D&D 4E 4E Hack: "Fiction First" Playtest

[LostSoul]

zoop

 

[LostSoul]

zip

 

[LostSoul]

booom

 

[pemerton]

LostSoul, all cool stuff! (Unfortunately I can't give you XP at this time.)

 

[LostSoul]

blah

 

[LostSoul]

nerf

 

[LostSoul]

sdafsdf

 

[LostSoul]

hello there

 

[LostSoul]

2.5 Wrapup

The past is prologue:

Can the lone dragonborn warlord make it back to civilization, with miles and miles of hostile terrain between himself and safety, gnolls on his trail lusting after his rich dragonborn blood... but are there potential allies in those strangers in the silver masks?

We'll see!

Since XP is doled out after extended rests, and since Krix was the only PC to survive (there were no more encounters after that one, I had already rolled), guess who got all the XP? Krix, for surviving that horrid experience, got 100% of the XP for the session! Not bad.

He needs to take a full day of rest to level up, though - can he make it? Exciting!

Next time the other players will be making new PCs. I've told them that there's no separation of character-player knowledge, so they know what's going on. (That's one thing we'll have to keep an eye on, to see how in influences decisions.) However, Loukamon and Baern are still alive - in gnoll captivity. How long does Baern have to survive before he's sacrificed to Yeenoghu? How long before Loukamon dies of overwork and exhaustion in the slave fields of the gnolls, or ends up being eaten alive?

I think I'll roll for it.

The new PCs may decide to take up the rescue of the old PCs as a Quest. If they are able to successfully complete their Quest, not only will they get XP, but their old PCs will act as Henchmen. This will put a lot of time pressure on the new PCs; I think the players now realize that they aren't tough enough to take on the gnolls (learning through play, awesome!), so they'll want to get as much XP as fast as they can. However, my system only grants you 1 healing surge per extended rest (and all item powers and resets action points), and getting Daily powers can take a day in itself.

There's a ticking clock... can they do it?

It'll be a good test of the system to see if the difficulty is too much or to little.

I also like the fact that all of this was set up by the players; I did nothing but sit back, maintain consistency of the game world, describe it to them, and run the NPCs. So far so good; we'll have to see what happens when other, long-term aspects of play start to arise.

 

[pemerton]

The description of the action determines the modifiers applied. Everyone except Loukamon is using the "Item" modifier since they are making direct attacks; Loukamon, since he's burning the brush, "directly affecting" the rats, gets to apply a skill.

<snip>

Loukamon and Krix ended up with a few rats crawling in their pants and armour (ongoing damage). Loukamon was bleeding pretty bad from all the bites and hundreds of rats were about to swarm him. His action was to try and shake them off - spending his Second Wind; he made a roll to determine when in the round he'd take his action, but I forget what it was (total defence). Meanwhile the other guys were busy pounding on the rats.

Can you say a bit more about the mechanics of this. In particular, (i) what is the "item" modifier, (ii) what skill did Loukamon apply, (iii) is the damage being dealt just the normal amount, and (iv) how do you handle conditions other than ongoing damage?

the description of your action carries a lot of weight.

<snip>

Ian lost his action - the rats he was trying to kill were dead - because he didn't describe an action that would allow him to act if those rats were killed before he went.

It also makes combat pretty chaotic, which I like.

Is there a Burning Wheel influence here, or from some other system, or just your own ideas?

It'll be a good test of the system to see if the difficulty is too much or to little.

I also like the fact that all of this was set up by the players; I did nothing but sit back, maintain consistency of the game world, describe it to them, and run the NPCs. So far so good; we'll have to see what happens when other, long-term aspects of play start to arise.

How did your players respond to a near-TPK in the second session?