"It's not a bad plan, Burt."*
The Monkey Boy and Monkey Girl played AD&D yesterday while the Mini-Monkey drew Pooh and a chicken on a character sheet.
They are learning the right way, of course - first edition AD&D, none of this second, third, or fourth edition crap. I'd have suggested breaking out Basic, but I didn't think of it until just now.
First, they surprised me in their choices of character class. Monkey Boy took a ranger and Monkey Girl took a thief. I expected both of them to take magic-users. I did something I never do - I went for party balance. I took a cleric/magic-user.
Equipment was less . . . practiced. Monkey Boy took a trident and glaive among his weapons. Who takes a trident? A glaive? These are things you give LVL 0 guards when you're going for color! Only a complete novice would . . . !
Oh, wait. Never mind.
Within minutes of starting the game, the party had split in three. I was mostly sitting back and letting them run, only saying, "Hey, wait a minute," when they were about to do something really hazardous.
MB1: "I race ahead and look for tracks and then follow them and see if I can find the orcs and like pshew! pshew! and get the box back and take it back to the guy!"
MG: "Since I'm a sneaky type, and can probably look around without anyone seeing me or knowing I was there, I'll run ahead and make sure it's safe for him."
Me: "I'm staying with the wagon."
MB: "I run back to the wagon and describe what I found and then run back and catch up with her so I can protect her if the orcs catch her!"
Me: "Did he leave his rations in the wagon?"
DM: "Did you?"
MB: "Um . . . yeah."
Me: "I go through and remove anything with sugar or caffeine."
MG: "I run back and tell Daddy to catch up with us!"
Me: "You want me to leave the wagon unguarded?"
MG: "No, bring it with us!"
Me: "It's night, right?"
DM: "Yes. It's just getting dark."
Me: "So you want to take the wagon and donkey closer to where we think the orcs are just in time to camp for the night instead of going back down the road four or five miles where we'll be farther from them if they look for someone to attack in the middle of the night like they did with the merchant?"
MG: "Yeah! We'll take turns on watch!"
Me: "So you feel confident holding off at least six orcs by yourself?"
MG: "I'd wake you guys up!"
Me: "Still, you feel like you could hold them off while we wake up, figure out what's going on, get up, pick up our weapons, which we probably aren't holding in our sleep, pick our targets, and join in?"
MG: "Yeah! I'd wake you up!"
DM: "You'd probably have to fight alone for at least three turns while they woke up."
Such incidents aside, it all went reasonably well until we reached the second building.
MG: "I go up the stairs, being as sneaky as possible."
DM: "Okay, roll to move silently."
MG: "Um . . . 57. Oops! A stair creaks or something?"
DM: "Or something. Anyway, you see a hallway with a door right beside you on the left and another farther along, also on the left, and then the hall turns at the end, also left."
MG: "Okay, I call down to the others to come up."
Me: [flinch] "I guess I hurry up there."
DM: "The door beside you opens."
MG: "What?!?"
DM: "Mercia and Jared2 aren't the only ones who heard you."
Goblins. Goblins who know they're popcorn and make plans to compensate.
Yep. By the end of the fight, Mercia and Galinda were invoking the zero-hit point rule, and Jared was left with the task of getting us out of there: binding wounds, getting us back to the wagon, going back for our loot, and burning the house down to hide the evidence of the battle.
It could have been worse.
*Return of the Living Dead.
1Dialogue throughout varies from approximate to completely contrived
2That was the party - Mercia, Jared, and Galinda the Slippery.
They are learning the right way, of course - first edition AD&D, none of this second, third, or fourth edition crap. I'd have suggested breaking out Basic, but I didn't think of it until just now.
First, they surprised me in their choices of character class. Monkey Boy took a ranger and Monkey Girl took a thief. I expected both of them to take magic-users. I did something I never do - I went for party balance. I took a cleric/magic-user.
Equipment was less . . . practiced. Monkey Boy took a trident and glaive among his weapons. Who takes a trident? A glaive? These are things you give LVL 0 guards when you're going for color! Only a complete novice would . . . !
Oh, wait. Never mind.
Within minutes of starting the game, the party had split in three. I was mostly sitting back and letting them run, only saying, "Hey, wait a minute," when they were about to do something really hazardous.
MB1: "I race ahead and look for tracks and then follow them and see if I can find the orcs and like pshew! pshew! and get the box back and take it back to the guy!"
MG: "Since I'm a sneaky type, and can probably look around without anyone seeing me or knowing I was there, I'll run ahead and make sure it's safe for him."
Me: "I'm staying with the wagon."
MB: "I run back to the wagon and describe what I found and then run back and catch up with her so I can protect her if the orcs catch her!"
Me: "Did he leave his rations in the wagon?"
DM: "Did you?"
MB: "Um . . . yeah."
Me: "I go through and remove anything with sugar or caffeine."
MG: "I run back and tell Daddy to catch up with us!"
Me: "You want me to leave the wagon unguarded?"
MG: "No, bring it with us!"
Me: "It's night, right?"
DM: "Yes. It's just getting dark."
Me: "So you want to take the wagon and donkey closer to where we think the orcs are just in time to camp for the night instead of going back down the road four or five miles where we'll be farther from them if they look for someone to attack in the middle of the night like they did with the merchant?"
MG: "Yeah! We'll take turns on watch!"
Me: "So you feel confident holding off at least six orcs by yourself?"
MG: "I'd wake you guys up!"
Me: "Still, you feel like you could hold them off while we wake up, figure out what's going on, get up, pick up our weapons, which we probably aren't holding in our sleep, pick our targets, and join in?"
MG: "Yeah! I'd wake you up!"
DM: "You'd probably have to fight alone for at least three turns while they woke up."
Such incidents aside, it all went reasonably well until we reached the second building.
MG: "I go up the stairs, being as sneaky as possible."
DM: "Okay, roll to move silently."
MG: "Um . . . 57. Oops! A stair creaks or something?"
DM: "Or something. Anyway, you see a hallway with a door right beside you on the left and another farther along, also on the left, and then the hall turns at the end, also left."
MG: "Okay, I call down to the others to come up."
Me: [flinch] "I guess I hurry up there."
DM: "The door beside you opens."
MG: "What?!?"
DM: "Mercia and Jared2 aren't the only ones who heard you."
Goblins. Goblins who know they're popcorn and make plans to compensate.
Yep. By the end of the fight, Mercia and Galinda were invoking the zero-hit point rule, and Jared was left with the task of getting us out of there: binding wounds, getting us back to the wagon, going back for our loot, and burning the house down to hide the evidence of the battle.
It could have been worse.
*Return of the Living Dead.
1Dialogue throughout varies from approximate to completely contrived
2That was the party - Mercia, Jared, and Galinda the Slippery.