DCC character classes, know full well that Barrowmaze is the ideal vehicle to slaughter a funnel full of sub-heroes, and also it's great fun to laugh as the survivors flee in terror back to Helix across the moors!  If you feel particularly cruel, you can have ghouls or bandits chase them almost the whole way, having eaten/stolen their horses and the digging crew they left to watch them.

Muwahahaha!

I released these to the G+ DCC community last year in the late spring, but 'ere you go, in the interests of making more flubaloo around Greg's awesome project.  You will find a "better than doing it on the fly" conversion of the monsters from Barrowmaze I to DCC stats.  There's also a combined Random Monster Encounters for my campaign which includes some monstrosities hell-bent on vengeance against the party, and a secretive clan of reptilian ghoul worshippers.  The entries include all kinds of opportunity to Hell to bust out in the middle of the tomb-quiet hallways, which of course degenerates into a "eat your brains" free for all.

1.  Barrowmaze I common critters with DCC stats
2.  Turbocharged BMI+BM2 random encounter tables

I had a plan to DCC statify all the Barrowmaze monsters in all the encounters throughout the text (something that +Paul Wolfe inspired me to do) but, there's an awful lot of variety and it comes to like 150 different monsters and then the baby came in August.

I also have a "mildly improved" list of awful random properties to add onto Undead Encounters, but I will hold off on that since I'm enchanting it a little stronger.

I might reboot the campaign - if you're interested, then drop me a line - or even better, just join the community on G+ and say so.  You can find the funnel generator for it at the Purple Sorcerer here (this is my opportunity to connect +Greg Gillespie and +Jon Marr who have done a bunch to get me excited in RPGs again). If you are interested in a paper version of the d200-something funnel occupations chart for the thing, to see what classes I was hoping to include into it, then that can be found here. Warning: madness abounds, there - I was inspired by Discworld, Gamma World, Ravenloft, Lovecraft, and Realms of Crawling Chaos.

The Scourge of the Barrowmaze is sort of an attempt to instill Ravenloft-style Gothic Horror and Post-Apocalyptic (think ASE) despair onto a traditional Dungeon Crawl Hack n Slash vehicle.  We never made it too far into the actual BM complex, since almost without exception the party was swamped by random groups of undead or surface-venturing parties of looters or cultists.  The community design is a pale rip-off of the Labyrinth Lord Roll20.net Barrowmaze game hosted lovingly by +Jason Paul McCartan.  His is an absolute model of what a campaign community ought to look like - frankly I don't know how he does it what with his other commitments.

I usually don't get into the crowdfunding for reasons that others may better explain, but this setting in particular has given me a lot of good times and I wish it well and Greg good luck.  Also, it would be fun to see even more hideous evil unearthed.

The Tomb of the Ssessarids (map doodling)

So, thanks to G+ and the hangout phenomenon, I have been lucky enough to find a semi-regular play group. Got me really thinking about DM'ing again, although I love play and have insight that my role-play has become very very rusty.  One thing I really dig is tossing dice and generating PCs and NPCs from random stats.  I find that DCC does this very well with the luck roll and occupation.  I'm off after this to purchase a thing from RPGNow.

Meantime, the other thing I like to do is mapping.  I no longer have reams of maps I made as a wee git, plunging ever downward with my Kayen Telva (lifted from A1 The Slavepits of the Undercity) and magic markers.  However, with my fancypants scanner I am able offer a thing I made last night in a couple of hours, namely the tomb of the Ssessarids, the hideous mercantile family prone to internecine warfare with other traders in the capital city of Thrax.  They were rumored to be snake worshipers who mingled licentiously with reptilian things that slithered up from the pits beneath the capital city.  They searched for long-life or perhaps immortality but instead turned into a degenerate pack of corpse-eaters, lead in the end by a blue-black scaled she-demon.

In the interests of digitizing the thing, I had made a key but chopped it out with PS and cleaned it up with threshold etc.  I intended to feed it into Illustrator as a LiveTrace thing to clean up the lines but, meh.  I ran out of steam.

The entrance is an underground dome with a basin, guarded by caryatid columns who will attack if the players do not cleanse themselves in the basin's waters, first (Although this carries a risk of disease).  Packs of ghouls crawl from the various holes in the structure and broke free to maraud when the hidden entrance was revealed in a rockslide.  The whole complex is highly trapped - the Ssessarids loved Blue Cobra poison and the disfiguring scars that remain should interlopers not die shortly after injection.  At the far end of the complex, 'asleep' on his bier, lies the body of the clan's founder, a ghul sorceror of some potency who does not hesitate to call upon his patron's representative - an elegant Naga with the face of a seductress.  She has ties to the Yuan-Ti, and the crafty Serpent Men who first taught the clan to use and distill poisons, and who coached them in the arts of subterfuge.  Since the geological event that re-opened the tomb, the ghul raiders have swept into the nearby town nightly to feast on children, the elderly, and local beggars.  They had much wealth in life, and are jealous of their gold.

Anyways, it's all there in the map.  As always, the ascent is treacherous so take heede