NOTES FOR THE DUNGEON MASTER
VARIANTS, HOUSE RULES, AND HYBRIDS
by Roger Moore
Long-time readers of POLYHEDRON
Newszine may recall a moderately heated
letter in issue #11, in which a reader
expressed his feelings about "official"
games and variant games, and how it
didn't matter what rules people gamed
with so long as everyone was having fun.
This column is an elaboration on the
subject of variant gaming, and variant
AD&D gaming in particular.
Much emphasis has been placed in
articles in DRAGON Magazine on why it's
better to game with hte rules as they are,
without adding or altering anything.
Much can be said in favor of this idea.
When you use the rules as they are, you
develop a better understanding for the
game system as a whole, how the parts fit
together and interrelate. One plays the
game the designer had in mind, and the
designer might know more about what
makes a good role-playing game than the
player does.
So why change anything? Because no
two people are alike, and everyone has
different ideas on what makes a game
fun. Thus is born the host of variant,
hybrid, and just plain weird versions of
the AD&D game that have spread across
the world. I play variant, weird AD&D
games, too.
This article is not advocating that every
DM or player in the world should start
playing variant or hybrid AD&D games.
It is worth looking over some of the variant
forms that AD&D games take, and
pointing out some of the problems associated
with them, as well as some of the
positive ways in which variants and
hybrids may benefit a campaign.
Critical hits
Critical hits and hit location tables are
unofficial rules additions that have been
with D&D and AD&D games for years
and years. Several other role-playing
game systems produced by other companies
use hit location tables for game combat,
determining what part of a
combatant's body or equipment is damaged
in a fight. Critical hits (especially
damaging blows that produce immediate
bad results for a combatant, such as having
one's arm chopped off) are also fairly
popular. Some game systems even use
fumble tables, showing what happens if
one misses a blow badly according to the
die roll. Fumbling may result in a
dropped weapon, striking an opponent,
or harming oneself severely.
The AD&D game already has certain
minor critical hit, hit location, and fumble
rules hidden away within it. On page 28
of the revised Dungeon Masters Guide
is a note on strikes against opponents who
aren't wearing helmets. Certain weapons
such as a Sword of Sharpness are able to
lop off limbs and heads on special rolls.
Beholders are attacked according to a hti
location table, and other monsters like
hydras and carrion crawlers have descriptions
that make it clear that where one
lands a blow on them is important. Then,
of course, there the Fumble spell, with a
few magical items related to it.
However, these rules do not dominate
the game. Combat proceeds without
worrying about where one has been
injured and whether one's arms and legs
are still attached (in most cases, anyway).
When critical hit results are applied to
AD&D game combat, the primary result
is that combat becomes much shorter and
deadlier all around.
In one game I refereed long ago, I
adopted critical hits with the group's
permission and ran some adventures
that way. We were all rather surprised at how
quickly the game changed. An 8th-level
dwarven fighter had his head mashed in
on the second round of a fight with some
lycanthropes, when he had not lost any
hit points previously. He was dead and
out of the game for good. That did not
please the player. We dropped the system
in future games. One could set it up so
that only player characters were allowed
to get critical hits, but this is patently
riding the game in the player characters'
favor, and the Dungeon Master might
just as well make everyone 20th-level
right from the very start.
Critical hit tables aren't necessarily
bad, but they will dramatically change
combat into a less-than-desirable option.
If you like high-risk "realism" (though
many critical hit tables aren't very realistic),
then this might work well in your
campaign. Just don't get too attached to
your characters. . . .
The same may be said of fumble tables.
Granted, if you've ever watched staged
combats between armor-clad members of
the Society for Creative Anachronism,
you know that people can do some
awfully weird things while trying to hit an
opponent. However, once again most
fumble tables will do little more than
shorten your character's lifespan abruptly
("Cut his leg off? How could my character
cut his leg off when he was aiming at
the troll??!!). Mild fumble tables, those
that have characters drop their weapons
or be temporarily unable to defend themselves,
might work out a little better than
those having characters maim themselves
or other characters, but that's often a
matter of taste.
Hit location tables . . . actually, hit
location tables have some appeal. Just
where did Bimbo the Barbarian take
fifteen points of damage from the giant
lizard bite? Hit location tables would
allow for odd shapes of armor, mixtures of
armor (such as a chain mail shirt with
leather trousers and no helmet), and
might add a little more "zing" to one's
characters ("This scar on my arm? Oh,
that's where the giant lizard bit me.")
One problem still remains. No matter
how much fun or how "realistic" critical
hit, fumble, or hit location tables are in
play, they have one general disadvantage.
The slow down the flow of the game. It
has been said of some role-playing games
on the market that a single sword swing
takes twenty minutes to complete, due to
the complex maze of tables and charts
that must be consulted for hit location,
attack method, critical hits, defender's stance,
etc. When people are sitting down
to a fantasy role-playing game, they want
to hack the orc and be done with it; if a
round of combat takes longer than five
minutes to play out, people are going to
get very, very bored, and the game will
suffer for it.
In short, keep tables like those above
short and playable if you want to use
them. Be prepared to alter the tables as
your group playtests them, so that the
game plays fast enough to keep everyone's
interest.
Variant Character Classes
DRAGON Magazine has printed
numerous unofficial character classes for
the AD&D game in the past, and it isn't
unusual to run into a few Antipaladins,
Ninjas, Berserkers, Timelords, and Duelists
here and there. Sadly, I must confess
to a personal weakness for variant character
classes, and I've made up a few of
them myself.
The problems in using variant classes,
however, must be overcome first. All new
character classes should be treated with
kid gloves in gaming sessions, and given a
careful going-over. A class might prove
exceptionally powerful and unbalancing,
or might turn out unpopular for its weaknesses.
Powerful classes, of course, will
get the most favorable response, though
often an initially good response will turn
sour over time.
DRAGON Magazine carried an interesting
NPC called the Witch, in issue <update: The
Witch, Dragon 114>
#43 that we tested out as a player character.
The witch receives an extraordinary
number of spells at low levels, and we
found this changed the game in favor of
witches over magic-users. Witches, with
their unusual spells, were also difficult to
"get rid of," and we finally dropped it
from use as a PC. As an NPC, however,
the class makes a nice, challenging opponent,
a change from the usual low-level
spellcasters. The power of the class is
balanced by the numbers and resourcefulness
of the player characters.
In my experience, the Ninja class
seems to be the most popular of all variant
classes for the AD&D game, but there
are as many versions of the class as there
are players. It is a rare month that goes
by at Dragon Publishing without at least
one or two manuscripts detailing Ninja
NPCs or PCs appearing in the mailbox.
One of the problems with Ninjas, however,
is that most of the versions do not
look substantially different from the
Assassin class, or else they seem to be
crosses of Monks, Fighters, Assassins,
and Thieves all at once. New character
classes should be as original as possible,
so as not to overlap or duplicate existing
classes to an extreme.
No matter how fun or "realistic"
critical hit, fumble or hit location tables are . . . they slow down the
flow of the game. |
If variant classes are to be used in a
campaign, a careful eye should be kept on
the class during play to pick out flaws,
missing information, and problems with
balance. It might be worth running a few
NPCs of a certain class by the DM, as a
sort of "dry run" before letting players
try it out.
Combat and clerical turn-away tables
Some referees, seeing that the clerical
turn-away table in the DMG does not
seem to follow a straightforward progression
of some kind, have developed their own
tables for use in their campaigns.
Combat tables are often modified as well,
to change the "to hit" scores of one or
more classes.
This is very tricky stuff. Theoretically,
you could (as the DMG notes) alter the <where?>
turn-away table to make it harder for low-level
clerics to get rid of tough undead.
You could even justify it in some game
sense by saying that your game universe
is "closer" somehow to the Negative
Material Plane than most other Prime
Material Planes, making undead stronger.
This variant might not be too bad, so
long as the Dungeon Master doesn't
abuse it by having lower-level characters
run into vampires, liches, and demons
very often. If the DM is one of the
"killer" types, however, it won't matter
much anyway what clerical turn-away
table is used, as the Dungeon Master will
find some other way to screw up the rules
and destroy all the characters he can.
Altering combat tables is a whole
'nuther kettle of fish. An article describing
a suggested revisoin of combat
tables in the DMG appeared in
DRAGON Magazine issue #80, and it
seems to be well put together. It must be
emphasized such material is very experimental,
and only long playtesting will
reveal any flaws in the design. It is worthwhile
comparing variant combat tables to
the original system, to see who or what
gets the advantages, and to make some
guesses from that on the changes the
tables will bring in play balance.
Even when the tables are replacing a
combat system generally acknowledged to
be poorly done (as might be said of the
weaponless combat system in the DMG,
which is overly complex and very difficult
to moderate), care should be used when
applying the system. A variant weaponless
combat system that I designed
appears in DRAGON issue #83; while it
seems to do the job, someone may well
write in and point out an aspect of combat
that wasn't considered, or some problem
in using the system itself. Nothing's
perfect, and feedback on suggested variants
is extremely important.
Special character abilities
One of the earliest sets of unofficial
D&D game supplements, not published
or authorized by TSR, Inc., ws the
Arduin Grimoire. Though this system
was eventually expanded into its own
separate game system, the first booklets
presented a tremendous assortment of
variants for the D&D game, most of uneven
quality. One of the most interesting
variants was a list of random
character special abilities.
By rolling on the table, one could add
new abilities to one's character such as a
resistance to fire (because one's father was
an efreet), bonuses "to hit" when using
certain weapons (often paired with unusual
curses, such as a negative modifier
used when making saving throws against
petrification), and the blessing of tasting
bad to monsters, who would spit such
characters out if eaten.
As can be guessed from the above, the
results of rolling on such tables could
produce some very strange characters.
Even stranger were tables for personal
characteristics, which allowed one to
determine skin, hair, and eye color, as
well as exotic body shapes. Well I recall
one elf in a campaign I was in, who had
golden hair, catlike pupils, and a prehensile
tail that held a dagger.
This was very amusing, but the overall
result was to make the game ridiculous.
The idea of gifting certain characters with
special abilities is very interesting and
potentially a good idea, but this can also
be one of the most unbalancing things
that one can add to a campaign if one
doesn't take a careful look at what can
result.
Special abilities should be assigned, if
possible, to fit the nature of the character.
It does no good to randomly assign a
character a +2 bonus when using a
longsword if the character doesn't even
use or own the weapon. The power of the
special ability should be kept low, to
avoid turning the character into
SuperDwarf. Non-human races have
certain special abilities already, like
detecting secret doors or finding stonework
traps. It is possible to add a few
similar talents to characters, so long as
they are of relatively limited nature.
For example, an elven character from a
culture that doesn't use swords might
have a +1 bonus "to hit" when using a
spear instead. The languages that beginning
characters know in the campaign
could be altered to fit local circumstances
(for instance, no goblins live in the area,
but lizardmen do and their language is
substituted instead). A human character,
normal in most other respects, might have
a low-grade form of infravision (good to
10') due to an elven ancestor. The possession
of psionics could be considered a
special ability in many ways, potentially
much more powerful than those listed
above, and thus more damaging to play
balance. Clerics in particular (judging
from the bonuses given them in the "Deities
and Demigods of Greyhawk" articles
that ran in DRAGON Magazine issues
#67-71) could be given some low-level
powers from their respective deities.
As always, if a special ability turns out
to be too much for the game to absorb, it
can (and should be) toned down or
dropped. Feedback is important in figuring
out what fits best.
Unusual class and racial mixtures
Some games allow dwarven clerics, half-elf
barbarians, or elven illusionists to
participate in the action. Now if the truth
must be told, allowing PCs to have classes
they shouldn't have doesn't do a lot of
damage to the AD&D game system.
They function pretty much like all the
other characters, and you eventually get
used to seeing Burt the Halfling Assassin
or Sir Tharon the Dwarven Paladin
around. These characters don't come
across as more overpowered than any
other characters.
If . . .
non-human
characters
have no
upper level
limits set on
them . . . the
game takes a
distinctly
anti-human
flavor. |
The major problem in allowing this is
that it breaks down the distinction
between races. Halflings were originally
conceived of as friendly people, not killers
or barbarians; paladins were meant to
add more meaning to haveing human
characters. If only humans can be paladins,
that makes being a human special.
If any lawful good character could be a
paladin with the right statistics, then why
be a human at all?
However, as said before, allowing this
variant doesn't seem to do a lot of damage
to the game, so long as some sort of
distinction is still maintained between
races. Maybe dwarven paladins can only
get to 9th level, just like dwarven fighters.
Maybe elven illusionists have the same
level restrictions as elven mages.
If all restrictions are taken off, and
non-human characters have no upper
level limits set on them regardless of class,
the game takes a distinctly anti-human
flavor. Humans do become pretty useless
when elves, dwarves, gnomes, and halflings
(not to mention half-orcs) can do
everything humans can do, only better.
This doesn't come across as very desirable
in most campaigns, and will produce
a very peculiar-looking game in a short
period of time.
Assorted variants and hybrids
Dropping the use of armor-class adjustments
for attacks made by certain weapons
is something many DMs (including
myself) do out of habit. It is difficult to
keep track of all the "to hit" variations,
though much of the troulbe can be eliminated
by writing down the appropriate
adjustments for the weapons a character
carries beforehand on a sheet of paper.
Still, you have to ask the DM what armor
class the monster is, and he may not want
you to know. . . .
Using or not using armor class adjustments
doesn't harm the game directly,
either way. It is worth the DM's time to
try it both ways, and let the referee and players
get a feel for how each method works.
A decision can be made after some trial
runs about keeping or rejecting the
adjustments, though if you're willing to
spend the time using them, it is interesting
to see how effective some weapons are
against certain armor classses. This could
lead to a choosier selection of weapons for
adventuring (morning stars and scimitars
look especially good against poorly-armored
opponents, which flails, footman's
picks, and two-handed swords
come across well against heavier armors).
Some variants seem to come from misreading
the rules. Some Dungeon Masters
allow clerics to gain the spells for their
wisdom bonuses, including spells they
shouldn't get until they reach higher
levels. A first-level cleric with an 18 wisdom
would then get three 1st-level spells,
two 2nd-level spells, one 3rd-level spells,
etc. This is just wrong, and drastically
unbalances the game in favor of the individual
cleric with such benefits.
Some referees give magic-users spell
bonuses based on their intelligence, which
brings to life the same problem mentioned
above with witches. Too many spells for
magic-users at low level makes them too
powerful; granted, a cleric or druid can
get more than one low-level spells, but
how many low-level spells are as tough as
a Sleep spell, a Magic Missile (which
doesn't miss at all), or Charm Person?
Final thoughts
As I've already said, I play variant
AD&D games. Halfling assassins, dwarven
clerics, and elven fighter/cleric/thieves
rub shoulders with ninja and
lizardmen in my campaigns. It isn't official,
but it's fun.
The point of all this, I suppose, is to get
DMs to look carefully at the variants they
use. If the system you're using seems to
push the game further and further out of
alignment, then the system should be
dumped. Listen to the players and what
they have to say about the variants you've
adopted.
And whatever you do, keep in mind the
basic intent of the game: It's no good if
people aren't having fun. That is, in the last
analysis, is about all that's important.
<C6 image>