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Arabian Nights after DCC days
Posted: Fri Dec 13, 2013 8:58 am
by jozxyqk
So in an odd turn of events, an PC in my group called upon his patron, the King of Elfland, casting the spell "Forest Walk" to escape an ambush. Some serious spellburn later, the PC got a 31 result (CLx100 allies travel to another tree anywhere on the same plane) and transported the party and a bunch of surprised woodsmen caught up in the fight to a faraway desert land.
I'm having fond memories of teenage dabblings in the Al-Qadim setting, and I'm wondering if there are any DCC modules (official or otherwise) that would give me some material here. Or (if anyone has a better handle on these things than me) tips for converting old 2E modules to DCC?
Thanks,
J
Re: Arabian Nights after DCC days
Posted: Fri Dec 13, 2013 9:09 am
by AQuebman
Sounds like someone ported themselves into Azi Dahaka worshipping territory which could certainly add some FUN! to the parties ventures. I don't know i've heard very much about numbers converting with DCC. Seems like most of the community will take monsters as they are in the core book or describe them as what they are and use the stats of another monster. With some minor tweaking you should be able to run any old module with relative ease.
I understand your pain though.. i'm terrible at converting and always feel a tad uneasy when I do it.
Re: Arabian Nights after DCC days
Posted: Fri Dec 13, 2013 10:48 am
by Skyscraper
I have no resources to suggest, but I find the turn of events in your game to be very amusing
Tell us more if you feel like it!
Re: Arabian Nights after DCC days
Posted: Fri Dec 13, 2013 11:12 am
by AQuebman
Might want to ask RavenCrowKing if he's around I know he converted Barrowmaze and may be able to give you direction.
Re: Arabian Nights after DCC days
Posted: Fri Dec 13, 2013 11:45 am
by ragboy
The biggest barrier to conversion is, probably, overthinking it. Grab the monster, convert the HD and AC, look and see if you think that's reasonable, and adjust. Then take its regular attacks (rinse, repeat). With monsters from the 2e/3e era, I try and take the "defining" special attacks/defenses and ignore the rest. I think those rulesets quickly outpace what is relevant to a standard DCC encounter. So, by overthinking it, don't worry about how you're going to work in "Hide +10" or whatever. Give the monster a flat bonus to Init and move on.
The second largest barrier is encounter frequency. AD&D/2e/3e have a frequency of combat encounter that's probably much higher than DCC (at least in my experience). AQ, I think, is a good choice because it tended to mix in a lot more non-combat encounters. Or encounters with monsters/bad guys that could turn into non-combat encounters. So, you'll probably want to think about how you're going to award XP for non-combat/creative encounters.
As far as campaign/class conversion, be sure to not overthink that either. Sha'ir are the closest to DCC wizards of any other spellcasting class in 2e (or 3e or 1e for that matter). They have a built in patron bond system with their gen. Changing spell names and possibly manifestations to match the setting are probably as far as you need to worry about it. I have a short adventure inspired by AQ over on my website for an example of this:
http://mysticbull.blogspot.com/2013/05/ ... zgoni.html
The various warrior-like classes can be handled with the appropriate Mighty Deeds and Lucky weapons. Thieves are thieves and assassins are assassins... maybe add some Merchant-Thief skills for the Neutral thieves. Clerics should be a fairly straightforward conversion. Depends on whether you want to stick to the mono-theistic Loregiver stuff, or not.
Personally, one of my dream projects is to convert Ruined Kingdoms, which was my favorite AQ adventure box/campaign.
Re: Arabian Nights after DCC days
Posted: Fri Dec 13, 2013 3:47 pm
by jozxyqk
ragboy wrote:
Personally, one of my dream projects is to convert Ruined Kingdoms, which was my favorite AQ adventure box/campaign.
Do it, and I will ensure that "ragboy" becomes an ongoing patron or deity in my campaign! That one featured Yak men didn't it? I think they would fit perfectly into DCC.
Thanks otherwise for the extremely helpful post--you are completely right about Shair--that hadn't even occurred to me. Also-- I am stealing your little site/encounter. Looks great for getting the PCs (and players) into the swing of things.
Re: Arabian Nights after DCC days
Posted: Sun Dec 15, 2013 2:45 pm
by ragboy
jozxyqk wrote:ragboy wrote:
Personally, one of my dream projects is to convert Ruined Kingdoms, which was my favorite AQ adventure box/campaign.
Do it, and I will ensure that "ragboy" becomes an ongoing patron or deity in my campaign! That one featured Yak men didn't it? I think they would fit perfectly into DCC.
Thanks otherwise for the extremely helpful post--you are completely right about Shair--that hadn't even occurred to me. Also-- I am stealing your little site/encounter. Looks great for getting the PCs (and players) into the swing of things.
Steal away -- that's why it's out there.
Let me know how it goes -- also you might look at Angels Daemons and Beings Between -- there's a couple semi-AQ-ish patrons in there: SET-UTEKH THE DESTROYER, especially. But, any of them could be made to fit.
Re: Arabian Nights after DCC days
Posted: Fri Jan 03, 2014 1:06 am
by Arijuna
Man, wish I saw this post prior. By coincidence I'm working on a short module with ancient Middle Eastern and east Indian mythological influences (DCC style of course). If anyone is interested in collaborating, please get in touch. I have an artist who is eager to illustrate. I just need to flesh out the idea more, write a draft, and get some play testing done!