What do you have in minds for your players?

[toadlike]

Hello everyone!

I was wondering if any of you are already planning your Dungeon Crawl Classics campaign?

I know that my home campaign will be set in a wild borderlands type of area dotted with small villages and ancient dungeons. I really want to stress the difference between adventurers and normal-folk. The adventuring caste in my games will be similar to the outlaw gangs of the wild west: nomadic groups that go to a town to ransack nearby dungeons and take advantage of the population. The normal-folk are the people that are exploited by the adventurers.

I still haven't made up a setting to serve as a backdrop to my players adventuring. I'm waiting to read the completed DCC book (or PDF) to get a better feel of what type of setting works best with the game.

I'm still very much on the fence about the demi-human races.

So tell me, what do you think your games will be like...

[Ravenheart87]

I have three ideas, but I'm only going to decide once I get the final pdf.

The first is a Wilderlands-like sandbox campaign, with more races and classes.
The second is an antediluvian age, like Hyboria.
The third is our far future, tha final continent of Earth.

Damn, I have too many ideas...

[reverenddak]

I'm continuing the campaign we started when the Beta was released. We're just getting in to the flow of things. My players know almost as much about the world they're exploring as I do. I can't remember the names of the villages they've visited, much less where they're placed on a map. It's been weird, but it makes it feel really claustrophobic when you don't know what's in the woods to the north, the mountains to the East and the sea to the west. No one's seen or been over the hills to the south...

If they decide to get on a boat I might have the Isle of the Unknown waiting for them out there, somewhere. They haven't seen or been, or even heard of a mega-dungeon yet (I have several to choose from.) They've only heard rumors of a city to the south. Might be Vornheim, it might be the City-State (of the Invincible Overlord)

I have Death Frost Doom and other LotFP mods lined up and Doom of the Savage Kings, and then the rest of the Official DCC mods. I know my group, and they're not as obsessed with the setting as some people are, they want wacky, crazy, fantastic adventures. I can't even get them to name their party, much less get them to care what the names of the mountains are to the East... Stoneheart???

[Harley Stroh]

I can't even get them to name their party, much less get them to care what the names of the mountains are to the East... Stoneheart???

I feel your pain, brother.

//H

[Harley Stroh]

The third is our far future, tha final continent of Earth.

That sounds *way* fun. Awesome.

//H

[reverenddak]

I can't even get them to name their party, much less get them to care what the names of the mountains are to the East... Stoneheart???

I feel your pain, brother.

//H

*this should probably be on the Judge's sub-forum.

But I no matter how many times I say, "No stupid character names!" I still somehow get Joe Blow, Count Spatula and Master Bator. I'm going to have my NPCs start ridiculing them for their stupid names, but knowing them they'll just over-react and try to kill everyone. Nutty, but honestly a lot of fun, but still a peeve. The wizard is my group is called Hammer! Not like the Sledge, but the Rapper. He wears Hammer pants.

[Ravenheart87]

The third is our far future, tha final continent of Earth.

That sounds *way* fun. Awesome.

//H

That would be based on one of the many Pangea Ultima maps. The cultures would be a "bit" different from the present ones, just like the flora and fauna, but humans didn't change too much genetically - they might have some unusual attributes, but otherwise their evolution stopped, just like in case of sharks. Elves are creatures from another dimension (or at least that's what they say), dwarves are degenerate underground relatives of mankind, halflings also another offshoot. This setting would have more weird and sci-fi elements. "Appendix N": Jack Vance - Dying Earh cycle, Clark Ashton Smith - Zothique cycle, Gene Wolfe - Book of the New Sun, H. P. Lovecraft - anything, Thundarr the Barbarian, Korgoth of Barbaria.

[toadlike]

The third is our far future, tha final continent of Earth.

Maybe it would be prudent for one of us to come up with stats for ray-guns, laser swords, and mutants. LOTS of different types of mutants!

Speaking of Hyborea, I'm tempted to include the winged ape-like race featured in Robert E. Howard's Queen of the Black Coast in my campaign. Those things are supposed to have predated mankind, so perhaps they were responsible for some of the temples, dungeons, and catacombs the players are gonna be looting.

If I were to include them as well as hint at whatever will come after mankind is gone, my campaign would theoretically enter cosmic horror-land.

[henis]

I have three ideas, but I'm only going to decide once I get the final pdf.

The first is a Wilderlands-like sandbox campaign, with more races and classes.
The second is an antediluvian age, like Hyboria.
The third is our far future, tha final continent of Earth.

Damn, I have too many ideas...

I too have been working on a Future-type world, but it has a "lost-lands" feel, or Turok/Thundarr atmosphere to it. Dinosaurs, Laser-swords, Super science, Magic......oh my.
Also got a Sand-box type of game were the players can name parts of the worlds around them (of course i got final judgement and no stupid names!!!), i.e lakes, mountain ranges, weapons, towns, logos etc. It may sound lazy but I like to hear their ideas and creativity. Plus I think they like the fact that they are able to take some part in the game itself. So can't wait to to get my eyes on that PDF!

[Harley Stroh]

Maybe it would be prudent for one of us to come up with stats for ray-guns, laser swords, and mutants. LOTS of different types of mutants!

Heck, yeah! You should start up some threads in the judge's sub-forum.

//H

[Geoffrey]

If they decide to get on a boat I might have the Isle of the Unknown waiting for them out there, somewhere.

When I get my copy of DCC RPG, I'm going to start the players as 0-level slobs on the Isle of the Unknown. I appreciate Joseph making a game that fits so well with my isle!

[RevTurkey]

Re: Stupid Names.

I recently ran a bit of D&D Basic to get my group primed for old school fun with DCC.
The names made me cringe:

Rango & Cash
...oh and Bash and Smash.

They had better come up with better names when I start running DCC!

[toadlike]

When I get my copy of DCC RPG, I'm going to start the players as 0-level slobs on the Isle of the Unknown. I appreciate Joseph making a game that fits so well with my isle!

I feel bad for those poor 0-levelers! How are you going to torture them next? Why don't you also send them to dread Carcosa, all Army of Darkness like?

[GnomeBoy]

Funny, a 'Future Earth' is exactly where my mind settled after first reading through the DCC Beta...

Been thinking about how to handle those oh-so-rare-but-deadly insta-kill type weapons...

[Ravenheart87]

I too have been working on a Future-type world, but it has a "lost-lands" feel, or Turok/Thundarr atmosphere to it. Dinosaurs, Laser-swords, Super science, Magic......oh my.

Turok is awesome! Laser and techno stuff are going to be artifacts. And since Pangea Ultima takes place circa 200 million years in the future, not just mutants, but lots of aliens, time travelers, astronauts and awakened old ones are welcome in such a setting.

[reverenddak]

I've been thinking about introducing firearms, was gonna wait for the LotFP thing, but why wait for gun powder if we can have lasers!

And Android is the first sample monster in the Final book after all!

[HiroTsukasa]

Greetings everyone, new to the forums but I felt inspired to join after getting my PDF copy of the finished book; so amazing. I ran a few games for some friends online in a play-by-post format back when the Beta first came out. It was a bit slow, but we all really enjoyed it. I promised I'd start a proper campaign once the full game was out. I've been having a lot of ideas and found it hard to pin down to one. So I've opted to run Blackmarsh since I have always wanted a chance to use it and that will get the ball rolling. I feel like with the whole "Mountain That Fell" backstory you could twist that into a lot of weird/fun Sword & Sorcery stuff.

Currently, I plan to dump them in Wedmor starting out and run "Portal Under the Stars" to kick things off. Once they're level 1's, I am just going to give them free reign and play it like a sandbox plotting reactively to their choices. Who knows, they might stumble upon a mega-dungeon somewhere. Barrowmaze seems like it could be resting within the black marshes.

I feel like I'm bursting with ideas after reading the book. Did anybody else's head start to spin at the possibilities when they saw Time Traveler among the sample monsters?

[Kobayashi]

I think I'll just go with the "there's something lurking near your village, what do you do ?" start, after the first adventure is over I'll see where I go from there, depending on the players' characters and actions. I'll make the world as we play.

After each session each player will have to add something to the game map/the world : a name, a place, a god, an NPC... It will be worth 1XP.

[Ravenheart87]

I feel like I'm bursting with ideas after reading the book. Did anybody else's head start to spin at the possibilities when they saw Time Traveler among the sample monsters?

I was already full of ideas, but reading a bit from the book makes it worse - now I have even more ideas, and I'm not going to be able to use all of them. The worst part is that I'm in the mood to tinker with the system, eg. seperate race and class, add new classes, and so on. It's hard to resist.

[Harley Stroh]

The worst part is that I'm in the mood to tinker with the system, eg. seperate race and class, add new classes, and so on. It's hard to resist.

Go for it! It's robust. Kick it around the block some.

Just promise to post additions into house rule forum for the rest of us to use.

//H

[Zdanman]

For me personally I will base my world on the best cartoon series ever.....Pirates Of Dark Water. Obviously it will not be pirate-themed but a quest for a series of weird artifacts, the corruption consuming the land, a mutated warlord on the heels of the party, weird monsters, more weird artifacts and a long lost civilization that is the last hope for the land. For people that did not see Pirates Of Dark Water - the opening:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I_5F1zYQF5M

Watch it. It really is great!

[romprecentor]

I am continuing a campaign we started with the Beta set. I had a lot of trouble deciding what world I wanted to base the campaign in. Then I remembered seeing a simple rule set for world creation on the Gnome Stew site. It's called Dawn of Worlds.

Had my players all assume the roles of gods and create a world to game in. Used a huge piece of paper and let them go to town. They created a world that they all are familiar with and have an interest in gaming in. Examples.

I start them with Portal Under the Stars and they get 5 characters through it. So next problem, I want to use old school modules and all the DCC stuff together. So I start them off 10,000 years in the future of their world. I can twist and change things to keep them on their toes that way. I combine their gods with the DCC ones and provide a reason for that. Then I plop them in a valley were they end up meeting a witch and forming a pact with her. She gives them a method of teleporting to remote sites to gain power and artifacts and she gets stuff in return. Now when I have a dungeon of module the witch sends them there and I drop them all over the world were I want. My Epic Words site for the campaign.

So far so good!

[reverenddak]

For me personally I will base my world on the best cartoon series ever.....Pirates Of Dark Water. Obviously it will not be pirate-themed but a quest for a series of weird artifacts, the corruption consuming the land, a mutated warlord on the heels of the party, weird monsters, more weird artifacts and a long lost civilization that is the last hope for the land. For people that did not see Pirates Of Dark Water - the opening:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I_5F1zYQF5M

Watch it. It really is great!

That show looks amazing! It's very Don Bluth - Dragon's Lair. If my adventures were cell-shaded, they'd very much look like that.

[Zdanman]

For me personally I will base my world on the best cartoon series ever.....Pirates Of Dark Water. Obviously it will not be pirate-themed but a quest for a series of weird artifacts, the corruption consuming the land, a mutated warlord on the heels of the party, weird monsters, more weird artifacts and a long lost civilization that is the last hope for the land. For people that did not see Pirates Of Dark Water - the opening:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I_5F1zYQF5M

Watch it. It really is great!

That show looks amazing! It's very Don Bluth - Dragon's Lair. If my adventures were cell-shaded, they'd very much look like that.

For it's time period it's one of the BEST written and animated shows ever. Period. Even today those backgrounds look stunning. It is a damn shame the series was never finished.

It is a little too high-powered for vanilla DCC but no problem. I can run shall I say "high adventure" DCC and it still will be cool. What is funny is that the Appendix N characters and stories were not really that inclined towards mortality and death. Oh sure it happened around them but not to them. That is not to say that the party will get off scot free.

[reverenddak]

What is funny is that the Appendix N characters and stories were not really that inclined towards mortality and death. Oh sure it happened around them but not to them. That is not to say that the party will get off scot free.

Where do I find episodes? I totally want to see it! I might turn my campaign into a pirate-themed one (I almost did that after watching the Pirates of the Caribbean series.)

It's one of the ironies of D&D, and more so for DCC. How do you tell these stories like Conan or Fafhrd & the Gray Mouser with ensemble casts without it turning into the Avengers (i.e. Super-Hero Teams.) People have to die, I guess.

Which is interesting actually. My longest running D&D campaign was for 3.5 and it really became a story of one character. I'm notorious for TPKs in my gaming groups because I can't help but ignore Challenge Ratings and other encounter balancing rules. Let's say kill lots of characters. So one character in that campaign survived the whole time we played it. His player kind of hated the character and tried to kill him several times, but it made for some really interesting events, curses, etc. He somehow never died. I hated that character at first, because he was a hyper optimized 3.5 character. I hate that, so I had to nerf him several times to his player's hatred (which is why he ended up hating and trying to kill him.) Over time, because he somehow managed to survive several suicidal actions, I grew to like him. His character's goals (being an only survivor and loaded with plot-seeds) became focus of the all the adventures. He was very much Elric, Conan or Cugel. The only people he trusted would be constantly dying around him, everyone else were either out to get him, or send him on wild and stupid missions for... who knows what? It's everyone's intent to be that (anti)hero. So only luck and time will tell.

This game just really makes you earn and tell that story. This is probably the biggest difference between DCC and vanilla D&D. Later editions of D&D really catered to those that wanted to be Conan the King at 1st level, instead of Conan the slave-boy/orphan whatever he was. This DCC really makes create your character's story by surviving to tell it.