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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Joshua Randall" data-source="post: 9629623" data-attributes="member: 7737">Like everything else in the story, Rufyl’s telepathy has the range of plot.If Blessed Dyan is a nature deity, that might subtly explain part of the conflict between His adherents and the old Druidic faith of the Kandians: after all, you can’t have two gods of the same domain. This might also subtly explain how the pre-Pazuzu Dyan-ites had success converting enough of the Kandians to get them to come from the highlands down to Saven to worship in the cathedral: because it wasn’t a big stretch to switch them from one type of nature worship to another.Of course this is all speculation and rationalization on my part.It was you who proposed Rufyl is a cat, and when was the last time you saw a cat volunteer to help with anything?  <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f923.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":ROFLMAO:" title="ROFL    :ROFLMAO:"  data-smilie="18"data-shortname=":ROFLMAO:" />I wonder if the author realized he needed to get all the good guys into one place, but he had put the good guys’ most appropriate home base (Wealwood) only a half-day’s journey from the bad guys’ home base (Saven). As well as had the bad guys invade and then blockade Seagate Island, which turned out to be irrelevant, because everyone in the College Arcane was already dead or fled. So there had to be a rewrite to explain how to separate the two teams and divide them between the two landmasses, hence the offhanded way in which Perth abandons the seat of Druidic power, the very land that is “we are the empire of Bhukod” according to Dalris.That’s (A)D&D for you! Anything distinctive about a culture is inherent in the beings that make up that culture. Drow? No matter where they are, they have weapons that disintegrate in sunlight and use poison. Dwarves? Have mining technology. Elves? Are born knowing how to use bows and swords.Unfortunately no. It would be cool to see a group portrait of most of Team Good Guys. We can imagine the scene: Thayne the gnarled svirneblin stands with one hand on his hip and the other shading his eyes from the sunlight; Garn holds the bridle of his horse; Dalris is in the foreground gesturing as she tells her tale; and Carr sits resting against a tree feeding Rufyl an apple. If you follow the sightlines of the characters, Dalris gazes into the distance, Thayne and Garn look at her, and Carr is off to the side where he can leer directly at Dalris’s supple curves and leather-clad backside.Wait for it….A way of death, yes. If we take the path I disallowed earlier (from Wealwood to Seagate Island to Thayne’s village) then it means we have completely bypassed Saven and thus never met Garn.But again: cat! And what could be more catlike than to give JUST enough information that it leads to the potential for random violence and death, rather than complete information that leads to a peaceful resolution?By realizing that despite what “they” have told you over the decades, AD&D is and always was heavily Gamist (with some nods to Simulationism). The word “Turn” in AD&D is explicitly a player-facing word, a turn that the player takes in the game being played. How much can you accomplish in one turn? As much as the rules say you can. And because the cycle of play emphasizes dungeon delving at a granular level and de-emphasizes everything else, one turn in the dungeon is much more precisely defined than one turn outside the dungeon.Player: Hey DM, how far can we get down the corridor in one turn?DM: Consult your movement speed, as modified by encumbrance, and lighting, and whether you are tapping the floor with a ten-foot pole, and also be aware that the longer it takes to traverse this dungeon the more rolls I make for wandering monsters.Vs.Player: Hey DM, we’re in our forest home base. What can we accomplish by tomorrow?DM: Eh, let’s call that one turn, so anything up to that amount.Garn is a quick worker. In the last week, while we have hiked across Seagate Island, Garn has met up with “most of” the still-pure paladins; created resistance cells; saw them on their own two feet such that they no longer need his direct involvement; journeyed to Wealwood; found it abandoned and ravaged by Arno’s troops; somehow gathered the intelligence that Perth, in disguise, got smuggled off the mainland to the island; went back to the coast; somehow also booked passage from the mainland to the island (despite being persona very much non grata in the eyes of the corrupted church); and rode his horse into the mountains. Poor Garn hasn’t had time to stroke our sceptre!Because D&D requires a fabulous treasure as the object of our quest.Yes, that is an even better analogy.Although I had this thought: we know that Dalris can collect relics from Ancient Bhukod in the same way that I might collect Superfriends lunchboxes from the 1980s: both are relatively commonplace and unremarkable. What if the reason Thayne didn’t take note of his aunt’s deific crown is that everyone has an entire collection of stuff worn by the gods?“Oh that’s right, Estla does have the crown of Aerdrie. She keeps it in her closet next to the vest of Correlon, the shoes of Labelas, and the gloves of Sehanine.”</blockquote>

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