[D&D 5E] Leveling without experience points tracking

Adventurer party from dnd.wizards.com

+David Rollins made an interesting blog post about a campaign, where he would use Lamentations Of The Flame Princess material in Known World setting using 5th edition Dungeons & Dragons rules.

This is what David wrote in his post:

"My big challenge will be adapting the experience awards in the adventures to suit 5E. I'm reading through my new DMG in the hopes that I can figure out a fair way to assign experience since the adventures I'm using where [sic] designed to use treasure as the main source of XP rather than the conflict."

This is what I would do! This is not my original idea. I've read this somewhere, probably many times from different sources. But I like it.

The number of adventures/modules you play is how fast you level.

Rule of thumb: You level when you've completed number of adventures/modules equal to your current level. First level character needs to complete one adventure, fifth level needs to complete five adventures. Fifth level character has completed total of 15 adventures.

Some adventures are shorter or easier, some longer or harder.

Easy fix. Easy or short adventures equal 1/2 or even 1/4 of a "normal" adventure. Hard or long adventures might equal to two or three normal adventures. You might need four very short and/or easy adventures to get to the second level. From third to fourth level you might need only two longer or harder adventures.
If the adventures are hard enough to earn you more than just one level, just ignore the rest. You cannot skip levels, same thing with gold-xp.

Works best with unified experience charts.

Old-school games usually have unique experience charts for each character class. More modern D&D versions have same experience advancement chart for each of the classes. Easy to adapt for modern versions, might need tweaking for older versions, as the classes are balanced with experience point requirements.

Do you have a way to convert B/X or 1E (or even more recent) experience points for the fifth edition, or vice versa?

Share your method in comments!
__________________________________________________

Disclaimer: I haven't read 5th edition rules (yet), so I don't know what I am talking about!

Checking out Chthonian Highways part 1

Here's their website: http://ironspine.com/wp/en/rpgs/chthonian-highways/
Here's the free alpha 0.3 release: http://www.ironspine.com/ch/downloads/CH-0_3-alpha.pdf

Because I am busy at the moment, I won't read the whole file. It's 63 pages (including the covers) and that's too much at the moment. I just check it out and comment what I see! This is a free pdf, so you should check it out yourself!

ATTENTION! I did write this p/review while reading the file, so here are some mistakes about the rules. I didn't quite get every concept how things work. This review is my opinion of the game and doesn't tell is the game good or not. Only you can tell it! I do think this is going to be a good thing, for people who like mechanics like this. Johnny blaze in his review (link) wrote: "More than FATE, less than D&D".

Hans Zenjuga is good artist. It's all his work in this product.

Chthonian Highways is a post-apocalyptic setting with Cthulhu Mythos. Sounds good, doesn't it? For me the setting is interesting enough to rip for other games, if the rules of this suck. But if the rules are good (well, You like them), you can probably ignore the setting. I am most interested in vehicle rules.

There's an one-page short story, I didn't read. There's information of the world, I didn't read either. But I think they are cool read, as they are quite broad. Not exhaustingly long this-and-that I don't like at all. Of course this is a demo, so it's hard to say how detailed the world description and the history part are going to be.

I do approve long world descriptions, if the necessary information is easy and quick to read to get a good idea of the world. The history part is usually quite boring for me, because I focus on what will happen, and not what happened. Naturally it's nice to know how the hell we and up here and why things are like they are, but I don't enjoy reading pages after pages of that kind of information. Easily skipped and as I said, I don't know what these parts are going to be in the final product. This was just an opinion of world and history texts in general in gaming products.

Ironcore Engine is the system used in this game. It is similar to d20 system (Pathfinder, D&D 3E) and Cypher System (Numenera, Strange). I am not familiar with Cypher, but being compatible with 3E style games means, it can also be quite easily compatible with old-school rules (OSR, yo!). HD, AC, that's basically what you need for stats, amirite?

System is easy enough; d20 + Skill + mods versus Challenge Level (CL). Edge and handicap work just like D&D 5E dis/advanteges; roll 2d20, keep other.

Special rules and whatnot: With pushing action you can add Fatigue points to your Ability. Some might like this, but I find it unnecessary addition. Stunt effects you get when you get 5 or better result against the CL. These are kinda like criticals. There's a list of effects like bonus to initiative or better/quicker result of an action. Velocity points you get from extraordinary successes and failures, and can be used to things like re-rolls and boosts. Strain is different kinds of damage, a penalty to your ability. Strained abilities can lead to exhaustion and exhausted abilities cannot be pushed.

My opinion on the rules? D20/3E is easy, if you keep it easy. 3E without feats and shit is quite simple to learn. Roll d20 and add stuff. In Chthonian Highways the core is that simple, but I don't quite like pushing, stunts, strain etc. They feel like a gimmick and extra things you have to keep track of. Maybe for more modern players (I was a modern player, got exhausted, began enjoying old-school) these are normal things to include and keep track of, but I am perfectly happy without stuff like this. I mean, Game Master and players can (and are encouraged to) describe stuff like this and apply rules as needed.

But the real question is, whether I like the rules or don't, are they good? I'd say the rules are quite solid. D20 (3E) has been, and still is extremely popular and familiar. People like 5E dis/advantage system. All the additional stuff more modern players might enjoy getting some moving parts to just rollin the d20. What's best, the rules are easy to strip!

Road warriors, the characters have an ability range of 1 to 20, but normal people's abilities are 3-5. Quite-a-range! Skills range is 1 to 10. Each skill is connected to an ability, what means which ability is used when the skill is pushed. It would be more interesting, if the skills-ability-connection wasn't determined, but could be fit for different situations. This way players are encouraged to use their character stats in a creative way. Easy fix, just decide it and nothing is broken.

Character creations has three familiar methods, using 2d6 instead of 3d6: divide points, roll 5 sets, discard lowest, and 2d6 in order for "hardcore players". Does Cypher use 2d6 and why doesn't Chthonian Highways use 3d6 is a mystery to me. But yeah, me likes.

Different roles give you different skills, starting gear and money (Barter Bitz). The character roles are broad archtypes which cover everything needed in my opinion.

I thought "choose a drive" meant this!

When reading "choose a drive" I was all fuck yeah! But it is actually your character's passion, motive, or reason. What the heck, I want to drive around and blow shit up, with a real drive made of metal and stuff, that's my drive. Whenever my drive relates the situation I get Velocity. Not for me. Yet another thing you have to keep track of (and remember) what actually doesn't improve anything in my opinion. Then you choose a vice, your dark side.

Skill list isn't bloated, what is a good thing. I hate long skill lists, because they don't add anything. I appreciate this. 20 points can be used to skills. Max 4, except class skills 6.

Experience points are not only to make your character better, but are also used to remove some ill effects like recovering or removing a point of Madness. I am not quite sure I like how your achievements are used to keep your character in order - but in the other hand, it's not that bad meta-game resource at all. Experience points keep you going, what fits the post-apocalyptic-mythos-world.

Junk section has stuff you can get. Weapons first. Weapons have traits like area of effect, automatic, blunt, difficult, entangle, heavy, impact, long, long reload, loud, pierce, pistol, quick, range, rending, scatter, single use, stun, thrown, and two-handed. These are basically special rules and descriptions of the weapon in question. Knife is quick what means "a character wielding a Quick weapon can attack the same target with an Edge if he used his Reaction in addition to the Action." Blunt weapons "cannot be used for cutting. They have Damage Handicap against Hard armors, but Damage Edge against Light armors." I see what they do there, but the implementation is a bit clumsy. OR it's just me being grumpy.

There's plenty of other stuff to get you in the mood. Nice list.

Combat: There's plenty of little things in combat, and most of it I'd ignore. I can make up stuff on the fly depending on the situations. I just need a core system to run some dice. Bonus thing is, though, if you appreciate things you got lots of topics covered here, so you don't have to guess things. Problem is, more things are covered in a rulebook more you have to rely on the book and that makes game slower. Unless you know the rules well, though.
More is less here, because you can always strip the stuff you don't need, so different things covered is not a bad thing at all.
Armors  have Armor Value what is damage reduce. You don't attack against AC, but 10 (small 5, lare 15) + athletics + mods. If and when you hit and roll damage, then armor reduces it this and that much. I am okay with this, even though I want games to work the way when you hit, you hit. No extras after hitting, it's straight damage. In Vampire: the Masquerade soaking sucked the fun out of everything. You hit well, but deal ridiculously low damage. Same problem here, you might end up hitting your opponent for 1 damage with each hit, making things boring. Well, in those cases when your opponent is too well armored, you need to figure another way to conquer him.
In D&D style games Armor Class as to-hit-target versus Armor Class as damage reduce has been debated a lot. For firearms this might be better, though. I mean you shoot someone, you hit, you better have that vest to stop the bullet, right?

Wheels, this is the chapter I am most anticipated of! This is the chapter I am going to read very well, and cover in part 2. This is the chapter I am most likely to use in other games (Mutant Future, I am looking at you, why didn't you include damn vehicle rules).

________________________________________________________

Conclusion: A solid game, but there is too much stuff for me. It is familiar with some core mechanics from 3E with added modernisations. I like stripped down version of 3E, or old-school style rules. So basically this game, in rules, doesn't give me anything I needed to use or anything that I cannot do already with my favorite systems. Except possibly vehicle rules I am very excited of!

The setting is interesting (what little I shuffled it) and easily used in any system.

It looks good. Layout is very Finnish. It's good, but looks very... this! Illustration is very, very good. I've seen old works of the artist, Hans Zenjuga, and he's come a long way to this.

Can I recommend this? Absolutely. Why? Three simple reasons:

1. The beta is free, so you lose nothing if you check it out and make your own opinions.
2. Post-apocalyptic road warriors and Cthulhu Mythos? Hell yeah!
3. Rules are quite simple and don't try too much. They take the popular format and add stuff they like. Not a single thing there which removing would cripple the system.

My objective evaluation of a product that is not directed rules-wise for me ends here, and continues with part 2 covering vehicles and vehicle rules.

[Review] Doodle Temple

I don't know what +Cédric Plante's secret is, but his artwork and ideas move me. His weird fairytale dream-like art and the setting you can see through it makes me feel very happy, but a little sad in the same time. It is beautiful and great like The Little Prince book. Many times when I feel down or life is kicking me, Cédric's art makes world a little bit better place. Luckily there's plenty in his G+ feed, so there is no day that bad ever.

Cédric also has fantastic ideas for roleplaying games. For example check out this Dwarf Cubemaster. Damn cool! But this post is about Doodle Temple, a print-on-demand book.

Doodle Temple is quite simple. It's a booklet, where each page is an illustration. There's also a die result drawn on the page, so you can use it as a random room and temple content generator. There are things like rooms, doors and windows, traps, and creatures. Needless to say, I really like the illustration.

But is this a novelty item or an actual roleplaying games product? Well, both. You get ideas from the book, but there is nothing else but pictures. You have to write everything yourself from room descriptions to monster stats. I think, that Doodle Temple works best not as a random generator, but an actual temple location using all the content in one place. In the other hand, you could use this booklet to randomly add weird into any location. Doodle Temple can be a detail or a feature making every dungeon and place a little weird and special.

You have figured out that I like this. Only you can decide do you like it. I do recommend it, because things like these are nice to have around and in your collection. They make you happy.
______________________________________

Blog full of EXCELLENT.
Print on demand at LULU.
Artwork at PIXELS.

S&W core campaign map hexed

I created hexed and hex maps for my upcoming Swords & Wizardry campaign using core book's default setting. Here are the results:

Original from the Core book.

Original with hexes. This will be players' map.

Numbered hexes for me to put surprises in the map.

Labeled map for reference of actual locations.

Like these? Download the maps here (ZIP).
___________________________________

Colorful hex maps created with Hexographer free version.

Let's create a character for Whitehack 2nd edition (booklet version)

https://whitehackrpg.wordpress.com/

I've played Swords & Wizardry Whitebox, and really enjoyed it. I already have it as a DIY printed PDF booklet, so I decided to get Whitehack instead. I am looking for a simple D&D version for quickstarting some one-shot-sessions, but enough meat to play a campaign. I felt, that Whitebox did the trick extremely well. And it's easy to move to S&W Core from WB, if needed!

But I am always open for new retro-clone-similacrum-OSR-systems, so I bought this one.

This is not a review. I have not read the book yet (except checking how core mechanics work to get some idea what I want from character). Let's see how easy and fast it is to create a character without reading character creation rules beforehand!


If you are in a hurry, just transfer a pregenerated character to a copy of the character sheet. Well that was fast! Now let's try to create a character ourselves! I didn't print a character sheet, so I have to draw one myself. Luckily the character sheet is simple (but damn awesome). Picture somewhere below.

This is a cool and so simple!
For 1st edition.

The Attribute Scores. 3d6 for each attribute. It doesn't say in order, so I decide to roll a series of attributes, and then put 'em where I want to! Here they are:

STR: 10; DEX: 14; CON: 10; INT: 12; WIS: 16; CHA 13

I want to make a magic-user-guy! That's why I put high WIS, because it affects not only perception and insight but also magical abilities. Whitehack magic is different without spell list, so I'd want to try it out!

Attribute scores affect different bonuses, but most of them are not listed yet. But from attribute descriptions I get:

+1 to initiative from DEX, two extra languages from INT

Character Classes. There are three classes, or archtypes. If you are familiar with True20 (Bluerose has one), this is similar. Deft are skilled,  Strong are fighters, and Wise are magicians, alchemist, scholars, priests etc. I am going to be Wise.

Magic I get I write a description myself. There is no spell list. Cool! Also spell casting is not Vancian memorize-and-forget, but you loose HP when you use spells. You've got twice spells than your slots. Slots are your spells that are ready to be cast. You must "memorize" spells to slots to use them. Nice! What I write down as a fresh, first level Wise, is:

HD: 6 (1d6+1); AV (attack value): 10; ST (Saving Throw): 6; Slots (for miracles) 1: Groups (for mechanical benefices): 2; Raises (which level attributes +): 0

My healing rate is doubled, but I cannot be healed with spells, medicine or skilled treatment. Shields and heavier than leather armor make me pay double HP for miracles. I also get -2 AV (to-hit) for two-handed weapons, except ye wizard weapons (like staff). +2 to save versus magic and mind tricks.

Class advantages and restrictions sound extremely reasonable and are totally fine with me. Great! I imagine that double healing rate but unable to boost healing means, that you basically automatically treat yourself all the times.

Groups. Broad definition of skills. Groups are attached to an attribute, so the group can give benefices to an attribute roll. My groups are:

Preacher, to CHA
Duelist, to DEX

Preaching duelist? Up yours D&D and sharp weapons restrictions for Clerics!

Now there are pregens, and names in a weird place cutting chapter in half. Not confusing, just weird layout.

Species. Now it tells me that my first group must be species! Damned. Wait, I fix previous groups I already decided. I think that species should be earlier in any character creation rules. Here's a great example why ;)  Oh wait a sec!

Groups section says I don't have to choose all groups right away, but can choose two (I did above). Broad definition of skills... bla bla. Write next to an atrribute, check. How to use, two per attribute max etc. Gotcha! Species section right after says that the first type of group is the character's species. It must be chosen at a character creation bla bla. I can note them after two attribute, but if I am half-demihuman I only write it down one attribute. Second is my vocation (but if I am full-dwarf I already used my two groups to be dwarf-dwarf so I can't get a vocation). Vocation is barbarian, or wizard or something. Like your class description (I am a Wise, so barbarian vocation would be interesting concept). If I don't use Groups for species, I am a human.

SO if I want to be human wise-preacher-duelist I don't have to use my slots for races. These two chapters, groups and species, could have been written 100 times better! They suck the first time. Booo. Oh wait, what! Species, vocations, affiliations, are all under GROUPS. So I sucked at reading.

Affiliations are guilds, societies and what-not.

So you can use your two group slots for species, vocations, and affiliations. I am going with what I already got, even though they are not beforementioned. I need to go on, I've been stuck with this too long already!

Gold & Equipment. 3d6 x 10 gold, I've got 60. I am poor. Leather armor costs 15 and gives AC 2. Quarterstaff with damage 1d6-1 costs 1. Shortsword with 1d6-1 damage costs 8. Total cost is 24. Rest of the money I use to buy trinkets. I hate buying starting equipment, so I skip this. Calculating equipment weight is also as boring as it gets!

Calculating Armor Class. Unarmored 0 + Leather armor = 2. Yay! If they want to hit me, they need to roll between 2 and their attack value. My AV is 10, so I need to roll 2-10 with d20 to hit myself.

Languages. From the campaign world, which is unknown for me. I speak my own language and something extra. Maybe divine, because I am a preacher.
________________________________________________

CONCLUSION

Character creation is quick, if you know what you are doing. I didn't read it beforehand, so I had a hiccup there with Groups. I think that the character creation is a bit wordy, and all things could be explained so much easier for even quicker results. There should be a fast character creation check list or something to get through with it.

But if you know what you are doing, this is good. Enough similarities to know what you are doing, but enough simple variations to make your character stand out really easy.

I need to try this with beginner group to check out how well they grab the Groups concept. In my experience beginners can think out of the box, when grognards only think Fighting Men, Magic-Users and Elves.