Character Classes in Classic D&D

Dungeons & Dragons, Role Playing Games 9 Responses »

Feb 282012

Rillian, CC-BY-ATT by Peter Seckler

This is part of my ongoing series that dissects early D&D and builds a simplified system out of it.

Original D&D has three classes: Fighting-Man, Magic-User, and Cleric. Basic D&D has seven: Clerics, Dwarves, Elves, Fighters, Halflings, Magic-Users, and Thieves.

The division in OD&D is simple: fighting-men bash things, magic-users are physically weak but use powerful magic, and clerics are a compromise between the two.

Basic D&D changes things around. Elves are now the compromise between magic and fighting, while clerics’ powers focus on fighting undead. Dwarves are basically fighters with better saving throws. Halflings and thieves bring interesting new dynamics: halflings are sneaky and hard to hit, while thieves have special abilities (much higher numbers when attacking unnoticed, and the ability to pick pockets, climb, etc.).

Dungeon Raiders strikes a balance between these two approaches, with four classes: Fighter (unchanged fighting-man), Wizard (unchanged magic-user), Rogue (combining the halfling and the thief), and Cleric (combining the cleric and the elf).

Fair enough. Now we must address even thornier issues: What stats must we use?

Hit Points (HP) have certainly proved their worth over the years, so we’ll keep that.

Should HP be random, even at first level? I argue no. Weakness is already modeled in the system. A character with one HP is certainly playable, but requires so much protection and is so unlikely to become stronger that it shouldn’t be a default part of the game. So, each class will have a specific starting HP, and will roll for more HP as characters level up.

What about the to-hit (attack) die? Here’s where I completely break with tradition. Here is where readers will either throw their hands up in disgust and skip to the next article, or give me a fair shake and continue reading.

I’m not going to use a d20 as the attack die.

Instead, each class will have its own attack die (thus keeping with the “Lots of Dice” element of early systems). Borrowing from Savage Worlds, each player will roll his or her character’s attack die, and try to meet or beat a 4.

I think we have enough information now to stat up the classes:

Fighter: 8 HP, 1d8 attack die, +1 damage.

Rogue: 6 HP, 1d6 attack die, +2 to difficulty on all saving throws, and +2 to difficulty on rogue-related ability checks (including but not limited to pick locks (DEX), detect traps (WIS), move silently (DEX), climb (STR), hide (DEX), and listen (WIS)).

Cleric: 5 HP, 1d6 attack die, and mostly utility and healing spells (each day, can cast a number of spells equal to the cleric’s level from all spells at or below cleric’s level).

Wizard: 4 HP, 1d4 attack die, and powerful combat spells (1 per level chosen from the list).

Review – Isle of the Unknown

Dungeons & Dragons, review, Role Playing Games No Responses »

Feb 232012

Not a Review yet

I’ve been writing this review for a few weeks now, and I want to let you in on why it took me so long.

The first iteration of the review was held up because all I could focus on was what I didn’t like about the product. There’s not a lot, as you’ll see below, but it was so distracting I couldn’t “see the Isle for the shore”.

I then realized my trepidation came from the lack of negative reviews I’d seen for RPG products. So for my second iteration of the review, I did what any logical internet dweller would do – I wrote a rant. I called the RPG reviewer community some names. I used the words “equines” and “manure”. I used the words “gushing” and “shill”. I was not polite. Just opening the document on my computer and a wagging finger would appear.

And then I bumped into some more reviews. And they were not universally polite. How I’d missed them the first time I don’t know. So I’m retracting the rant you never saw. If you really like to be insulted let me know and I’ll put it up.

Thank you. That was cathartic.

This is a Review: Isle of the Unknown

Isle of the Unknown is a OSR accessory recently published by the Beacon of Weird Fantasy Role play: Lamentations of the Flame Princess. It describes itself far better than I could:

“This book describes an island nearly 35,000 square miles in size. Using traditional fantasy role-playing rules, the Referee can conduct adventures upon the Isle of the Unknown. It can be placed anywhere in the Referee’s campaign world, or it can serve as the basis of a new campaign, or as the setting for one-shot adventures.

One point of interest is described for each of the map’s 330 land hexes. None of the monsters, magic spells, magic items, etc in this book has been taken from any previously published role-playing game product. This will help ensure freshness and a sense of wonder and newness as your players explore a realm that is truly unknown.”

excerpt from Introduction for the Referee, page 4

and it comes with an excellent Preview! (PDF)

What I like

• It provides exactly what it advertises. Each hex has something in it – something interesting. Monsters are obviously unique. Statues are fascinating and mysterious. Magic users have made a mark upon their surroundings.

• The art is fantastic. The monsters are colourful and vibrant, and the humans are interesting and engaging. Many are stunning.

• The indexes at the end are useful – monsters by hitdice, magic users, clerics, statues and towns by location. I especially like the use of thumbnail pictures for the monster index.

• I said it before, but the monsters truly are unique. Many are weird (unusual). Nothing so weird as a sofa-fish, but there are some that push the limits – like the pyramid bird on page 63. I also like how, generally, it is not obvious how “dangerous” each monster is. Those that look benign are often the most lethal, and vice versa. How many HD do you think mister Koala has above hmm? I’m not gonna tell you – buy the book.

• It has lots of content – you’d be hard pressed to use it up.

What I don’t like

• The map is, well, boring. Nowhere on the island looks interesting or stands out. Another review suggested it was a printing problem. The colours (of the map) in the book do seem muted compared to the pdf. But let me put it this way: This is an exceptional map.

• The cartography is missing basic elements. There are 16 towns and cities on the map, the largest at 19,100 people. But there are no roads. Maybe they don’t need to be on the players map, but the GMs map should have them.

• The geography is wrong. The rivers go from coast to coast. And there’s a river that forms a loop in the mountains. And this wasn’t just a one-time mistake, every one of the rivers connects to multiple coasts.

• There’s no background story. This is most likely deliberate, seeming as it is meant to be dropped into an existing campaign, but it makes the book seem unfinished. Why are there so many statues sprinkled all over the island? Is there a reason for all the wizards? I’d rather a simple 2 paragraph backstory was included, and I could chose to ignore it, use it, or adapt it to my needs.

The bottom line

If you’ve run out of creative juices and need something to drop into your campaign, this is your book. Bonus points if you’re already running an OSR game, but I don’t think it’d be hard to adapt to other versions. There’s still a little work to be done, like drawing in roads, coming up with treasure and perhaps an overarching backstory, and an explanation for the statues, but those are things don’t have to be handled immediately. A great supplement for those looking for inspiration or a little campaign help.