WlfSamurai
Maelstrom Engineer
Our OOC thread!
Some additional game information:
Setting player expectations:
Changes to the adventure
Milestone advancement
Information and rolling
Scene framing
Player questions
Stars and wishes
Side initiative
Open rolls
Stupid HP game
Some additional game information:
- There is the potential for wilderness survival skills in this adventure, so take that into consideration
- You are have been hired by The Lords’ Alliance to investigate the extended winter and increasing troubles in Icewind Dale
- You’re contact is Rezzak Bertrand out of Neverwinter, a lesser known noble acting as a proxy of Lord Dagult Neverember
- You will be starting in Bryn Shander, one of the Ten-Towns, meeting with Speaker Duvessa Shane
- You’re following up on a notice that is posted in all the Ten-Towns. The Council of Speakers is looking for aid.
- I’ll be asking you guys to decide how you came to be a party and what you’re group goal is
- There are additional trinkets in the Icewind Dale book if you want me to roll you one. Either way, don’t forget to roll for a trinket! I enjoy them.
Setting player expectations:
Changes to the adventure
I will be making changes to the adventure to tighten it up. I reserve the right to change anything in it and there will definitely be minor changes. I like a lot of character choice and agency, so changes may be made on the fly to make it fit your choices or to make it more fun.
An example is that a lot of the early adventure is very sand-boxy. I’m hoping to give you more concrete direction and keep it moving.
Milestone advancement
The adventure uses milestone advancement based on criteria in the book. So we won’t be using XP, per se.
Information and rolling
This is more to give you heads-up about my style. I lean more narrative-ist with hints of OSR. You may find I give you more information than you’re used to. For instance, if you describe your character searching a body or looking through drawers, that’s not a investigation check. I tell you what you find. Or, if there is a hidden enemy approaching, I will be making “soft moves” as-in small clues in-game to see what you do rather than just doing a perception roll.
Tying to above about rolling, I’m typically only looking for rolls that have some sense of danger or consequence to failure rather than making your roll to interact in-game with things. Also, I prefer to “fail-forward” which is an overly fancy term for failures on rolls being interesting. No matter the roll, my goal is use it move the fiction forward, regardless of failure or success.
Hopefully that makes some semblance of sense. Basically, the summary is that I’m aiming for high immersion and RP over rolling for every little thing. I’m looking to keep the action and game moving.
Scene framing
Just another preference. Where I can, I’ll try to enter a scene later in the action and leave it earlier to keep the story pace up. This may not always work out. But, I’ll do my best.
Player questions
There may be times I ask questions for you to answer about your character or the world to establish something about either. I enjoy engaging players in light provocative questions to build world stuff or their characters. This is a published adventure, so there will be less. But, I still may do it for fun.
Stars and wishes
This is something I’ve started implementing in my games and I really like it. At the end of Chapters, before we jump into the next, I’ll ask for Stars and Wishes.
- Stars: you give kudos to the players or DM for RP or cool scenes you liked. This is just a way to say, “Hey, I really liked XYZ in this Chapter. That was fun.” Or, “I liked how you RP’ed that scene!” Etc.
- Wishes: What do you wish to see next Chapter? What interests you that you hope we can see in the next Chapter?
I like rolling initiative per side. So, you guys will all act together and so will the enemy.
Open rolls
I'll be posting creature AC for you guys to roll against and, likewise, I'll be rolling in the RPN dice roller for combat.
Stupid HP game
I have an old game that we used to play in my old D&D group call "yours or mine". If you decide to roll your HP when you level up, I will roll secretly as well. You can decide to take my roll instead of yours, but whatever mine is, you have to keep. So, basically, if you roll low, you have another chance to get a higher roll.
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