An Evaluation of Watchfires & Thrones: Year One

Please forgive the cross-posting as this article appears on both Archive of the Rotten Moon and The Society of Torch, Pole and Rope. It appears on the former since it concerns the Watchfires & Thrones campaign and has been repeated on the latter as it deals with old school roleplaying campaigns in general and may be instructive to those thinking of starting or at the beginning of a classic D&D game.

This Sunday marked the one-year anniversary of our Labyrinth Lord campaign. In the past twelve months, we’ve met thirty-nine times for a rough total of 150+ hours of gaming. The original intent was to have a game schedule of three weeks on/one week off, making for forty meetings a year. As you can see, we came very close to hitting that mark.

The Hard Numbers and Mechanics of the Campaign

When the campaign began, each player created two characters to help them survive the very lethal first two levels of campaigning. Many of those characters have come and gone, and with the exception of one player, no one has an original PC left on their roster. The largest experience point total for a single character is 14,848; the lowest is 2,500. We’ve had two players leave the group due to real life issues and a third player who had to take two extended leaves of absence for the same reason. Of the original three players from the first session, two remain active.

Player character deaths were rife in the early months of the campaign, but stabilized as the survivors advanced in level, a change was made to the critical hit house rule, and the players themselves learned from the mistakes of the past. There have been a total of twenty-two PC deaths (two of which were later raised from the dead) and three NPC deaths (including two dogs). The most PCs lost by a single player is nine.

The campaign itself has spanned two worlds: the original pulp sword & sorcery venue largely centered in and around the city of Rhuun and my traditional D&D campaign world of R’Nis. Between those two worlds the party has explored a dead sorcerer’s tomb, a temple dedicated to the Black Goat, a megadungeon that was built by aliens, Stonehell Dungeon, the ruined cellars of a wizard, a series of insect-infested caves, a ruined monastery holding the blood of a goddess, and (tentatively) a crumbling temple inhabited by hobgoblins. They’ve also participated in a street fair gone amok and defended a frontier homestead against an army of goblin raiders. Although many of the adventures have been homebrewed, other material has come from “The Ruined Monastery” by James Maliszewski, Night’s Dark Terror by Jim Bambra, Graeme Morris, and Phil Gallagher, The Horror on the Hill by Douglas Niles, Temple of the Ghoul by H. John Martin, The Veiled Society by David “Zeb” Cook, and “The Pits of Bendal Dolum” by Doug Lyons.

There have been many rule selections and changes over the past year, and some have worked better than others. The campaign began using the Original Edition Characters rules for Labyrinth Lord, but changed to straight Labyrinth Lord minus thieves after two sessions, mostly due to the fact that I wanted to have monsters with variable damage dice. Character generation was 3d6 in order and two rolls allowed for starting hit points. Once the PCs left the pulp campaign world, Advanced Edition Companion rules were added to the game and starting attributes changed to 4d6 arranged where desired. Thieves also became available to players at that time. Critical hits were initially handled as a “20” results in double damage. This rule changed around the middle of the campaign to a roll of “20” meaning full damage. This resulted in less PC casualties. Clerics cannot cast spells at 1st level and must wait until reaching 2nd level to access their first daily prayer.

My intention was to run an open sandbox campaign where the players could choose what adventure seeds to pursue against a backdrop of a vibrant, constantly changing, living world. The plan was that the PCs would build their fame and fortune and eventually acquire or build a stronghold of their own. This endgame would effectively bring this portion of the campaign to a close.

Evaluation of the Campaign and its Progress

In my eyes, the Watchfires & Thrones campaign has been a successful one. I approached the game with an equal mixture of excitement and trepidation. This was to be my first time in the referee’s chair for more than session or two in almost a decade. I was confident with my decision to use Labyrinth Lord as the ruleset, but simply knowing the rules cold is by no means a guarantee of success. There are too many X factors that can scuttle a campaign before it hits its stride and I was out of practice in how to handle them. To my relief, the rust came off quickly and I’ve been able to handle most of the in and out of game issues with aplomb.

It is the rare campaign that is 100% successful, however, and Watchfires & Thrones is no exception. Looking back on the past year, I can see several missteps that I wish I had avoided and paths I should have taken. These might not have always been noticeable to my players, but they were glaringly apparent to me.

My first mistake was succumbing to gamer A.D.D. on the cusp of the campaign’s start date. Although I had been preparing to run things in my longtime campaign world of R’Nis, I decided at the last minute to switch gears and do a more hardcore pulp swords & sorcery setting instead. This meant that I effectively put myself back to square one in regards to prep work, which would continue to haunt me during the early sessions. I felt that the setting never really came to life for the players as I myself had no clear understanding of the campaign world outside of a handful of idle thoughts stung together on the flimsiest of frameworks. I was constantly trying to do work on the campaign world and was barely a step ahead of the players at any given time, which if you’re trying to use your roleplaying game as a recreational escape is not the best route to take.

That constant scramble led to my making the decision to transport the entire party to my regular campaign world via a magical portal. This allowed me to keep the campaign moving with the established characters while giving me access to all the work I had already done. But there were unforeseen, long-lasting ramifications to that decision.

The swapping of campaign worlds also occurred not long after the release of Advanced Edition Companion for Labyrinth Lord. Since the world of R’Nis had been forged in my days of playing AD&D and its inhabitants skewed in the direction of those rules, I threw open the floodgates of character generation for all subsequent PCs starting play in the new world. This meant that formerly verboten classes like thief, assassin, monk, and others were now playable. It also affected the manner in which attributes were rolled. Rather than using the 3d6 in a row method, I allowed “roll 4d6, drop one and arrange.”

While this decision didn’t result in a gross unbalancing of the game, I personally feel that it didn’t add anything to the campaign either. I had been concerned that the campaign was missing something by reducing the probability of someone rolling scores good enough to play a ranger or paladin and I wanted to allow those classes to be played. But after representatives of those classes entered the game, I discovered that they really don’t bring all that much to the table and, like I discovered with thieves, a campaign can roll merrily along without their presence. After having seen both methods of character generation in play to compare and contrast, I’ve come to the conclusion that 3d6 in order is the superior method for classic style play and I will likely be sticking to that system of character creation from now on. I’ll also be limiting other material from AEC in future games as well, preferring to rely on homebrewed materials that make the campaign world more uniquely my own over “stock fantasy D&D.”

My other major issue was my failure to take the desires of the players into account when working on the campaign. I should have questioned the players more often and earlier to better determine what they wanted out of the campaign. The problem, to my eyes anyway, was that I had anticipated running this wide-open sandbox world, one where the players would be free to chose from any number of adventure seeds. I did a lot of preparation to allow for this once we swapped worlds, only to discover that the group was pretty enamored with Stonehell and would happily continue delving there until they reached name level, uncovered all its secrets, or the campaign collapsed—depending on which came first. As the old line states: “Don’t bring a knife to a gunfight…and don’t bring the whole sandbox when the guys just want to play in a hole in the ground.” It’s not a game-breaking issue by any means, but it does mean that I could have used my energies in a more productive manner by concentrating on my campaign tent-pole instead of the surrounding, never-to-be-visited locales.

There were (and remain) a few minor quibbles and reevaluations, but since this campaign was intended to get me back up to fighting weight, referee-wise, I’ve looked at these as lessons rather than problems. Amongst them are whether I will have future starting players roll up two characters and run them off and on. There are benefits to this, especially at starting level, but the dividing of experience amongst multiple characters makes for a slower level progression, which in turn limits me in regards to what fun monsters and magic I can throw at the party. I may allow a player to run multiple PCs in the future, but this would be by player choice rather than campaign design.

Somewhat connected to this issue is the use of training to advance in level, resulting in a time and money cost. I’m currently using training in my game, but I’ve come to the conclusion that this is baggage from AD&D that doesn’t have a place in original or basic D&D and their retro-clones. I’ve got a simpler system in mind, one that allows for more player choice when it comes to advancement, and I think my next and subsequent campaigns will do away with training completely if this other system works as intended.

One final problem bears mentioning as it is something every referee who runs a game long enough encounters: burnout. A few weeks ago, I was feeling this to great effect. My energy levels were running low and there was even one session that I really didn’t feel like having because I was at the end of my creative tether. I thought the campaign might be overdue for a temporary sabbatical as I recouped and regained my energy. However, I’ve continued to push through these feelings and it seems that I’m getting back into the groove of the game. The last two sessions have done wonders for my attitude, and although other real-life concerns remain to plague me and I have a tendency to want to do anything but sit inside and play once spring arrives, I’m hopeful that by continuing to work through the slack times the campaign will continue until it reaches its natural ending. My advice to other struggling referees: Keep pushing until you break on through the wall. It’s worth it.

Despite all these concerns, which may be more apparent to myself than my players, the Watchfires & Thrones campaign has been a great source of fun for the guys who come to the table each week. Some have stated on more than one occasion that this campaign is simply the best one they’ve ever played in. I’m prone to be modest in the face of such praise, but so long as everyone else is having a good time and keeps coming back for more, I’ll accept those compliments as intended.

Watchfires & Thrones Session #36

With almost a year under our belts, the guys know that I like to throw what I call a “spectacle game” every once and a while. Nothing gets them ready for a game better than to come in and find some special surprise set up on the game table, be it a city street, a cliffside cave, or a spinning maze of death. Since the theme of the campaign is the steady rise to power and influence, I thought it was time to both give the players a taste of mass battle and to pay homage to role-playing’s wargame roots. Thanks to the information provided in Night’s Dark Terror, this session saw the players taking on the roles of armchair generals. Everyone had a great time and it made a nice diversion from dungeon crawling—although they are anxious to get back to Stonehell.

Special thanks go to he who managed to get me a copy of the battle map from Night’s Dark Terror. I have the module in a second-hand, incomplete form and it was missing. I would have gladly paid the $5.00-$10.00 for a PDF of the module and just printed out the maps from that, enriching the coffers of Hasbro a little, but they still remain convinced that hoarding the PDFs of their products makes the best business sense. I think I’ll go buy a Pathfinder PDF on general principle.

As the gates of the barbican slammed shut behind them, the party beheld a young woman with a face streaked by soot and whose hand clenched a bare dagger in a white-knuckled grip. From the roof overhead came the leather-clad man as his zipped down a ladder to the ground below. The smell of smoke grew as the first flames began to spread from the burning barn to the wooden gatehouse in which they stood. The man pointed across the muddy courtyard before them, indicating a two-story hall and hearth made of stone and timber. “Run!” he cried, indicating the stout oak door that stood in the face of the main hall.

As the party crossed the courtyard they could see a three-story stone tower attached to the hall that peered down at them with crenellated eyes. To their left, the settlement’s barn was now an inferno and the palisade that connected it to the tower and gatehouse was a sheet of flame. From out of the smoke came more high-pitched cries and a half-dozen goblins charged through the flames and smoke to cut off the party’s run to safety. Green-skinned and clad in crimson from head to foot, the chittering humanoids were thirty for blood and battle.

While the man and woman continued their run towards the hall’s main door, the rest of the party angled to meet their attackers. Lyrax fired the first of what would be many arrows that night, taking down two of the attackers with arrows through the throat. Raijek’s crossbow dropped a third, and Baragkus, Grumble, and Mars Markus made fast work of the remaining three. With their assailants dead, the rest of the party reached the hall and the warriors held a quick debate over whether they should hold their ground or let themselves be bottled up in the (possibly flammable) hall. Grumble, Mars, Baragkus, and Fisk decided to hold the line while Lyrax, Raijek, Korlack, and Kaldar headed inside to take position atop the stone tower that kept watch overhead.

As the courtyard warriors prepared to dispatch the next wave of goblins, they heard more screaming coming from the smoke around them. The sooty clouds parted briefly to reveal ten wolf-riding goblins racing their way. Then, the slavering fangs and serrated blades of their enemies were upon them.

After Grumble was bitten and stabbed, and Mars Markus took a serious wound, the fighters determined this was one melee they had little chance of winning. Their own attacks had only slightly injured the massive wolves and the goblins’ spears were all too sharp. Mars and Fisk broke and ran through the hall door while Grumble and Baragkus covered their retreat. The spider cleric and hired fighter reached the hall just as the panicked inhabitants of the settlement were closing it, stout locking bar held at the ready. A cry of warning was shouted and the dwarf and fighting man in the yard retreated with haste, taking more wounds as they turned to run. Despite these new injuries, they dove into the hall just before the door was sealed and barred against the invaders.

Inside the rough timber hall, the party made the acquaintances of “Fort” Wolf’s Head’s residents: Pidar, the patriarch of the clan, his wife, Darya, his 10 winters-old son, Matthias, and their aging manservant, Steg. Also in attendance was the weeping, recently widowed, Masha, and her infant daughter. The young couple they had met at the gatehouse was Tars, Pidar’s eldest son, and his wife, Allana. Pidar’s mother, Kumuk and her granddaughter, Irina, were also in the settlement, but were currently cloistered in their room in the tower above.

Pidar explained that two tribes of goblins had attacked the settlement at dusk, striking from out of the woods without warning. There seemed to be two distinct tribes: the orange-skinned wolf riders and the green-skinned, crimson-clad goblins. This attack was one of several which had occurred along the frontier over the last two days. Pidar was hopeful that with the party’s help, the settlement could hold out until dawn, at which time it was likely that the sun-hating goblins would slink back to their lairs. With this information in their possession, the party began making preparations for the long night ahead of them.

Mars originally suggested that everyone retreat to the tower for fear of the goblins torching the hall. But the tower would be a perfect death trap in the goblins broke in so fortifying the hall was undertaken as the next best option. Tables and chairs where broken up to barricade three of the main building’s entrances while the armory was opened and stripped of arrows. Lyrax and Raijek ascended to the tower’s roof to keep an eye on the goblins. Once there, they discovered that full night had fallen and the wan light from the crescent moon mixed with the smoke pouring from the now-charred remains of the barn, gatehouse, and palisade provided limited visibility. In the woods to the north and east they could see a score of small campfires burning, the shadowy bodies of goblins passing in front of these blazes with great frequency. The sound of drumming and chants filled the night air as the goblins prepared for their next attack.

In the hall below, the party hustled the settlement’s non-combatants down to the tower’s secured lower storeroom. The rest of the family was armed with bows and slings, and then stationed about the building to overlook the north and south courtyards. Baragkus dragged the hall’s largest chair to in front of the main door and sat with sword in hand to wait the inevitable attempt to break in. Kaldar and Korlack kept watch from the hall’s second story on the courtyard to the south. Grumble and Mars took up position in the tower armory, but not before learning that Pidar’s mother was a cleric of the Sovereign Flame when she healed the spider priest of his wounds. Fisk prowled the halls, a free safety ready to run where needed.

An hour after dark, those on the tower found themselves under attack by goblin snipers, slingstones smashing against the stone walls and battlements surrounding them. The darkness and cover made missile fire difficult for both sides, but when Grumble’s shortbow finally picked off one of the hidden snipers, the barrage of slingstones fell quiet.

As the night crept closer to midnight, the sound of drums ceased and a stillness filled the air. Then, from out of the gloom came a charge of goblins. Two wolf-riders led a half-score of infantry across the wooden bridge as another ten skulked through the shadows to take up position in the smoking ruin of the barn. As the wolf-riders and their soldiers laid siege to the hall’s kitchen door (which had been barricaded stoutly), the barn-hiding goblins began letting loose a fusillade of slingstones at any visible defender.

Lyrax dropped a pair of flaming brands into the courtyard, which allowed the defenders in the tower and those in the room above the kitchen to see their targets easily. Lit by the flames, the two worg-riders found themselves under concentrated attack by missile fire and they only managed to strike the door a few times before they fell to ground dead. Their underlings’ morale broke upon their deaths and they fled for the bridge that brought them.

Korlack rushed to one window, taking a vicious hit from a slingstone when he revealed himself. With his lack of protective armor, the warlock paused to wonder why it was that the plate-mail clad spider cleric was the one positioned behind an arrowslit while he was put on window detail. Deciding enough was enough; the sorcerer turned and entered the tower, finding shelter with Kumuk and Irina. The matronly cleric took pity on the injured magic-user and used her last curative spell to heal him.

Kaldar, despite seeing what happened when Korlack revealed himself, cautiously worked his way to a window that overlooked the barn below. Conjuring up a magical slumber, the elf took out most of the hiding goblins and the barrage of slingstones dropped off to a patter. Unfortunately, one of these stones struck Allana, knocking the woman senseless.

With most of the goblin slingers asleep, the defenders were able to concentrate their attacks on the few remaining snipers and it wasn’t long before they too fled back into the darkness. Raijek and Fisk went out to quickly dispatch the slumbering goblins.

The party took the opportunity to further shore up their defenses after this attack, plundering iron stock from the settlement’s forge to lay a series of obstacles about the hall. The unconscious Allana was turned over to Kumuk to attend to, and new positions were taken up around the hall. There came a period of anticipation an hour later when the drums again stopped, but they resumed after a half hour’s pause. The goblins were well-versed in psychological warfare.

It was deep into the night, midnight several hours behind them when the next attack came. Grumble, Lyrax, and his dog companion stood on the tower roof, watching the woods around them. Grumble’s bushy ears detected the sound of great leathery wings in the air above, and the dwarf glanced up to see three warm bodies dropping out of the night sky to attack. Within moments, the rooftop trio found themselves under siege by giant vampire bats!

Meanwhile, down in the hall, Kaldar’s keen ears detected the sound of breaking glass. He cautiously crept forward with bow in hand…

Back on the roof, the first bat landed atop Lyrax’s dog, delivering a painful bite and causing the canine to begin twitching and frothing out the mouth before falling motionless. Grumble and Lyrax glanced at each other and mouthed “Poison” as they fought against the flying menaces, now with a heightened sense of fear.

In the corridor below, Kaldar peered around a corner to see two more of the giant bats awkwardly climbing through a broken window. “Crickey!” he cried. “Look at the size of those beauties!” That was enough to draw Baragkus’ attention and the so far unneeded fighter dashed up the stairs to take on these new foes. Unfortunately, Kaldar’s cries also attracted the attention of Darya who had been stationed in the room across from where the bats entered. As she opened the door to see what was amiss, one of the creatures launched itself at her and the two combatants stumbled back into the room out of sight.

Up on the roof, Grumble managed to dispatch one of the bats, but the remaining two put up a stiffer fight. The dwarf took a bite for his efforts, but was able to resist the bat’s paralytic enzymes. Lyrax’s arrows dropped a second bat just as Grumble launched a flurry of axe swings at his own opponent. With a solid “thunk,” the axe met meat and the flying assailants were dispatched completely. In the hall below, Baragkus made short work of the bats with his great sword, but not before Darya had succumbed to the bite of the bat and fell into a deep coma. She too joined the unconscious Allana under Kumuk’s care.

Dawn was fast approaching and the defenders, although tired, found their spirits on the rise. Just another hour or two and victory would be theirs. They were injured, half-delirious with exhaustion, and completely out of spells, but the sun would be their salvation. It was with these thoughts in their heads that the sound of drums stopped one final time.

To the east, Lyrax and Grumble saw a horde of goblins appear at the tree line, a score and a half in all. Great, tall ladders were held in their green hands and they stared with undisguised menace at the unprotected windows along the halls’ eastern flank. With one last chant, the mass of goblin attackers charged out of the woods and headed towards the hall.

Lyrax and Grumble began firing at the charging horde, with the human archer cutting down goblins like a scythe. Arrow after arrow connected to send his targets falling to the ground to be trampled by their comrades. Grumble kept up a steady rain of death as well, and soon found himself to be on the last of his arrows.

Inside the hall, the defenders scrambled to meet the goblin charge. Kaldar and Raijek bravely fought against the first of the goblins to reach the wall while Mars and Fisk raced down the stairs to support them. Korlack, with no spells remaining, grabbed a sling and pouch of stones to join Grumble and Lyrax on the tower. Baragkus remained seated near the main door, suspecting this might be a feint.

As the goblin ladders were thrown up against the walls, the party found themselves locked in one last, desperate melee. Goblins were cut down as they topped the rungs, ladders were pushed away to send their climbers falling to their deaths amongst the horde below, and all the while, Lyrax, Grumble, and Korlack continued to rain destruction down upon the screaming masses. Under their hellish hail, more than half the goblin’s numbers perished within the shadow of the hall’s eastern wall. Grumble unleashed his last arrow before throwing his bow at a goblin’s darting head and then rushed down the stairs to join the melee.

Several of the goblin attackers managed to clamber through an unguarded window and stabbed at the unarmored Raijek while others clashed with the armored form of Mars. Down on the hall’s ground floor, Baragkus finally heard what he had been waiting for—the sound of axes hacking at the main door. Gripping his sword in hand, he took up position next to the barricaded portal, Pidar joining him on the other side. After thirty seconds of hewing away at the valve, the door gave to admit a trio of the largest goblins Baragkus had ever seen, each clad in crimson and led by a battle-axe swinging warlord. The fighting man clashed with the humanoid potentate as Pidar slashed at one of his henchmen. Raijek abandoned the battle upstairs to bolster the defenses at the front door as Grumble arrived from the tower.

Outside, the last of the goblins perished under Lyrax’s arrows and the scattered numbers inside the hall were cut down by Kaldar, Mars, Fisk, Grumble, and Tars. The last goblin stared at the steel wall arrayed before him…and dived out an open window to land on the hard ground below with the sound of snapping bones. Struggling to his feet, he limped away, straining to reach the safety of the forest. Lyrax nocked one last arrow and sent it barreling through the goblin’s chest, dropping him to the muddy ground with one arm still outstretched towards the forest’s gloomy sanctuary.

In the main hall, Baragkus and the goblin leader remained locked in battle. One of the goblin’s bodyguards moved to flank the towering fighter while the other pressed his assault against Pidar. The clan patriarch lost his footing on the blood-streaked planks of the floor…and his goblin opponent ran him through with his blade, dropping the stout frontiersman to the cold, bloody floor, dead. With his host slain, Baragkus went into a rage and started to hack through the goblin king’s defenses. Raijek arrived just in time to stem off the bodyguards’ counteroffensive.

Moment later, the goblin king’s head sailed across the hall, tumbling to a halt in a dusty, forsaken corner of the room; his bodyguards fell dead in the doorway soon after. The defenders were victorious!

As the sun rose above the trees, the party stared wearily about at the destruction surrounding them. This would just be the beginning of their quest to end the hobgoblin threat to the Uncertain Lands.

Recaps will resume in two weeks. See you then!

In Media Res

This unseen video footage from the twelfth session of Watchfires & Thrones was just recently put up on The Role-Playing Game Historical Society Meet-Up page (Thanks Rob! Come back soon!). Shot on a cellphone if my memory serves me correctly, it is a short piece filmed entirely on location at Brothers Grim Games & Collectables in Selden, NY.



I'm currently waist-deep in alligators as I try to get attend to various matters this week, so please excuse the lack of recap for now. I hope to get around to it tonight or tomorrow at the latest. Emails will be replied to after it is completed as well. Sorry for the delay.

An Explanation

Those of you who follow this blog but don’t play in the campaign must be wondering what the hell is going on after reading the latest game recap. That game session saw the adventurers leaving their previous campaign world to find themselves in Stonehell Dungeon. That’s quite an unexpected and abrupt change so some clarification is in order.

At the start of the Watchfires & Thrones campaign, I had originally intended to run a classic sandbox hex- and dungeon-crawl campaign set in my longtime AD&D game world of R’Nis. I had been developing new material for that world ever since I began documenting my return to my gaming roots with the Society of Torch, Pole and Rope, meaning that I had accumulated quite a bit of material over the course of the previous year and a half.

On almost the night before the campaign started, I decided to completely switch gears and start from scratch in a new pulp sword & sorcery world. In hindsight, I know this decision was based on me feeling burned out with R’Nis and wanting to try something completely new. I’m also unashamed to admit that I was inspired by what some other very creative people were doing with their own campaign world, truly imagining the hell out of them and creating settings that I enviously wished I had thought of first. Compared to these masterpieces, my own game world seemed pretty bland.

The players and I leaped headfirst into this new world and there was a lot of fun all around. I was loving the change of setting and play was fast and furious. The players were enjoying not knowing what sort of cockamamie creations they were going to face each week and even the prodigious body count couldn’t blunt the fun we were having.

Then I figuratively shot myself in the foot.

You see, I have this habit of being unable to say “no” to any offer to write something game-related for publication. This would be bad enough without my insane desire to make more work for myself by self-publishing my own material. So when we found ourselves with a long period of time off from the game between Father’s Day and Independence Day, I had the opportunity to look at my schedule and what I needed to do both personally and professionally. And holy crap was I screwed.

The first casualty was the Society of Torch, Pole and Rope, which you probably know is on extended hiatus until I free myself up some time to do proper “not phoned in at the last minute” posts. That bought me some time, but not enough. Something else would have to change.

The next thing that would have to go would be my game, but after returning to the role of referee, I wasn’t willing to make that sacrifice. I just needed to find a way to reduce the amount of work I had to do between each game session.

Since I had decided to base the campaign in a world that I had no material for, there was a lot that needed to be done from week-to-week, and I often found myself furiously putting material together just before I left the house to play each Sunday. That’s no way to run a campaign if you want to actually enjoy it. I was drawing hex-maps and stocking them, designing a new megadungeon, and doing research for the world backstory in order to find a way to introduce some very unorthodox ideas into a fantasy role-playing campaign. While I still think that this campaign setting is a very cool one and a great change of pace, it’s not one that I can maintain and truly allow to bloom with the time that I have. I simply wasn’t satisfied.

In addition, there were a few things that I had introduced to the campaign in order to test them out and see how they worked in actual play. Some of these were very successful; others less so. Perhaps my biggest disappointment was allowing the players to run multiple characters at one time. It was originally my intention that they would switch back and forth with characters when one was unavailable or a change of pace was needed, but that wasn’t how things worked out. This required several changes to the game itself, a reassessment of how much experience points were awarded each session, and, worst of all, it encouraged a sense of detatchment from the overall campaign world. And if the players weren’t becoming invested in the setting, I couldn’t be bother to do so too. That’s a shame because that investment and sense of wonder is the prime reason I prefer to play these games and be the referee. A change was obviously in order.

Rather than reboot the campaign—a last ditch effort if there ever was one—I decided to change worlds and put myself back in not only a game world where I feel most at home, but one that has accumulated a great deal of material over the years. That factor alone will reduce my prep time immensely. I also wanted to implement a strict “one PC at a time rule” in order to encourage a connection with the campaign world, and swapping the campaign setting would allow me to slowly introduce the players to a world with more depth and history than the one they had been playing in.

Luckily for me, this swap wasn’t as difficult or far-fetched as it might normally be. The Black Gut, the megadungeon that the PCs were exploring, featured many gates and portals to different locations and worlds. At the end of the last session, we had stopped with them right next to a chamber that held one such gateway. If I could just get them through it, we could start fresh with new adventures.

Rather than railroad them all, I was very open with the players about what I wanted to do and presented them with my proposal. I made it clear that I wouldn’t make any gross change without their agreement and participation, which they thankfully gave me. A little metagaming later, a reduced number of PCs stepped through a gate between worlds to find themselves in Stonehell Dungeon.

There’s going to be some more modifications but I’m waiting for the party to reach civilization. Most of them will require training at that time to advance so it will be the perfect time to introduce those changes. I think that despite the suddenness and magnitude of the world change, it will be for the best in the long run, and I simply can’t wait for our next game session.

The Hall of Records

Being a compleat repository of the certificates of valor awarded to adventurers throughout the lands.