Make it abundantly clear, especially for the 3.X player you've mentioned, that PCs are squishy. That they will die, often. That they may consider waiting until 3rd level until assigning their PC a name and a background story. That they are not special and unique snowflakes. That if they hear voices in Kobold chittering in the dark and charge, they might get pelted to death by kobolds with slings. That the game is about getting rich or dying in the attempt,mand they may require several attempts before they get the hang of it.

If I'd done that before my current OD&D game, I could've saved myself a world of drama.

Quote from: The Butcher;717100Make it abundantly clear, especially for the 3.X player you've mentioned, that PCs are squishy. That they will die, often. That they may consider waiting until 3rd level until assigning their PC a name and a background story. That they are not special and unique snowflakes. That if they hear voices in Kobold chittering in the dark and charge, they might get pelted to death by kobolds with slings. That the game is about getting rich or dying in the attempt,mand they may require several attempts before they get the hang of it.

If I'd done that before my current OD&D game, I could've saved myself a world of drama.

Amen.

If the players start with the attitude " We are the heroes", bring a good supply of body bags.

Quote from: The Butcher;717100Make it abundantly clear, especially for the 3.X player you've mentioned, that PCs are squishy. That they will die, often. That they may consider waiting until 3rd level until assigning their PC a name and a background story. That they are not special and unique snowflakes. That if they hear voices in Kobold chittering in the dark and charge, they might get pelted to death by kobolds with slings. That the game is about getting rich or dying in the attempt,mand they may require several attempts before they get the hang of it.

If I'd done that before my current OD&D game, I could've saved myself a world of drama.

Quote from: Exploderwizard;717104Amen.

If the players start with the attitude " We are the heroes", bring a good supply of body bags.

Yup! If the PCs want to be heroes, then just skip the first levels and start them at 4th outright. Even then, if they are cocky and stupid, they are going to die.

Quote from: Exploderwizard;717104If the players start with the attitude " We are the heroes", bring a good supply of body bags.

Go green and leave their corpses for the gelatinous cube to clean up.

No advice. Just applause for your choice of game, and deciding to run a game as a parent of a young child.

Advice? If you were actually just starting with OD&D "little brown books," then I might suggest that 1st ed. AD&D books could be more accessible. S&W is, IIRC, rather a neater text than either of those, so that's not really an issue.

Quote from: BenoistIf the PCs want to be heroes, then just skip the first levels and start them at 4th outright. Even then, if they are cocky and stupid, they are going to die.

Agreed, although my recollection of low-level 3e play does not suggest a huge difference. Maximum on HD at 1st, plus more common constitution bonuses, were offset by the damage monsters such as orcs were dishing out.

Quote from: Benoist;717076Option 2: instead of the G/D/Q series, plug the Temple of Elemental Evil up north in the woods.

I think the Temple could do with some reworking; it's always turned out in my experience to bog down into a slog that lost our interest before we got very far.

I would suggest reducing the population density a bit, and maybe removing some traps that seem too arbitrarily placed.

The advice on dungeon design in the actual OD&D books was IMO pretty good, while as a model the ToEE starts an approach toward the kind of badness I associate with 3e products.

Wow guys, you have outdone yourselves this time! Mining the collective mind here always produces good results. Thanks a lot

Quote from: Benoist;717074You can actually take Masks of Nyarlathotep as a model here. The Caves of Chaos and the Dungeon of the Unknown are just a small pieces of a bigger puzzle of evil unfolding. You have humanoids coming into the Borderlands, and evil waking under the earth for some reason. On this, you could add B4 for some more hints and cultish stuff going on in the sandbox, including those clues which might lead to the core issue that is making evil stir at the frontier.

Haven't read yet B4 (though Ihave confirmed I own it), but I note the idea.

My idea at this moment is like this: Rogahn and Zelligar are these two famous champions that go into the Borderlands to carve an empire for themselves. Not lawful good guys, but not terribad people. Just ambitios mates. So they carve a little place for themselves, and 30 years ago they defeat an army of northern barbarians, and after that they go into the north to crush the barbarians and the source of their power once and for all. Something bad happens (didn't decide what), and instead of defeating the barbarians they free/wake up/release something Very Bad. And die, or are enslaved, or something.

Anyway, the Realm of Man 30 years later is in disarray because the Emperors have been weak. The evil that these two guys released is encroaching around the north, and its nearest fortress are the Caves of Chaos. And they have corrupted the Castillian of the Keep, who sends people to the Caves so they die and provide the chaos guys with riches, while informing their boss (the Counts of Bruma) that everything goes swimmingly and no barbarian threat in sight, thanks a lot. All this time, this bigass barbarian - chaos- worshipping army is massing outside the frontier. The guys in the Caves of Chaos are doing recon for them.

QuoteThis could be an excellent plug for the Giants, having the Steading of the Hill Giant Chief up north beyond the Borderlands. The PCs come to learn that the humanoids have been pushed out of their home up north by the presence of the Giants, and that there is more to the threat than actually meets the eye. The Evil Castellan of the Keep doesn't care, but after the PCs take him out (if they do) the replacement, who would be a wimp but a smart individual, would actually care and ask the PCs to explore up north and find out what is going on. One of the PCs could even become Castellan of the Keep under this scenario.

I like this. Also, Giants and Skyrim go together veery well. B4 may be harder to integrate as there are no deserts nearby.

Quote from: Benoist;717075OH and as for general advice to run OD&D. When in doubt, assign a probability on d6 or some other die type, and ask the player concerned to roll, or yourself, depending on the situation. Use your common sense, think logically, role play the world, and everything should unfold organically from there.

Have fun.

Well, when I ran BECMI I used a lot the "roll 1d20 under your attribute score" and it worked swimmingly. But I like that many exploration rolls are more or less standardized as x in D6.

Quote from: Benoist;717076Option 2: instead of the G/D/Q series, plug the Temple of Elemental Evil up north in the woods.

The Temple is a meat grinder. I like it.

QuoteOption 4: buy Gygax Magazine Issue 3, and plug the Marmoreal Tomb of Garn Pat'uul in the Borderlands. Would actually work great with the Giants series for reasons that might become clear later. Plug Caer Caeladon (Castel Celadon, Nester's Folly, aka The Hobby Shop Dungeon) somewhere north and west, on the edge of a big lake, and have the problem originate from there. The players will be quite busy for the next year, and if the campaign is a success, you'll get to the dungeon proper a year from now.

Several options may be selected simultaneously, of course.

I see what you did there

Quote from: Rincewind1;717084Sounds good, though I'd start the man as terminally ill (I assume that you already planned for the sudden reveal of Goody Uncle into Devious Schemer here , since I can sense otherwise players might prefer to just go about faking the items rather than go into the dungeons . Plus it'd give them perhaps a chance to discover the truth about him, as well as put some minions to his disposal, so that if the PCs discover the truth, his whole plans don't go into the toilet.

I like this better than my original theory

QuoteWell, that was the theory and just the "main storyline". In practice, by session 5, the Chosen one has already taken to whores and suffered first bout of depression as party's Thief died trying to get the gemstone from pyramid  that was crashing onto them after reading of the prophecy, the group was knees deep into dealings with Alexandrian mob, and they were about to embark on an expedition to release an ancient dragon - pharaoh turned god turned corpse. None the less, despite all  that, they were keen on following the main plot, since if anything, there was an obvious promise of power there .

Awesome.

QuoteMake some pointers for your "main plot", the one you described. Then also come up with the "filler" stuff - both the parts of the living world, and parts that'd be tied to the main quest, but not directly part of it. Also, use broad strokes when preparing the main plot, and always plan for backup if players just don't bite entirely - for example, don't force the players to fight the lich, but rather prepare the situation in such a way (such as him going on a rampage in their home kingdom after he ransacked one of the planes and they just let him) that it'd be simply in logical interest for the PCs to take action against him.

Yeah, that is what I did in WHFRP because, after the undead fled, the group consensus was "OK, let's pretend this never happened" and they went on theor merry way while the undead sorcerer caused havoc. Finally, they decided to solve the problem they created... after 3 years

QuoteIn your case, since you already have the main plot, the rest remains to be filled in. I sadly don't remember TES world that well (or at all, Morrowind was the only one I played).

Do not worry, I am only using the map

Quote from: The Butcher;717100Make it abundantly clear, especially for the 3.X player you've mentioned, that PCs are squishy. That they will die, often. That they may consider waiting until 3rd level until assigning their PC a name and a background story. That they are not special and unique snowflakes. That if they hear voices in Kobold chittering in the dark and charge, they might get pelted to death by kobolds with slings. That the game is about getting rich or dying in the attempt,mand they may require several attempts before they get the hang of it.

If I'd done that before my current OD&D game, I could've saved myself a world of drama.

Well, they played Masks Of Nyarlathotep with me and I killed eleven PCs. In 7th Sea I killed 4. They are used to everything being hard with me

Quote from: Benoist;717107Yup! If the PCs want to be heroes, then just skip the first levels and start them at 4th outright. Even then, if they are cocky and stupid, they are going to die.

Nah, they like challenges.

Quote from: Skywalker;717117No advice. Just applause for your choice of game, and deciding to run a game as a parent of a young child.

Thanks a lot. One of my players will bring a set of huge-sized dice so my 15-months toddler may sit at the table and play with the dice without choking hazards. Now, if she manages to be interested for some while in the game, we will be able to play

Quote from: Imperator;717313Thanks a lot. One of my players will bring a set of huge-sized dice so my 15-months toddler may sit at the table and play with the dice without choking hazards. Now, if she manages to be interested for some while in the game, we will be able to play

I am hoping to run S&W Whitebox with my 5 year old, so hopefully your toddler will be able to join in in the near future.

Does your partner play? If so, we managed to get by by having the partner playing be responsible for the toddler. It's much less disruptive that way IME

Quote from: Imperator;717051Well, almost. I am starting this weekend a Swords & Wizardry White Box game, with Delta Houserules on top. So I guess is like running OD&D with some bits from Supplement I, or something like it.

Glad to see S&W WB get some love. I do think it's got the OD&D philosophy, and my suggestion is just to let things happen and "wing it" from a rules perspective. Most newer RPGs are thick volumes that try to cover every potential situation, but OD&D wasn't like that and doesn't try to be that. Go with stat checks and stuff like that instead of looking for rules for everything, and just have fun with it.

Quote from: Skywalker;717385I am hoping to run S&W Whitebox with my 5 year old, so hopefully your toddler will be able to join in in the near future.

Does your partner play? If so, we managed to get by by having the partner playing be responsible for the toddler. It's much less disruptive that way IME

Yeah, my wife played a female dwarf, but taking care of the toddler can be distracting and tiresome. Anyway, we squeezed a good session.

Quote from: finarvyn;717496Glad to see S&W WB get some love. I do think it's got the OD&D philosophy, and my suggestion is just to let things happen and "wing it" from a rules perspective. Most newer RPGs are thick volumes that try to cover every potential situation, but OD&D wasn't like that and doesn't try to be that. Go with stat checks and stuff like that instead of looking for rules for everything, and just have fun with it.

Oh, it went swimmingly. And they didn't set foot outside of  the Keep. And one of the elves charmed the priest. You know, the priest who is secretly a Chaos worshipper. That one. And there was plenty of mischief.

More on this later