17 May, 2011
Crossbows Underground
Something obvious occurred to me just now. Bows send arrows in an arc, thus archery. Therefore, having their range converted from yards to feet underground makes perfect sense. Crossbows are favoured by underground denizens because quarrels don't arc - they depend on a relatively straight trajectory, more like a firearm. Therefore, crossbows should get to retain their range in yards underground, thereby conferring an appropriate reason to select crossbows for dungeon situations.
04 May, 2011
The Big Move
Our move is almost done! Of course, done in this case means a lot of stuff is in a storage unit and there are tons of boxes all over our new house and furniture in strange places - like a 7 foot TV armoire in our kitchen. But, most of the boxes are out of our old place, so I should be back to normal inconsistency instead of protracted absence by the weekend. Whee!
22 April, 2011
E is for Erstwhile Ended Entry Effluvia
It's a good thing I had the presentiment to not sign up Explicitly for the daily post alphabet challenge. We've been in various stages of trying to get into a new Edifice for a little over two months now, and it's kept my output even more Economical than usual. But, it's finally at an End, and we Exchange money for keys later today! Excelsior!!
Although this Equivocally means that my Efficacy will actually further Erode for a while, it also means that after a week or so it will Escalate and Expand to a much greater, Even daily, proliferation.
Enyway..
In coming up with a couple more names for unplanned npcs in my Greyhawk game, I realised something enter.. er.. interesting. I like making non-player characters. It entertains me. My favourite part of making them, and generally the only thing I do to make them, is coming up with a name and personality.
I don't roll stats at all unless I absolutely have to. Even for a man-at-arms hired by the party, I eschew stats. He or she gets their attack roll based on their level, which is most likely zero-level-human, and that's pretty much it. In the incredibly rare instance that an ability check is needed, I assume it's an 11 unless I've already established there is something unusual about them. What about hit points? Well, level one fighting-men get a d6 in ODnD. Goblins are a d6-1. Goblins are able to drive peasants before them, whilst enjoying the lamentation of the women. Thus, here is the simple breakdown on ye common folke. Children, elderly, infirmed - 1hp; clerks, maids, typical townies - 2hp; farmers, laborers, healthy lads and lasses - 3hp; the burly blacksmith and other buff stereotypes - 4hp.
I got a little sidetracked, but it went in an acceptable direction. Back to names! I enjoy making up names and personalities. I have no trouble making up diverse personalities, and there are some great tables out there if I did. I should come back and edit this to give a ballyhoo to a couple of them.. With names, even though I love inventing them, I sometimes worry that since it's one person coming up with all the names of all the npcs, they will begin to sound like they're all cousins.
Today, while making two names for a couple hired spearmen that I hadn't foreseen, I thought "hey, I'm trying to make this as much a Gygaxian Greyhawk as possible.. how did he come up with names?" Easy - in addition to the much-discussed anagrams, he used lots of old obscure archaisms, oft times adjusted a bit. This has the added bonus of enjoying some synchronicity with Gene Wolfe's writing, so that makes it feel even better. Thus, I now share a few great links to aid in this method of coming up with proper nouns for a campaign.
Grandiloquent Dictionary
Luciferous Logolepsy
Strange and Unusual Dictionaries dead
Worthless Word FOR the Day dead
Enjoy!
Although this Equivocally means that my Efficacy will actually further Erode for a while, it also means that after a week or so it will Escalate and Expand to a much greater, Even daily, proliferation.
Enyway..
In coming up with a couple more names for unplanned npcs in my Greyhawk game, I realised something enter.. er.. interesting. I like making non-player characters. It entertains me. My favourite part of making them, and generally the only thing I do to make them, is coming up with a name and personality.
I don't roll stats at all unless I absolutely have to. Even for a man-at-arms hired by the party, I eschew stats. He or she gets their attack roll based on their level, which is most likely zero-level-human, and that's pretty much it. In the incredibly rare instance that an ability check is needed, I assume it's an 11 unless I've already established there is something unusual about them. What about hit points? Well, level one fighting-men get a d6 in ODnD. Goblins are a d6-1. Goblins are able to drive peasants before them, whilst enjoying the lamentation of the women. Thus, here is the simple breakdown on ye common folke. Children, elderly, infirmed - 1hp; clerks, maids, typical townies - 2hp; farmers, laborers, healthy lads and lasses - 3hp; the burly blacksmith and other buff stereotypes - 4hp.
I got a little sidetracked, but it went in an acceptable direction. Back to names! I enjoy making up names and personalities. I have no trouble making up diverse personalities, and there are some great tables out there if I did. I should come back and edit this to give a ballyhoo to a couple of them.. With names, even though I love inventing them, I sometimes worry that since it's one person coming up with all the names of all the npcs, they will begin to sound like they're all cousins.
Today, while making two names for a couple hired spearmen that I hadn't foreseen, I thought "hey, I'm trying to make this as much a Gygaxian Greyhawk as possible.. how did he come up with names?" Easy - in addition to the much-discussed anagrams, he used lots of old obscure archaisms, oft times adjusted a bit. This has the added bonus of enjoying some synchronicity with Gene Wolfe's writing, so that makes it feel even better. Thus, I now share a few great links to aid in this method of coming up with proper nouns for a campaign.
Grandiloquent Dictionary
Luciferous Logolepsy
Enjoy!
16 April, 2011
Masterthief
Lots of great discussion and synergistic ideas are clicking around the osr about lock picking and trap disarmament. So far:
Rather Gamey
Telecanter
Zak Smith
Roger the GS
-C
One thing that occurred to me was the similarity between some of these procedures and playing an old game of Mastermind. Every time I played Mastermind with my dad, he won. He always won chess too. Smartest person I ever met :)
So, to use Mastermind for picking locks or disarming traps, it's pretty easy to vary the difficulty. You don't have to use all four slots. The fewer slots used, the easier the lock. Also, you don't have to use all the colours. The fewer colours used, the easier the lock, although I would suggest a minimum of 3 colours. The third way to adjust the difficulty is by limiting how many guesses (how many turns) are allowed before the thief fails the attempt. Failure meaning, of course, either jamming the lock or setting off the trap.
The only thing remaining for this method, then, is to assign some appropriate terms to the different elements of the Mastermind game.
The standard version has 6 different colours for the code pegs. I'm going to assume the colours might be different depending on the individual set one happens to have, so I'll list it out this way. Once you assign a colour to a technique, it should stay that way for all your locks. The basic lock techniques discussed on the other blogs above would require using 4 (and only 4) colours.
It also has two different colours for feedback pegs, often black and white. These are the pegs the DM will use to simulate what the thief finds out about the lock as he's making his attempt.
So, in this method the coloured clue pegs stand for different picking techniques. What do the slots stand for? Well, not tumblers. Generally, if I understand Wikipedia correctly, most locks are just one tumbler, or at least one tumbler per keyhole. A tumbler has multiple pins, but usually more than four. Thus, the four slots simply stand for how many techniques it takes to open it, or basically how complex the lock is on a scale of 1 to 4. The number of guesses allowed (lines on the board) shows how forgiving the lock is. Something made by gnomes to be highly pick-resistant might only allow 3 or 4 guesses. Some locks may require special techniques that most locks don't, thus using more colours of clue pegs.
How about Telecanter's example where an experienced thief just knows you should never bump a dwarven lock? Easy. If it's a dwarven lock, the DM doesn't put any bump-coloured pegs behind the codemaker screen on the board. Then it's up to the DM and player as to whether the player realises it's a dwarven lock, and knows what to avoid.
Now for the Suspense!!
Each line on the Mastermind board, each guess, takes one round of game time. This is where it really becomes exciting, because everyone knows that the thief picking the lock on the door to the escape route only has 4 minutes before that bugbear guard comes back this way on his patrol! Can he do it?!! They all want him to hurry, but they have to stay quiet!! Every time it's not right, that bugbear gets one minute closer!!! Or that insane cultist has nearly finished summoning Tsathoggua, and every round spent trying to put the right coloured pegs in the right holes to pick the lock on the Necronomicon brings the yawning black gulfs of terror one round closer!!!!
Are you excited yet?!!!?!
If you want to give an experienced thief more clues to reflect their knowledge, use their pick-locks chance (or disarm, as appropriate) to get hints. When you see a black key peg, for example, the picker usually only knows they used a correct technique at the right time (put the right colour peg in the correct hole.) They don't know which step (hole) they got right, they just know they made progress. If they roll under their chance, maybe they do know which step they got right, thereby drastically reducing how long it will take them to finish the lock. Many other types of hints are possible too, perhaps even allowing the thief to know which technique to start with (which colour to put in the first hole) just by recognising the type of lock.
Rather Gamey
Telecanter
Zak Smith
Roger the GS
-C
One thing that occurred to me was the similarity between some of these procedures and playing an old game of Mastermind. Every time I played Mastermind with my dad, he won. He always won chess too. Smartest person I ever met :)
 |
| Mastermind Info at Wikipedia |
The only thing remaining for this method, then, is to assign some appropriate terms to the different elements of the Mastermind game.
The standard version has 6 different colours for the code pegs. I'm going to assume the colours might be different depending on the individual set one happens to have, so I'll list it out this way. Once you assign a colour to a technique, it should stay that way for all your locks. The basic lock techniques discussed on the other blogs above would require using 4 (and only 4) colours.
- colour a - bump
- colour b - probe
- colour c - rake
- colour d - twist
- colour e - undulate
- colour f - flick
It also has two different colours for feedback pegs, often black and white. These are the pegs the DM will use to simulate what the thief finds out about the lock as he's making his attempt.
- black key peg - you used the right technique at the right time
- white key peg - you used a technique appropriate for this lock, but you used it at the wrong time
- left open (blank) - you used the wrong technique!
So, in this method the coloured clue pegs stand for different picking techniques. What do the slots stand for? Well, not tumblers. Generally, if I understand Wikipedia correctly, most locks are just one tumbler, or at least one tumbler per keyhole. A tumbler has multiple pins, but usually more than four. Thus, the four slots simply stand for how many techniques it takes to open it, or basically how complex the lock is on a scale of 1 to 4. The number of guesses allowed (lines on the board) shows how forgiving the lock is. Something made by gnomes to be highly pick-resistant might only allow 3 or 4 guesses. Some locks may require special techniques that most locks don't, thus using more colours of clue pegs.
How about Telecanter's example where an experienced thief just knows you should never bump a dwarven lock? Easy. If it's a dwarven lock, the DM doesn't put any bump-coloured pegs behind the codemaker screen on the board. Then it's up to the DM and player as to whether the player realises it's a dwarven lock, and knows what to avoid.
Now for the Suspense!!
Each line on the Mastermind board, each guess, takes one round of game time. This is where it really becomes exciting, because everyone knows that the thief picking the lock on the door to the escape route only has 4 minutes before that bugbear guard comes back this way on his patrol! Can he do it?!! They all want him to hurry, but they have to stay quiet!! Every time it's not right, that bugbear gets one minute closer!!! Or that insane cultist has nearly finished summoning Tsathoggua, and every round spent trying to put the right coloured pegs in the right holes to pick the lock on the Necronomicon brings the yawning black gulfs of terror one round closer!!!!
Are you excited yet?!!!?!
If you want to give an experienced thief more clues to reflect their knowledge, use their pick-locks chance (or disarm, as appropriate) to get hints. When you see a black key peg, for example, the picker usually only knows they used a correct technique at the right time (put the right colour peg in the correct hole.) They don't know which step (hole) they got right, they just know they made progress. If they roll under their chance, maybe they do know which step they got right, thereby drastically reducing how long it will take them to finish the lock. Many other types of hints are possible too, perhaps even allowing the thief to know which technique to start with (which colour to put in the first hole) just by recognising the type of lock.
13 April, 2011
P D eFfery
The ever-stylish and informative Matthew has brought the light of handy pdf-any-post goodness into our dark little corner of the universe. Visit Rended Press to partake in the greatness.
12 April, 2011
Tekumel 11
After you untie him, Chk-chk, the undead tinaliya, slowly sloshes up into a sitting position. He rises in a disturbingly mechanical way, a single slow motion, as though his muscles are merely tools and don't have the normal sensations of a living thing. He twists his head back to you in the same unnerving manner. "This is a labor.. labor.. laboratory of the Old Ones. Food may be anywhere, depending on what you are willing to eat. I do not think I need to eat anymore."
The small creaking creature slides down onto the floor, and walks over to the bejeweled metal table next to the first platform. "I do not understand this." He begins walking toward the archway into the room filled with unusual items and equipment, saying "what is in here?"
The small creaking creature slides down onto the floor, and walks over to the bejeweled metal table next to the first platform. "I do not understand this." He begins walking toward the archway into the room filled with unusual items and equipment, saying "what is in here?"
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