The Dungeon Masters' Foundation

[Piratecat]

You absolutely want Spycraft. It's one of my favorite d20 books, and (so long as you pick peoples' gadgets and gear for them ahead of time) it's a glorious conversion of spy movies into fun gaming.

 

[Pbartender]

Allow me to address an earlier question, as I have no small experience with a very similar situation...

And now for my first naive question:
What's the best way to work transient PC's into a campaign? (People that can't play all the time, but still want to be able to play).

...So, I guess my real question is, what do you do with transient characters in a mistrustful and irresponsible group?

I work a rotating shift. Depending on the week, I work days, evenings or midnight shifts, and I work three out of every five weekends. This made it a little tricky to join in regularly scheduled gaming sessions. Since my schedule is very predictable, we finally decided to run two games... One that I play in during the three weekends I don't work, and another that I don't play in during the two weekends I do work... That's your first option, if the missing players are always the same people and are relatively predictable in their absences.

If not, then a second option is what we tried before we decided to play two different games... Make certain the character of the part-time player is a member of a guild or secret society. Part of the catch of bekonging to this guild is that fact that the members are always 'on call' for guild missions and such.

Each member of the guild carries an identification badge... an amulet or ring or some such... which is enchanted with a permanent Refuge spell. Whenever the guild requires the services of the PC, they activate the Refuge badge, instantly teleporting the PC back to the guild hall right in the middle of whatever he had been doing. When the guild is finished with him, they scry out his friends for him, and teleport him back.

Instant out, instant in. No need to explain what he'd been doing... "I could tell you, but then I'd have to kill you." And you can even award him some basic XP for the adventures he has off-stage, if you want.

I've been thinking for a while about the possibility of hosting the DMF in its own website (however, we must change the name to Game Master Foundation or otherwise we'll get a nice letter from WotC's lawyers). How that sounds?

If it's a viable option, I could help in setting up the website, but my aid will have to wait as I'm currently building my own personal website too.

If you're interested, I'd like to extend an invitation to all of you to the Rat Bastard DM's Club.

We run a message board that's solely devoted to everything you want to accomplish with the DMF. The actual RBDMC is a private forum, where we can discuss and suggest adventure plans without worrying about our players sneeking peeks; it is roughly analogous to your DMF counsel. The Crucible Forum is open to the public, however, and anyone is welcome to join in and post; The Crucible serves the exact same purpose as the DMF.

We're always looking for more traffic on our boards. If nothing else, it can be a good example of how to put your own web-site/message-boards together, should you so choose.

 

[Buttercup]

Just honest speculation here...

I don't think the creators of this thread are trying to limit themselves so much as they are trying to stay in touch with each other specifically. Instead of having a thread by subject they are having a thread by dialog. With the size of ENWorld and it's continued growth, it makes since that some people are going to gravitate together and want to have a more direct dialog instead of searching across many threads to have that dialog on a per subject basis. Kind of like the Hivemind in OT.

I'm sure no one is limiting themselves by just sticking to this one thread, and they will be taking advantage of all that ENWorld has to offer (kick the tires and take it out for a spin). For a lot of us, it’s become our home on the web and I’m sure it will become theirs too!

Gotcha. It's another clique. Enjoy yourselves then.

 

[ChaosEvoker]

I have a question, how does one go about adventuring in a d20 Modern campaign? You can't really jsut kill things there is law enforcement and such. It's kidn fo hard to "adventure" is the normal sence of the word. So hwo do you adventure in a d20 Modern world?

 

[Darkness]

So hwo do you adventure in a d20 Modern world?

You could set the campaign up like an action movie, except that it's a campaign rather than a one-shot (which the movies are).

The PCs could all be cops, special forces, martial artists, ninjas, mobsters, etc.

 

[JoeGKushner]

Few things...

Spies have gone underused in D&D games for a long time. There's a huge Dragon article that talks about their utility but I don't have the issue number handy. For other ideas, like magic items thats that can spy, try Dynasties & Demigouges as that has some interesting options for the more political aspects of a spy campaign.

d20 Modern: Adventuring in the modern world represents many difficulties from the standard. Part of this is solved in the campaign selection. For example, if you use something liek Shadowchasers to emulate say, Buffy, then you've got direction and style going on already. Other games need to be rooted to something, say a group of professors who discover some weird activity suggesting cultists or perhaps a military group given a new breed of physical enhancement performing drugs.

 

[Darkness]

There's a huge Dragon article that talks about their utility but I don't have the issue number handy.

316 is about spies.

 

[Blade of Desecration]

I have to say that while I've been DMing various D&D settings for about 12 years, I have very little knowledge of non-D&D material. The reason I bring this up is due in large part to the videogame Goldeneye: Rogue Agent. I love the James Bond world, and I've been inspired by this game to create a Bond-esque spy campaign. Only problem is, I don't know of any books in which to look for applicable rules. The obvious ones are d20 Modern and its brethren (which I plan to take a look at this weekend). I've heard of a book, which I think is called something like Spycraft, but I really can't remember.

I own most of the Bond movies and all of the video games (except Agent Under Fire because it... wasn't up to snuff), so inspiration shouldn't be a problem. I just need suggestions on where to look for rules and other crunch (preferably d20 as I'm not much of a fan of conversion and my PCs are just getting comfortable with those rules).

Thanks in advance.

Another game that could be used for this purpose is Shadowrun, though that's more of a mob/merc game.

 

[Mordmorgan the Mad]

You absolutely want Spycraft. It's one of my favorite d20 books, and (so long as you pick peoples' gadgets and gear for them ahead of time).

That's why I've got Q

I'll really have to take a look at Spycraft, especially if it's d20.

Regarding Adventuring in d20 Modern: it's really not all that different. True, you can't go around killing random folks (sorta the same in a D&D campaign), but depending on who you work for, murder is acceptable (like a 00 agent [which means you've got a license to kill], or a CIA agent). Of course, you could be freedom fighters and on the lamb or hiding underground. If there are monsterous creatures in the game, I don't think many cops would mind a group of "adventurers" sending them to thier maker.

 

[ChaosEvoker]

That's why I've got Q

I'll really have to take a look at Spycraft, especially if it's d20.

Regarding Adventuring in d20 Modern: it's really not all that different. True, you can't go around killing random folks (sorta the same in a D&D campaign), but depending on who you work for, murder is acceptable (like a 00 agent [which means you've got a license to kill], or a CIA agent). Of course, you could be freedom fighters and on the lamb or hiding underground. If there are monsterous creatures in the game, I don't think many cops would mind a group of "adventurers" sending them to thier maker.

That beign the problem, normally there aren't montrous creatures in d20 Modern, or so the impression I got. unlses you work for a government agency of some kind, you can't be an adventuerer. Freedom fighters would be attacked by the military, and, quite honestly, wouldn't stand a chance. I'm sitll having a hard time with this.