Shadowdark Shadowdark General Thread [+]

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Hes not selling it

If it invalidates a Dolmenwood sale -- a product he has spent more than a decade of blood, sweat and tears on -- that's the issue, not whether the people invalidating the sales are making a profit off it.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I always wonder why you can’t have a conversion document that only makes things clear within the scope of owning the original document, like referencing page numbers in the original.

That's typically what successful conversion documents, official and otherwise, end up doing.

 

[Fenris-77]

If it invalidates a Dolmenwood sale -- a product he has spent more than a decade of blood, sweat and tears on -- that's the issue, not whether the people invalidating the sales are making a profit off it.

Yeah, that's not the intent at all, and I can't see it doing that. Just my two cents of course. The project isn't about reproducing DW page by page, just about converting the mechanics to SD.

 

[Reynard]

In a perfect world, conversions are unnecessary because adventures are intentionally designed for the game they are supposed to be used with. I think you must inevitably and necessarily lose something in the conversion, and a well designed thing should be experienced in the system it was made for. This is doubly true in a project like Dolemwood because the creator actively rebuilt the system to serve the project.

All that said, it isn’t "wrong" to convert things. But why not play it as the creator intended?

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

All that said, it isn’t "wrong" to convert things. But why not play it as the creator intended?

Speaking for myself, some of the latent BXisms are kind of a turn off for me with Dolmenwood. But ideally, that would just mean I'd get to play it, rather than run it.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

So, I'm planning on statting up a devil swine or wereboar for next weekend's session. But looking at existing Shadowdark monsters, it's a little weird.

There are two lycanthropes in the Shadowdark core book, a rare case of the book going light on Monster Manual/SRD conversions. (I refuse to believe more people needed the chuul converted than the weretiger.)

The wererat is level 3. The werewolf is level 4. Rat is level 1. The wolf is level 2. So it looks like lycanthrophy adds about two levels to the base monster.

Shadowdark doesn't actually use templates, but both existing lycanthropes get Impervious (only damaged by silver or magical sources) and Lycanthropy (if 12 or more damage from the same werewolf, contract lycanthropy).

So far, so good.

But boars are level 3. So a wereboar would be level 5, making them tougher than a werewolf. Werebears would be level 7. It feels weird to me for werewolves to be one of the weakest lycanthropes. Is it just me? Or, alternately, is the +2 level thing just coincidence?

I'm also leaning more towards making a unique monster, since I want this particular group of wereboars be a family and didn't intend to have infection be part of their threat. (They're basically the hillbilly cannibals of lots of circa 2000 horror movies.)

Thoughts?

 

[Reynard]

So, I'm planning on statting up a devil swine or wereboar for next weekend's session. But looking at existing Shadowdark monsters, it's a little weird.

There are two lycanthropes in the Shadowdark core book, a rare case of the book going light on Monster Manual/SRD conversions. (I refuse to believe more people needed the chuul converted than the weretiger.)

The wererat is level 3. The werewolf is level 4. Rat is level 1. The wolf is level 2. So it looks like lycanthrophy adds about two levels to the base monster.

Shadowdark doesn't actually use templates, but both existing lycanthropes get Impervious (only damaged by silver or magical sources) and Lycanthropy (if 12 or more damage from the same werewolf, contract lycanthropy).

So far, so good.

But boars are level 3. So a wereboar would be level 5, making them tougher than a werewolf. Werebears would be level 7. It feels weird to me for werewolves to be one of the weakest lycanthropes. Is it just me? Or, alternately, is the +2 level thing just coincidence?

I'm also leaning more towards making a unique monster, since I want this particular group of wereboars be a family and didn't intend to have infection be part of their threat. (They're basically the hillbilly cannibals of lots of circa 2000 horror movies.)

Thoughts?

I think you are overthinking it. The were rat werewolf are the levels they are because that's where they fit in the Shadowdark milieu.

So you just need to ask, where does the wereboar fit? Based on what you wrote, I'd design them as level 2 creatures.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Yeah, I need to look at my PCs' levels and reverse engineer from there. I want this family to be very scary -- Texas Chainsaw Massacre, but it has to scare fighters and wizards -- but not an insta-TPK.

 

[Fenris-77]

So, I'm planning on statting up a devil swine or wereboar for next weekend's session. But looking at existing Shadowdark monsters, it's a little weird.

There are two lycanthropes in the Shadowdark core book, a rare case of the book going light on Monster Manual/SRD conversions. (I refuse to believe more people needed the chuul converted than the weretiger.)

The wererat is level 3. The werewolf is level 4. Rat is level 1. The wolf is level 2. So it looks like lycanthrophy adds about two levels to the base monster.

Shadowdark doesn't actually use templates, but both existing lycanthropes get Impervious (only damaged by silver or magical sources) and Lycanthropy (if 12 or more damage from the same werewolf, contract lycanthropy).

So far, so good.

But boars are level 3. So a wereboar would be level 5, making them tougher than a werewolf. Werebears would be level 7. It feels weird to me for werewolves to be one of the weakest lycanthropes. Is it just me? Or, alternately, is the +2 level thing just coincidence?

I'm also leaning more towards making a unique monster, since I want this particular group of wereboars be a family and didn't intend to have infection be part of their threat. (They're basically the hillbilly cannibals of lots of circa 2000 horror movies.)

Thoughts?

You would have a more flexible approach if you used the base of whichever human got bitten, instead of the animal. So, your base lycan is your average peasant with the improvement, as you note, based on a standard level boost. But you could also have bigger, nastier humans as the base, like the level 6 evil knight (or whatever). So for a given task you just pick a combination of human template and were template that combine to give you roughly the level you're looking for. Plus you have all the abilities of enhanced human to play with.

If I wanted werewolves in my own setting, I'd do up a whole range of levels, starting from the base one in SD but adding (off the top of me head) a bigger brute, a sneaky hunter, a shaman, and a werelord leader.

 

[zottel]

Yeah, I need to look at my PCs' levels and reverse engineer from there. I want this family to be very scary -- Texas Chainsaw Massacre, but it has to scare fighters and wizards -- but not an insta-TPK.

You could also over stat the wereboars, but add a deliberating weakness to some or all of them. Maybe the ritually blinded themselves, are bound to a relic, or can't abide strong scents. Pig iron could be a fun weakness, for the pun alone. 'Creating & Adapting Monsters for use in Shadowdark RPG' by Michael Putlack, as well as the Shadowdark core book, has some more weaknesses to use.