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D&D Subforum / Pen & Paper RPG Discussion Thread

Fourier

Posted this in the tabletop forum, but it was suggested some here might be interested:

Anybody interested in an online play-by-post game of some tabletop RPG. I've been finding Roll20 difficult to schedule as most players are in different time zones and so would prefer an Irish crowd.

No experience required and it'd be relaxed enough in pace.

Games I'd be interested in running:

1st Edition D&D, but with one of the modern adventures (award winning ones published in the last few years).

Cyberpunk 2020 Blade Runner-ish, also going to be made into a game by the lads who made the Witcher games

Rippers Resurrected High action Victorian horror, like a lighter Penny Dreadful

All of these have very cheap pdf options.

EDIT: Another possibility is Vampire: The Masquerade.

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Digital Solitude

Sign me up! Have a little experience DMing D&D 5e if we want more options in future?

Been looking to get a solid group together for ages, would love to be a player after so long.

Mollyb60

Oh ho ho ho I am IN!!!!

*brushes off paladin cape and sword*

Vampire Masquerade was the very first RPG I ever played. What an introduction!

Necro

Might watch the first one of these unfold before I jump in. Will be busy for next few weeks so can't commit to playing right now but definitely interested

OldGoat

Noob, or rather cannon fodder here. I've a single 5th ed campaign under my belt but looking to expand my experiences.

Are we talking Play by snailmail or Play byEMail? Do I need to practice my handwriting? I'm sure I have a fountain pen around here somewhere.

Mollyb60

Yes actually I've never played an online RPG before. I guess it would be all based in a thread kinda like the werewolf games? All gameplay on the thread maybe using an online dice generator for rolls etc?

I've only ever played 5e of D&D so I wouldn't be familiar with 1st edition stats and rules etc. So we might need to either have a crash course in rules or just learn as we go (which I'm always a fan of!)

Fourier

Yeah, it's pretty similar to the werewolf games, just with the occasional call for a dice roll (mostly in combat or for powers) and the dice rolls are on one of the sites that has logged dice rolls (e.g. orokos.com or rollz.org)

If you know D&D 5E you actually already know 1E, just a load of rules don't exist in 1E. I could give a quick primer. Or to be honest we can use 5E if you already know it. Either are fine as they both have free versions of the rules online and the adventures are written with either 1E or 5E in mind (they wouldn't work with the more complex 3E).

What game would people like? I've run each roughly ten times and played in them all, so I really don't mind.

Fourier

Necrominus wrote: »

Might watch the first one of these unfold before I jump in. Will be busy for next few weeks so can't commit to playing right now but definitely interested

If you decide to join, I can always have you appear at the next pub/tavern/genre appropriate watering hole at any point, so no worries.

OldGoat

I'm inexperienced enough to hold no preferences in what edition you use, happy with whatever ye decide.
I like the idea of playing first edition just to see how the game mechanics differ but at the same time playing in the familiar rules of 5ed is less daunting.

/Sits squarely on the fence.

Mollyb60

I'd be happy to go with 1e

Digital Solitude

I'd like to give 1E a whack, its pretty brutal is it not?

Wouldn't mind a run at Rippers either if people got behind it

Fourier

I'd like to give 1E a whack, its pretty brutal is it not?

Wouldn't mind a run at Rippers either if people got behind it

1E is quite brutal, I'll go into that a bit in the primer on it.

I'd definitely have no problem running two games, so if we got others for a game of Rippers I'd run it.

1E seems to be the main choice, so I'll write the primer later today.

I have had one other person express interest, so I'll leave the thread for a day or two and we could start Sunday or Monday possibly.

Fourier

Regarding the pace of the game, typically three posts a week per individual is normal pace, would people be up for that? Slower/Quicker?

Digital Solitude

That's much lower than I was expecting, I could do faster but that sounds good to me.

No rush on when it starts either

Did Fourier just close his account though?

Banjo

Since I've found myself hanging around this forum a bit due to the Pokemans thing anyway... what does this entail? I've never played a table-top RPG, but I did see the episode of Community where Fat Neil needed cheering up if that helps. Maybe I could just be a foxy lizardwench serving at that first tavern, see how it goes....

Mollyb60

Ahhh community. Introducing people to nerd culture. Is there nothing that show can't do?
We welcome you into our moist bosoms with joy Banjo.

It's basically the same as that episode with Fat Neil. We all have characters, we go on a quest and fight evils. we roll dice to see who wins the battles, we viciously loot the dead bodies........ that's about it.

Fourier

Digital Solitude wrote: »

That's much lower than I was expecting, I could do faster but that sounds good to me.

No rush on when it starts either

Did Fourier just close his account though?

Faster is grand with me, I suspected we would go faster as boards has a quicker post rate than most play-by-post forums.

I actually just changed my board's account email to be in sync with the one I use for online RPGs usually, so my account closed for a second, I was surprised for a moment as well!

Fourier

Banjo wrote: »

Since I've found myself hanging around this forum a bit due to the Pokemans thing anyway... what does this entail? I've never played a table-top RPG, but I did see the episode of Community where Fat Neil needed cheering up if that helps. Maybe I could just be a foxy lizardwench serving at that first tavern, see how it goes....

It's really just what Mollyb60 said, describe what you are doing given the current situation and I call for a roll if there's an element of chance to it rather than guaranteed success. There's no way to do it wrong really. If you're hesitant you could watch the first few posts and then join in at the next tavern as the lizardwench

Necro

Fourier wrote: »

It's really just what Mollyb60 said, describe what you are doing given the current situation and I call for a roll if there's an element of chance to it rather than guaranteed success. There's no way to do it wrong really. If you're hesitant you could watch the first few posts and then join in at the next tavern.

My plan exactly. Although not sure if you're familiar with my habit for posting... A LOT. :pac::pac::pac::pac:

Fourier

Before I post the guide here are the rules we'll be using:

http://goblinoidgames.com/index.php/downloads/

The link next to "Labyrinth Lord (no art)".

This is a copy of the rules of 1E D&D, tidied up a bit, made a bit more consistent and clearer.

You just need p.4 - p.14

Fourier

I've written this to be useful to people who've never played and if you are familiar with 5th Edition. If you've watched Stranger Things on netflix, this is the game the young lads play. Sorry if I likely repeat stuff you know. Basics first, combat next post and then some minor stuff in the third. If this is a bit boring, there's the rules above or just go with it while we're playing.

First of all, the most basic rule. To see if you succeed at something, you roll a twenty-sided dice (d20 for short). Most of the rules are just about what number you have to roll.
There are three situations where you have to roll:
1. To see if you hit with an attack
2. To resist something like poison, dying from a lethal blow, a magic spell
3. This ones a bit vague, but to "see if you can do something". Or really whenever you do something not in 1. or 2., like jump across a gap.

Secondly, First Edition D&D has a very vaguely sketched out world. There are towns, wilderness and dungeons. Towns are where you start, hire people and get jobs. Dungeons are where you are sent and contain treasure and monsters. The wilderness are simply the forests, deserts etc between the towns and dungeons.
"Dungeon" is a very generic word, it refers to any building/structure with multiple floors with treasure in it (e.g. tower of an ancient wizard, underground city, ancient mine)

The main goal of the game is to get as much treasure out of the dungeons as possible. Treasure is what lets your character improve, buy new gear and hire help. If you've played later editions of D&D, treasure is where you get most of your XP (3/4s of it), not defeating monsters. Hence the game is more about surviving lethal dungeons than defeating monsters. Even defeating a monster can be different, eg. you can get most or all of the XP for defeating a dragon just by convincing him not to kill you. Although you will still get into fights.

Characters tend to be from a mercenary group and can die quite often, I'll discuss later how I might handle death.

Your character has six stats/numbers associated with them:
Strength
Dexterity
Constitution
Intelligence
Wisdom
Charisma

They can be any value between 3 to 18, 3 being poor and 18 being great.

Strength determines how strong you are, how likely you are to hit with a sword or dagger and the damage you do when you hit.
Dexterity determines ability to balance, chance to hit with a bow or ranged weapon and how hard you are to hit.
Constitution gives you higher health and your chance to survive poisons or a lethal blow.
Intelligence determines your ability to learn, especially important for magic users and your ability to read and write.
Wisdom is willpower, perception and intution. It also detemines how much you can resist magic attacks.
Charisma is used to see if you convince people and also how many followers/assistants you can hire.

When we get to making the characters I'll go more into how exactly they affect things, but for example a monster or human usually has to roll a 10 or better to hit you, but if you have Dexterity 15 they'll need to roll 11 or better.

You can be seven classes of people:
Fighter - Good at fighting, hard to kill, no magic
Magic-User - Poor at fighting, easy to kill, strong magic. Has to find spells to learn them.
Cleric - Moderate at everything, half way between Fighter and Mage, but closer to Fighter. Good against undead. Different spell list to Magic-User. Has access to all their spells, but has to pray to their God in the morning to get a subset of them.
Elf - Also half-way between Fighter and Magic-User, but closer to Magic-User.
Dwarf - Very like the fighter. Not quite as good at fighting, but good at detecting traps.
Halfling - Good at hiding and bows.
Thief - The special class. Easy to kill, but has loads of special abilities like picking locks, climbing.

Mollyb60

If this takes off and the first game goes well I would strongly campaign (ha) for a sub-forum dedicated to this game.

How long do you think your game would last Four? Or are you envisaging a long campaign? I've never been on Roll20 so I don't know what sort of games they run.

Banjo

I don't see Lizardwoman waitress on that list. I'm starting to waver...

Maybe I'm a retired thief who survived the dreaded face-pox as a child leaving me with scale-like scarring over one half of my otherwise foxy visage... Gets me out of having to explain what my tail its going to do in every single round...

Had a look at that PDF. looks really familiar. Think I might have read these rules before back in the 80s. My parents bought me a book but I never actually played it. Googled a few covers - yep, D&D Expert Rules set 2 with the Isle of Dread module. Think I still have the book in my attic. OK, after reliving a childhood I never had with the SNES mini, I'd love to have a go at reliving a childhood I was supposed to have but never got around to!

Mollyb60

Fourier wrote: »

You can be seven classes of people:
Fighter - Good at fighting, hard to kill, no magic
Magic-User - Poor at fighting, easy to kill, strong magic. Has to find spells to learn them.
Cleric - Moderate at everything, half way between Fighter and Mage, but closer to Fighter. Good against undead. Different spell list to Magic-User. Has access to all their spells, but has to pray to their God in the morning to get a subset of them.
Elf - Also half-way between Fighter and Magic-User, but closer to Magic-User.
Dwarf - Very like the fighter. Not quite as good at fighting, but good at detecting traps.
Halfling - Good at hiding and bows.
Thief - The special class. Easy to kill, but has loads of special abilities like picking locks, climbing.

I'm currently playing a cleric in the RPG and I'm hating it. I've played a fighter and an elf before so I think I'll go with a thief this time. I've never played a thief.

Digital Solitude

Dibs Cleric

Banjo

OK, if Fighter is the generic meatbag, it probably makes more sense for the beginner to be the Fighter.

I call Fighter!

The Soup King

Hi folks I have been chatting with the op in a different thread and would like to get in on this I have basically no experience but Im eager to learn. I would like to play a halfling.

I just picked up a hard copy of d&d 3.5 in a charity shop is that any use here?

Digital Solitude

The Soup King wrote: »

Hi folks I have been chatting with the op in a different thread and would like to get in on this I have basically no experience but Im eager to learn. I would like to play a halfling.

I just picked up a hard copy of d&d 3.5 in a charity shop is that any use here?

Not really, 3 and 3.5E are pretty different from 1, 4 or 5E.

If you had experience in 3.5E it would probably have crossovers but reading a 3.5E book to learn 1E will just confuse you.

*edit* Is it the Players Handbook or Dungeon Masters Guide?

Mollyb60

Don't worry Soup king. We can learn as we go along. Four has a pretty good outline up above with seemingly plans for a few more posts of explanation for players.

The Soup King

Okay I will ignore the rules in 3.5 and just read the lore for fun.

Edit: it's the players handbook

Lord TSC

Gonna tag this topic. I don't know if you guys have a full party but I've always wanted to play DnD and never had people to play with. If there's slots, I'd love to join, but if there's not, I'll happily spectate and sign up for the next one, or an alternative one. I've actually always wondered if it would be possible to play this way so am interested to see how it goes.