Dangerous Thoughts (God, I love new players)

[Guest WhammeWhamme]

Originally posted by WhammeWhamme

Well, one too few!

 

Gimme!

 

By this, I mean "I know of no story, but this sounds interesting."...

[Klytus]

Originally posted by WhammeWhamme

Well, one too few!

 

Gimme!

If I remember the story correctly, it was an article writen in Dragon magazine by a player in a campaign run by a DM named Tucker. He was taking his party through your standard dungeon crawl. But as a twist to the standard random encounters, the entire first level of this dungeon had been taken over by kobolds. Only these kobolds didn't fight fair. They used pits, arrow slits in the walls, murder holes, flaming oil, traps... every trick in the book, and hardly (if ever) giving the party a clean shot at any of them. The hapless party basically had to race through the level to find the stairs down just to get away from the litte savages.

 

One successful dungeon crawl later, the party is on their way out and going back up to the top... when they remember the kobolds. They are badly wounded and nearly out of spells and supplies, but they have no other way out than to run the gantlet again.

 

Forever after "Tucker's Kobolds" struck fear into the hearts of even the most seasoned adventurers. I think the folks at Blizzard who designed the little pecker-heads in Act III and Act V from Diablo II borrowed a few pages from Tucker's book.

 

It taught me early on the power of a well played and intelligent adversaries.

[Kristopher]

A friend of mine, and a fine GM, has mentioned that article more than once, always with a grin.

[gewing]

I keep trying to forget the movie exists! except for the shower scene.

 

Originally posted by McCoy

The book is great. As for the movie, I still can't believe Virginia needed money that badly.

[gewing]

back in jr high we played really cheasy, but I admit I was a little offended when My younger brother ran a night where a kobold was hiding behind the door. My fighter came through the door, only to get hit from behind. No problem, right?....

The Kobold had gauntlets of ogre power and a +5 bastard sword!!!!

 

 

Originally posted by tmutant

One of my favorite things to do as a GM is give the players what they wish for. With a twist. For example, in an AD&D (no bloody 3.5, no bloody 3, no bloody 2, OLD school, original hardcover AD&D) campaign, after a grueling session getting through high level monsteers, someone said, "I wish we could fight some kobolds or something." So next session, they did. Had to recover a stolen gem from a kobold lair. The key is that kobolds built the place knowing that they are 1/2 hit die beasties. And that they breed like rabbits. 400 kobolds attacking through murder holes, traps, pits, boiling fluids of various kinds. You know, fighting some kobolds.

 

If you give players enough rope, they hang their characters for you.

[Armitage]

Originally posted by WhammeWhamme

By this, I mean "I know of no story, but this sounds interesting."...

 

From the editorial in Dragon #127, November 1987, by Roger Moore (gotta love the CD Archive):

 

This month’s editorial is about Tucker’s kobolds. We get letters on occasion asking for advice on creating high-level AD&D® game adventures, and Tucker’s kobolds seem to fit the bill.

Many high-level characters have little to do because they’re not challenged. They yawn at tarrasques and must be forcibly kept awake when a lich appears. The DMs involved don’t know what to do, so they stop dealing with the problem

and the characters go into Character Limbo. Getting to high level is hard, but doing anything once you get

there is worse.

One of the key problems in adventure design lies in creating opponents who can challenge powerful characters. Singular monsters like tarrasques and liches are easy to gang up on; the party can concentrate its firepower on the target

until the target falls down dead and wiggles its little feet in the air. Designing monsters more powerful

than a tarrasque is self-defeating; if the group kills your super-monster, what will you do next — send in its mother? That didn’t work on Beowulf, and it probably won’t work here.

Worse yet, singular super-monsters rarely have to think. They

just use their trusty, predictable claw/claw/bite. This shouldn’t be the measure of a campaign. These

games fall apart because there’s no challenge to them, no mental stimulation — no danger.

In all the games that I’ve seen, the worst, most horrible, most awful-beyond-comparison opponents ever seen were often weaker than the characters who fought them. They

were simply well-armed and intelligent beings who were played by the DM to be utterly ruthless and clever. Tucker’s kobolds were like that.

Tucker ran an incredibly dangerous dungeon in the days I was stationed at Ft. Bragg, N.C. This dungeon had corridors that changed all of your donkeys into huge flaming demons or dropped the whole party into acid baths, but the demons were wienies compared to the kobolds on Level One. These

kobolds were just regular kobolds, with 1-4 hp and all that, but they were mean. When I say they were mean, I mean they were bad, Jim. They graduated magna cum laude

from the Sauron Institute for the Criminally Vicious.

When I joined the gaming group, some of the PCs had already met Tucker’s kobolds, and they were not eager to repeat the experience. The party leader went over the penciled map of the dungeon and tried to find ways to avoid the little critters,

but it was not possible. The group resigned itself to making a run for it through Level One to get to the elevators, where we could go down to Level Ten and fight “okay†monsters like huge flaming demons.

It didn’t work. The kobolds caught us about 60’ into the dungeon and locked the door behind us and barred it. Then they set the corridor on fire, while we were still in it.

“NOOOOOO!!!†screamed the party leader. ‘It’s THEM! Run!!!â€

Thus encouraged, our party scrambled down a side passage, only to be ambushed by more kobolds firing with light crossbows through murder holes in the walls and ceilings. Kobolds with metal armor and shields flung Molotov cocktails at us from the other sides of huge piles of flaming debris, which other kobolds pushed ahead of their formation using long metal poles like broomsticks. There was no mistake about

it. These kobolds were bad.

We turned to our group leader for advice.

“AAAAAAGH!!!†he cried, hands clasped over his face to shut out the tactical situation.

We abandoned most of our carried items and donkeys to speed our flight toward the elevators, but we were cut off by kobold snipers who could split-move and fire, ducking back behind stones and corners after launching steel-tipped bolts

and arrows, javelins, hand axes, and more flaming oil bottles. We ran into an unexplored section of Level One, taking damage all the time. It was then we discovered that these

kobolds had honeycombed the first level with small tunnels to speed their movements. Kobold commandos were everywhere. All of our hirelings died. Most of our henchmen followed. We were next.

I recall we had a 12th-level magic-user with us, and we asked him to throw a spell or something. “Blast ‘em!†we yelled as we ran. “Fireball ‘em! Get those little @#+$%*&!!â€

“What, in these narrow corridors?†he yelled back. “You want I should burn us all up instead of them?â€

Our panicked flight suddenly took us to a dead-end corridor, where a giant air shaft dropped straight down into unspeakable darkness, far past Level Ten. Here we hastily

pounded spikes into the floors and walls, flung ropes over the ledge, and climbed straight down into that unspeakable darkness, because anything we met down there was sure to be better than those kobolds.

We escaped, met some huge flaming demons on Level Ten, and even managed to kill one after about an hour of combat and the lives of half the group. We felt pretty good—but the group leader could not be cheered up.

“We still have to go out the way we came in,†he said as he gloomily prepared to divide up the treasure.

Tucker’s kobolds were the worst things we could imagine. They ate all our donkeys and took our treasure and did everything they could to make us miserable, but they had

style and brains and tenacity and courage. We respected them and loved them, sort of, because they were never boring.

If kobolds could do this to a group of PCs from 6th to 12th level, picture what a few orcs and some low-level NPCs could do to a 12th-16th level group, or a gang of mid-level NPCs and monsters to groups of up to 20th level. Then give it a try.

Sometimes, it’s the little things—used well—that count.

[Magmarock]

Originally posted by Armitage

Sometimes, it’s the little things—used well—that count.

 

Or, in other words: "It's not the size of the monster that counts, it's how you use it..."

 

Now why does that sound familiar?

 

Mags

[The Monster]

About player comments as GM inspiration: Our group has the rule that whenever a player makes a comment about a potentially kewl monster or event, a GM has every right to use it (and since several of us GM, it's open season) - with the provision that the one who made the comment will not be the first victim of whatever it is. There have actually been moments in our sessions where people have made comments just so they won't be the first victim of their idea, because they knew someone else would be thinking the same thing.

[Kristopher]

Originally posted by Armitage

From the editorial in Dragon #127, November 1987, by Roger Moore (gotta love the CD Archive):

 

This month’s editorial is about Tucker’s kobolds. We get letters on occasion asking for advice on creating high-level AD&D® game adventures, and Tucker’s kobolds seem to fit the bill.

Many high-level characters have little to do because they’re not challenged. They yawn at tarrasques and must be forcibly kept awake when a lich appears. The DMs involved don’t know what to do, so they stop dealing with the problem

and the characters go into Character Limbo. Getting to high level is hard, but doing anything once you get

there is worse.

One of the key problems in adventure design lies in creating opponents who can challenge powerful characters. Singular monsters like tarrasques and liches are easy to gang up on; the party can concentrate its firepower on the target

until the target falls down dead and wiggles its little feet in the air. Designing monsters more powerful

than a tarrasque is self-defeating; if the group kills your super-monster, what will you do next — send in its mother? That didn’t work on Beowulf, and it probably won’t work here.

Worse yet, singular super-monsters rarely have to think. They

just use their trusty, predictable claw/claw/bite. This shouldn’t be the measure of a campaign. These

games fall apart because there’s no challenge to them, no mental stimulation — no danger.

In all the games that I’ve seen, the worst, most horrible, most awful-beyond-comparison opponents ever seen were often weaker than the characters who fought them. They

were simply well-armed and intelligent beings who were played by the DM to be utterly ruthless and clever. Tucker’s kobolds were like that.

 

{snipped}

 

That passage nicely sums up a lot of what's so very wrong with level-based systems.

[The Monster]

...which brings to mind another of my rules of thumb:

Player characters can always bring down one of anything.

 

I've tried designing big, nasty critters, and unless I pretty much declare by GM fiat they can't kill it, the players always find a way or make just the right roll(s). So I don't even try any more.

[gewing]

In one of our campaigns the Ref thought he had adequately prepared for us, he set 2 or 3 ettins against us. We were short players, so he let each of us bring in a second one we had worked up. When my Archer used prepared arrow fire to take out both heads of an Ettin at once, he decided he should have had more come out...

[Guest WhammeWhamme]

My favourite story on these kind of things...

 

...went something like this:

 

[Me] (Under campaign notes) "There has been significant nuclear testing in the South Pacific over the years..."

 

[Player] "So, we'll be fighting giant monsters?"

 

[Me]

 

"How did you unravel the plot of my first adventure for the campaign so quickly?"

 

[Playerr] "I wasn't serious..."

[Korvar]

Similarly, for me, our GM was running a "street scum mysteriously get cyberware" campaign, set in the near future of our home city. A lot of it took place at night, and each time Dawn was mentioned I made some silly comment about "...and the sound of Vampires scurrying home ahead of the sunrise..." Completely off topic.

 

Turned out the Big Bad was a Vampire...