You Meet in an Inn

Lame.

Even so, you've used it. You didn't want to, but everybody had their characters rolled up, and you had to do something. Next time you're starting a campaign from scratch, and you're at a loss for how the characters meet, try one of these.

Can you think of another one? I'm sure you can, you're smart. Type it in the comments, and I'll add it to the list. I may tweak it a little, but what the hell.

• You are all in jail together.
• You all heard rumors of treasure, and you meet at the dungeon entrance. There is a man camping there who hires out as a lantern-bearer.
• You are all captives of kobolds, goblins, bandits, etc. inside the dungeon. You were waylaid and brought here while unconscious, and your things are in a room nearby.
• You all have copies of the same wanted poster.
• You are all related, or grew up together.
• You all served in the military or town guard together.
• A local ruler, merchant or official has put out a call for mercenaries, and you are the ones who have answered.
• Townsfolk inundate the inn, seeking help from all the guests. Insert 7 Samurai.
• You all wake up together, lying on individual altar stones in a darkened room. A faint smell of ozone hangs in the air. In the floor of the room wisps of smoke rise from a charred corpse partially melted into the stone. A corpse with what appears to have been a sacrificial dagger clenched tightly in one hand.
• You are all summoned to the reading of a recently departed friend/relative/colleague's will.
• You are all traveling with the same merchant caravan when... 
• You are shopping in the local market when a giant ship's anchor drops from the sky, smashing a nearby market stall.
• You are survivors of a ship wreck. 
• You wake up naked, buried in a pile of naked corpses. (stolen from Zak S.) 
• You are brought together by a major event (refugees from a flood, plague, earthquake, zombie apocalypse, pirate attack, etc.) 
• You are all outlaws, and are members of a bandit group. 
• Goblins attack your hamlet. Your parents' old weapons are in your houses. Defend the town! 
• You are all cursed, and have come together at a wizard's tower to perform a quest so that he will remove the curse. 
• You are all members of the caravan guard on a trek across the desert to an exotic city of traders. 
• You meet at a party. 
• You are all students of the local adventurer's guild. This is your final test before you're thrown out in the world on your own resources. 
• You all get strange (different) notes inviting you to the same place. The notes make some kind of sense when put together. 
• You're all dead, and will adventure in hell or the outer planes.

Railroaded

Yikes, another long dearth of blog posts. My genius is suck.

In my Labyrinth Lord version of Eberron, I find it entirely inappropriate to refer to the train as The Lightning Rail. I do like the fact that it exists. One of my first favourite films was the 70's Murder on The Orient Express with the huge raft of stars from the period, including Albert Finney as Poirot. I think Sean Connery was in it too. Anyway, I find the idea of the train itself to be a wonderful fantasy possibility, but the name makes little sense for a very compelling reason.

There are no rails.

The train moves along above a series of relatively small stone pyramids. This isn't an upgrade from a time when it ran on actual rails, and there are no other rail-utilising technologies screeching around Khorvaire. Somehow 'The Lightning Stones' or 'The Lightning Pyramids' just doesn't convey the idea of any kind of transport, let alone a train. So what should it be called?

I know! I'll turn to you, rarified niche of the internet! Please tell me what I should call The Lightning Rail.

Starting Spells

I've used many different methods for determining what spells magic-users (and sometimes clerics) have scribed in their first spell book when they enter the game. Sometimes it's all first level spells, sometimes it's just one, or one plus their INT modifier. Sometimes it's according to the (surprisingly restrictive?) table on page 8 of the Greyhawk supplement. Sometimes the spells themselves are picked by the player, or randomly determined, or sometimes a mix of both.

In your campaigns, what do 1st level magic-users get in their first spellbook? Please let us know!

The Elven Experience

Page 5 of Supplement 1, Greyhawk, arguably changed elves in DnD forever.

Elven thieves work in all three categories at once (fighter, magic-user, and thief) unless they opt to never be anything other than in the thief category. Thus, experience is always distributed proportionately in the three categories even when the elf can no longer gain additional levels in a given category.

With the words 'work in all three categories at once' the elf no longer had to choose what class he would be during an adventure. I have to admit I sort of missed it. Not only because it kept the elf from being two characters at once, but also because it was interesting and unique. A lot of players thought it was odd or inconvenient, or simply just wanted to squeeze as much 'high performance' out of their character as they could at every turn, like it was some sort of ridiculous racing car. They liked the change.

In my Greyhawk PbP game, we've just recently added the Greyhawk supplement, including the revised elf. I miss the old elf, but I also understand it's sometimes hard for a DM to explain. The way I ran it before, the player had to choose between operating as a fighter or a magic-user at the start of an adventure, and remained as chosen until the next safe point was reached, which is also when I awarded experience. From safe point to safe point they were locked in to their choice, whether it was the next day or several days later when they made it back to town.

My question to those reading this: how would you explain it? Suggest a reason why an elf might be forced to make this choice, and then abide by it until next he found himself safe.

The Evil That Men Don't

In some published game settings, mostly those which are relatively newer, it's been quite popular to say that not all members of the traditionally evil humanoid races are evil. In some cases, a majority are even shown to be quite the opposite. I'm generally of the opinion that such things occur for mostly two reasons. Either the author is desperate to be different, or it's a reflection of Western European apologism.

Be that as it may, I'm curious what the other DMs out there do in their own games. Are all your orcs, goblins and kobolds evil?

Fifteen Games

Here are my 15. Some of them I probably wouldn't even want to play again, but they are ones I won't forget, and which (for better or worse) will continue to influence me.

1. DnD, Moldvay, AD&D 1st, AD&D 2nd
2. Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay, 1st
3. Axis & Allies
4. Talisman
5. Traveller
6. Wizardry
7. Marvel Superheroes
8. Guild Wars
9. World of Warcraft
10. Chess
11. Call of Cthulhu
12. Zork
13. Clue
14. Magic: The Gathering
15. HeroQuest

Does a Shifter Weigh the Same as a Duck?

This place has been pretty quiet for a few days while I've been ruminating about Eberron. I've decided on Labyrinth Lord for the ruleset, and I'll be starting out with it totally stock, no house-rules going into it. I've also made some (fairly easy) decisions about some of the player races. They will all be available for players to choose from, just like in the standard setting material, but instead of using the Advanced LL rules (yet) I'll be casting them in the mold of other old-school demi-human classes.

As elves are to fighter/magic-user, so shall shifters be to fighter/thief. I'll be up front with people, however, that playing a shifter isn't going to go over well at all anywhere within the confines of Old Galifar. The reaction would range from 'pelted with produce' to 'public execution,' with a usual average somewhere around 'torch-wielding-mob.' They would be more characteristically realised within my version as the NPC cat-woman sorcerer of Conan's borderlands.

Warforged, if appearing as a player character, would fall into more of the dwarf class mold. They are fighters, with level limits mirroring dwarven advancement. Their immunities are more extensive, obviously, but these and their counterpart limitations are an inherent part of the setting. In my version, they were not produced in nearly as many numbers as in the official version of the setting. They just aren't that much better than human troops to justify the expense. If they didn't have free will, that'd be a different story. As it is, many see them as a novelty of the rich and a failed experiment of the military.

My main remaining decision is how to start out. Eberron provides an incredible variety of starting points for a party of adventurers, but I'd rather not start in a big city, like Sharn. Starting them as post-mourning amnesiacs injects a lot of iconic setting flavour into the campaign right from the start, but on the other hand might seem clichéd.

When trying to evoke a certain setting, I always like to include the setting's published adventures in one way or another. They often form the meat of a setting's character. However, the one first-level module I've found takes place in Sharn, which I'd like to avoid for a while.

Thus, I'm still nailing down the first adventure, but otherwise ready to go. Perhaps some of you out there have an idea of a good way to start!