For whom the gnoll tolls

For a variety of reasons, this weekend the girls and I only had time for one shortish session of Dungeons & Dragons. Fairy Girl actually didn't want to play at first, and it was up to Monkey Girl to handle all the treasure distribution and divvy up the earned experience points. Fairy Girl eventually did join the game, though, so the adventure was able to continue as before.

The party returned the rescued hostages to the keep safely, and were rewarded for their efforts. The merchant's guild gave them 100 gold and exempted them from any taxes and fees for a year. The rescued merchant's wife gave them a magical dagger +1. With a bit of money in their pockets, the adventurers spent about a week at the keep, resting and healing wounds in preparation for another expedition.

Returning to the Caves of Chaos, they elected to re-enter the goblin caves that started off the previous adventure. Inexplicably, they chose not to explore any of the cave complex they hadn't ventured into before, but instead stuck to the rooms they'd fought through previously, noting someone (or something) had cleaned up after the fight to some degree. The door to the hobgoblin's lair was locked this time, but Monkey Girl successfully picked the lock. They followed the same patter in the hobgoblin tunnels, eventually covering all the ground they'd previously explored and then venturing into new tunnels. They soon found the heavy door that led to the outside, and again, decided to leave with out exploring any further.

I found this somewhat puzzling, I have to admit. When I was playing--even at an ignorant, early age--once we started in on a particular cave complex or whathaveyou, the party would continue exploring until the monsters were all cleaned out. This whole approach of cleaning out a few rooms then venturing on to a different cave is new to me. But we'll see what happens.

Back outside, the party decided to look for a new cave, and climbed further up the hill until they espied a previously undiscovered opening in the hillside. They entered boldly, and immediately ran into four gnoll warriors. Gnolls, interestingly enough, weren't listed in my AD&D Monster Manual, so when the girls wanted to know what they were, I had to dig out the old D&D basic set rule book to find out they were large hyena-like humanoids. Big, powerful and ugly, particularly when facing a party of first-level adventurers. Remember how the girls (and my dwarf) were over-matched by orcs the first time out? Yeah. Gnolls are worse. Still, buoyed perhaps by their success against the hobgoblins, they pressed the attack and killed two gnolls as two others hung back shooting at the adventurers with bows. Then the bow-wielding gnolls fled, apparently to get help. The party charged after them, but lost sight of their quarry and ended up taking a wrong turn. Remember that scene from Star Wars where Han Solo and Chewbacca chase those stormtroopers through the Death Star, only to run into a battalion of the white-suited canon fodder (original or special editions doesn't matter--the principal is the same)? That's what happened to the party. They ran right into the gnoll's grand hall, with a bunch of warriors and many, many more females and the like. Bravado fled, as did the adventurers without a second thought. At which point they ran smack into the original two bow-wielding gnolls along with a handful of reinforcements. A sharp, pitched battle ensued, resulting in the defeat of the gnolls but also the quick exhaustion of my dwarf's healing spells to bring several characters back from the brink of death.

And that's where the adventure suspended for the night--with the party, weakened and battered, magic spells all spent, stuck deep inside the gnolls' tunnels with a bunch of warriors chasing after them from the grand hall. How's that for a cliffhanger?

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Of hobs and goblins

Over the weekend we found time for two more Dungeons & Dragons sessions with the girls. They're getting the hang of it, although Fairy Girl still giggles more than is entirely necessary.

The first of the two sessions picked up following their initial encounter with the orcs in the Caves of Chaos. After some gut-checks, it was generally agreed upon by the party that they were over-extended, with all magic exhausted and everyone sporting multiple wounds. A strategic retreat was then enacted back to the Keep on the Borderlands. With a modest amount of silver in my dwarf cleric's pockets for safe keeping (the girls are multi-classed thieves, after all) the group returned to the keep, exhausted. A couple of new NPCs were recruited to the team--a young human fighter and a gnome illusionist (don't you love gnome illusionists?). The next day, with wounds healed and numbers bolstered, they returned to the Caves of Chaos.

This time, the girls gave the orc caves a wide berth, instead exploring a different set of caves that turned out to be inhabited by goblins. Goblins proved a better match for the newly expanded party, and a rousing victory was had. I have to add at this point that Fairy Girl--a Wizard 101 devotee--had been particularly crestfallen when, against the orcs, she realized as a first-level magic user she was limited to only one spell per day. Since we're playing 1st edition AD&D rules, I invoked Unearthed Arcana and allowed her the use of three additional 0-level cantrips. I have to say I'm impressed with her use of them, particularly the "summon gnats" and "summon spider" spells, which she used to the party's advantage despite their incapability of inflicting damage. Thus ended our first session of the weekend.

The second session picked up where we left off in the goblin caves. The party, pressing ever on, found some stairs and eventually ended up in a warren of hobgoblins. The larger, more powerful hobgoblins proved a significant challenge, and several characters and NPCs in the party were at or near death before all was said and done. But they discovered and rescued a merchant's party that had been captured and tortured by the hobgoblins, fighting their way back out through the goblin tunnels to save the hostages. They also came out pretty nicely in the treasure department, with a bunch of coins, some chainmail and other assorted goodies. Monkey Girl seems to be particularly enjoying the game, using her thieves' skills (unsuccessfully for the most part, but still) and role playing her character to a good degree.

I'm looking forward to them eventually facing off against the skeletons lurking in one cave. We'll have a reenactment of Harryhausen's Jason and the Argonauts, mark my words!

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The Keep on the Borderlands

I believe I've mentioned before how Monkey Girl and Fairy Girl have been enchanted by the siren song of the online MMO Wizard 101. Since their parents are cheap, they've only played the limited free areas, but have been clamoring for paid accounts to move beyond the limited arena combat they spend most of their online time playing. Hoping for a distraction, I showed Monkey Girl my old Dungeons & Dragons books and modules a few weeks ago, and the urge to play this strange game with books, paper and oddly-shaped dice grew until she was pestering me incessantly.

So, over the course of several nights this week, in between Girl Scouts and piano lessons and the like, we rolled up some characters for the girls. Monkey Girl is a half-elf fighter/thief. Fairy Girl is an elf magic user/thief (you can see they go for the elfin multi-class schtick). Yours truly, in addition to being the DM, rolled up a cantankerous dwarven cleric/fighter, because I like to be ornery and know full well that healing spells will be needed early and often. With all that out of the way, tonight we started our first campaign.

Remeber the classic old B2 module, "The Keep on the Borderlands"? Yeppers, that's what they're experiencing for the first time, much the same as thousands of gamers before them. The girls got to the keep, were challenged by the guards and made their way to the tavern where they rented a room and met up with my dwarf. Monkey Girl picked up on the DM's narrative clues right away and pursued the path to adventure with gusto. Fairy Girl took a bit longer to get into the spirit, standing in the doorway giggling a lot, hiding under her bed in the tavern room and generally trying to avoid any interaction with any of the NPCs. She loosened up a great deal once they reached the Caves of Chaos and barbecued a squad of attacking orcs with a "Burning Hands" spell. Unfortunately, after just two encounters with orcs in the first cave, my dwarf has already exhausted his supply of healing spells. Uh-oh. Once gameplay resumes, the party will likely beat a hasty retreat to recharge the old batteries and spells while recruiting additional fighters/cannon fodder to come along on future excursions.

Hopefully, Fairy Girl will keep the giggling down to a minimum.

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To campaign, or not to campaign?

In recent months, Fairy Girl and Monkey Girl have graduated from the online worlds of Neopets and Webkinz to the more full-blown MMO of Wizard 101. This stems, no doubt, from Monkey Girl's voracious devouring of the Harry Potter books and other assorted young adult fantasies this past year. Being cheapskate parents, the girls are limited to the free play areas on the site, which has satisfied them for the time being.

But the other day, Monkey Girl asked me something that caused me to swoon a bit: "Dad, what's Dungeons & Dragons." Oh, lordy. Did I play me some D&D (and AD&D, natch) back in the day. In fact, I'd attended several Aggiecons and Armadillocons before I realized there was something going on there other than gaming. I fondly remember the old WarCons held in February at Texas A&M, gaming-only cons invariably hit by ice storms. I played my first head-to-head and tournament games there, and had much fun.

Eventually, me and my gaming buddies drifted away from D&D. We played a heck of a lot of Champions! and also dabbled in GURPS, TORG, Call of Cthulu, TFOS and the like. All fun, of course, but D&D remained the gold standard. During the 80s, I bought just about every product put out by TSR. The Player's Handbook, Fiend Folio, Unearthed Arcana, Oriental Adventures... you name it. I still have probably 90 percent of my gaming stuff, too. But then TSR came out with revised versions of the basic D&D game with a lot of half-human characters and downright odd rule changes. The 2nd Edition of AD&D soured me, too, as it seemed a sanitized, watered-down version of the game intended to placate the torch-and-pitchfork crowd (yeah, like that's possible). The steep price tags on buying new versions of all the stuff I already had was a turn-off as well. Then, it only seemed like a few years before the 3rd Edition came out, then 3.5 and now they're up to the 4th Edition, all of which are different from previous incarnations and require much cash outlay to repurchase all those new core rule books.

It's been more than 10 years since I last played, a sporadic after-work campaign that wasn't entirely satisfying for anyone involved, the high point being the silly catch-phrase "Let's offer him cheese!" As the DM (I'm always the DM. *sigh*) I decided to stick with the original, 1st edition rules, and you know what? They worked fine.

Ah, nostalgia is a dangerous thing. This evening when I get home, I think I might just pull out the old Dungeon Master's Guide and Monster Manual and flip through them, with their crude line art and pages and pages of tables and notes. If the girls happen to exhibit an interest, there might be a campaign in the offing--I know I've got The Keep On the Borderlands module in there somewhere...

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