Crimecraft

Sorry, I know, I've been away too long.  A combination of work pressures and chicken pox has held me at bay.
But I'm back!  Well, at least in convalescence.

The bad news is that I'm back talking about MMOs again.  There are two reasons for this.  I'm not playing any P&P stuff at the moment. I'm trying to get a little group together locally, as I'd like to play-test my new system, but finding people who admit to being roleplayers is hard enough, let alone anyone actually committing to a regular date.  I honestly think the world has got its priorities wrong.  Well, not the world, but the vast and terrible majority of its vast and terrible inhabitants.

Anyway, two swelling paragraphs of digression is enough.

Crimecraft!

I've been playing a little of this game here and there, during my pox-ridden convalescence.  And I'm really enjoying it, I have to say.  Sure there's plenty of room for improvement.  But most of what it does it does well.

For those who don't know and can't be bothered to click a link and read a little (and I feel for you, I honestly do) let me tell you, Crimecraft is a free-to-play (which is always nice) 3rd person shooter (which is often nice) MMO (which can be nice, has a lot of potential, but often goes awry).

Its refreshing to step outside the fantasy genre from time to time.  There is only so much eldritch blades, daemonic curses, and sorcerous prophecies that one can take (especially with so, so much of it being so, so hackneyed) that every now and again, just slamming a clip of HEAP rounds into your riot gun and letting loose on a few pixelized strangers is something of a well-deserved catharsis.  And its something that Crimecraft delivers pretty damn well.

I heartily recommend checking it out, for a bit of ballistic light relief.

Actually, far more than light relief... perhaps ballistic heavy petting would be better?  No, try ballistic orgiastic bliss.  Yes, that just about covers it.

Being an MMO (essentially the online world's appellation synonymous with 'roleplaying') you can craft your own weapons, or ammo, or mods to your weapons.  You can cook up your own combat drugs.  There's quite a lot of customization possible, both in the look of your character, and in their skills, so it does float one's MMO boat quite well too.

One thing that has started to frustrate me a little is the fairly regular need to replenish your supplies of Ammo and Boosts - the latter being the drugs you use in combat to enhance your performance.  And I love a good performance enhancer, in practically any form.

But the good news is, the developers provide forums to which the players can submit their ideas.  I made my first post today, on the subject of how to get around the need to constantly find a gun vendor to buy new ammo or a chemist to buy new boosts... how to automate that process a little.  If you're interested, you can read my typically eloquent and elegant solution here.  :-)

(btw, I jest with that last line, in case you were thinking I really am that narcissistic).  You can never be too careful.  The number of people that take what I say seriously.  Seriously!

peas.

Dungeon Bash turned on its head

Ah, its feels good to be back in the P&P driving seat after a couple of random posts about MMOs.

So without further ado...

Dungeons.

You gotta love 'em.  

Though, that said, the tired old dungeon bash (or Dungeon Crawl as they are oft called) has really had its day for anything but the most rudimentary of games run for the most novice of players.  And even then I'd say you could do something more interesting with it.

Award-winning P&P game designer John Wick, whom I have referenced numerous times in prior posts, has a pretty interesting concept with his Dirty Dungeon.  Which he describes here on You Tube.

As with most of Wicky's ideas, they certainly give you food for thought, but I tend not to take them up wholesale, rather pick bits out of them, mush them up a little and turn them into something else.  Which is precisely what I intend to do with his Dirty Dungeon concept - and make it more of a collaboration rather than something almost purely player prescribed, which whilst an interesting idea - goes a little too against the grain of roleplaying for my delicate palate.  What I'd like to see players do, is actually roleplay the gathering of the information.  And so you as the GM come to the table with a rough background for why the dungeon is there.  And a modular design for the architecture, and as the players do their research in libraries, talking to old adventurers, and generally listening to rumour and gossip about the place, you think on your feet and use their discussion and the ideas that emerge to build your dungeon on the fly.

Anyway, that's not what I came here to talk about.  That's all intro.

The following idea is something I developed a few years ago, inspired by the Bulldog Productions game Dungeon Keeper. I started it once with a group of players but never got to finish it due to the encroachment of RL into the fantasy world I prefer to inhabit.  It might be interesting now to redevelop it in conjunction with the Dirty Dungeon idea above.

The idea is fairly straightforward but ultimately turns the classic notion of the Dungeon Bash on its head.

In a distant region of the world, a little off the beaten track, a town has been periodically besieged by the denizens of a nearby dungeon.  And periodically the town strikes back by sending off the odd group of heroes and adventurers to seal the dungeon, and its fate, once and for all.  Obviously this hasn't worked, and none of them have ever been seen or heard of again.

The PCs are hired by notables in the town, or the local Venturers' Guild, or just because they want to make a name for themselves.  Whatever reason, some townsfolk tell them about the dungeon, and they stride off (after researching the legends and making suitable preparations one hopes) to go bash it.

But this is an 'evilpilch' game, and they don't call me that for nothing.

The dungeon is in fact the lair of an ancient and potent Lich, far more powerful than the combined forces of the party.  And this is important.  Because at some stage (not prescribed, we allow the players to penetrate the dungeon to a degree) but one by one, they come a cropper and fall foul of the dungeon's traps and undead denizens.  

But this is not the end of the game.  Far from it.  The players, after their demise are reawakened en masse, on a series of cold dark slabs of stone, much like sarcophagi.  And on a shelf before them they see what they suspect are their own hearts in dangling from a chain within glass jars.  A corresponding crudely stitched wound down their breastbones.  They have been reanimated as Wights.  Undead that retain the memories of their former lives, and their skills, but are at the behest of their reanimator.

On so begins the game proper.  With the Lich tasking the players to defend its lair against intruders.

The Lich also has a series of special tasks for them, kidnapping virgins from the town.  Bringing in children to sacrifice at the Lich's altar.  All manner of gruesome and unsavoury assignments.  There may even be a way for the players to turn against their master, or otherwise indirectly orchestrate the Lich's demise so they are freed from bondage.

But in short, this is how a regular dungeon bash can be turned on its head.

You kill the poison turtle and it drops a magic battleaxe...

It's your favourite, fantasy MMO land.  Strolling through the near photo-realistic forest you come across a skeletal knight in full plate armour wielding a spiteful broadsword, his tattered tabard bearing the emblem of a cruel and long-dead Order.

Fortunately you are a sorcerer of terrific power, and you casually unleash All Hell's Fury with the merest twitch of an eye and turn its bones to dust.

You run over, loot the corpse and find: 16 gold pieces and an enchanted hat shaped like a chicken's head.
What should you have got?  Well the 16 gold is incongruous as I find it hard to believe that a skeletal knight requires any loose change.  The chicken-head-hat is just plain silly, not because its a chicken-head-hat, but because the skeletal knight wasn't wearing it, nor does it have any bags to keep such an item.  And again, why would the skeletal knight be carrying it?

What should have dropped is: an ancient suit of plate armour, a tattered tabard bearing the emblem of a long-dead Order and a spiteful broadsword, also likely very old.  You can see where I'm going with this.  What they have is what they drop.

One thing that really frustrates me about MMOs in there insistence of creating incongruous loot tables for virtually all of the mobs.  Its high time this was rectified.  I want to see mobs dropping what they are visibly carrying, plus a chance to drop a few other things congruous to their background, condition, blah, whatever.

It really is that simple.

What they have is what they drop.