Okay, so what happened right, why didn't I get a game going?
Well being in a predominatley French part of Canada has always proven to be a challenge on extra curriculars, bought especially in something like D&D which relies so heavily on verbal descriptions, and lets face it describing a detailed dungeon room is challenging enough in English, my French is just not good enough to make it work.
Recently though I had read a post from James raggi at LotFP describing how to get players, well the gist of the article was to tell me to get off my butt and ask, so I did just that. Since I had no takers from the letter I had posted at the game store, I just sucked it up and asked people at work. Low and behold I got four takers ( a couple I didn't think would) with a couple of other maybes. So I told them that I was going to set up a game for them after we move in a month (it's just too busy and chaotic in here right now).
My wife and I will have a new home and I'll be set up to host them in style (maybe with a little home baking as well). My question now is which module to introduce them to classic d&d with; my gut is saying B2 Keep on the Borderlands: I like to idea of starting them in the small keep and its combination of dungeon, town, and wilderness possibilities; with some work I can hopefully create backstories to open up the dungeon so its more that just exploring the dungeon for exploring's sake. I don't what railroady plots, but I feel that they'll want some goals to work towards, particularly in the first session. It's got to be something that will hook them in to want to play more (three of the four have never played before).
My only hesitation with B2 is it does seem to be combat focussed, with very little in the line of purpose (which I will have to create, and very few traps, there's just one I think). I think I can change things up to maybe add an extra danger or too; and maybe some connection with the evil priests in town (after all the hobgoblins have prisoners from town, and captive orcs...so maybe there's possibilties there as well).
So I'm not completely sold on B2 yet, but if anyone has any input about B2, or ideas for introducing new adult players into the game, let me know.
P.S. This is the first time I've created a link on blogger, It's supposed to be idiot proof, which sounds just about right for my level, so let's see if it worked.
Gary Con XVI: Where Dreams Came True
3 weeks ago
YOu may want to consider B1, though that requires some extra work for you (since you have to populate the dungeon.
ReplyDeleteWhat about using the Dungeon from the original AD&D DM's guide or the Dungeon from the Holmes basic edition?
APIC
Thanks, I had forgotten that the dm's guide had a small dungeon in it, I'm going to have to take a look through it. As for B1, I've been debating about using it also, I like some of the built in traps, but again I think the new players would like to have a goal to try to attain, as oppose to just exploring. I was thinking of having it as one of a few alternative areas they could explore, instead of just relying on the caves of chaos. Oh ideas ideas.
ReplyDeleteHmmm....I'll have to see if I have a pdf copy of the Holmes edition.
You may also want to consider the One-Page Dungeon codex, it has a whole bunch of one-page dungeons, many have a goal or theme.
ReplyDeleteVisit Chatty's or Chgowiz's blog-pages, you should be able to find a link to the 1-page dungeon codex from those.
Most dungeons ARE "combat focused." Personally I've always found B2 a good starting adventure for folks who have never played...from calling out their names at the gate (i.e. getting into character) to hiring mercs and ordering food at the tavern (i.e. role-playing and exploring) to figuring out how to get in the caves themselves (none are at ground level)...all very nice aspects of an intro to D&D. Then of course the caves are fairly low impact dungeons...each small cave complex can be treated as an individual "lair," easily delved and retreated from as necessary. Once they grow tired of the caves, the Keep can still act as a base of ops for launching other adventures!
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