Wandering Monsters: Hellenic Horrors

It is Greek Week over at Wandering Monsters, where James gives us the early draft of the sphinx, chimera, and hydra.

Despite my love for Greek mythology, the number of times I have used all of these monsters could be counted on one hand, mostly because it was pretty difficult in 4th Edition to get characters high enough level to tackle them (as they were each level 10 or higher). Hopefully with 5th Edition’s flat-math I can throw them at my players much sooner.

Sphinx
I almost got an Ecology of the Sphinx article published in the last issue of Dragon that was released under Paizo’s tenure, which unfortunately–or perhaps fortunately depending on who you are–got hedged out for an ecology article on the tarrasque (I also wrote up a gynosphinx monstrous class that I used for 12 levels in the last 3rd Edition campaign that I played in).

I remember describing them as mortal creatures created specifically to function as the stewards of the gods, which was a kind of way of explaining why some, like Egyptian gods, had animal heads. That may be why I prefer the idea of them being mortal spirits caught in the middle of a divine transformation. To me it provides a more engaging explanation for why they enjoy hanging out about temples, tombs, sacred sites, and the like.

Also, animal heads.

When it comes to spells I am mostly fine with androsphinxes casting as clerics due to their divine association, though I am not a fan of massive spell lists (especially when they feature spells too low level to be useful). As for the roar, I would prefer to it as a recharging ability that does more as the androsphinx is wounded.

I like the idea of giving gynosphinxes special divination traits as opposed to pretty much every divination spell out there, as powers that are not easily replicated by magic will make it more likely that characters–even fairly powerful ones–might have a reason to seek one out instead of just dropping a bunch of cash on a spell scroll.

Chimera
The chimera is one of the few monsters that I am totally cool with being manufactured by someone (or thing) else, which makes me wonder why they must all have a fire-breathing dragon, goat, and lion head. Think about it, the chimera is the perfect monster that lets Dungeon Masters mix and match other monsters to create something entirely new to throw at their players, and it makes sense in the game’s fiction because a wizard did it.

Limiting it to just one kind of dragon and two animals is a huge missed opportunity, and it does not make sense unless for whatever reason in the game’s fiction it is the only viable three-way combination. What if druids made a chimera out of a green dragon, stag, and wolf? A blasted wasteland might be inhabited by a chimera made up of a blue dragon, elephant, and…I dunno, some form of desert-dwelling hunting cat.

The most dangerous weapon of a sand cat is its cuteness.

3rd Edition had a chimera template, but you do not really need to go that far. Just make a Customization Options sidebar with some guidelines on adding/replacing abilities with some damage benchmarks, because, after all, does it matter if a chimera has two bite attacks instead of a bite and gore?

Hydras
Oddly there is no flavor text attached to these. Were they created by the gods long ago, perhaps for use as a weapon during some ancient war (after all, in Greek mythology Hera raised it to slay Heracles)? Did they spring from the wounds of a primordial? Given that they have at least five heads, maybe they are related in some way to Tiamat?

Mechanically hydras have operated pretty similarly throughout the editions:

• In 2nd Edition hydras lost heads automatically as they took damage. They had maximum hit points per Hit Die, so once each head was severed then the hydra was slain. Its body was immune to attacks unless it dealt damage equal to its original hit points, making it possible to obliterate one with a single, powerful attack. Your standard hydra model did not grow extra heads; that was specific to the Lernaean hydra variant, which could have up to twelve and whose body was completely immune to attacks.
• 3rd Edition required that you declare that you were trying to sever a head using the sunder action (and could ready an action to attack it as it tried to bite you). If you dealt enough damage to sever a head, two more would grow in 1-4 rounds unless you used fire or acid on the stump and inflicted 5 points of damage. Unlike 2nd Edition you could attack the body, but its scaling fast healing made this fairly difficult.
• 4th Edition kind of combined the approach from previous editions: heads were automatically destroyed through hit point damage, but would grow two heads on the following round unless it took any amount of acid or fire damage. This meant that while it eventually die, the fight could get progressively harder if you lacked the ability to deal acid or fire damage. At least it did not have regeneration.

If I had to choose I would pick 4th Edition’s take on hydras, as the fact that it automatically loses heads while taking damage escalates the danger (unless someone applies fire or acid before its turn comes about, which adds a tactical element to things). It is also easier to juggle at the table than in 3rd Edition.

The only problem is that it begs the question as to why characters can chop off hydra heads, but not an ettin’s, or any other part of any other creature for that matter.

D&D Next: Barbarian

Clarifications are all well and good, changes to spell durations perhaps less so, and conversion notes for a D&D Encounters adventure are nice if you happen to have it (though personally I feel that I put way more effort into my adventure conversion), but really the big thing about this playtest packet is the barbarian class.

A reliance on Strength and Constitution, d12 Hit Die, and some kind of rage mechanic are to be expected. Like the fighter (and the rogue and monk), the barbarian is great with weapons, starting with a bonus to attack rolls and Martial Damage Dice right from the get-go (and, obviously, it scales at the same rate).

The other starting features let you add your Constitution modifier to Armor Class when you are not wearing armor, and when you are not raging you can make an attack with advantage at the cost of granting everyone else attacks with advantage against you for a turn.

The most complex class feature is rage. You can rage twice per day at the start, which grants you advantage on Strength-based attacks, checks, and saves, a scaling bonus to damage rolls, and resistance to non-magical damage. The downside is that you cannot rake reactions, and if you do not attack the rage ends.

As you level up you gain fast movement, roll twice for initiative and take the best result, have essentially zombie durability (make Constitution saves to stay at 1 hit point regardless of damage, though the save DC increases each time), negate surprise, regenerate hit points when you are at less than half, and more.

Like the 3rd Edition barbarian there are no decision points, which is fine because as Mearls said this would be a kind of early draft; customization–such as modifying how rage works and some awesome-sounding shapechanging stuff–would come later.

My initial reaction is that while the barbarian is tough and powerful, it does not deliver anything we have not already seen. Actually thanks to 4th Edition’s barbarian and berserker it would have to deliver quite a bit in order to meet or exceed my expectations. Again, it is an early draft, so this might change depending on what options eventually crop up. Lack of options aside, another reason for my reaction is rage, specifically everything about it.

It is not that I am not surprised by the decision to make a rage a limited-duration, daily resource, as it makes it easy to manage, but that also makes it unexciting for me: you activate it, get a bonus for an encounter, and that is it. Diablo III‘s barbarian had a mechanic where you build up “rage” through successive attacks. The more you hit, the higher it got and the better special attacks you could trigger. Out of combat it gradually depleted, so you had an incentive to stay in the thick of it hewing through enemies as fast as you can.

Iron Heroes had a token system that operated in a similar manner: a berserker would build up fury tokens by killing enemies, getting hit, and spending actions to basically psyche yourself up, and spend them to trigger your abilities. If they want to stick with dice, you could give the barbarian a dice cap, and require her to skill enemies to get hit in order to build them up, spending them to deal bonus damage, make extra attacks, inflict an automatic critical hit, absorb damage, and so on. To me this seems a lot more dynamic and interesting .

A concern that I have seen is if the barbarian is better than the fighter. It has more hit points, and since it can combine Dexterity and Constitution to determine Armor Class it is a pretty simple feat to match even a fully-armored fighter at the start, and you do not have to spend anything to get it. Rage provides a massive combat bonus for basically the entire encounter if you can keep attacking, which may end up contributing to the 15-minute workday (especially since wizards also get only two spells per day).

At any rate I plan on giving it a gauntlet-style run sometime this week in order to see how it plays, as well as compare it to a fighter. Maybe several fighter builds, just to see how sword and board, two-handers, and dual-wielders match up.

Legends & Lore: D&D Next Goals, Part 4

Over the past few weeks Mearls has talked about the two key goals for D&D Next, as well as what the basic and standard rules might offer. This week we get an idea of what to expect from the advanced rules. Before I get into that, here is a quick recap:

The basic rules, basically, have you roll stats, pick a race, and pick a class. Feat-like benefits will be baked into the class reflecting an iconic archetype, and they might let you roll skill dice for ability score checks related to your class. This reminds me of a slightly less complicated 2nd Edition, as you could pick out proficiencies, so maybe it is more like 1st? Basic?

Going from basic to standard seems like a pretty small step. As I said last week, it reminds me of 3rd Edition’s degree of complexity in that you get to pick skills, feats (or a specialty), and actual class features. So while you might like a mace-wielding cleric, you can break out of that mold. I am guessing that wizards will get to pick traditions, rogues schemes, and so on.

Advanced rules on the other hand open up a floodgate of possibilities, from ways to awarding XP, to hirelings and animal companions, to alternate magic systems, and more. He likens it to 3rd Edition’s Unearthed Arcana, which is great because that is one of my favorite 3rd Edition books, stating that the game is designed from the ground up to encourage rules hacking.

I also liked that the rules are categorized according to how complicated they are to implement and use. Dials are fairly easy to implement (but can still impact a game quite a bit). The two examples were removing all magical healing, and awarding XP for stuff completing quests or the more nebulous “doing things related to your class”. Modules do not change existing things, but just add more stuff to the game like henchmen and animal companions, as well as the oft-mentioned “tactical combat”.

The more dials you spin and modules you add makes the game more complex, and will likely slow things down, but Mearls assures that you can go crazy with them without breaking your game. This is all well and good, but what about the third category?

These rules did not have a label, but unlike dials and modules changes the core of the game so deeply that perhaps they were never meant to be named. Unlike dials and modules, which play well together, Mearls warns that employing more than one “core” change requires some careful consideration, as they are designing them with the assumption that you are using one at a time. To delve further is to invite madness, or dig up a balrog. Something like that.

In all seriousness I am glad that Mearls is being open about this, and hope that like in Unearthed Arcana the final product includes sidebars that explain to you the potential ramifications that these changes can bring about (bonus points if they mention other sets of rules that work well/not at all with them).

The focus list at the end is full of awesome. With the exception of facing and hit locations I like all of it, in particular per-encounter resources, mechanical benefits for character motivation, action points, variant XP rules, fast-combat rules for hordes, magic item crafting, armor with damage reduction, variant magic systems, and horror/sanity.

D&D Next Q&A: Weapon Dice, Sorcerer, Warlock, & Feats

NOTE: Phaezen and Sky Roy cleared up a huge misconception on my part. I had assumed that two-weapon fighting reduced the damage dice on both weapons and removed any ability score bonuses, to boot. It turns out that while both attacks take an attack penalty, only the light weapon loses out on the damage bonus, so it is not as bad as I had originally thought. In that case my only criticism is that I think that the attack penalty could be reduced a bit (maybe -1/-1), or at least removed for the primary attack. Seems like a good stress-test opportunity.

Two-weapon fighting in Dungeons & Dragons has almost always been a bad idea. I do not think it was even possible in Basic (barring houserules), but according to 2nd Edition’s Combat & Tactics you could try attack with two weapons, you just took a -2 to the first attack and a -4 to the second. 3rd Edition kind of kept this model, starting you out at a whopping -6 and -10 to attack, which could be reduced to -2 and -2 through the use of lighter weapons and feats.

4th Edition made it more universally applicable through the use of feats and its power system. The Two-Weapon Fighting feat gave you a +1 bonus to damage when you made attacks while wielding two weapons, I guess assuming that you worked the other one in there at some point. Simple, to the point, and stacked with Weapon Focus, though understandably too simple for some, which is why it was nice that several classes–namely barbarians, fighters, and rangers–had access to at-will multi-attack powers (though many higher level attack powers let you hit multiple things, too).

The current take on it in Next is that you have to be wielding a light weapon, you take a -2 penalty to both attack rolls, and you have to use the light weapon’s damage die for both attacks. Oh, you also do not get to add any bonuses. So, as an example, let us say that a fighter with a Strength of 16 wants to hit an orc with a longsword and short sword: she makes both attacks at a net +2, and if she hits both times will deal an average of 7 damage.

What if the fighter just ditches the short sword for a shield? She makes her one attack at a +4, deals an average of 7.5 damage, and has a slightly improved Armor Class. Even if she goes with the short sword her damage is only reduced by a half-point, but she is still way more accurate. If she decides to on a full-offensive and pulls out a greatsword? Her attack bonus still stays at +4, but damage improves to 9.5.

Of course none of this assumes feats, of which three out of the Two-Weapon Fighter specialty are directly applicable:

• Dual Wielding lets you use any one-handed weapon when making your double-attack, which can improve the average damage from 7 to 9 (assuming two longswords, here). You still have the penalty though, so you are spending a feat to make less accurate, slightly less damaging attacks.
• Two-Weapon Defense gives you a slight Armor Class boost, which means that with Dual Wielding you are now doing better-than-longsword damage, with the same Armor Class, but are still less accurate.
• Eventually you can get Two-Weapon Strike, which lets you make one attack with advantage. This is a pretty good payoff because you are also making the attack at your full bonus, and you get to add damage bonuses. The drawback is that you have to spend a feat on Dual Wielding and wait until 9th-level.

I was not a fan of having to plan towards a concept in 3rd Edition, and it is because of this that in my last playtest packet feedback that I voiced by dissatisfaction that a player wanting to wield two weapons is worse off in every way–accuracy, damage, and defense–unless she spends feats. Eventually being able to make a very accurate attack is nice, but that is at least eight levels down the road; in the mean time you will be much better off using a sword and shield, or a two-handed weapon.

My proposal was to allow a character with two weapons that attacks the same target to roll both damage dice, keep the highest result, and add her damage bonus. This makes it so that you get more reliable damage, without exceeding what a character with one weapon can do (or doing more than a character with a two-hander). You could do this as part of a single attack roll, or require that both attacks hit in order to gain the benefit (which has the advantage that the dual-wielder gets another chance at landing an attack, though she will not always get to roll extra dice).

The problem is that this only works against a single target. What about hitting multiple targets? In this case I was thinking of a mechanic where the character can divvy up damage to two or more targets, which would again prevent the dual-wielder from out-damaging the two-hander. This could also require the use of Martial Damage Dice, like the monk’s Flurry of Blows, as the benefit is that the fighter gets to make extra attacks to stack damage, instead of rolling multiple dice and taking the best result.

As for the sorcerer and warlock, I still see no reason why the dragon-sorcerer cannot be a heavy-hitting melee-ish spellcaster type. I really dug the sorcerer mechanic, and hope that future iterations retain the “manifest traits as you cast more spells” shtick. Frankly if they are going to make a warrior mage, why not make a warmage tradition?

Dragon’s-Eye View: Hippogriffon?

Where do you stand on the visual design of the hippogriff? For me it depends on their origin, as the mythological griffin is described as equal parts lion and eagle, with the hippogriff being the rare offspring of a horse and griffin, because, as in Dungeons & Dragons, griffins really like to eat horses (which sucked because they were easier to deal with than griffins).

Dungeons & Dragons, on the other hand, divides them into two similar-but-separate critters. I say, why not stick with a theme? Lions and eagles are griffons, horses and eagles are hippogriffs, and I am totally cool with them having a horse’s arse with a full-on eagle’s head (I think that the 3rd Edition hippogriff looked kind of odd with the beaked-mouthed horse, though the hoofish-talons were kind of neat).

I think the image above is perfectly serviceable (though it was odd that it was the only hippogriff I could find in all of Magic: The Gathering). Similarly, the hippogryph from World of WarCraft is another solid example, albeit with antlers. Actually, why not go further and mash other things with eagles? It is not like animal-plus-animal monsters are exactly an innovation in the game, after all.

You could even try to tie the entire griffo-sphere together with a similar origin, whether it is crazy wizard, nature spirit, or eagle god. Maybe a couple of wizards/spirits/god decided to have a bet on who could make the best eagle-combo.

Wandering Monsters: Flying in Style

Where past weeks grouped up monsters by type—fey, goblinoids, dragons, angels, etc—this week’s theme is flying critters, specifically griffons, hippogriffs, pegasi, wyverns, and rocs.

Regular flight is a rare occurrence in most of my games (actually, mounted anything is a rare occurrence). When I ran Age of Worms for the first time back in…2006, maybe 2007, the players eventually bought a hippogriff during one of their brief stays in Sharn (which the bard quickly made into an Improved Familiar).

It was pretty cool despite being able to only carry one person at a time, as everyone was loaded down in heavy armor, but the novelty wore off when the human warblade picked  up a Siberys dragonmark that let him use greater teleport once per day. Also, I think the cleric could cast fly on everyone. Maybe they will rein that sort of stuff in this time around, thereby making flying creatures and magic items a greater incentive?

Griffons and hippogriffs—both carnivorous quadrapeds—do not see much change. I guess griffons are native to mountains, so that is something else to differentiate them besides the Hit Dice and levels of previous editions. I found the bit about griffons enjoying the flesh of hippogriffs and unicorns to be an interesting addition: if nothing else it could add some conflict.

The pegasus sees a pretty drastic change, becoming a celestial spirit fused with mortal flesh. It also mentions them being gifts of good-aligned deities or, very rarely, appearing to serve good characters on their own. I can get behind this exalted origin, especially because it makes the answer to the evil-mount question obvious: nightmares.

I think that having the default wyvern weigh in at Huge is a bit much. If you are going with the “bargain-basement dragon” comparison, then why not give them size categories, too? Most wyverns run the range of Medium to Large, with truly ancient ones eventually growing to Huge. This is an instance where you could look to 3rd Edition’s monster advancement, where at a certain point the monster’s size increases. This would make it easier to handle multiple wyverns (or wyverns as part of larger encounters) and, well, some of us have wyvern minis.

Rocs rollback to their 3rd Edition size of Gargantuan. This I can get more behind, even though it sucks for my roc mini, as I do not expect to see many encounters featuring more than one (though one being ridden by a storm giant does sound awesome).

D&D Next: Legends & Lore, Part 3

This week Mearls gives us a glimpse at what we could expect from the “standard” rules. Before I get into that,  I want to point out (in case you somehow missed the news) that Wizards of the Coast has apparently begun offering pdfs from every edition on DriveThruRPG. There are currently some freebies, like B1: In Search of the Unknown and H1: Keep on the Shadowfell, though I do not know if those are temporary or not.

So, rules.

As a quick refresher on the character basics, players build them by rolling stats, picking a race and class, and…that is it. The standard rules, on the other hand, ratchet up the complexity to something more akin to 3rd Edition: skills and feats are a thing, and you can break out of the more traditional concepts. He uses the cleric as an example, stating that a basic cleric would use a mace and turn undead, while a standard one might worship Thor, wield a warhammer, and blast foes with lightning.

This sounds great in theory, as in my group some players prefer something simple and straightforward, while others enjoy trying to break the mold or even “power-game”. Tastes can change over time as a player becomes more familiar with the rules, or sometimes you are doing a one-shot and putting a lot of effort into construction a character is just not worth it. One issue that comes to mind is the standard characters being more powerful than their basic incarnations (and, by extension, advanced being better than the rest). While I am not assuming that it will not generally be the case, I think that over time optimizers will find potent combinations.

3rd Edition style multiclassing and prestige classes are back in. While I like the system because of its flexibility, there were plenty of issues with it, specifically with class-dipping (where you take one or two levels of a class for the front-loaded features), spontaneous feature explosion (where you suddenly learn a bunch of stuff, like every 0-level spell and a bunch of 1st-level spells over night), underpowered or non-viable character combinations (fighter/wizards), or classes that only exist as vehicles for better classes (fighter, sorcerer, wizard, etc).

I think they are at least aware of the first issue, what with the “When you create a character whose first class is [name], you gain these benefits” clause in the Classes document. Maybe picking up a new class gives you a different or reduced starting suite? Maybe you gradually pick up everything over a slightly more lengthy period of time? Maybe a specialty allows you to nab more or everything, similar to 4th Edition’s hybrid classes and the Hybrid Talent feat?

Actually with the exception of all feat cost, I mostly preferred how 4th Edition handled multiclassing: you spent a feat to gain just a bit of another class, and could gain more bits over time if you spend more feats. It handled the second issue, where a fighter with no magical background or training just suddenly got a spellbook with every cantrip and a bunch of 1st-level spells (or, conversely, a wizard was able to suddenly use most weapons and every form of armor).

It is nice, at the least, to see Mearls admitting to the third issue that can arise from all of this (the first of many challenges listed further down), so maybe this time around public playtesting will help weed it out, or at least mitigate it. I do think that it is important to note that not just power-gamers like breaking down a character into component parts: players interesting in a very specific concept or the narrative will almost certainly get some enjoyment out of building a character bit by bit.

For Dungeon Masters, the standard set of rules lets you create monsters 4th Edition style, using a set of damage, hit points, defenses, etc benchmarks. Given my past experience with 3rd Edition, this is great news as I found that 4th Edition made it very easy to create monsters on the fly. There will also more detailed rules added to the core for stuff like wrestling, swimming, etc. The breakdown is that the basic rules are for DM’s who prefer to improvise, while the standard set is for DM’s that like to tinker.

This could work out really well for people that want to start DMing, as several players in my group have tried but can get bogged down with too many rules and numbers. Even better is that you will apparently be able to mix and match rules complexity, so newer DMs (or those that prefer a looser game) can stick with the basics, while players can customize every facet of their characters, and vice versa.

Finally, Mearls lists a bunch of challenges that include the aforementioned multiclassing balance, as well as trying to ensure relative balance between options (including casters and non-casters), permitting some degree of optimization without allowing a massive gap, and allowing players to create characters based on a concept or story without making them too weak, as opposed to picking what you are “supposed” to. The only really odd “challenge” on the list was expanding the roster beyond four races…that sounds like it should be pretty easy, so hopefully we will see new stuff with the next packet.

Speaking of new stuff in the new packet, it looks like that the mystery class is the barbarian. Not much is mentioned, but apparently it differentiate itself from the fighter with a power-boosting rage and a more reckless fighting style. All things to be expected, but I am curious to see how it is conveyed in the mechanics. Personally I felt that the 3rd Edition barbarian was fairly similar to the fighter, while 4th Edition’s take had clear mechanics that made them act and play much, much differently. I especially liked the berserker subclass, which could act like a fighter sometimes, but then go into a frenzy as the situation demanded.

The bit at the end about customizing your rage really excites me: the idea of being able to choose whether to stick with more mundane brute strength effects, or change your shape sounds awesome (especially since both a bear and earth elemental are mentioned). Absorbing the warden into a barbarian type works for me.

D&D Next: Concept Art

I noticed this thread on RPG.net today, which linked to a DeviantArt account brimming with D&D Next concept art (looks like the artist’s actual site can be found here). A lot of it is stuff that we have already seen, but there are plenty of new things in there, too (like the yaun-ti, ogre mage, and kuo-toa).

I think a lot of it looks good, particularly the humans, elves, dwarves, and aboleth: the armor and clothing look a lot more functional, and aside from the female dwarf and maybe one of the halflings there was nary a boob-window in sight (at least on the women that looked like they were supposed to be adventuring; the sun elf gets a pass, because she is wearing a bright yellow dress).

I am disappointed that the goblin, fire giant, and halflings have not seen any changes: the goblin still looks too much like an orc for my taste, the fire giant looks bland with its flat, shiny armor, and I am still not sold on the halfling’s big head and tiny feet.

Also, I think the hell hound and spectre are both pretty uninspiring, and the mind flayer looks very much unpolished. Still, these are concepts and the game is still yet a ways away, so maybe we will get some interesting, polished art down the road.

Dungeon World: Expedition to Castle Ravenloft, Part 1

Strahd is an iconic Dungeons & Dragons villain, that is a member of an iconic monster (vampire), and part of one of the more iconic campaign settings.

Despite most of my Ravenloft knowledge coming from the Swords & Sorcery 3rd Edition revamp, I bought Expedition to Castle Ravenloft as soon as it came out, as I heard that it would have notes to drop Castle Ravenloft in Forgotten Realms, Eberron, or even a d20 Modern campaign.

I never got a chance to try to run it until about two years ago, as a slapdash 4th Edition conversion. This resulted in a single four hour long pair of zombie-strewn encounters, in which zombie-bits were strewn about.  Though we did not pick it up again, I still kept the book–among a handful of other choice 3rd Edition materials–which was good because recently I decided to give it another shot.

Using Dungeon World.

Given that my last, probably most successful campaign, involved just a hint of planning along with a heaping pile of  me making things up as I went along, the way Dungeon World plays seemed like a good fit. Thankfully I had kept up on reading it, as I had always hoped to run the mini campaign at some point, so I had the plot and most of the encounters outside the castle–which, to be fair, is a big place–fairly well committed.

After about an hour of working out bonds and backstory, I started the adventure with the party–Hawke (human fighter), Luther (human paladin), Zelikman (human wizard), Vincent (human thief), Lakra (halfling cleric), and Haepha (halfling barbarian, hooray for playtest docs)–riding towards Barovia. I decided to be nice and give them a wagon and pair of horses for free, partly to speed up travel time, partly because a lot of them were in it for the money and it would make it easier to clean the castle out (again, it is a big place).

They rode through the gates, which slammed closed as they passed. After about fifty or so feet of muddy track flanked by imposing, werewolf haunted wilderness they beheld the rolling hills of Barovia. Well, they would have were it not for the oppressive mist. What they could see, far in the distance, were some flickering lights that they correctly pegged for a village. With no other direction they headed towards it.

They arrived without any incident, and quickly noticed that there was not only no one around to greet, ominously warn, or chase them away, but they also could not hear anything. Haepha went to the nearest house and started pounding on the door, because nothing breaks the ice more than a group of heavily armed and armored mercenaries banging on your door in the middle of the night (especially when vampires, werewolves, and other creatures of the night are a thing).

Luther sensed a powerful concentration of evil in the north-western area of the village, which combined with plenty of lesser evil presences skulking about the village overwhelmed him, causing him to vomit. With everyone’s attention turned to him, only Vincent and Lakra noticed the door opening. Lakra pulled Haepha out of arms-reach of the arm reaching for her, followed by the rest of a rotting female corpse. Vincent tried to stick her with a dagger, but missed, losing it somewhere inside the house.

Luther recovered and engaged the zombie, running it through with his sword. This did not seem to inconvenience it much, though to be fair its teeth fared equally well against scale armor, too. While Hawke and Haepha tried to assist, another zombie appeared–a little girl, this time–and bit Haepha from behind. Hawke tore the larger zombie off of Luther with his…spiked…chain? Really, a whip? Well, this slipped into Castlevania territory faster than I would have guessed.

Anyway, he was able to use it to yank the zombie off of Luther, giving everyone a chance to hack it to pieces. Even though Zelikman lacked offensive spells of any kind, Josh put himself to use using his quarterstaff to keep them at bay. Haepha, not afraid to fight someone her own size, reached behind her and lobbed the zombie-child over her shoulder. It collided with Luther, impaling itself on his sword and knocking him over. It seemed to take awhile, but eventually the combined efforts of six armed adults were able to put it down for good.

Zelikman investigated the remains, but was only able to ascertain that the culprit was in fact not conventional necromancy. Vincent, on the other hand, got a better payoff when he investigated the house and found both his dagger and some 30-odd coins for his efforts. Haepha decided to scout ahead a bit, but after hearing the sounds of both scratching from behind a door and something slurping and crunching bones in the mists ahead, quickly made her way back to the rest of the party.

Wanting to catch a live specimen for study, Zelikman proposed cracking open another house and tying one up. Luther was opposed to this, because paladin, but eventually settled on the possibility that studying them might help prevent it in the future and/or make it easier to stop. In an act that would make a blonde, scantily clad horror cliche decry as foolhardy, Vincent decided to creep around the house, alone, to find a back door.

He did find a back door, but it was ripped off its hinges. Literally. The hinges were still attached to the house. The realization that this might not have been a good idea finally dawning on him, he started to make his way back, when something got his back. He managed to crawl away, losing his armor and half of his shirt  in the process.

Despite his cries for help everyone just kind of waited for him to make it back, expecting him to come barreling out of the mist, followed by a single creature. However, what came out was not some spry, snarling monster with rending claws, but a large…what do you call a group of zombies? A pack? A shamble? Anyway, there were ten or so of them. The fact that Vincent was only three-quarters clothed might have been funny if it were not for that.

Since Jeannie is pretty new to this whole thing I tipped her off that her character can Turn Undead, so Lakra help up her symbol and invoked the name of her god, which radiated a holy light that kept the zombies at bay. Everyone huddled close, and after a very lengthy argument on what to do next, Zelikman took the initiative, running towards their wagon that had been left some 20-feet away. He cast Cause Fear on the horses, which in retrospect should not have been necessary, because zombies.

The horses bolted towards the zombies, which was good because over a ton and a half of horse and wagon is pretty ideal for turning zombies into hamburger. What was bad was that that combination is also pretty ideal for turning humans and halflings into hamburger, especially when they are both in the way and huddled close together (though on the plus side live people make for fresher meat-stuffs).

Everyone dived out of the way and tried to grab onto the wagon. On the bright side, not only did almost everyone make it into the wagon but most of the zombies were also crushed. On the downside the horses could not be stopped (because, zombies and Cause Fear), and the two abandoned characters were the healer and one of the heavy-hitters. On the other downside, the mist reduced visibility by a considerable amount and the wagon crashed into a barricade. On the other other downside, the barricade was used by the surviving townsfolk to keep the zombies out of the town square.

The characters picked themselves up, some a little worse for wear, some cushioned by others, and took stock of the situation: about six decidedly not-zombified villagers were standing about in various degrees of shock and confusion, armed with makeshift polearms. Lanterns hung from various buildings, providing some much-needed light. Oh, and zombies were dragging themselves over the recently demolished barricade.

Luther and Vincent tried to convince the villagers to help. Half stayed, but the rest called them fools, proclaimed their imminent demise, and ran into a large building. The door slam was followed by the unmistakable sound of the door being barred, which was then followed by whatever sound furniture makes as it is being stacked against a barred door. Probably heavy dragging and lots of thuds.

Vincent and Hawke went about shoving their wagon into the breach, forcing some of the zombies back and effectively sealing it for the moment. They followed up respectively with thrown daggers and spiked chain, while Luther scanned the area for his sword. He found it, but it was behind a zombie that was shambling towards him. A quick shield bash sent the zombie sprawling, allowing him easily pick up his sword, properly join the fray, and destroy them.

Zelikman managed to escape the town square before the breach was sealed, easily slipping past the zombies in search of Lakra and Haepha, who were following what they hoped was the same direction that the wagon went. They heard something running towards them, and after Haepha asked who it was got an answer in the form of a ghoul leaping out of the mists at her. It knocked her to the ground, but she was able to easily kick it off, back out of sight. A quick, brief scrabbling of claws on stone was followed by silence.

Shortly after they saw light approaching: Zelikman. He told them what had happened, and as they turned about to head towards the town square were confronted by a skeleton with a sac of grotesque organs suspended in its rib cage. A cord of tooth-capped intestine snapped at Haepha. She grabbed it, but dropped her sword. Zelikman tried to hack at it with her sword, but could barely lift it. He tried to toss it to her, but she failed to grab it, smacking Lakra in the head.

Lakra quickly recovered and smashed one of its legs with her hammer. In a frenzy, it bit into Haepha. She braced her legs against its ribs and pulled, shredding the organs against ribs and teeth and destroying the monster…aaand that is where we stopped: split party in a mist-shrouded, undead-infested village.

After-Session Commentary
Even after running a few sessions on the side I feel like I do not have a good grasp of how things work in Dungeon World, especially when it comes to those “no” and “yes, but” results in combat. There were plenty of times where they rolled a six or less, and I was not sure how to proceed. Even 7-9 results were tricky, especially when there were only two zombies about. I guess I could have added more, but I did not want to bog the game down with a never-ending zombie grind.

A few of the players were new to the scene, and the idea that I could just hurt them or do other nasty things without “needing” to roll was completely alien to them. Oh, you missed? Zombie bite. You threw the zombie and rolled a 7-9? You get it off your back, but knock someone else over in the process. These things kind of tripped me up, because I was not sure if I was “supposed” to allow a Defy Danger, or what. I think a big book of moves and responses would be great.

Eh, I prefer to learn by doing anyway, so we will see how it goes next week.

D&D Next: The Horned Hold Map

And here is the final map for the Horned Hold, from my D&D Next conversion of Thunderspire Labyrinth.