Ratik, as Far as that Goes.

Yesterday my brother was looking at the World of Greyhawk map and he noticed the land of Ratik. He was curious about the little nation, and I'll be honest here, I was too. In my years of running in Greyhawk I never ran across the province as I tend to focus south of the Nyr Dyv and out west towards the Sea of Dust.

Ratik was new territory for me to explore; and the thing is, Ratik appears to be new territory for everyone else too. As best as I've been able to tell it was only mentioned in four places: (1) the World of Greyhawk Boxed Set, (2) in an article in Dragon 57, (3) the Living Greyhawk website, and (4) the Living Greyhawk Gazetteer. That's not a lot of information to go on.

Mounted Knight by Arthur Pyle

In the World of Greyhawk Boxed Set (pg. 32) the Archbarony is revealed to be an offshoot of Aerdi and to be a province ruled by the rather competent Ratik line. They have strong connections with the dwarves and gnomes of the area and are respected by the raiders and nomads surrounding them. When the hordes of humanoids began attacking Ratik not only weathered their advances but drove them out of their lands. Unfortunately this sent the humanoids south into the Bone Marches where they wrecked havoc.

Aside from the prosperous logging industry the only aspect of the Ratik description that I found worth noting was that in the north Ratik woodsmen were armed with bows and patrolled that boarder while in the south "hillrunners" were equipped with slings and watched the southern boarder. 

The article from Dragon 57, Developments from Stonefist to South Province by Gary Gygax, (pg. 13 - 16) is largely a battlefield report. While there are some interesting tidbits here it largely points towards the steady development of the fractious area without anything all that substantive given away. The only thing that I found interesting was that the dwarves in the Rakers (the mountain chain to the west of Ratik) are largely holed up in their mountainous fortresses as they are being besieged by gnolls and like-minded humanoids.

After this all I found on the area is from the Living Greyhawk website and Gazetteer (pg. 88 - 91) which largely express the same information though with the Gazetteer providing more depth to the reader. Our leader is now Lady Evaleigh of Ratik and the barony is now completely divested from Aerdi. To be perfectly honest, while this provides the reader with the most information on the area from any of the sources I have it's largely a mess. This brings up one of the problems that I have with the Living Greyhawk Gazetteer. While it provides players with some of the most current information on the setting as of its publication it also tends to feel a bit like the authors are attempting to throw everything they can think of at the players. It makes things feel rushed and discombobulated at times (especially in less developed areas like Ratik). 

So that's as much information as I have on the nation of Ratik. If anyone else has anything to add from any of the official sources (Living Greyhawk, modules, the magazines, and so forth) please let me know because I would love to continue fleshing out the little nation-state. 

A Line in the Sand for One of the Oldest Settings in D&D

On December 19. 2017 Dungeons & Dragons Creative Director, Mike Mearls, did an Ask Me Anything on Reddit which I found an interesting read. Among the many questions he was asked was one about his favorite setting. Mike answered, "I'd love to tackle Greyhawk, but I'd want to approach it from the original [Gary] Gygax material, ignoring most everything post-1983 (unless he was the author)."

That's an interesting way to go in re-imagining the setting as it both eliminates a rather large swath of weak material but also some beloved adventures that came after Gary Gygax was forced out of TSR. Kick out the Greyhawk Wars, World of Greyhawk, all the Carl Sargent stuff, all the Living Greyhawk material, and all the stuff published by Wizards of the Coast throughout the tail end of Second Edition and all of Third Edition. Essentially it would reset the world at the Greyhawk Boxed set with the whole setting on a tenuous peace with armies posturing and occasionally raiding across the boarders but without the outright war that characterized the setting throughout the majority of its published existence. 

I'm conflicted about this proposed reset. On the one hand I hate some of the changes that came to the setting after the Greyhawk Boxed Set and really hate the way that the world was reshaped by the Greyhawk Wars; but on the other hand I really love some of the Carl Sargent stuff (seriously, Sargent rocks and to completely lose his influence from the setting would really be a bit difficult for me). Still, at this point the Greyhawk setting has been largely neglected and pushed to the side so often that just to have some light from someone who loves it would be . . . amazing. 

Rary the Traitor by Ben Wootten

Listen, as a setting the World of Greyhawk is just a few short years away from being a forgotten memory that used to be a place played in back when the game first started. It's a relic waiting to be discarded. That needs to change before it gets forgotten and left to those few of us still waving our flag out here on the boarders of ignoble oblivion.

Greyhawk deserves to have a new generation of players care about it the way that I do after reading Carl Sargent. It needs to have authors that love the setting exploring it and pushing the game in a way that the Forgotten Realms simply can't compete with anymore. It needs to have boarder wars and devils walking the face of Oerth again. It needs to be a place where players go when they've gotten over the triteness of Faerun and are looking for somewhere new to explore where the canon warriors haven't entrenched themselves on every hill and loudly proclaim, "That's not how it goes in the books!"

There is so much potential in Greyhawk for new players. It's the land where the greatest adventures are set and where the best game designers made bold choices. It's a place where the great experiments of D&D were often first tested and where many of the most beloved spells, items, devils, gods, and non-player characters were first pushed out in the world. It can be that place again, and if the way we get it there is to let go of things like Sargent and the post Gygax material, then we should. 

Come on Mearls. Make us proud and do something breathtaking with the setting. 

The Greyhawk Wars

So last night I was reading a bit of Carl Sargent's work on Greyhawk and it got me to thinking how much fun it would be if we were to get some new exploration of the Greyhawk Wars time period or the era shortly thereafter. There's so much fertile ground to explore there that I would love to see it done. 

Perhaps I will.

Anyway, while I was thinking about it I made this thing. It's a bit massive when you blow it up, but I like it all the same.

If you like it, please share it with your friends, with the people at Wizards of the Coast, and with random strangers you meet at game shops. Spread the word about Greyhawk kids!

Using Morale in Dungeons & Dragons Without Bringing Dice Into It.

Since I first began running Dungeons & Dragons back in '04 I've had this notion that I like Morale rules in my games. I say notion because I've never actually read what the real Morale rules were in AD&D 2e but my beloved Monster Compendium showed what the morale for monsters were and so I wanted to use the damned thing. Only thing was I didn't have access to an AD&D 2e Dungeon Master Guide so I never actually read a solid explanation for the rule so playing with it was a bit of a hit or miss affair. After a while it simply went missing from my games altogether.

Last night, though, I was reading through a copy of the Sword Lords of the Eastern Regions that was given to me when I read this passage:

". . . USING THE UNIT MORALE CHART: Use this chart when a unit's morale is called for, such as facing up to a Demon. If the roll is missed on one die, the unit must withdraw from the action for one turn at half movement, and then check again. The facing of the unit is up to the player whose unit is affected. If the morale save is made, the unit will obey battle orders . . ." (Becker, 27)

It struck a cord and got me to thinking again about using a Morale Rule in my Dungeons & Dragons game - only this time I'm going to actually look up what the rule meant in AD&D 2e instead of just making it all up on the fly. So let's look at the explanation that David "Zeb" Cook wrote in 1993 edition.

". . . Monsters and NPCs are an entirely different matter . . . The DM makes their decisions, trying to think like each creature or non-player character, in turn. 

In combat, thinking like a creature mainly means deciding what actions it takes and how badly it wants to fight - the morale of the creature. 

As a general rule, monsters and NPCs are no more eager to die than player characters. Most withdraw when a fight starts to go badly. Some panic and flee, even casting their weapons aside. If they think they can get mercy, brighter foes might fall to their knees and surrender. A few bloodthirsty or brainless types might fight to the death - but this doesn't happen too often. These are the things that make up morale, things the DM must decide, either through role-playing or dice rolling . . ." (Cook, 69)

I really wish that I had read this passage from the AD&D 2e Dungeon Master Guide years ago because the line ". . . most withdraw when a fight starts to go badly . . ." is something that I could have used earlier to dramatically improve my games. Even with my bastardized morale rule too often I found myself pushing the monsters to stay in the fight until every last one of them had fought to the death. While that can be interesting on occasion having monsters run from the players can create its own sort of drama as the players can gain a real reputation in the world that feels more authentic.

Jeff Easley title unkown

It's also interesting that with the morale rule it seems that there are degrees of failure for the monsters and non-player characters that your players encounter in the world. Are there degrees of success as well?

Zeb continues:

". . . The first (and best) way to handle morale is to determine it without rolling any dice or consulting any tables. This gives the biggest range of choices an prevents illogical things from happening . . . To decide what a creature does, think about its goals and reasons for fighting . . ." (Cook, 69)

As I've been reading more of AD&D 2e in recent weeks I've noticed that there is a decided trend among the writers that as a Dungeon Master you should think about your monsters' and non-player characters' motivations behind what they're doing. This aspect of the game wasn't missing from my beloved D&D 3.5e but it wasn't as pronounced and as a result for a long time I didn't consider such things. Instead I tended to look at the Challenge Rating chart and pick monsters to throw at my players based on what lined up with their level. That was a mistake and it made my game less interesting as a result.

With that in mind let's talk about unintelligent creatures for a minute. Zeb writes:

". . . Unintelligent and animal intelligence creatures attack, most often for food or to protect their lairs. Few ever attack for the sheer joy of killing . . . A mountain lion, for example, doesn't hunt humans (as a rule) and doesn't stalk and attack humans as it would a deer . . . Such creatures normally allow a party of adventurers to pass by unhindered, without even revealing themselves. Only when the creature is close to the lair does the chance of attack increase . . . When they do become involved in combat, animals and other creatures rarely fight to the death . . . Their interest is in food . . ." (Cook, 69)

I find it interesting that while I have often had trouble remembering to get monsters to flee I almost never experience the same issue with wild animals. The difference tends to be that I am around animals both wild and domestic regularly so I've internalized their habits; while monsters, to my mind, tend to be nothing more than imaginary creatures bent on destroying the civilized world of man and demi-human alike. Even though I know what the monsters are doing in my game world and why they're doing it, it's rare that I've treated my monstrous encounters with the sort of complicated motivations that they deserve. Reading Cook's discussion of morale I can't help but feel he would be slightly disappointed in my handling of the monsters.

". . . Intelligent Creatures have more complicated motivations than the need for food and shelter . . . Greed, hatred, fear, self-defense, and hunger are all motivations, but they are not all worth dying for . . . As a guideline for intelligent creature and NPC motivation, consider the actions of the player characters. How often do they fight to the death? Why would they? At what point do they usually retreat . . ." (Cook, 69)

And here comes a point where I begin to understand why I might have simplified monsters' motivations. My players almost never retreat. Not once in the 13 years that I've been running have I had a group that fell back (though I have been a part of two groups who fell back as a player). Typically my players fight to the death every time the enter into an encounter. This begs the question, though: do they determine their notion on how to handle a fight from the way that my monsters interact with them, or do I take my lead from them?

I think that I will have to put Zeb's ideas into action to tell.

More later.


Works Cited
Becker, Michael, Keith Elliott an Wilfredo Aguilar. Sword Lords of the Eastern Regions. Archive Miniatures & Game Systems. 1981. Print. pg 27

Cook, David "Zeb." Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 2nd Edition Dungeon Master Guide. Random House. USA, 1993. pg 69 - 72,

Tales from the Yawning Portal

More like tales from your boring-ass uncle who can't get over the fact that he's not playing high school football anymore.

Seriously, I'm not saying that I could do better but it is ridiculous that Wizards of the Coast expects us to buy yet another rehash of previously released material.

Update 1/7/2017

I've thought more about this and I realized that the reason why I'm so dissatisfied with this latest product announcement is that Wizards of the Coast has proven itself capable of providing us with quality reinterpretations and imaginings of classic adventures throughout this edition. So it feels like they're taking a short cut here and not giving us everything that we deserve as consumers. 

Listen, I know that they have a plan and it has been working throughout this edition but I really am at a point where I just want something set in another world than the Forgotten Realms. I would love to see them begin exploring Eberron, Dragonlance, Dark Sun,  or ~places hand over heart~ Greyhawk again. They proved with D&D 4e that they were fully capable of putting out excellent setting books that would rival the D&D 2e stuff; and now that they've shown themselves so capable throughout this edition it's time to do that again. 

As of right now I don't see any reason to pick up the Yawning Portal as I have all of the original adventures it is based on. Of course if it hits a really good sale I might pick it up because I'm a fucking collector who's been steadily purchasing all of 5e since it's release and that's what collectors do. 

You Say the Underdark is Going Crazy? Diinkarazan Started That.

Buppido, who thinks he is the reincarnation of Diinkarazan in Out of the Abyss

For the last couple of years I've been looking occasionally at the boxed set The Night Below (TSR 1125). The adventure fascinates me as it's a massive undertaking designed in such a way that it test both the players' ability to improvise and plan effectively, as well as, the Dungeon Master's. That's been a rare commodity in the modules that I've examined over the years and so the Night Below has captured my imagination. Still, I've never made a concerted effort to really plow through the adventure from beginning to end so that I'm prepared to actually run it.

I'm changing that.

Anyway, there's a character that has kind of gotten my attention lately, Darlakanand (a Derro with a terrible name) who is driven by the mad Power, Diinkarazan (again, a terrible name). Diinkarazan is one of the many Second Edition divine powers that you run across every so often when exploring a module from that era that will send you off through other books trying to figure out who the hell they're talking about.

The first time that I noticed Diinkarazan was when I ran across the Isle of Derangement: 

". . . This small island has, in the center of its one cove, a single 6-foot-high standing stone with a Derro handprint indelibly etched into its surface. This stone was once touched by the mad Demo demi-deity Diinkarazan, and it causes insanity in anyone approaching within 30 feet (saving throw vs. spell to resist). However, from time to time creatures swim too close to shore and are affected; as a result,a community of wholly deranged kuo-toa lives here. They have become the dominant group by killing anything else that arrives . . ." (Sargent NB, 35)

There's something about the idea of a divine presence coming in contact with a location and leaving a part of its will behind to forever affect the world afterwards that just strikes a perfect tone for me. I mean, Diinkarazan has manifested real evidence of his presence in a world where few even acknowledge his existence and in so doing has indelibly changed a whole section of the Underdark. Sure it's not as sexy as a bunch of Demon Lords running amok in the Underdark as is happening with this year's Rage of Demons story BUT wouldn't it be wild if the ultimate secret of that storyline was that the players had come into contact with the Isle of Derangement from Night Below and were living out the Rage of Demons story in their minds?

Diinkarazan is an interesting character who is really only developed in three places that I know of: the Night Below (TSR 1125), Monster Mythology (DMGR4, TSR 2128), and On Hallowed Ground (TSR 2623). In the Night Below Diinkarazan is a passing presence mentioned but not really defined. Monster Mythology Diinkarazan is granted a whole paragraph where we learn about his relationship with the Derro's primary god, Diirinka. Here it is revealed that Diinkarazan is shunned in Derro lore because the shamans who revere his twin brother, Diirinka, are doing their best to make sure that Diinkarazan is never powerful enough to seek his revenge on his brother for betraying him. The betrayal happened like this:

". . . The two young gods, probably children of one or other of the lesser dwarven gods (this is most unclear), sought to expand their dominion and wished to create their own race of dwarves. They wanted their creation to be distinctive, typified by qualities hill and mountain dwarves lack - speed, dexterity, and magical prowess. Drawn to deeper places than to other dwarves, they explored the Underdark and found a vast cavern glittering with the elemental force of raw magic. They began to gather up strange, alien magical artifacts scattered about a central green crystal sphere floating just above the ground, and as they did so a vast spectral brain floated up from the sphere and surveyed them coldly. Ilsensine, the god of illithids, did not take well to his secrets being stolen by a pair of diminutive dwarves. Diirinka backstabbed his own brother and left him to be consumed by the spectral horror, fleeing for his life. He left his brother to be cursed most horribly by the furious illithid, and banished to the Abyss where he still dwells . . ." (Sargent MM, 59 - 60)

It should come as no surprise to longtime D&D enthusiasts that both the Isle of Derangement and the god Diinkarazan come from the man who moved the needle of D&D away from what had become a tired and banal system and into a whole new realm of possibility: Carl Sargent. Sargent's work has always been the sort of thing that inspires my imagination in ways that few others before him have been capable of doing and almost no one has done since. Just look at that description for the relationship between Diirinka and Diinkarazan! Betrayal, family, power, horror! It's all there and yet so little is defined. It's tantalizing and in the equivalent of two paragraphs Sargent has created a demi-god that I want to make a part of my campaigns. He's everything I like about the Gods of Chaos from Warhammer without the baggage.

I have yet to read On Hallowed Ground yet, but I've ordered it. If anyone would like to fill us in on Diinkarazan's role in that supplement while I wait on UPS to show up I'd love to hear about what he's doing there.

Works Cited

Sargent, Carl. Monster Mythology. USA. TSR, Inc. 1992. Print. pg. 59 - 60

Sargent, Carl. Night Below, Book II, The Perils of the Underdark. USA. TSR, Inc. 1995. Print. pg. 35

Buy the Books Mentioned Here

Musings on the Second Realms

The Bat was holding court. Around his table set the largest collection of self-centered losers that had ever been produced on the plateau. They had gathered together for a night of Dungeons and Dragons, or so they claimed. In truth most of them gathered to worship at the Bat's feet and to tell tales of their sexual conquests - which should have been impossible since all but one of them was a virgin.  

Ah, but never let the truth get in the way of a good lie . . .

I was in the back room of Elton's Lifetime Loser Lounge prepping for the night's run and trying to ignore the massive egos that were proclaiming themselves from the large group private room. They were intentionally projecting their voices so that everyone else in the Lounge would know that their game was the best, the funniest, the most creative. Only problem was they played like they were acting out a script and no matter the situation the lines never changed.

I listened as the problem of the night was laid out and recited their actions along with them. "The dragon," began the Bat in his low rumble, "has been attacking Shadowdale for a week straight. Each night he crosses the city billowing fire down on the rooftops and each dawn the city tries to rebuild. This morning the call has gone out for heroes. Who among you answers?"

I'm going to find Elminster.

Yeah, me too. 

While they're looking for Elminster I'm going to see if there are any lonely ladies looking for a shoulder to cry on.

"Aren't you a paladin who has taken a vow of chastity," the Bat asked, already knowing the answer.

Not a very good one.

------------------------------------------------

I started hating the Forgotten Realms long before I actually began playing Dungeons and Dragons. Morticia and her brother, Frog, would go on for hours about their adventures in the Realms. They met Elminster and that Blackcloak fellow. They went to the Underdark and then to Myth Dranor. They did this and they fucking did that and if you didn't already know the entire story then you were a loser.

Fuck that noise.

The boys playing in the Bat's game just reinforced my notions about the Forgotten Realms, and then I started reading the Forgotten Realms Campaign Guide (FRCG) for third era Dungeons and Dragons. Why in the world presented by the FRCG do they need me? There are hundreds of high level characters running about the realms! And the way that the FRCG came across encouraged people to look to the non-player characters and to let them be the stars of the show!

My god I play the game to be the star of my own story. My fellow players are doing the same and we want to be the motivational factor of the game. We want to tell our stories, not relive someone else's glories. 

But with my current group we could play there as they either don't care about the non-player characters in the Realms or they don't know about them. So I'm going to do a little bit of investigating and see if the setting is worth playing in, if it is my next campaign will be taking place in the Forgotten Realms using the Second Edition rules set.