Arilyn's latest activity

The DMs who ran Retreater's games don't seem to have read any play examples in the book. One of them -- the "do every dungeon room in...

There is ample guidance in the shadowdark rulebook to explain the playstyle in the GMing chapter.

Sorry to hear that none of your DMs knew how to make it work. :/ 1. That perfectly cromulent house rule does fix this issue, though...

Two other observations: Sometimes I think that advocates for Shadowdark, or OSR/NuSR in general, exaggerate the avoidance of combat...

Of course there are classes dedicated to combat. You need them because combat as a fail state does not mean you can completely avoid it...

I came across it on Yahoo Images. I tried accessing the webpage it came from but ran into a dead end. :( If this fella was in 5e, I...

Exactly. There are luck tokens, characters don't automatically die at 0 hp, spells may fizzle but they can also go on streaks and...

Shadowdark isn't neary as deadly, even at low levels, as some other OSR games. It's not 5E or anything, but it's also not OD&D. Kelsey...

I sometimes do this. I try to track down the creator's actual plays if I can. Watched some of Kelsey's walkthroughs and definitely...

Oh, there's definitely a split between D&D-as-it-was-played in the 1970s and early 1980s and what people sometimes call the NSR, where...

I never liked D&D back in the day because of the rapid character death, the horribly boring dungeons and the slow crawl of hitting every...

If this is how your GMs are running SD, no wonder you had a frustrating time. Kelsey wrote great advice for running the game in the...

Why thank you! Dopamine is always nice.

That's rough? You are good! 💪

It's vital that SD not be played like 5e or even 2e. Danger should be telegraphed so players can make informed choices. Combat will...