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He kinda looks like a troglodyte.

I like motivated players. I think it's better to be a reactionary Dungeon Master, and let the players drive the play, while the Dungeon Master concentrates on creating the intrigue and drama. I've been running games for years, publishing for over a decade (hell, the only other thread I've...

Again, I blame house rules. That said, you'd need a party with a non-negative Charisma modifier in B/X, and there's only a ~2.x% chance of a 12 anyway, and 5e characters will generally eventually have 20's in their stats, I did the best in the conversion that I could. I prefer, and...

Correct, of course. I blame house rules.

Hahaha at maxed out. Yes, a 13+ gives you a +1, a 16+ gives you a +2, and an 18 gives you a +3. However, these scores were generated with 3d6, in order. So, yes, if someone happened to get a 16, they would have a 15% chance at helpful (rolling a 10, 11, or 12 on 2d6) With a d20, you always...

No, no, you misunderstand. It's a skill check, which means that there's a 5% chance of Helpful, instead of a 2.8% chance in the bell curve system. 2 Immediately Attack 3-5 Hostile 6-8 Neutral 9-11 Friendly 12 Helpful Which means any result of 15 or higher is indifferent - the same result as...

Also, replacing the core stat with Charisma in all the checks is a great addition! I didn't feel brave enough to do it myself (and considered, I didn't want anyone to get that much leverage from that one single stat). It's a great idea!

First of all, thanks for the wonderful comments. I worked a long time on this. It's based off the old Arabian Nights game, and is designed to preserve agency of the player characters and make social interactions less arbitrary. It was designed originally for older styles of games...

I was most certainly trolling you with that name. :-)

ITT: people who haven't read the downtime section in the PHB and seen that you can spend gold for proficiency.

Hi! This is -C from Hack & Slash! I want to say that several of the traps are very reminiscent of Grimtooth because for one or two traps/tricks a month I use it as inspiration. But I'm not just thoughtlessly taking traps -- I'm primarily concerned about agency in traps. What is the way the...

Frankly, I think the thought of engaging in a 'balanced' encounter where I'm expected to win is about the most unheroic thing conceivable. Now, having a swingy combat swinging against you, and taking a stand against overwhelming odds - that seems a little more heroic then scooting a target...

My metric of what value a game has is how fun it is to play. A game can only be "improved" if it is more fun. I have certain activities I find that are fun, and others that I do not. A game that removes my ability to do certain things because they are not "fair" because otherwise balance is...

I find the entire premise of his observations absurd. There are more people gaming now then at any other period of my life. My entire peer group - men, women, children are gaming regularly. Tabletop gaming, not computer or video games. I just do not meet people that haven't or aren't playing...

Absolutely. It is actually in this case (the gradual elimination of race as class, first by instituting level limits, and eventually by the removal of said limits) that the 'make sense' paradigm is most blatantly displayed. First, in the assumption that since human intelligence is the only...

I would just say that assuming a naturalistic explanation is the only kind of explanation that is valid (i.e. makes sense) shows a lack of imagination. I discuss that here in the context of Race as Class.

Thanks for all the great responses and comments! I hope everyone is getting some use from this.

Cute. From the appropriate section of the document: The first and most important thing to remember is that empty rooms aren’t. “Empty” refers to the fact that they lack an antagonist, threat, reward, or something ‘unusual’. The purpose of an empty room is to insure the players never know which...

Kellri (Kellri) has some excellent documents for old school play. Ancient Valuts (Ancient Vaults & Eldritch Secrets-The Old School Revolution is weird) provides a new monster/spell/ or magic item daily? More often? The Underdark Gazette (The Underdark Gazette) provides weekly summaries of the...

You mean besides the long list of examples down the right hand side of my blog?