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Post by sixdemonbag on Aug 23, 2017 23:11:34 GMT -5
Lol. "Somewhat Supported" was my band name in college. Not everyone wore jock straps, eh?  Alright RK, take your damnable exalt. You got me with that time. You earned an actual LOL from me with that one. Now to dig up my old Red Hot Chili Peppers CDs... |
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Post by sixdemonbag on Aug 23, 2017 23:12:13 GMT -5
And you look like you really need more sleep and a good haircut too! It's all deflection as he was the one to let the demon out the bag, not me...  Not bad. I'll allow it.  |
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Post by Deleted on Aug 23, 2017 23:31:44 GMT -5
"A sad story, is it true?"
"No. There is a song as well."
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Post by sixdemonbag on Aug 23, 2017 23:33:12 GMT -5
I would of course love to try it out, as I like games in general, RPGs or otherwise. But, at the same time, it's so much fun to play a character amongst a small party, that I've never really sought out a true tabletop wargame experience. The computer versions of such never really grabbed me. You never tried to become the king, duke or baron? Build an inn? Become head of the mage's guild? I am not being critical it just trying to advance one's character's fortune and make one's mark is a common characteristic among the dozens of players I refereed over the years. Even most anti "I don't want to rule" group winds up with something if nothing else because now they have this big empty dungeon or locale that is empty of its inhabitants. Good question. And maybe I'm not understanding what domain management actually entails. So sure, I've certainly built up some posh digs. But, they were usually nothing more than fancy "homebases" with some additional adventuring opportunities. I'm under the assumption that we are talking about commanding armies across large land and sea expanses using mass combat rules over a multi-session campaign once the PC in question is eligible for such. I now feel like this assumption might be faulty and wrong, however. Maybe someone could actually clarify what we are talking about we say "endgame" or "domain management." As a non-wargamer (not by choice, just no exposure) I have no reference points for anything wargamer-related nor the terminologies. I could just be confusing myself again (happens a lot lol). EDIT: As a kid in the 90's (ahem, 1990s mormonyoyoman ) almost all of this style of play is foreign to me. I started with 2E and the RC. |
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Post by sixdemonbag on Aug 23, 2017 23:42:19 GMT -5
 Perfect 7?!!! Lies!! More blasphemy!! A misinterpreted insult?! Even better!! Uh ... I mean worse!! I exist in a constant state of confusion!!! And you look like you really need more sleep and a good haircut too! Donald Sutherland's memed face is offended. But not by much. |
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Post by mormonyoyoman on Aug 24, 2017 0:10:08 GMT -5
Then you begin your quest forthwith! I suggest taking the "other" fork in the road this time around... Yes, I will forthwith channel my inner Robert Frost... So THAT'S where you've been keeping him! |
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Post by robertsconley on Aug 24, 2017 7:40:30 GMT -5
Good question. And maybe I'm not understanding what domain management actually entails. So sure, I've certainly built up some posh digs. But, they were usually nothing more than fancy "homebases" with some additional adventuring opportunities. Building up one's homebase counts as a form of domain management. It not like you got it for free? Either you paid gold, had to adventure, or do a combination to get a place, and outfit it the way you wanted? Also it just you and the party living there? Or do you have servants, hirelings, and henchmen living there as well? A king especially in a D&Dish fantasy setting, is in one sense is just a household who has the power, mystique and above all the connections to rule over a realm compared to a single dwelling. I'm under the assumption that we are talking about commanding armies across large land and sea expanses using mass combat rules over a multi-session campaign once the PC in question is eligible for such. I now feel like this assumption might be faulty and wrong, however. Sure but in a wargame like Chess, Risk, Diplomacy, Axis & Allies, Chainmail, Squad Leader, etc. The point is to play the game out competing with other players. With tabletop roleplaing campaign that could happen but the point to pretend to be the person who is actually in charge. If a wargame is used to resolve mass combat it is a tool to adjudicate the fact that your, who is in command of an army, for whatever reason has to fight a battle. But how does one's character command a army. Especially if the campaign started out with everybody at 1st level? Well it a bit like real life. You use your wits and skills to survive. Taking advantage of the opportunities to accumulate wealth, connections, and power. But instead of your goal being just to defeat some ultimate bad guy or building your posh digs. You also aspire to a position of leadership in the culture or society around you. Perhaps even to be the ultimate sovereign (king or emperor). How does his happen? Imagine the setting as a real place and ask yourself how does one become king. Form a plan and see it through for better or for ill. Just as you probably formulated plans to take out this bad guy or organization or how you puzzled through maps and rumors to find the location of a treasure. At least in my campaign there is no special mode or level one has to be to do any of this. Obviously it going to take a fortuitous combination of circumstances for a 1st level character who nobody know to become king. But that character after having 8, 9, or 10 levels of adventures along with the attendant connections and knowledge of the larger setting? Now you talking about some possibilities. The fly in the ointment so to speak is that the referee to be of a type who willing to let you "trash" his setting. In addition be comfortable in letting you set the primary direction of the campaign. Be comfortable with the fact that while he figured on the sprawling Barrowmaze and shutting down the Pit of Chaos that fuels the evil that dwells therein to be primary focus, you view it just as a means to end with you ruling the surrounding realm. Maybe someone could actually clarify what we are talking about we say "endgame" or "domain management." As a non-wargamer (not by choice, just no exposure) I have no reference points for anything wargamer-related nor the terminologies. I could just be confusing myself again (happens a lot lol). What makes thing confusing that my view is that when it comes to the mechanics of the rules the major difference between tabletop RPGs and wargame is one of focus. Use the rules to setup a campaign or scenario with opposing sides with expectation of declaring a winner then it is a wargame. Use the rules to enable people to play individual character doing whatever in a setting then we are talking about tabletop roleplaying. Obviously if you are king, you need to know how much income you are getting, and what resources you have to draw on. The most important resource of course is the people of your realm. The people of the realm come with all kinds of complications from the great lords down to the lowest peasant. The challenge (and hopefully) of course is how you can manipulate this to achieve your goal whatever they may be. How do you manipulate this? Well my method is for the players to describe or roleplay what they want to do and then I figure out which rules to apply. For example I have cobbled a set of rules governing the economics of running a kingdom. Given population, land area, and relative fertility, I can tell you how much income as whole there is and what each of your major subordinates earn. For the most part this is based on a set of rules from Columbia Games called Harnmanor. To this added some of my own research and tweaks as well as some rules from other system that I liked. Most of the players are not interested in the spreadsheets I use. They learn about the situation through in-game reports just as if they were really there as the character. A few players do get into the spreadsheets so for the stuff they know about, I will give them a copy. Since none of this deterministic from year to year because of random events, I consider this an abstraction of the character being interested enough to dive into the actual books. For both the challenge is that things are always fluid. Harnmanor has a nifty mechanic where each year you roll for a series of events for one subordinates. They can be good, bad or indifferent but they invariably require the player to do something as his character. Personally I like Harnmanor because that event table really does generate things that you would think would occur when ruling. EDIT: As a kid in the 90's (ahem, 1990s mormonyoyoman ) almost all of this style of play is foreign to me. I started with 2E and the RC. I read that sentiment a lot. In the end it boils down to you imagining what you would do if you were there as the character. Just go whatever your interests are. Like I said all you need to make this happen is for a referee to willing to let you "trash" his setting and thus set the primary direction of the campaign. If you don't like ruling don't worry about then. More than a few players when achieving a position of authority find trying to deal with the problems of subordinates annoying as hell despite the wealth of powers. I have other players who already experienced this and now try to avoid any position of responsibility prizing their independence and freedom of action above all else. Then there are the player who relish the challenge of being in charge and work at carving out a place within my setting. I am cool with any of these choices and over the years deliberately designed different regions and cultures where the different styles fit in. So that the players doesn't feel like I am jamming Games of Thrones down their throat all the time or any other particular trope for that matter. Hope this helps to answer your questions. |
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Post by mormonyoyoman on Aug 24, 2017 10:05:26 GMT -5
An extremely useful and too-good-to-vanish article that needs to be unhidden and disseminated. In 1977. I wonder if many would listen today, or would it be met with the same resistance as Rob's dissertation of Arneson's invention of a system of designing new kinds of systems?
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Post by scottanderson on Aug 24, 2017 11:13:18 GMT -5
I like to play fighters and clerics. I like playing human men. It just so happens to be useful that my preferences match the need of groups I have played with. Everyone can use another human fighter or Cleric. It's not like I want to play yet another elf ranger for inatance.
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Post by Admin Pete on Aug 24, 2017 11:14:01 GMT -5
I know what the word means. No verbal gymnastics, I just don't understand how things are being defined, why and how are "campaign" and "group adventure" something other than a campaign is a group adventure? I don't know how these are being defined so that they are different things. I am not trying to be flippant or dense, I just don't know what you are all talking about. There's the campaign; and then there's "campaign play". If I understand you then, you are saying you distinguish between the "campaign" (the world setting) and "campaign play" (group adventure) as two separate things that you fully integrate and I see them as just one thing to begin with. I think we agree, we just conceptualize it differently. |
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Post by Admin Pete on Aug 24, 2017 11:20:46 GMT -5
The fly in the ointment so to speak is that the referee to be of a type who willing to let you "trash" his setting. I have never understood this, the whole point as a referee is to build a world for the PCs to live in. If you don't want them to do that, why even bother having a game in the first place. I have read many posts of DMs complaining about players messing up their story. IMO if the players are a hindrance to you, stop reffing and write a book. IMO your players should be your pride and joy, especially since AFAIK most of us game with our friends. |
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Post by robertsconley on Aug 24, 2017 11:25:23 GMT -5
An extremely useful and too-good-to-vanish article that needs to be unhidden and disseminated. In 1977. I wonder if many would listen today, or would it be met with the same resistance as Rob's dissertation of Arneson's invention of a system of designing new kinds of systems? Thanks for the compliment. My experience with people reaction to the above (and other things I do) mostly positive. The biggest thing I run into is people trying to "guess" where I want them to go. It takes a few session before it sinks in that I am really OK with them just bailing on whatever is happen and take off in a different direction (physically, or socially). That they are free to attempt (note attempt) anything their character can do. Partially due to the fact they have see if I am going to be fair about how I handle the consequences of their actions. |
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Post by scottanderson on Aug 24, 2017 11:25:42 GMT -5
On the topic of "ruining the campaign world," the DM only has ownership of that world until the players enter. Then it's a shared space.
You're not there to play act a story. It's not a dramatic novel or play. You have guys, they roll dice and stuff, and then you tell the story of what they did later. It's more like fictional history than drama.
If the DM wants to keep his world his own, then let me encourage him to write fiction in that setting and then ask his friends to read it, rather than forcing them to sit there and be passive tourists?
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Post by Deleted on Aug 24, 2017 12:11:45 GMT -5
You should all go read "Setting up a wargames campaign" by Tony Bath. It would answer 90% of the questions about how to do it.
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Post by robertsconley on Aug 24, 2017 12:16:49 GMT -5
The fly in the ointment so to speak is that the referee to be of a type who willing to let you "trash" his setting. I have never understood this, the whole point as a referee is to build a world for the PCs to live in. If you don't want them to do that, why even bother having a game in the first place. I have read many posts of DMs complaining about players messing up their story. IMO if the players are a hindrance to you, stop reffing and write a book. IMO your players should be your pride and joy, especially since AFAIK most of us game with our friends. I don't get it either but it happens even when there is no external reason for the attitude to make sense like if the session is part of a organized play campaign. The thing to remember it not binary. Either extreme is rare to encounter. Even for me there are occasion where once or twice a year where I say "Look let's end the session early so I can work on stuff to support what you want to do." It is for more likely you will run into somebody with a pet peeve or quirk that when rubbed the wrong way leads to out of game tension. I know for myself I don't do gonzo. Not that I am impolite about it but I just don't cater to that style. There is humor and funny moments, but it happens like in real life, everybody is in the right mood and the circumstances are right it just a hilarious evening. But there are referee who run campaigns that just gonzo through and through and player who just love the off the wall style. That isn't me, and the few times I tried refereeing that way fell flat. It just not my cup of tea. So when a player who clearly has gonzo in mind arrives to play most of the time it doesn't wind up as a good fit and they quit after a few sessions. No referee is going bat a 1000 when it comes to accommodating different styles of play. And I had gonzo players adjust and they wound up having fun. |
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Post by robertsconley on Aug 24, 2017 12:23:53 GMT -5
You should all go read "Setting up a wargames campaign" by Tony Bath. It would answer 90% of the questions about how to do it. Unfortunately unlike Ancient Wargaming it is sold at collector's prices. |
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Post by robertsconley on Aug 24, 2017 12:40:15 GMT -5
On the topic of "ruining the campaign world," the DM only has ownership of that world until the players enter. Then it's a shared space. You're not there to play act a story. It's not a dramatic novel or play. You have guys, they roll dice and stuff, and then you tell the story of what they did later. It's more like fictional history than drama. If the DM wants to keep his world his own, then let me encourage him to write fiction in that setting and then ask his friends to read it, rather than forcing them to sit there and be passive tourists? Agreed but when it comes to actual people and groups it not as simple as that. Like I said earlier it isn't black and white. Rather the worse just have a lot of pet peeves and quirks about the setting while the best only have a few. Most referee I encounter are in the middle and when it is a problem is something like this. Ref: "So you are not going to Blackwater Deeps?" Player A: "No, we talked over through the week after last session and we want to go Ashdown, find passage on a ship, and go to Greymoor Island." Ref: (looking annoyed) "However you all were hell bent on following the map to Blackwater and that all that everybody could talked about. Why Greymoor?" Player B; "Yeah but that last fight with the wights was kind of tough and we will just get slaughtered if go there." Ref: (looking real annoyed glancing at the notes and maps he worked on throughout the week). Player C: (being more socially observant) "You know guys maybe we should go to Blackwater, we did win the fight after all." (animated mildly tense discussion ensues). The problem is while in theory the majority of referee say they are open to players changing their mind. The reality is that if the work get put in, especially after it looks like the players are going to go the locale, it hard not to be annoyed when they do 180. Hell I am not immune to that although I gotten good at masking this attitude. And before anybody say "Well they shouldn't put that much work into." That not the point. It annoyance at that any of your precious hobby time is now wasted by the player changing their mind. Personally what I did to overcome this (with the side benefit of making how I run campaign more flexible) is that I am relentless in finding material to use as building blocks so I have minimal prep to do even if the players do a 180 degree. The details of my campaign is a mix of original content, and stuff I bought or downloaded. I am equally as relentless in twisting the background and characters of what I use to make it a seamless part of my Majestic Wilderlands setting. |
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Post by Admin Pete on Aug 24, 2017 13:37:54 GMT -5
You should all go read "Setting up a wargames campaign" by Tony Bath. It would answer 90% of the questions about how to do it. There are three copies on Amazon right now for $60.00 and up. |
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Post by Admin Pete on Aug 24, 2017 13:42:19 GMT -5
You should all go read "Setting up a wargames campaign" by Tony Bath. It would answer 90% of the questions about how to do it. Unfortunately unlike Ancient Wargaming it is sold at collector's prices. Has anyone writing a "Cliff notes" for it that would give people at least minimal guidance if they are interested in that? |
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Post by robertsconley on Aug 24, 2017 14:03:11 GMT -5
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Post by Admin Pete on Aug 24, 2017 14:09:55 GMT -5
Ref: "So you are not going to Blackwater Deeps?" Player A: "No, we talked over through the week after last session and we want to go Ashdown, find passage on a ship, and go to Greymoor Island." Ref: (looking annoyed) "However you all were hell bent on following the map to Blackwater and that all that everybody could talked about. Why Greymoor?" Player B; "Yeah but that last fight with the wights was kind of tough and we will just get slaughtered if go there." Ref: (looking real annoyed glancing at the notes and maps he worked on throughout the week). Player C: (being more socially observant) "You know guys maybe we should go to Blackwater, we did win the fight after all." (animated mildly tense discussion ensues). I would run that conversation this way: Ref: "So you are still going to Blackwater Deeps as you were planning last time we met?" Player A: "No, we talked it over through the week after the last session and we want to go Ashdown, find passage on a ship, and go to Greymoor Island." Ref: (knowing the players are flush with cash) Cool, are you just looking for passage on a ship if it is available or looking for a ship to charter or to buy a ship and hire a captain and crew for the flexibility or for something else?" Player B; (Players start discussing their options and what they might like to do since there are options on the table) Ref: While players are discussing this, the ref fleshes some ideas out in his mind and makes a few quick notes) Traveling to Ashdown and starting the voyage (and surviving it) should occupy this whole game and next week he will be fully ready to take on Greymoor Island.) |
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Post by robertsconley on Aug 24, 2017 14:10:14 GMT -5
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Post by robertsconley on Aug 24, 2017 14:14:09 GMT -5
I would run that conversation this way: I would too but there the ideal and what people actually do. The trick to understand why it occurs and then figure out a effective method of conveying how they can do it other than "You are doing it wrong" "You always have the power to come up with things" "Just make something that is fun." People need to something more specific to make it click for them how they can be more flexible. And you need to come up with multiple ways of doing the same things because of the variation in the way people thing. It not infinite but neither it is just one thing that works all the time for all the people. |
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Post by sixdemonbag on Aug 24, 2017 14:57:47 GMT -5
Lots of good information sharing going on here! Thanks everyone. I really enjoyed reading your response to my questions robertsconley . Very illuminating and I would play in your campaign in a heartbeat. Just for clarity, maybe I can summarize my experience thusly: I've never been in a situation where anyone was interested (or capable) of running mass combat scenarios. I don't think modern gamers associate that type of gameplay with RPGs. To many, that would seem to be the antithesis of what RPGs are all about. Now, I know that's a bad assumption and I don't agree with it. That's just been my experience. Old timers would be shocked how few kids recognize anything prior to AD&D or even 3E for that matter. Personally, 3E killed my interest in D&D. 5E rekindled it. Then, thanks to the beauty of the internet and legally available PDFs, I was able to educated myself on the merits of OD&D. I think I am in the minority, though. |
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Post by ripx187 on Aug 24, 2017 19:35:44 GMT -5
This has turned into a very helpful thread. I've ordered a copy of Bath's book on KINDLE. I had spent decades trying to figure this stuff out on my own, I didn't even have the proper search terms. I do disagree somewhat with the opinions of PC vs. PC, even during the war scenarios the game can still be cooperative, but that is more my style. If you are interested I had written an article about this kind of deal which can be found here. |
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Post by sixdemonbag on Aug 24, 2017 19:53:43 GMT -5
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Post by Deleted on Aug 24, 2017 22:16:25 GMT -5
Sorry, I was feeling lazy and couldn't be arsed to look up the name of the combined volume. |
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Post by robertsconley on Aug 25, 2017 7:39:06 GMT -5
Lots of good information sharing going on here! Thanks everyone. I really enjoyed reading your response to my questions robertsconley . Very illuminating and I would play in your campaign in a heartbeat. Just for clarity, maybe I can summarize my experience thusly: I've never been in a situation where anyone was interested (or capable) of running mass combat scenarios. I don't think modern gamers associate that type of gameplay with RPGs. To many, that would seem to be the antithesis of what RPGs are all about. Now, I know that's a bad assumption and I don't agree with it. That's just been my experience. Old timers would be shocked how few kids recognize anything prior to AD&D or even 3E for that matter. Personally, 3E killed my interest in D&D. 5E rekindled it. Then, thanks to the beauty of the internet and legally available PDFs, I was able to educated myself on the merits of OD&D. I think I am in the minority, though. The modern situation is more nuanced. All one has to do is look at the number of game stores catering to Games Workshop and other miniature wargame like Flames of War to see that miniature war-gaming is not dead. Then there is stuff like Heroclix which a variation of miniature wargaming that didn't exist back in the day. And there still companies and hobby groups supporting traditional miniature wargaming alongside all this. I am sure there some amount of crossover between the minature wargame scene and the tabletop RPG scene but it is swamped by the fact that both support a rich diversity of games and play styles. Back in the early 1970s a lot of what the miniature wargaming did found it way into tabletop RPG because the two communities were synonymous for all intents and purposes. Once D&D became a "thing" that was no longer the case. For example my own background is that I started off with hex and counter wargames from Avalon Hill and SPI circa 1977 while I was in 6th grade. I didn't encounter D&D until a year or so later when somebody gave me the Holmes Boxed Set. Probably because I saw it in Boy Scouts and wanted a copy. I grew up during the hex and counter wargame craze so our inclination was to adapt various wargames to do handle things in a tabletop RPG campaign. For example SPI's Swords & Sorcery got some use in a manner not unlike how Dave Arneson used the Outdoor Survival Map. I incorporated Miniature wargaming through the use of first version of AD&D Battlesystem. A game I continue to use to day throughout multiple editions of D&D ( One thousand four hundred and fifty orcs slain).  Like me, your knowledge of what possible and what was done with the hobby is growing. Potentially leading to something that can expand the range of the campaigns you referee. |
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Post by robertsconley on Aug 25, 2017 7:42:33 GMT -5
Sorry, I was feeling lazy and couldn't be arsed to look up the name of the combined volume. But the good news it prompted others like myself to look it up and we got it figured out so now everybody benefits. The bummer about the Hyborian Age stuff is that is based on articles published in various zines rather than the original notes which are apparently missing. Still there a lot of stuff in that section. And of course the preceding section on miniature wargaming is filled with good stuff. |
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Post by robertsconley on Aug 25, 2017 7:45:34 GMT -5
A Battle system side note.The main reason Battlesystem endures regards of what edition of D&D I am using is because the heart of it a generic dice resolution system. The combat resolution chart is built on top of what is called a binomial distribution. A binomial distribution is used to calculate the odds of X success out of Y changes at Z probability. So if you have a 100 guys attacking a Ogre that hit on a 15 or better, you can see what the odds are of 50 of them hitting are. Or 30, or 60. As it turns out it follows a bell curve. So the wizards at TSR figured that all out, and made a unified table showing how many hit dice (d8) of damage is done if they were rolling a d4 for damage, a d6 of damage, etc, etc. That table can be used with any RPG that uses a d20 for resolving attack. All that left is converting the Armor class (or odds of success) into a form that works with the original battlesystem rules. This also means that despite being written for AD&D, 1st edition Battlesystem will work with OD&D 'as is'. You can plug in the AD&D version of monsters, characters, and units and it will work just like it would in the OD&D combat rules.
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