Dungeon Crawl

DungeonCrawl, the Game.... A Ruleset for Dungeon Adventuring, Updated 4.18.06

1.0

2.0

1.1 1.1.1 1.1.2 1.1.3 1.1.3.1 1.1.4 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 2.1 2.1.1 2.2 2.2.1 2.3 2.4 2.4.1

Not too serious, not too complicated, but lots of fun. Written by Steven Daggs

Game intro ...................................................................................................................................................4 Game Requirements: ........................................................................................................................... The Dungeon ......................................................................................................................................... Miniatures: .........................................................................................................................................5 Randomizers .......................................................................................................................................... A note regarding random directions: .............................................................................................. Tokens: .................................................................................................................................................6 Number of players .............................................................................................................................. Scenarios .............................................................................................................................................7 Winning ................................................................................................................................................... Ongoing Campaigns .............................................................................................................................. Character intro ..................................................................................................................................................8 Classes .................................................................................................................................................... Class based attributes ....................................................................................................................... Races ....................................................................................................................................................... Racial attributes .................................................................................................................................. Gender .................................................................................................................................................... Attributes ............................................................................................................................................ Movement Value (mv) .......................................................................................................................9

1

2.5

3.0

4.0

5.0

2

2.4.2 2.4.3 2.4.4 2.4.5 2.4.6 2.4.7

Combat Die (cd) .................................................................................................................................. Attack Value (av) ................................................................................................................................ Defense Value (dv) ............................................................................................................................. Magic Resistance (mr) ....................................................................................................................... Wounds (wnd) ........................................................................................................................................ RND‛s (Remain Not Dead points) ...................................................................................................10 Special abilities .................................................................................................................................................... 2.5.1 Spells ........................................................................................................................................................ 2.5.2 Banishment .............................................................................................................................................. 2.5.3 Healing ...................................................................................................................................................... 2.5.4 Thief skills ............................................................................................................................................... 2.5.5 Double Attacks ....................................................................................................................................... 2.5.6 Ranged Attacks ...................................................................................................................................... Character specifics .............................................................................................................................................. 3.1 The Fighter ............................................................................................................................................. 3.2 The Cleric: .........................................................................................................................................11 3.3 The Archer: ............................................................................................................................................. 3.4 The Thief: ...........................................................................................................................................12 3.5 The Mage: ............................................................................................................................................... Party Creation ..................................................................................................................................................13 4.1 Standard party makeup ........................................................................................................................ 4.2 Optional party composition .................................................................................................................. 4.3 Additional Startup equipment ............................................................................................................. 4.4 Playing with higher lvl characters.....................................................................................................14 Game Fundamentals ...........................................................................................................................................15 5.1 Turn based action .................................................................................................................................. 5.2 Initiative .................................................................................................................................................. 5.3 Movement ..............................................................................................................................................16 5.3.1 Standard movement .............................................................................................................................. 5.3.2 Double movement .................................................................................................................................... 5.3.3 Moving past obstacles, critters and party members ..................................................................... 5.3.4 Special movement ................................................................................................................................17 5.3.5 Flight ......................................................................................................................................................... 5.3.6 Immaterial ............................................................................................................................................... 5.3.7 Waterwalk / Lavawalk ........................................................................................................................... 5.3.8 Jumping/Leaping ..................................................................................................................................... 5.3.9 Swimming .................................................................................................................................................. 5.3.10 Falling .....................................................................................................................................................18 5.4 Armor, Weapons & other basic Equipment ...................................................................................... 5.4.1 Magical Equipment –AKA – the Goodies ............................................................................................ 5.5 Combat – A basic overview ...............................................................................................................19 5.5.1 Simultaneous results ............................................................................................................................... 5.5.2 Attack Zone (az) – Free Attacks ......................................................................................................... 5.5.3 HTH (Hand to Hand) Combat ...........................................................................................................20 5.5.4 Ranged attacks ......................................................................................................................................... 5.5.5 Spell attacks .............................................................................................................................................. 5.5.6 Banishment .............................................................................................................................................21 5.5.7 Backstab attack ....................................................................................................................................22 5.6 Non-combat actions ................................................................................................................................. 5.6.1 Spell effects .........................................................................................................................................23 5.6.2 Open lock ................................................................................................................................................... 5.6.3 Hocus Pocus ............................................................................................................................................... 5.6.4 Quickening ................................................................................................................................................. 5.6.5 Shield ......................................................................................................................................................24 5.7 Opening locked doors & chests ............................................................................................................ 5.8 Death ......................................................................................................................................................... 5.8.1 Mostly Dead .........................................................................................................................................25 5.8.2 Cheating Death ......................................................................................................................................... 5.8.3 Completely Dead ..................................................................................................................................... 5.8.4 Looting the dead ......................................................................................................................................

5.9 6.0

6.4.1

8.0

9.0 10.0 11.0 12.0

13.0 14.0 15.0 16.0

17.0

18.0 19.0

Healing ...................................................................................................................................................................... Healing Potions .....................................................................................................................................26 Game Setup ............................................................................................................................................................. 6.1 The Dungeon ............................................................................................................................................ 6.2 Encounters ............................................................................................................................................... 6.3 Special encounters .............................................................................................................................28 6.4 Player placed encounters ....................................................................................................................... A note regarding tokens ..................................................................................................................................... 6.5 Determine what game variant is being played .................................................................................. 6.6 Determine Flag or Special encounter locations ...........................................................................29 6.7 Determine party entrances .................................................................................................................. 6.8 Determine who goes first ..................................................................................................................... 7.0 Player turn ................................................................................................................................................ 7.1 Resolve any encounter tokens within line of sight ......................................................................... 7.2 Determine character movement ......................................................................................................... 7.3 Resolve any tokens that are now in line of sight ............................................................................ 7.4 Carry out any special character abilities ......................................................................................... 7.5 Resolve any encounters from opening doors or chests ................................................................. 7.6 If combat occurred ............................................................................................................................... 7.7 The last act .............................................................................................................................................. Encounter Resolution ............................................................................................................................................ 8.1 Doors, chests & Traps ........................................................................................................................... 8.1.1 So we try to open it – now what? ...................................................................................................30 8.1.2 The Trap is sprung! ................................................................................................................................. 8.1.3 The Trap has been dealt with ..........................................................................................................31 8.1.4 Rewards for your troubles ................................................................................................................. 8.2 Critters ................................................................................................................................................32 8.2.1 Encounter Tokens .................................................................................................................................. 8.2.3 Critter Determination ........................................................................................................................... 8.2.4 Rewards ..................................................................................................................................................... 8.2.4.1 Rewards Table ......................................................................................................................................... 8.2.4.2 Gold ........................................................................................................................................................33 8.2.4.3 Goodies ...................................................................................................................................................... 8.3 Special event encounters ...................................................................................................................... 8.3.1 Pick a card, any card ..........................................................................................................................34 Combat procedures ...........................................................................................................................................35 An example of play ............................................................................................................................................36 Ending the game .................................................................................................................................................38 Game variations ..................................................................................................................................................39 12.1 Basic ............................................................................................................................................................ 12.2 Capture the Flag ...................................................................................................................................... 12.3 Death Match .........................................................................................................................................40 12.4 Crusade ....................................................................................................................................................... 12.5 Snatch & Grab ......................................................................................................................................41 Optional Rules – extra stuff ...........................................................................................................................42 General commentary and other notes ...........................................................................................................43 Charts ........................................................................................................................................................................ Encounter ................................................................................................................................................... Rewards ...................................................................................................................................................... Critter lists .........................................................................................................................................................44 Low value .................................................................................................................................................... Medium value ............................................................................................................................................. High value ..............................................................................................................................................45 Elite ............................................................................................................................................................. Goodie lists ............................................................................................................................................................... Offensive ...............................................................................................................................................46 Defensive ................................................................................................................................................... Miscellaneous ............................................................................................................................................ Work in progress musings and FAQ.................................................................................................................47 Character Sheet....................................................................................................................................................53 5.9.1

3

1.0 Game intro What you are now reading is a quick play, tongue in cheek, dungeon adventuring game. This is a game were everybody plays equally - not where one player controls the bad guys and everybody responds/submits to his decisions. Each player controls his own little band of misfits AND controls the critters that another player will encounter. Each player is someone else‛s nemesis. All encounter and miscellaneous event rolls are done in the open, and are a surprise for everybody to enjoy. The whole point of this little endeavor is for everybody to have fun, so it helps if you don‛t take things too seriously. These rules are not intended as an overly detailed, exhaustive study in the complexities of subterranean armored combat. Nor will they require you to undertake a prolonged course of study in order to properly equip and prepare your party for eventual world domination.

“Elegance in Simplicity” is the rule, even when it comes to brawling in the dark recesses of the dungeons. Hopefully you will find DungeonCrawl to be reasonably quick and unreasonably fun. Enjoy. All players will begin the game with essentially equal parties. In the standard game, parties are composed of 1 fighter, 1 archer, 1 cleric, 1 thief, and 1 mage. For more advanced games, players may customize their party to suit their playing style. All players have roughly the same goal – get their party out alive with as much loot as possible. In the basic game, the winner is determined by the player with the most loot at the end. More advanced games have differing goals, or specific objectives to be accomplished in order to claim victory. But it all boils down to: Kill Critters, Get Goodies; try to get out alive so you can brag about it. 1.1 Game Requirements These are the things that you really will need to have in order to play DungeonCrawl. 1.1.1 A Dungeon This game is written with the assumption that it will be played out using some sort of “hands on” dungeon environment and miniatures. By personal preference, I recommend creating a dungeon environment using the excellent molds and designs created by Bruce Hirst and available from his website: http://www.castlemolds.com. However, you may use anything that you and your group of devil may care ne‛er do well friends can throw together. DwarvenForge‛s MasterMaze line is equally versatile, and there are also several “print and fold” paper solutions available online. Additionally, you could create a dungeon layout using Legos, Lincoln Logs, or any number of reasonably available building block / construction style toys. Once you have undertaken this task, you may find that creating a dungeon is in itself a very enjoyable pastime, so have at.

4

1.1.2 Miniatures These make up the player‛s adventuring parties as well as the critters they will face. I make no specific recommendations regarding miniatures, but wish to note that the Critter List [16.0] was arrived at mainly by evaluating the miniatures that I have, and coming up with rules and values for them. I note this to point out that my Critter List is not all inclusive, but rather serves to provide stats for the critters that players would encounter while playing at my house. Certainly you may create stats for critters that you own, which I may not have specifically accounted for, and all I ask is that you try to fit them in relative to the values of roughly equivalent critters. Miniatures used could be Lego minifigs, heroquest figures, DnD mini‛s, different colored checkers that you have numbered so you could tell‛em apart, whatever you can get your hands on.

1.1.3 Randomizers - the guiding hand of Fate... Different methods for determining random results are required to play DungeonCrawl. Dice - Odds are, if you have any interest in games of this type at all, then somewhere in that place you call home, you will find a little bag (or a box, or a full blown drawer) of oddly shaped dice. For this game you will need 4-sided (d4‛s), 6-sided (d6‛s), 8-sided (d8‛s), 10-sided (d10‛s), 12-sided (d12‛s), and 20-sided (d20‛s) dice. From this point on they will be referred to in the following format – a d6 means you roll a 6 sided die. If you can not locate any of these odd little dice in your home, then your local hobby shop will happily accommodate your need for only a few bucks. Playing cards – standard Las Vegas style playing cards. Everybody has a pack of these hidden somewhere – go find‛em, dig‛em out, and shuffle. - A note regarding shuffling - There are no specific requirements for shuffling – I mean, obviously don‛t cheat, but its not like you are required to entirely re-shuffle after each draw, and then follow up an impartial cutting of the deck. let‛s get real - the occasional casual reshuffle is fine. However, some people really like to shuffle. All the time. Almost to the point of annoyance. If you are playing with somebody like that, and letting them shuffle keeps them happy, then by all means, have at. Certain cards designate specific effects (detailed here [8.3.1]) so in order to allow the possibility of similar events effecting different parties, the deck should be reshuffled throughout the game. In this manner, it becomes feasible that the shrine effect that so devastated one party might also happen to another party. Spread the grief evenly is my motto. 5

A quarter - Or some other denomination of coin that you can flip to determine heads or tails. Pretty simple. A note regarding random directions: Occasionally you may be instructed that something needs to be moved in a random direction. The easiest way to accomplish this is to think of a clock face - 1 thru 12, right? Well, arbitrarily designate a side of the table as the top of the clock, and then roll a d12. Now, think of a clock. This provides you with a random direction. Simple, right? 1.1.4 Tokens Pebbles, buttons, little colored bits of paper – anything that you can use to symbolize potential encounters. These are placed throughout the dungeon as the game is setup, and occasionally added as play commences. These tokens indicate locations where critters or treasure might be found.

Two main types of tokens are used – those designating possible Critter encounters, and those designating potential non- critter encounters (ie, things like chests, bags, magic swords embedded in a piece of rock – that sort of thing.) Therefore, you will need to have tokens that obviously represent two different types of potential encounters. For example: You could use pennies to mark potential critter encounters, and nickels to show where potential treasure could be found. It‛s as simple as that. This is covered in more detail here [6.2]. Additional tokens will also be used, but simplicity and easily recognized for what they are representing is the main key element here. If all of the players forget what the green jellybean was supposed to signify, then it failed its duties as an effective token. For punishment, it should be removed from the table, and eaten. 1.2 Number of players At least 2 minimum (unless you are the type of person who can honestly play chess against yourself without cheating. If so, you could probably also enjoy playing a solitaire version of this) up to a max of 6, but preferably 3 or 4 players total. Combat occurs between the current player, and the player immediately prior to him, so all players have the opportunity to participate during another players turn. This keeps eveybody involved, but too many players could tend to slow down the action a bit too much. By preference, 4 players is probably optimal. 1.3 Scenarios There are 5 game scenarios fully detailed in the Game Variations Section [12.0]. You may certainly adjust and /or add “house rules” versions to your gaming style if it seems appropriate. In a nutshell, the 5 variants are: Basic: In which our intrepid adventurers attempt to survive the dungeon and emerge with the 6

most loot. Capture the Flag: In which each party fights to obtain a specific item and be sucessful in exiting the dungeon with it still in their possesion. DeathMatch: In which each player tries to destroy everybody else. Last one standing wins. Crusade: In which the adventurers seek to destroy a great evil, and live to tell the tale. Snatch & Grab: Similar to the basic game, except the game ends as soon as one party exits the dungeon. This allows a player who feels his (or her) party are in the lead with the loot count to be able end the game quickly before others can catch up. 1.4 Winning Well, specific victory conditions vary, but in the basic and snatch & grab variants, it‛s the party with the most gold that wins. The other 3 scenarios have pretty clearly defined victory conditions, so it is usually easy to determine the victor. There are bonuses for having the most surviving party members, as well as penalties for dying, but all in all, the winners of this game are the one‛s who have laughed the most while playing. If you aren‛t having fun, then what‛s the point? 1.5 Ongoing Campaigns If players desire to have an ongoing “campaign” feel to the games, then arrangements can be made to allow players to utilize accumulated loot from previous games in the current game. This will enable a party to become more powerful over the course of several games. Additionally, surviving characters have a tendency to become stronger and more powerful over the course of a campaign. Please note: These rules were not originally designed to allow for the experience growth of particular characters. This was an intentional decision, as I envisioned the game as more of a tabletop afternoon adventure than an actual role-playing game with extensive character development and background. I have included an Optional Rules [13.0] section that provides a format for character development through the time honored method of Personal Growth through Survival. Or, more clearly stated - those who die in the course of the adventure don‛t benefit from it. That may sound a little strange, but since the cleric can revive even characters who are mostly dead (defined as a character who just took damage equal to or greater than their current wound rating - thus having 0 wounds and knocking heavily at Death‛s door) it works out that character‛s who have “died” and been “cured” by the immediate application of the cleric‛s healing prowess, are unable to gain experience for that adventure. They may of course continue to accumulate Goodies (magical treasure) but they are considered to have missed out on the educational benefits of “Remaining Not Dead.” More on that later. See [13.0] for specifics. Whether played as a single afternoon‛s battle fest, or as part of an ongoing campaign, I believe you will find that this is a game that can be played out in a couple of hours, but one that you will want to play again, once you have rearranged the dungeon layout, and restocked the critters.

7

2.0 Character intro There are 5 types of characters. Some characters have similarities to one another, with overlapping abilities, some are wildly different. You can not create a custom character that does everything. That is not what this game is about – if you want to play a game where you can create the Uber-Character that can do everything, then you should go online to get the cheat codes to your favorite computer game and have fun. Think of DungeonCrawl as a board game with a mix of pieces that each have particular specialties that they do well, and other abilities that they do ... less well. Would the game of chess be as much fun if all the pieces could move like the queen and jump other pieces like a knight? I doubt it. So, in my game, each piece has its own quirks. 2.1 Classes Each character type has strong points and weak points, and they can be roughly summed up as such: Fighter - The Basher - Good for down and dirty hand to hand “HTH” combat. AKA “A Brick” Cleric - The Medic - Combat EMT – keep him alive, and he will keep everyone else up and kicking. Archer - The Shooter – Should avoid HTH, but excellent ranged attack. Thief - The Sneak - Neutralizes traps and opens locks, poor at HTH, but has an effective “Backstab” attack. Mage - The Artillery - Old guy (or gal) with a staff, who meddles in the arcane powers with explosive results. 2.1.1 Standard Character attributes Class AV DV WNDs Special Fighter 5 5 3 break down doors - bash open chests - 2 attacks if he hasn‛t moved. Cleric 4 4 2 banish undead (counts as av5 d8 attack) - heal self and others Archer 2 3 2 18” ranged attack (av5 d8) - can shoot twice if hasn‛t moved Thief 2 2 2 disarm traps/pick locks & backstab attack (av5 d8 wnds 2-3) Mage 1 2 2 magical attacks 24” range (av5 d8) - mr = 3/10 2.2 Races There are 4 character races for a player to choose from. Racial attributes effect game play in a number of different ways. They determine a character‛s movement value (mv), and what combat die (cd) the character is assigned. Additionally, there may be racial modifiers applicable to the character‛s class stats. And finally, non-human races have a natural magical resistance, humans do not. Characters may be of any race, and vice versa. 2.2.1 Racial Attributes Race MV CD (HTH) Human 8 d8 Elf 10 d6 Dwarf 6 d8 Halfling 6 d6

Special none wnds -1 wnds +1 DV+1

Magical Resistance none MR = 1/10 MR = 1/10 MR = 1/10

2.3 Gender Does not matter. This an equal opportunity environment, gender has no bearing whatsoever on the abilities of a particular character. When someone is about to bash you with a warhammer, it does not benefit you to assume they are going to hit you softly because they are a girl. That kinda thinking could get ya dead right quick. 2.4 Attributes These are the things that make each character different. They are initially determined by race and class, but may be adjusted by magical means during the game.

8

2.4.1 Movement Value (mv) Movement (mv) is a standard based upon character race. Speed is a function of race, not class - a fighter trained to wear armor will be just as capable maneuvering in it as a mage is in his robes. A fully trained warrior in full kit can move as effectively as an out of shape, robe wearing, staff carrying, spellcaster. Human movement rate is 8” per turn. Elves are faster - 10”, because, well, they are elves. Dwarves and Halflings are slower - 6”, because their legs are shorter. Running (and doing nothing else that turn) doubles movement rate. Practical effects of movement are covered in section [5.3] 2.4.2 Combat Die (cd) The Combat Die (cd) is a generalization based upon stereotypical physique - humans and dwarves are built more for combat than elves and Halflings, thus they have higher cd‛s. The combat die (cd) is the die rolled and combined with either the character‛s attack value (av) or defense value (dv) as circumstances dictate. Therefore, it will normally be shown following either av or dv, and will often merely be indicated by the die type – aka d8, d10 etc. So, an attack of av5 d8 indicates an attack value of 5 added to a combat die roll of a d8. 2.4.3 Attack Value (av) Attack Value (av) is also based upon common assumptions regarding relative combat value, with a few quirks thrown in. For Hand to Hand combat (HTH), and for certain strength based physical skills, a character will use their standard av. All characters have some form of attack rated at av5 d8. For the fighter, it is his HTH attack, for the archer, it is his ranged attack. Characters with specialized attacks of av5 d8 – ranged, magical, banishment, backstab – will revert to their standard values when engaged in HTH combat. So while a mage may have a av5 d8 fireball, his combat ability when trying to bash something with his staff may only be av1 d6. This is one of many obvious reasons for a mage to want to avoid HTH combat. 2.4.4 Defense Value (dv) Defense Value (dv) is based (again) upon common assumptions of armor and combative skill. Halflings get a bonus cause they are little, and presumably harder to hit. Characters make a dv roll when directly attacked, and whenever there is potentially damaging activity occurring. (Like standing in the midst of an exploding fireball – this would certainly qualify as a hazardous position to be in.) This defense roll simulates combat reflexes and pure luck combining to allow the poor git to avoid certain death by ducking or dodging at just the right time. Unless specifically stated otherwise, all characters are allowed a defense roll against magical attacks. 2.4.5 Magic Resistance (mr) A target of a magical attack first tests for magic resistance. If successful, they are not effected by any magical effects. If they fail, they make a combat defense roll versus the magical attack roll. If they fail that, they take damage. MR is cumulative - an elven mage will have a 40% resistance (but he only has one wound, if he does get hit, he‛s dead) Humans do not have mr unless granted by some magical goodie. 2.4.6 Wounds (wnd) Wounds (wnd) indicate how much damage a particular character can take before he cashes in his chips. Fighters get 3 because they are trained to go out and get beat up – it‛s what they do. Everyone else gets 2 because you always deserve a chance to learn from your mistakes. Dwarves get a +1 bonus (wnd) because they are a dense and sturdy folk. Elves suffer a penalty of -1 because they are more slightly built and delicate than everyone else. (Pansies.) And otherwise, everyone would always want to be an elf - there has to be some drawback for just being pretty.

9

2.4.7 RND‛s (Remain Not Dead points) These are the points that a character earns for surviving a game without dying. They are explained fully in section [13] and can be cashed in to increase the characters basic stats. 2.5 Character class abilities Each character type has the ability to do something better than the other classes. Fighters ... fight (well, duhhh), Mages cast spells, Archers shoot things, thiefs steal stuff and sneak around, and clerics have that whole “Holier than Thou” thing going for them. 2.5.1 Spells The specialized domain of the mage. There are 6 spells to choose from, they are: Fireball: A burst of concentrated fire with a 3”x3” area of effect, causes 2 wounds. Lightning strike: Targets a single model, causes 2 wounds. Hocus pokus: Turns a single target critter into a randomly different critter. Open Locks: Allows a mage a chance to open locked objects. Quickening: Speeds up targeted individual for 1 full turn. Shield: Creates a protective field around targeted character. Specific information regarding spell ranges, durations and effects is contained here: [5.6] 2.5.2 Banishment A cleric‛s ability to send the dead back to their final rest. Can effect all undead the cleric has in line of sight. This ability counts as an av5d8 attack which causes 1 wound. [5.5.6] 2.5.3 Healing The other side of the clerical coin. Basically this combat EMT can get even the mostly dead back on their feet and adventuring again if he gets to them in time. Full detail in section [5.9]. 2.5.4 Thief skills An av5d8 ability to open locked doors and chests, and disarm traps. Additionally, the thief has the ability to hold his move until all others have moved, and make an av5d8 2w backstabbing attack. [5.5.7] 2.5.5 Double attacks Both the archer and fighter may make a second attack if they do not move that turn. 3.0 Character specifics: More in depth character descriptions. 3.1 The Fighter This individual is the main HTH (Hand to Hand combat) element of any party. The fighter is the highest offensive and defensive unit; able to absorb deal out the most direct damage. He has the ability to bash down locked doors, and smash open locked chests. The fighter can take his full movement, and still attack. If he chooses not to move, he may attack twice, providing he is either attacking the same target again, or he is attacking a target that is already within his attack zone. (Attack Zone (az) is detailed here: [5.5.2]) No game play difference is made regarding what type of weapon, or combination of weapons your character is using. Any and all combinations will inflict 1 wound on a successful attack. Twohanded weapons, single handed weapon with shield, two single handed weapons, whatever, they are all considered equal. The fighters training, arms, and armor are what entitle him to an Attack Value (av) of 5 and a Defense Value (dv) of 5. They also are able to withstand 3 wnds before dying. In basic terms, this guy is a brick.

10

3.2 The Cleric She is an effective HTH combatant in her own right, as sometimes it is easiest to spread the virtues of ones chosen deity by using a blunt instrument. The cleric has the ability to banish the dead to their eternal rest, which can be a very powerful asset, but is naturally only effective against the undead. Against everything else, she is sort of a second string fighter, with combat medic skills. The cleric‛s healing abilities are awesome, and considering the environment in which she often finds her self, highly necessary. If/when a party member reaches 0 wnds, and are very nearly perished; they have achieved a karmic plateau known as being “mostly dead”. While in this state, a player character is more or less quietly expiring, and is incapable of performing any action, aside from sustained bleeding. It is during such a situation that a cleric is indeed a lifesaver. Harnessing the power of their chosen deity, the cleric has the ability to return the mostly dead individual to full health, merely by devoting a full turn to administering to their wounds. During that turn, if the cleric concentrates her skills, doing nothing else (with the exception of expending her normal movement in order to get to her patient) then the character will recover and be able to fight another day. Or, get up and fight right away (on their next turn), as the case may be. Game play specifics of both the banishing and healing processes will be addressed in detail in a bit. With regard to character weapons, as with the fighter, it doesn‛t really matter – however the miniature is configured, a cleric will have an av of 4, a dv of 4, withstand 2 wnds, and deal 1 wound of damage with their HTH attack. 3.3 The Archer This is an individual who understands the value of keeping ones targets at a distance. Why bother getting your hands dirty, if you can turn the other guy into a pincushion at 30 paces. He can shoot twice if he has not moved, or once if he has. If an archer shoots at 2 different targets, they must be within a 30 degree arc. The archer must not need to alter aim significantly in order to acquire the second target. An archer may fire at any target within 18”, and may choose to fire past other models in order to target a specific individual, and can even fire at a target engaged in HTH with a teammate. This versatility comes at a price; they will suffer a -1 attack modifier for each intervening model. An intervening model is one defined as being within 1 inch to either side of a direct line drawn between the archer and his target. Use some common sense with determining modifiers - if the archer is targeting something huge, and fireing over the head of short teammate (a dwarf, or halfling for example) then they do not necessarily need to suffer a penalty for firing past an intervening model. That being said, if they miss the intended target, there is still a chance that they shot the intervening model in the back. This is called “bad luck.” If they hit what they are aiming at, all is good; if they don‛t... bad things could happen to the intervening model. To keep things simple, if the archer is dumb enough to have tried this, and missed, then flip a coin. Tails = he shot the closest intervening model in the back, Heads = he missed everything and his teammate need never know how close he came to getting fragged. Shots in the back are not actively defended against, so if the archers initial attack value (his av +cd) exceeds the victims av alone, the victim will take a wnd. Bummer. Archers tend to be overly confident of their skills - they are so assured of their ability to hit what they aim at, that they don‛t really consider the possibility of hitting someone they didn‛t aim at. If it should come to pass that they fail to hit an intended target, and instead shoot a party member in the back, then it was the other guy‛s fault for stepping into the line of fire. Oh well, too bad for him. 11

Archers have two types of attack, HTH and ranged – for obvious reasons, they prefer to use their ranged attack. Standard stats: av2 dv3 wnds2 apply for HTH; for ranged attack, use av5 cd8. Each successful attack does 1 wound of damage. An archer‛s ranged attacks can not be used if target is within 2”. Minimum range requirements illustrate that you can‛t nock, draw and release at the big rat gnawing on your leg. Towards this end, archers will always endeavor to avoid HTH when possible. In consideration of ease of game play, it doesn‛t matter what type of missile weapon the miniature is carrying – long bow, short bow, crossbow, sling, whatever – if he/she/it is your archer, then they have archer stats. Additionally, keep things simple and assume all arrows are recovered, or that one of the reasons the archer is so lousy in HTH is because he is encumbered by a huge bag of arrows. In other words, he will not run out of arrows. 3.4 The Thief The sneaky one. Typically less than stellar in combat, but very handy for detecting and disarming traps, and should they find themselves stuck in a combat situation, they may make a backstab attack if they can set it up. Thieves can hold their move until everyone else has done so, and if they then can maneuver into a backstab situation without crossing the victim‛s “attack zone” (they arrange to end up within 1” behind the victim, and did not pass directly in front or adjacent to the victim in the process) then they can deliver a backstab attack during this combat phase. (av5 cd8) This attack is rolled against the defenders dv + ½ (round up) of the victim‛s cd roll, since it is based upon the concept that the thief has the benefit of surprise and thus the victim is not actively defending. This attack can be very effective, and it is the one and only reason for a thief to ever really want to enter into HTH. Their stats are as follows: av 2 dv 2 wnds 2 – special attack value av5 cd8 used for detecting/disarming traps and for backstab attack. A successful backstab will deal 2-3 wounds, normal thief HTH attacks will only cause 1 wnd. 3.5 The Mage The arcane one. This is an individual who is drawn to magical power like a moth to the flame, and strangely enough, often with similar results. While the limits of the mages powers and knowledge know no earthly bounds, there are really only 6 spells commonly used in the course of a DungeonCrawl. These are the primary reason that his fellow adventurers are willing to put up with his arrogant attitude, and the “I know something you don‛t” shtick. The offensive spells at their beck and call are the fireball and the lightning strike. The ability to turn the attacking hoards to cinders at a distance earns the respect of even the most cynical teammate. The mage is capable of unleashing either of these devastating attacks once each turn, provided he has done nothing more than a standard move in addition to casting the spell. Mages can blast anything they can see within range requirements, regardless of intervening models. Fireballing ones own party is considered bad karma though, so in a tight situation, a lightning bolt is preferred. The downside of all this firepower is that, in essence, the mage is a wimp. His arcane studies provide him with an innate magical resistance (mr) of 3/10, so he gets a chance to shrug off magical attacks, but his physical attributes lead to a very definite HTH strategy – Avoid It At All Costs. Mages really seriously do not want to get stuck in hand to hand combat, because they suck at it. They will die. They need to keep away from melee so that they can pick people off at distance. There are 4 additional spells that the mage can use in the course of an adventure. Each have certain benefits and drawbacks, and will be described in more detail later on [5.6]. In short, the Hocus Pokus spell allows the mage to attempt to turn the big bad ugly into a little bad ugly, but sometimes the attempt backfires, and you are faced with a bigger, badder, uglier critter. 12

The Quickening spell allows the mage to increase the speed (both of mv and attacks) and enhance the dv of a single targeted individual – but the recipient will suffer a wnd when the effect wears off. Open Locks allows the mage dispense with the necessity of including a thief in the party. The Shield spell certainly enhances the targets dv – but the mage can cast no other spells while the shield is in effect, so its usefulness is limited. Magical attacks are made with the following stats: av5 cd8, range is line of sight. The fireball covers a 3”x3”area. Lightning strike targets one individual enemy. The target of a fireball must be at least 2” away from the caster, but lightning has no minimum range. Fireball and lightning damage is 2 wnds for anyone caught by it - this becomes important when combating bigger monsters. For HTH consideration, a mage‛s stats are av1 dv2, and they have 2 wnds. They deal out 1 wnd of damage in HTH when using a dagger, staff, beating the critter with their heavy spell book, whatever. As with the other characters, it does not really matter what their miniature is equipped with, the stats remain the same. 4.0 Party Creation Each player controls their own party of adventurers. Composition of the party will be dependant upon the type of game your group has decided to play. 4.1 Standard party makeup Each player gets 1 character of each class, of any race. 4.2 Optional party composition Players may build custom parties, using preset point values. In general, it is a good idea to have the party made up of one of each character type, as each has special skills which will prove useful in the course of the adventure. But, players may tweak their party composition in any manner they see fit within the following criteria. Each player only gets 8pts to use to build their party. A party must have at least 3 characters. Standard Character types: Cost Class AV DV WNDs 1 Fighter 5 5 3 1 Cleric 4 4 2 1 Archer 2 3 2 1 Thief 2 2 2 1 Mage 1 2 2

Special

break down doors - bash open chests - 2 attacks if he hasn‛t moved. turn undead (counts as av5 CD d8 attack) - heal 18” ranged attack (av5 CD d8) - can shoot twice if hasn‛t moved detect/disarm traps/pick locks & backstab attack (av5 d8) fireball/lightning attack 36” range (av5 CD d8) - mr = 3/10

Character racial options are as follows: Cost Race MV CD (HTH) Special Human 8 d8 none .5 Elf 10 d6 wnds -1 .5 Dwarf 6 d8 wnds +1 .5 Halfling 6 d6 DV+1

Magic Resistance (MR) = 1/10 MR = 1/10 MR = 1/10

Characters enter the dungeon equipped with generic standard equipment as follows: Each carries a weapon which delivers a single wound per attack. Each wears armor appropriate to their class, and reflected in their preset defense value. 4.3 Additional Startup equipment Bonus startup equipment (if your are playing using the optional party rules) may be purchased from the following table using points remaining after party composition is determined. 13

Bonus Cost .5 1 1

startup equipment costs and specifics Item Discription One time use instant cleric – useable by any character, cures any and all wounds once healing potion Magic weapon Replace any 1 character‛s starting weapon with a +1 AV version of the same weapon. Magic Cloak A +1 DV cloak wearable by any class.

So, based upon the above, a player may, if desired, create a party composed of only 3 members, possibly all non-humans, with multiple magical goodies. The type of player who likes to min/max startup stats might chose to have 2 Dwarven fighters with magical weapons, and an Elven mage with a magical cloak, and a potion of healing. That adds up to 8 pts, it provides for an impressive combat line composed of 2 sturdy dwarves, each with magical weapons, ranged attacks are covered by the elven mage, who is fleet of foot, but a tad fragile (1 wnd) but the enhanced dv given by the cloak will help him avoid an untimely death. The healing potion may be used by any party member to resuscitate an ailing teammate, once. Perhaps this same player, being a bit more paranoid, might elect to alter party composition a bit, and make 1 of the Dwarven fighters into a Dwarven cleric instead. This would still provide for a strong front line, but at the same time allow for a bit more healing power, and add powerful ally against undead. I suggest using a full 5 person party, at least for the first couple of times you play. 4.4 Playing with higher lvl characters You may desire to start off with more powerful characters, and if all players agree to do so, it is easily accomplished. In essence, you will be using a party composed of characters with a bit of experience, who have already accumulated goodies. Your options are as follows: Basic party – as described above – one of each, or use the 8pt optional party. No additional goodies, no character improvements. Advanced party – earns a +1 on encounter determination rolls Created as a basic party, plus 5 improvement points, and 5 random goodies You may use a maximum of 2 pts on any one character. Each point so designated, improves that character in the following manner. 1 point will: Add 1 to standard av, dv, or wnds Or, add 1 to specialist av or d2 to specialist cd Or, add 2” to movement Or add d2 to standard cd (d6 becomes d8, d8 becomes d10, etc) Or add 1 to mr Distribute your points, roll for your goodies, and get ready to play. Heroic Party – earns a +2 on encounter rolls As above, but with 10 improvement points, and 10 random goodies Maximum of 3 pts to any individual character Elite party – earns +3 on encounter rolls As above, but with 15 improvement points and 15 random goodies Maximum of 4 pts to any individual character Duplicate goodies are NOT re-rolled (just think of it as fate playing a trick on you.) So, once the players have decided what type of parties they wish to play, take a moment to assign the improvements and goodies to the characters, and record them on your character sheet so that you don‛t forget who has what. 14

5.0 Game Fundamentals – So how‛s this all work anyway … 5.1 Turn based action – a basic overview The game follows the “first we move, then we fight” school of thought. At the beginning of a player‛s turn, immediately check to determine if an encounter occurs for line of site tokens visible to the characters, prior to making any movement. (That process is detailed below) Then, the current player moves his characters. If character movement brings a new token into line of site, Then that token will be checked as soon as the player hascompleted character movememnt. If so desired, the player may elect to hold his thiefs movement in “reserve” but all other characters are moved prior to determining if the encounter token activates. Since we (the actual human players) know that our party is in the vicinity of a potential encounter, we may tend to position then in a manner that would be most benificial should the anticipated encounter occur. This is fine, and could reasonably reflect a healthy paranoia on the part of the characters, who we could assume have noticed something suspicious. However, since the characters are presumably acting and reacting as individuals (not a modern day well disciplined and trained tactical SWAT team) it would be inappropriate to have the party continually moving as if they were aware of each encounter before hand. Certainly, maneuver your adventurers cautiously, but you cannot hold the rest of the parties movement in reserve while you send one fellow ahead to check for bad guys. The only character that may hold his movement until after encounters are checked for is the thief. He‛s sneaky that way. Once all movement has taken place, check any newly encountered (ie, now within line of sight) tokens for potential activation. If an encounter token activates, roll on the appropriate critter chart to determine who/what has appeared. Assign the critters to the previous player (the player counter clockwise to the current player) and have him/her bring the critters into play. The critters will begin begin their movement from the point that the token was placed. (we will assume that they came up out of a trap door, a secret door, descended out of a hole in the ceiling, whatever seems reasonable.) regardless of their origin, the critters enter play from the point that the token was located, and may immediately utilize their full movement. if they cross thru an opponents attack zone[5.5.2], they will be subject to a free attack. Once all characters have moved, actions are declared.. Actions consist of activities such as casting spells, firing arrows, healing, trying to open doors or chests, or attacking something. That‛s about all this game is about. After actions are declared, carry them out systematically, so you don‛t overlook something. (You want to avoid the possibility that a critter your archer forgot to shoot this turn kills your cleric next turn) After 1 round of combat (both sides get to attack and defend once) the current player‛s turn is over. (combat is cover in more depth here [9.0]) If the player chooses to do so, he may place one of his hindrance tokens. Tokens may be placed within line of site, but no closer than 6 in‛s to any player‛s models. (More detail on this later on) 5.2 Initiative – How does it work? Combat often takes multiple turns, and an initiative roll is made to determine which side moves first. Typically, combat occurs as the result of a random encounter token being activated. Which means that the party may be caught flatfooted, allowing the critters to deploy and declare attacks immediately. Once the critters have deployed, party members who have not yet moved (possibly the thief) or acted that turn are allowed to react to the sudden evil onslaught, moving and making attack declarations as appropriate. This will be explained more in depth in section [8]. Since combat occurs simultaneously [5.5.1], initiative does not provide any combat benefits beyond allowing one side to react and move prior to the other. 15

5.3 Movement To keep things simple, be lenient on movement. In other words, allow models to move diagonally if there are no obstacles in their path. Just use a ruler or something to ensure that they don‛t get carried away and exceed their movement allowance. With regards to movement, turns cost nothing. A model may perform all the U turns he wants provided he doesn‛t move a linear distance greater than his movement allowance. As long as opposing models are within 1” of each other, they can engage in HTH. 5.3.1 Standard movement As determined by the characters race, this is the distance that the model may be moved, and still be able to attack, or otherwise perform an action. In most cases, and always during combat, movement is taken prior to an action. If combat is not occurring, it may be reasonable to allow a character to move after an action has been performed. For example, a cleric begins a turn adjacent to a wounded comrade, having just survived a melee that ended last turn. The cleric may heal the other party member, and then take his standard movement. He may not perform any other action this turn. Likewise, the healed comrade may also make a standard move after being healed, but he also is unable to perform any other action this turn – his action this turn was in effect, being healed. 5.3.2 Double movement Any character (or critter) may choose to take a double move, and forego other actions during a turn. This basically indicates that they are running. If they run thru an opponent‛s attack zone, they roll their dv+cd as normal, and they do not get to counter attack. If an opponent moves thru their attack zone, then the running individual Does Not get a free attack. Double movement comes at a cost, and that cost is, you get to do nothing else. There may be magical goodies or spells which contradict this, but they will be detailed separately. 5.3.3 Moving past obstacles, critters and party members If there are impassable obstacles, then certainly the model will have to travel around it. If there are obstacles in the way that all players previously agreed would effect movement, but not prevent it, then apply that effect against the model‛s movement rate. If you are using a dungeon tile that has a flooded room, and all players during setup agreed that traveling thru the flooded area would halve the characters movement rate, then obey that restriction when the situation is encountered. If something occurs during play that wasn‛t anticipated when the dungeon was setup, then get a consensus of all players opinions, arrive at 2 or 3 reasonable solutions and roll a d6 to determine which one occurs. For example, you are using a dungeon tile that has a stream of lava on it. During setup, everyone agreed this would be an impassable obstacle, but during game play a lucky character found boots of flight and now wants to fly over it. A quick opinion poll shows a split decision – on a d6 1-3 the character is capable of doing it, on 4-6 the convection currents over the lava are too great, and the player is forced back from the still impassable obstacle. Achieve a reasonable solution, and move on. Friendly models can move thru each other without hindrance, provided neither is involved in HTH at that moment. For example, a cleric can hustle past an archer in order to get to a model who needs healing, without penalty to either. But he cannot pass thru the space occupied by a fighter engaged in HTH – he will have to go around – and he will need to be aware of the opposing combatant‛s attack zone, or he may just become a casualty himself. Movement past enemy models is of course possible, but you will likely have to defend against a free attack [5.5.2] in the process, assuming you cross thru their attack zone. Opposing models may not be passed thru, unless the moving character is immaterial like a ghost. In other words, 16

the player controlling a ghost may choose to have the ghost waft thru a fighter in order to attack a cleric behind him (which would make the ghost susceptible to a free attack from the fighter if it moved thru his attack zone, but not susceptible to a free attack when the ghost is actually occupying the same space as the fighter – you can‛t stab yourself in order to damage the ghost –that won‛t work) But, the fighter cannot choose to charge thru a ghost in order to attack whatever is behind it. 5.3.4 Special movement These are types of movement that characters do not inherently posses, but critters might. Additionally, these powers may be granted by magical goodies. 5.3.5 Flight Flight ignores obstacles such as tables, chairs, and rubble strewn about. Also allows unhindered travel across pits and water obstacles. Characters who have somehow gained the benefit of flight are not able to fight, shoot arrows, cast spells, backstab, banish undead, etc, while flying. Yes, some critters are fully capable of fighting while flying, but they were born with wings, adventurers were not. All of a fighter‛s martial training assumes gravity is firmly in effect, likewise an archer would be unable to properly adjust for windage if he himself were part of the wind. Flying will allow an archer or mage to attain a lofty perch (if available) and then rain down death and destruction. 5.3.6 Immaterial Ghost, Wraiths, and certain other undead epitomize this condition. Now you see‛em, now you don‛t. Boo! Those that can assume a non material form can ignore all normal obstacles – locked doors, gates, walls, pits, water, fire – all of it is ineffective at stopping immaterial critters. Pentagrams, circles of protection, and certain other magical forces may be able to stop an immaterial being, but … well … I actually haven‛t written rules for that yet. Patience grasshopper, patience. 5.3.7 Waterwalk / Lavawalk Elemental style movement (yes, water elementals can walk on water, and fire elementals can walk on lava, duh) that characters may acquire thru magical means. This ability effectively allows the unhindered crossing of water or lava. 5.3.8 Jumping/Leaping Characters may attempt to jump across a linear distance of 5 or 10 ft. This is treated as running, which means other actions are not permitted during the turn in which a leap is attempted. A run up distance of the standard move is required, and a role against the characters standard attack value is required in order to be successful. The difficulty of the jump is as follows: 5ft linear jump 3dv+d6 10ft linear jump 5dv+d8 ties favor the character. If you feel this is too difficult, bear in mind that these are people wearing armor and carrying lots of gear. If you feel this is too easy, bear in mind that this is a game in which unreasonable things occasionally occur. 5.3.9 Swimming Characters cannot swim. This is pretty much a given, people in armor trying to swim, sink. Don‛t blame me, blame physics. This is only a problem with water areas that have been deemed impassable; presumably those are areas that cannot be waded thru. Characters can wade thru passable water hazards at ½ their standard mv rate. You cannot run through water. Well, scratch that- if you want to declare a running move, then 17

you can move at your full standard (non running) rate, and you cannot perform any other actions during that turn. Now, back to impassable water hazards – if you are not swimming, and you are not wading, then what you are doing is referred to as “drowning”. Drowning is not good, it is one of the few ways where you could become dead, and out of reach of the clerics healing powers. Clerics can not hold their breath long enough to heal characters resting at the bottom of a water hazard. Characters who find themselves in deep water, need to get out, quickly. No wnds are suffered on the first turn they find themselves in impassable water, but they will suffer 1 wnd at the end of each additional turn that they remain in the water. Getting out of deep water requires a successful attack role against the following values: Mages/thieves/archers Fighters/clerics

3dv+d6 5dv+d8

ties favor the character.

This process is more difficult for fighters and clerics for obvious reasons – they wear heavier armor. Other characters who are in a position to assist (they are on dry land within 1” of the drowning victim) may add +2 to the characters role. Assisting characters cannot perform other actions while on lifeguard duty. Characters that drown, sink, and cannot be brought back by the cleric. All their goodies are also gone. Bummer. 5.3.10 Falling Falling is a natural movement ability that all characters possess. It‛s just not customarily considered a preferred method. Characters who fall into a pit, or the equivalent of more than 10ft (game feet, roughly 2”s) will need to survive a 5av+d8 attack to avoid suffering a wound. If your dungeon environment provides the opportunity to suffer a fall from a greater height, then increase the av of the fall for every additional 5 ft fallen. Falls up to 20 ft cause 1 wnd, 20 to 50ft cause 2 wounds, and if your characters can somehow manage to fall further than that, then they are effectively dead. Extricating characters from pits is effectively the same process as getting out of deep water – roll the character‛s attack against the following difficulty – 4dv+d8. All characters face the same difficulty, and no wounds are suffered for failing to get out of the pit. (Note: it is assumed that the party has mundane equipment like ropes and such with them, so getting people out of a pit is more a nuisance than anything else.) 5.4 Armor, Weapons & other basic Equipment Characters enter the dungeon equipped with generic standard equipment as follows: Each carries a weapon which delivers a single wound per attack. Each wears armor appropriate to their class, and reflected in their preset defense value. Each carries class specific items as appropriate –mages have their magic components, clerics have their holy symbols, thieves have their lock picks, archers have LOTS of arrows, fighters have their stern disposition & bad attitude. 5.4.1 Magical Equipment – the Goodies Come on, you want it; you know you want it; it‛s why you‛re here. And most likely, you will find it. Every encounter has the potential of providing some magical goodies for your greedy pleasure. There are many types of goodies, some usable by everybody, some restricted to particular character classes. See the attached Goodie Lists [17] for specifics, and keep your fingers crossed when you roll on it. In essence, magical goodies are desirable because of how they affect a characters av, dv, cd, wnds, or movement. Why this is important was covered in section [2.4]. 18

5.5 Combat – A basic overview Combat involves two types of values: known commodities -the attacker‛s av and the defenders dv - and a random element -the cd rolled by each combatant. This allows fate to influence the outcome directly – in other words, a defender with a low dv, can still defend against a high av attacker, if the respective die rolls work out in the defenders favor. Similarly, an attacker with a low av, can overcome a high dv defender, if the attacker rolls really high, and the defender rolls really low. A more in depth explanation of combat is found in section [9.0]. 5.5.1 Simultaneous results All combat during a given turn occurs simultaneously. Now, this rule is not intended to indicate that all combatants line up, pair off, and on the count of 3 stab each other – rather it is intended to illustrate that combat is inherently chaotic, and therefore there is no controlling force that can pause the action and say “OK, this guy was going to attack that guy, but since that guy got killed by the other dude instead, I am going to change his attack to this fellow over here.” That is not going to happen. Both sides declare who is going to do what to whom, and then we methodically roll dice to see what happens. If one bad guy suffers enough damage to kill him 3 times over, and the guy next to him doesn‛t take a scratch, so be it. 5.5.2 Attack Zone (az) – Free Attacks - mentioned previously, but what do they mean? The attack zone of any given model includes all squares directly in front of and to either side of that model. See figures 1 and 3, below. Unless specified for a particular critter, the attack area does not include the rear flanks, or the square directly behind the model. If an enemy model crosses thru a miniatures attack zone, then the stationary character/critter is allowed a free attack on the offending miscreant. This means that a standard attack roll (av+cd) is made against the moving model‛s standard defense roll (dv+cd) but no counterattack is allowed. Up to 2 free “attack zone” attacks can be made by one model against another during the course of a models movement. Example – a giant rat runs by a thief, crossing first in front of, and then alongside the thief, as it attempts to flee. Even though the rat may have physically occupied more than 2 of the squares immediately in front of and/or beside the thief in the course of its pell-mell scramble, the thief will only be allowed to make 2 free attacks upon it. These attacks are referred to as free, because they do not count against him as an action, but the rat is still entitled to his defense rolls. The only exception to this freebie attack rule pertains to clerics – if they are busy healing somebody, they cannot interrupt that action in order to take a free attack on a passing critter. If they do so, then the healing that they were undertaking fails, and they will have to devote another turn to their patient. Oops – second exception – the cleric‛s patient is not permitted to make free attacks during the turn in which he is being healed either. His/her complete attention is occupied with “remaining not dead”. Note: merely entering one of the squares delineating the attack zone does not initiate a free attack against the intruder. We can assume that an opponent closing with the character, and stopping upon entering the attack zone is on guard and prepared for combat, thus there is no careless opportunity available in which the free attack could be made. It is the process of passing thru one of the squares comprising the attack zone that triggers a free attack. Also Note: merely having a portion of a model within an opponents az does not necessarily indicate the models are within HTH range. In figure 2 below, both C & D are within 1” of the character, and are therefore potential HTH targets. We can assume that if critter A approached the character from the front, that he will have had to have passed through 2 squares of the az, 19

and thus was open to 2 free attacks. Both B & C would not have been in danger of a free attack, as they stopped within the first square of the az. We can also assume that D may have crossed thru one square of the az, and thus earned a free attack, but as he has stopped within the az, and within 1” of the character,and is thus presumably “on guard” a second free attack would not have been possible.

Figure 1

Figure 3 Figure 2

Figure 4

5.5.3 HTH (Hand to Hand) Combat For HTH combat to occur, two models need to be within 1 inch of other, and have an action available. It works like this: Compare the attacker‛s av+cd to the defenders dv+cd – If the attack total is greater than total defense value, then the attack lands, and target unit suffers a wound. If the defense total is higher than the attack, then no damage is taken. Ties favor the defender. Note: The attacker does not need to be in the other guys az – he only needs to be with in 1” of his target. In figure 4, above, critter D can happily attack the character, and although the character will be entitled to his normal dv+cd roll, he will not be able to counter attack, as his attentions are elsewhere. If critter D happens to be a thief, and if he got himself into this choice location without crossing the characters az, then this attack could be a backstab attack.[5.5.7] A basic combat example:

an elven thief attacks a dwarven mage av = 2 dv = 2 cd = d6 cd = d8 2 + d6 roll vs 2 + d8 roll

In this example, the dwarf has a slight advantage, because even though a mage is less martially trained than a thief, he is still a dwarf, and dwarves are sturdy folk. However, if the thief were able to maneuver into a position where he could backstab the mage [see 5.5.7], then the thief would have the advantage. But as it stands, either side could prevail depending upon the roll of the dice. In case of a tie, defense wins. 5.5.4 Ranged attacks Just like HTH, but using the archer‛s specialist value instead of normal HTH rates. The defender uses their standard dv and cd values. Ranged weapons can fire twice per turn, if the unit has not moved, or once if the unit made a standard move. Range for standard character missile weapons is 18” (Please remember that we are underground here, so arching the shot is a bit difficult.) Unless magically enhanced, missile weapons do 1 wnd damage. 5.5.5 Spell attacks Essentially the same procedure as HTH, but the attacker uses their specialist av and cd instead of their standard values. The target uses its normal dv+cd in defense. 20

In the previous example, the dwarven mage decides to lightning bolt the elf after surviving the elf‛s foolhardy attack. The elf first gets a 1/10 resistance save, and if he fails that, he makes a defense roll of 2+d6 vs 5+d8 (most likely, he‛s toast) All spell attacks allow for a magical resistance roll; a successful roll indicates no damage is taken. A failed mr roll still allows a defender their normal dv+cd roll, unless otherwise specified. The purpose of a allowing a dv roll vs spells, is to accommodate the possibility that the targets superior combat reflexes, and/or outright bloody luck allowed the fortunate git to dodge or trip at the just right moment so as to avoid certain pain. Funny force, fate. Works in odd ways.

Figure 5 Figure 6 Since a fireball attack has an area of effect, it is important to understand how that works. Figure 5 shows the basic blast area, and figure 6 shows some critters unlucky enough to be caught in the vicinity. Only critters A & C are going to take damage from the blast, and then only if they fail their defense rolls. B and D are effectively outside the blast area. I typically advise centering the fireball on one particular square, as it then makes it pretty easy to determine what models are caught in the effect area. Rule of thumb is that if more than half of a models base is within the blast area, he is potentially toast. The lightning strike targets a single critter, so it has no area of effect, and since it is a line of site attack, it‛s resolution is pretty straightforward – if the mage can see ‘em, he can blast ‘em – roll and check attack vs defense and see what happens. 5.5.6 Banishment The cleric‛s Banishment attack is a different type of attack, because it has both a broader application, and a narrower focus. It can be used to attack all undead in line of site, and gets resolved against each undead as an av5 d8 attack. Basically, the cleric roles his attack value, and all the undead he can see, roll their defense. The successful banishment causes 1 wnd to each critter, and may take out several nasties at one time. This will destroy most low value undead with a single successful attack. More powerful undead may take a second round to overcome. Good stuff, but only useful against limited (aka, undead) opponents. In essence, the cleric strikes a holy pose, and orders the disturbed souls to depart the realm of the living. In reverential awe, they do so. Or not; if they make their defense roll, they may just continue with whatever nastiness they were about to commit prior to being interrupted by the holy do-gooder. On the critter chart, those creatures susceptible to banishment will be labeled as undead. If they are not so labeled, then banishment won‛t even slow them down. Undead with a magical resistance (mr) are allowed that save prior to rolling their standard defense. The cleric may continue to attempt to banish once each turn until successful, or until overrun by hoards of angry undead. 21

5.5.7 Backstab attack A very tricky maneuver, but effective if achieved. Traditionally, the thief‛s main goal with regards to combat is to avoid it altogether. He would be much happier looting the dead after someone else took the risks involved with killing them. This is reflected in his less than stellar combat abilities – normally av2 and dv2 – better than a mages, but that‛s about all you can say about it. However, since they can hold their move until all others have already moved, they potentially have the ability to maneuver into a position where they can attack an opponent from behind. If the thief attacks from one of the 3 squares behind an opponent – essentially these are the squares that are not part of the opponents attack zone - see figures 1-4 above – and if he was able to get there without crossing thru that opponents attack zone (although he can cross some other models az, providing he survives the free attacks generated by that action) then he may attempt a backstab as his attack. The premise here is that the target does not see it coming, and thus the attack is nearly undefended. The targets full dv is allowed (consider this the passive defense of the targets armor) and one half (rounded up)of the victims cd roll (consider this the effect of fate causing the target to shift his weight, or dodge for some reason at just the correct moment to foul up the thief‛s backstab attempt.) It is not an easy attack to achieve, but if the thief lands it, he will inflict 2-3 wounds, instead of the standard 1. So flip a quarter … heads= 2wnds … tails =3wnds If the attack fails to land (the attacking player rolls poorly, the defender rolls really well, whatever) there is a small chance that the victim will not realize an attempt was even made (as unlikely as that sounds, if the victim was unaware that the thief got behind him, then it is equally possible that he would remain unaware of the botched attack – assume that the thief completely whiffed the attack and didn‛t even touch him – hey this is fantasy remember, roll with it.) Anyway, if the attack failed, roll a d6, on a 1 or 2, the victim is not aware of the thief, and assuming that both the victim and the thief survive until next turn, then the thief can try again. In reality, what this means is that the player controlling the victim should not arbitrarily have the victim turn around next turn and attack the thief, he should instead have the victim continue to fight the opponents he was previously engaged with, and seek out new opponents if there are any in front of him. If the victim moves to locate new opponents, the thief may follow – and is of course required to avoid the targets attack zone all over again. Now this does not mean that the player controlling the victim is obliged to stand there and get whacked if there are no other targets to engage – if there are no other models for the victim to attack, it is entirely plausible that he would turn around and discover the thief, and there after attack him. All this is of course moot if the thief misses the original backstab, and then rolls 3 or better on a d6 – this means his clumsy attempt alerted his victim, and he better get ready to run next turn. ‘Nuff said on that subject. 5.6 Non-combat actions These are the sorts of things your characters may undertake that don‛t immediately involve bloodletting. They may help prepare for bloodletting, or assist in recovering from bloody mayhem, but they are not, in and of themselves, combative actions.

22

5.6.1 Spell effects – Fireball and Lightening strike have already been pretty much covered, so here is a more compleat writeup on the other 4 spells the mage can call upon. Spells Fireball Lightning strike Open Lock Hocus Pocus Quickening Shield

Area of Effect 3”x3” Square single target single target single target single target single target

Range line of sight line of sight 1” 3” 6” 1”

Attack Strength av5 cd8 av5 cd8 av4 cd6 av5 cd8 n/a n/a

5.6.2 Open lock - allows a mage to open a locked object, less capably than a thief could pick it, or a fighter could bash it, but still its better than no skill at all. Range 1” av4 cd6. 5.6.3 Hocus Pocus - sort of a transformational spell that only effects critters. (Not other players‛ characters) Basically, it transforms a critter into something else, randomly. So this could be good, but it could also be bad. The mage may use this spell on one critter within 3”s and if that critter fails its magic resistance (if applicable) and its defense roll, then roll a d6, on 14, a single random low value critter replaces the target critter, on a 5, its replaced with a single moderate value critter, and on a 6, its a random high value critter. The replacement critter starts the next turn fully capable of attacking as its new incarnation, and any attacks it made during the turn it was transformed are carried out as normal for its previous form. (because all combat occurs simultaneously, remember?) The encounter will generate treasure and goodies as per its original value. That is, a high value encounter that gets transformed into a moderate value critter will still have a high value treasure result, and a moderate value critter that becomes a high value critter will not suddenly gain riches. 5.6.4 Quickening - With this spell, the mage bestows double movement rate, double attacks, and adds 1 to the dv, of one target miniature. This could be a party member, or a critter. This goes into effect for the turn following that in which it was cast, and last for just that single turn. Only physical attacks are doubled, magical attacks (fireballs, lightning) cannot be cast by the same character twice in one turn, due to limitations in the nature of the time-space continuum. In other words, just because the mage can move his hands faster, and talk really fast, doesn‛t mean the spell will work twice. In fact, a mage who is quickened cannot cast spells at all, because his carefully timed manipulations of the magical auras that power his spells don‛t work right when done at double-time. Oh well, it will still allow the mage to run away really fast. For example, an archer who has been Quickened, may remain stationary and fire four arrows next turn; or move 2x his normal movement range, and shoot twice; or flat out run for 4x his normal move. The turn after that, he is back to normal. Quickened targets that move through another model‛s attack zone are only subject to one free attack (as opposed to the standard 2 free attack maximum), no matter how many portions of the attack zone they move through. Oh yeah, by the way, the target of this spell suffers one wound automatically, as the result of the extra stress placed upon their heart and circulatory system. This wound occurs as the spell wears off, at the end of the turn that its powers were in effect. The drain upon the recipients system is so great that it can not be cast upon the same character 2 turns in a row, for to do so will cause 2 wounds automatically as the spell wears down. What this boils down to is this – If quickening is cast upon a character who is already quickened, then they will remain quickened on the following turn – but they will suffer 2 wounds at the end of that turn, in addition to the single wound they sustained during their first turn of being quickened. 23

5.6.5 Shield - A mage may cast the shield spell upon himself, or upon any other character. While in effect, it increases the recipient‛s dv by 2. But, it is not a persistent spell, which means that the mage may not cast another spell while the shield is maintained. In essence, the mages magical forces are being continually focused into a mobile buffer around the target character, and the moment he casts a different spell, the buffer dissolves. So basically, the shield spell is most useful for those times when the mage needs/desires to gain protection at the expense of offensive capability. A shielded character may move and fight as normal. The shield will not protect the recipient as well from attacks that land during the turn in which the shield spell was cast, instead, it is only a +1 dv protection for that initial turn. (considering that the attacks were already underway when the spell was cast - simultaneous combat, remember? - envision that the buffer-zone did not have the time to come to full power yet) If the spell is cast upon another character, and the mage dies, the shield dissolves immediately. If the shield dissipates during combat, either because the mage just became dead, or has decided to cast some other spell, it fades away immediately, and no dv advantage is gained during that turn‛s combat. This may come as an unfortunate surprise to a character who may was dependant upon that defense bonus, but that‛s what happens when you trust dabblers of the arcane arts. For example, during the first turn of combat, a player has his mage cast shield upon the party‛s cleric. That is the mage‛s action for this turn. For any attacks against the cleric this turn, she receives a +1 bonus to her dv. During the second turn of combat, providing the mage does not become dead, or decide to cast some other spell, the cleric will receive a bonus of +2 to her dv. That +2dv bonus will remain in effect until the mage decides to cast some other spell, or dies. The spell can be switched from one target to another at any time, but that voids the dv bonus on the first target, and starts again as a +1dv bonus upon the new character, just as if the spell has been freshly cast. It is not permissible for a player to switch the focus of the shield spell from one character to another if the combat dice have already begun to be rolled. That decision must be made prior to any combat rolls actually being made. This is to avoid the possibility of “ooh, he made his defense roll by 4 points, so he didn‛t really need the shield, so I will move it over to this guy who really needs it.” That sort of thing is highly frowned upon by the lords and ladies of fate - ie, the other players. 5.7 Opening locked doors & chests Fighters, thieves, and mages each have the ability to open locked doors and chests. Basically, fighters just tend to pound on them till they break (utilizing their standard av5+cd ). Thieves use their lock picking skills (av5+d8). Mages use their magical abilities to try to get the lock to fall apart (av4+d6). Only the thief has the ability to disarm any traps he might find while picking the lock, both the fighter and mages techniques tend to set off potential traps. This is covered in depth here [8.1] 5.8 Death Dungeons are a dangerous place. Characters are going to die. Often, in fact. But, since this is all just a game, it does not need to be a permanent affliction. The key to getting back up to fight again is having a cleric available to patch you up. (Big hint – Keeping the cleric alive is VERY important) 24

5.8.1 Mostly Dead – don‛t let this happen to you! When any character has taken sufficient damage to reduce them to 0 (or fewer) wnds, they have become “mostly dead” and begin the brief journey towards “all the way dead.” This is a condition to be avoided, or corrected rapidly, if possible. Characters who are mostly dead cannot move, cannot fight, cannot cast spells – basically all they can do is lie there and bleed, thus becoming more dead. 5.8.2 Cheating Death – and getting away with it! In game play terms, it works like this: if the cleric is base to base (or reasonably close - say, within a quarter inch) with the character who just croaked during the turn in which they croaked, and attempts to revive them at that time (assuming that they have not already used up their available action doing something else) then they will be able to revive the mostly dead character automatically (this is the benefit of having a direct line to the healing power of a god – it‛s a good thing.) If the cleric gets to the dead character the turn after he was struck down, then there is a 1 in 6 chance that the character is not revivable. It becomes progressively more difficult to heal the mostly dead, eventually they become completely dead. For example, the cleric sees his companion get flattened by the big ugly critter, so he drops everything and runs over to help. On the next turn, he is able to establish base to base contact, and commences EMT procedures. Role a d6, on a result of 1, the victim is all the way dead and the cleric has failed to save him, and coincidentally, has now utilized his declarable action this turn. If it takes 2 turns for the cleric to get there, then there is a 2 in 6 chance of failing, 3 turns = a 50% chance of failure, and so on. If it takes more than 5 turns to attempt to revive the poor soul, then stick a fork in ‘em and flip ‘em, cause he‛s done. You cannot roll to determine chance of revival until the cleric is base to base and has declared that‛s what he is attempting to do. None of this “oh he looked dead, so I am going to use my action to attack this critter over here, instead of carrying thru on my attempt to heal” kind of thing. Characters who have been healed and/or revived this turn, start the next turn at full health and may commence normal activity immediately. 5.8.3 Completely Dead or “When Death wins” If the Cleric did not get there in time, or rolled poorly, the patient dies. About all you can do then is divide up the poor fellows magical goodies (if any), and move on. Loosing a character does not prevent a party from pressing on, and continuing to collect goodies and loot. (Remember – as long as one of your characters exits the dungeon alive, with loot, it was a good day) 5.8.4 Looting the dead Looting the dead - goodies that get dropped by a dead character can be picked up and used by any character within 1” on their NEXT turn. This pilfering of the dead takes place instead of other normal actions - you may still take a normal move before or after. If the cleric was by their side as they kicked off, then it is reasonable to assume that the cleric is able to recover any magical goodies the dear departed was carrying, and pass them out to the rest of the party next turn. 5.9 Healing, or “I‛m not dead yet, really, I‛m feeling much better now…” The cleric can completely heal any single character during a turn wherein the miniatures are in base to base contact (or really darn close, see [5.8.2]), and are not performing other actions (other than a standard movement). 25

For example, the cleric makes her standard move, and meets up with a character whom has also just made their standard move – Healing Magic will now commence, and the character will begin next turn all healed up. If either character is attacked during this turn, they can make their defense roll, but if they fail the defense roll, they will take damage, and the cleric‛s attempts at healing for that particular turn are wasted. Neither the patient nor the cleric is allowed to counter attack while healing is attempted. A cleric can only heal one character at a time (multitasking is not really an option when you are trying to stuff somebody‛s spleen back into place.) 5.9.1 Healing Potions – why they are useful, and how they work. Magical healing potions can be administered by any character, and in essence temporarily assign clerical healing powers to the drinker of the potion. So drinking the potion does not actually heal you – instead it bestows healing power upon you so that you may heal yourself, or someone else who needs healing more than you. Perhaps the party‛s cleric - should she become perished, and therefore unable to heal herself. 6.0 Setup 6.1 The Dungeon - Setting the Stage Lay out the dungeon – do this as a group, and try to make it interesting. Arrange multiple entrances throughout, distributed evenly if possible, so competing parties are unlikely to enter right on top of each other. As previously mentioned, I use dungeon components created with Hirst Arts molds, sometimes augmented with dungeon tiles from Dwarven Forge‛s MasterMaze line. You can use anything you like, including just creating walls out of legos and lining em up on the dining room table, and then use a ruler or tape measure to determine movement and ranges. Have fun with it.

6.2 Encounters Since encounters, traps, and such occur randomly, we need to preset locations were such things may – or may not – occur. This is accomplished by placing markers (tokens) throughout the dungeon in places where encounters could take place. These tokens have the possibility of “activating” when a players party encounters them. Or they may just wander away. Place potential encounter tokens, 1 or 2 per chamber, and in other likely locations, as appropriate. Additionally, please keep in mind that every closed door is a potential encounter (who knows what lies waiting on the other side…) Section [8.1] has specifics regarding doors and chests. 26

Use different types of tokens to represent the two main types of random encounters: animate & and inanimate. Animate encounters definitely involve critters, and are tested as soon as characters can see them (or can be seen by them). Inanimate encounters are things like doors and containers. Something may occur, but only after the characters specifically begin messing around with it – (trying to open doors, unlock chests, etc.) These tokens need to be obvious to all players prior to beginning the game, so that time is not wasted during gameplay having characters investigate nifty looking doodads that aren‛t potential encounters. Now, I agree that the more really cool stuff you have distributed throughout the dungeon, the more amazing everything is going to look. But unless you want each and every item to be a potential encounter – this is possible, but it will make for a long game – then I advise that you limit potential encounters to critters, containers, and doors. Critter encounter tokens are pretty specific – they indicate very definitely that if an encounter does occur, it will involve opponents, combat, and hopefully treasure. I typically use .5 inch skull tokens to represent critter encounters. It looks sort of dramatic, having these skulls randomly placed thoughout the gaminging area, you just know that interesting things are going to happen.... Container encounters are a little bit different. They arise when a party investigates a chest, crate, pile of bags, stack of barrels or whatever has been designated as representing a static encounter – in other words they are indicative of the party searching for treasure and goodies, and thus opening themselves up to the possibility of a random event occurring. These encounters are not always for the better, they do not always benefit the party, and sometimes they do involve critter intervention. Resolution of these events will occur later, but in essence, it is important to remember that placement of the tokens representing these potential incidents does not indicate that the owners of the dungeon were preparing to move, and thus have stacks of boxes and barrels and whatnot willy nilly all over the place, rather they are placed to become obvious foci for the players to investigate.

27

In order to provide flavor and ambiance to your playing environment, you may have all sorts of dungeon dressing spread throughout – torches, tables, dead bodies, rubble, etc. Eager players will probably want to spend time searching and investigating each and every item they encounter. This could seriously bog down gameplay, and lead to a situation where the characters never really make any progress through the dungeon, because they are caught up in every little detail. This sort of attention to detail is important in a role playing game, where the gamemaster is patently out to get you with fiendishly designed traps ensured to catch the party flat footed when they miss some innocuous clue, but that sort of trickery is not what this game is all about. All potential encounters need to be recognizable by the players as such before the game commences. Because there is typically no one individual controlling the game, we have to rely on the dice to determine when the bad things happen. That and the good graces of the individual who‛s turn preceeds your own, as that player will be the controller of the many evils that befall your characters. 6.3 Special encounters Unique dungeon dressing items – evil alters, burial crypts, shimmering pools, statues with ruby eyes that seem to glow with an inner light, etc – are all potential encounters as described in section [8.3] and should be placed throughout the dungeon when it is set up. Basically, this entails identifying the more unique and interesting areas or items that you have placed so that all players are aware of the significance, and may seek them out or avoid them as they see fit. 6.4 Player placed encounters – Hindrance Tokens/Annoyance tokens In addition to the normal encounter tokens pre-placed prior to the start of the game, each player is given 2 random encounter “hindrance” tokens for “opponent inconvenience” placement. These can be used to create a potential hazard in your opponent‛s path, should it appear that they are in need of additional critters to keep their party occupied. Or, perhaps just as an example of player vindictiveness - whatever. At the end of a players turn, he/she may place one of these tokens in the vicinity of another player‛s party. Or their own party, if they are bored and want to fight something. These tokens can be placed anywhere desired, including within a party‛s line of sight (they will be tested for activation immediately upon the next turn of whichever party they are in sight of) – but no closer than 6 inches to any character model. They are identical to standard tokens once placed in play. See token activation [8.2.1]. 6.4.1 A note regarding tokens I use the skull piece found on HirstArts mold #70 for standard potential encounters, I use the dragon‛s skull piece from mold # 80 for player distributed encounter tokens, and I use a standard .5” square block painted brown as a potential treasure chest token. Hey, it works for me. Again, you could use different colored Lego blocks to designate potential encounters. In fact, some of the Lego castle sets have all sorts of pieces that could be drafted into service – be creative. Whatever you are using, be sure at the beginning of play that all players are familiar with what represents potential encounters, and what are merely really neat bits that you added to the dungeon in order to create the appropriate “atmosphere.” 6.5 Determine what game variant is being played This is pretty straightforward, just make sure everybody understands which game variant is being played – this is to avoid any nasty surprises should one player forget that the chosen scenario is DeathMatch.[12.3] 28

6.6 Determine Flag or Special encounter locations Crusade and Capture the Flag scenarios require potential quest locations to be setup in advance, so now is the time to set them up. [12.2] 6.7 Determine party entrances - Introducing the Hero‛s to their fate It‛s time to figure out where the different parties enter the dungeon. When you created the dungeon, you established multiple entry points. Now you need to randomly assign each party to an entrance. If you created 6 entrances, then number them 1-6, and roll a die for each player to determine where his/her group will start. Do not start two parties at the same entrance. 6.8 Determine who goes first Roll a d6 to determine who goes first. High roll enters dungeon first, proceed clockwise around the table. 7.0 Player turn Here is a walkthrough of the basic points of a standard turn. Its a pretty straightforward process, actually. 7.1 Resolve any encounter tokens within line of sight Any tokens that are visible to any member of the party at the beginning of the turn, should be tested. 7.2 Determine character movement The current player moves his characters as he sees fit - all characters should be moved prior to checking for new encounters, except possibly the thief, if his move has been held in reserve. 7.3 Resolve any tokens that are now in line of sight Any tokens that have been revealed as the result of character movement should now be tested. If these activate, proceed to combat [9.0]. The thief may take his move at this time if it was held in reserve. 7.4 Carry out any special character abilities If combat is not ensuing, then now is the time for characters to perform non combat activities – healing[5.9], opening/bashing down doors or picking/bashing open locked chests[8.1], looting the dead[5.8.4], whatever. 7.5 Resolve any encounters which may result from opening doors or chests Doors and chests are potential encounters, see [8.1.2]. 7.6 If combat occurred… If combat occurred as the result of any of the potential encounters, then that phase of the players turn has ended once each side has had the opportunity to attack, providing the situation and proximity allowed for HTH or ranged attacks to take place. If neither side was affectively able to attack, then next turn initiative will be rolled, and combat will ensue. [9.0] 7.7 The last act Once all movement, special skills, and applicable combat has occurred, the players turn is nearly over, with one possible activity still to take place. The player may place a hindrance token is available, and if so desired. [6.4] 8.0 Encounter Resolution ... “I‛ll take what‛s behind door # 1 ...” 8.1 Doors, chests & Traps Pretty much everything the characters encounter is potentially lethal. This why things like random encounter tokens, chests, etc are placed throughout the dungeon during setup – it gives the characters something to do. So, when a possible trapped item is encountered, the party has to 29

decide if they are going to investigate it or not. Until a decision is made to actively interact with the potential threat, its status is undetermined. When it is decided that a thief will attempt to check for traps, or a fighter is going to break open a door or a chest, then it is time to learn if the item is actually trapped or not. 8.1.1 Results or “So we try to open it – now what?” First, roll a d6. On a 1, the door/chest/barrel/whatever, is unlocked, untrapped, and empty. Boring - move along, move along. On a roll of 2-6, the previous player draws a random card from a shuffled standard deck of playing cards. If it is a red card, the item (door, chest, barrel, whatever) is trapped, if it is a black card, it isn‛t. If trapped, the thief now has the opportunity to attempt to disarm it, by rolling his av5 d8 against the value of the trap. The trap‛s value is determined by adding a d6 to the face value of the previously drawn card. Face cards are worth 10, aces thru 10 are worth 1 thru 10. Therefore, if the trap card is an ace of hearts, and a 6 is rolled, then the thief needs to roll above a 7 in order to disarm the trap (nearly impossible to miss with an av5 d8 roll). Obviously, there will be traps that pop up that are too difficult for the thief to disarm without magical enhancement, oh well, those will be considered a learning experience when they blow up in his face. If the thief fails to disarm the trap, or if the item is being broken open by a fighter instead of being disarmed, then it will go off. 8.1.2 The Trap is sprung! - Boing! Traps - roll d8, add appropriate party encounter modifier 1-2 = low value critter 3 = pit trap - 20‛ drop into a 10x10 pit (works as a av5d6 attack - a successful defense avoids falling in) 4-5= med value critter 6= water trap - 10x10 area of floor opens into a 10‛ deep water pit - drowning becomes a problem. (determine victims in the same manner as the pit trap.)

7 = small fireball av5 d6 2wnd 3” rng - less range, greater damage 8 = big fireball 6av d8 1 wound 6” range from epicenter - less individual damage - higher likelihood of damage 9 = high value critter 10+ = elite critter To designate the location of a pit trap, a 2” square of some sort (paper/felt/craft foam) is placed by the previous player. To determine exactly where the center of a pit or fireball is, do the following: Roll a d12 to establish a direction, and a d4-1 to determine how far away from the trigger mechanism it will be. So, if a thief is checking for traps on a door, and fate decides that a pit trap is imminent, we roll a d12 and a d4-1 to determine where the pit occurs. We rolled a 3 on the d12, and a 2 on the d4(actually we rolled a 3 on the d4, but the -1 brought the result down to 2) If we assume that the direction the thief is facing is the top of the clock, then we will move the center of the pit 2”s to the right (towards 3 o‛clock.) So, the thief will most likely not fall in, but other members of his party might. All models with any of their base inside the area of the pit, need to check if they fell in or not. This same procedure works to determine where the center of a fireball will be. In the event that the trapped item is a door, then after the trap has sprung the door is either completely gone (it blew up or fell in the pit) or is now open (aka, the door opened up and the 30

critters on the other side attacked.) In either case, the party does not have to try to unlock the door, as the point is now moot. If the thief successfully disarmed the trap, then the door will still be there, and will need to be unlocked. Critters defending a door will have their standard treasure. Doors have no treasure. If the encounter involves a trapped container, and it results in a critter encounter, then the player controlling them needs to place the attacking critters in a way that makes some kind of sense. For example, giant rats may have swarmed out of a lair beneath the chest, spiders may have dropped from the ceiling, guards may have rushed in from the nearest entrance (alerted in some manner by the item being disturbed) Critters resulting from a trap encounter should be placed within 6” of the trapped item, and are able to immediately move and attack. Defeated critters will have any goodies normally assigned to them - these goodies are separate from what ever treasure the trapped item might contain. If the trapped item was a container of some sort (chest/bag/barrel/whatever) then the trap is assumed to have been setup in such a way as to avoid destroying the item it was protecting. So the chest may be a bit singed or dented, but it is still locked tight. 8.1.3 The Trap has been dealt with… Once the trap situation has been resolved, or it‛s determined that it wasn‛t trapped to begin with, then it is time to attempt to open the door/chest/whatever. Again, roll a d6 and add it to the value of the card, and then use either the thief‛s “open locks” roll or the fighters attack roll against that result to determine if the lock has been successfully picked, or just plain busted open. If the first attempt to open the item fails, then other members of the party may try as well, or the player may decide to wait til his next turn and try again. Regardless of when the second, and possibly additional attempts to open the item are made, each attempt requires a fresh draw from the deck, and a new d6 be rolled, in order to reestablish the difficulty of opening the object. This reflects the fact that different characters may use different techniques to attempt to open something, and that the same character attempting to open it multiple times will try different ways of doing so each time. Presumably he/she will eventually figure out an effective manner of doing so. A new value to roll against each time illustrates that the different attempts are encountering different strengths and weaknesses of the challenge. For example, a fighter may be having a difficult time overcoming the defensive value of a door, continually facing high value cards in his attempt to bash it down. Finally on his third attempt a low value card is drawn, and a 1 is rolled on the d6, providing him with a defensive value that his av5 d8 attack will easily overcome. We can assume that he finally decided to just pop the door from its hinges, instead of trying to pound thru it. 8.1.4 Rewards for your troubles … Once the trap is resolved and/or the lock is out of the way, then we determine what the characters find. If the item in question was a door, then it is now open, and the party may move thru. Once a door has been unlocked, it stays unlocked for the course of the game. If the item in question was a container of some kind, then draw a card again to determine your reward. 31

Ace thru 10 = 100 to 1000 in gold Jacks = 1 misc. goodie. Red Queens = 1 offensive goodie Black Queens = 1 defensive goodie Red Kings = 2 offensive goodies Black Kings = 2 defensive goodies Roll on the Goodie List to identify what specifically was found. Section [17] 8.2 Critters Critters are the antagonists that the adventures test their metal against, and are found throughout the dungeon. The various encounter tokens placed by the players during the dungeon setup all indicate locations where the adventures may meet up with the ravenous denizens of the underworld. 8.2.1 Encounter Tokens – Is the there anything there? Whenever a party achieves a line of site for an encounter token, roll a d6. On a roll of 1, nothing happens, but leave the token, and re-roll each turn the party remains in line of site. On a 2-5, an encounter occurs; determine critter and bring ‘em into play. [8.2.2] On a roll of 6, remove token, place it 4 to 16 inches away in a random direction. 8.2.3 Critter Determination – or, something wicked this way comes … Now we know an encounter is unfolding, but we need to determine with what. To accomplish this, roll d8. Add any appropriate party encounter modifier.(see [4.4]) 1-4 low 5-7 med 8-9 high 10 elite In general, the critter values correspond to the following guidelines … Low value encounters typically involves single wound critters with no special attacks, av & dv values in the 2-5 range, and a cd of d4 to d8. Units may have ranged weapons. Quantity of 1-6

Moderate value encounters will include 2 or 3 wound critters, special attacks are possible (multiple attacks, or poison bite/sting, etc) magic resist possible, av & dv values of 5-7, cd value of d8 or d10. Quantity of 1-3, individual moderate critters may lead a band of low value critters. High value encounters will involve critters with 3 wounds or better, multiple attacks, definitely a special attack of some kind, magic resistance probable, av & dv values of 6-9, cd of d10 or d12. Quantity 1-2 Elite Critters are just plain mean and nasty. Now refer to the critter chart [17] to discover what specific critter you encounter. 8.2.4 Rewards Once the ravening hoards are defeated, its time to revel in the rewards of combat. This rewards come in 2 forms – Gold and Goodies, and there distribution is based upon the type of encounter experienced. 8.2.4.1

32

Encounter type

Low value encounter Moderate value encounter High value encounter Elite encounter

Gold (d6)

200-1200 300-1800 500-3000 800-4200

Goodies

0-2 (d4-2) 1-4 2-5 (d4+1) 2-8 (2d4)

8.2.4.2 Gold ... “All that sparkles .. etc...” Add any gold found to your loot tally, and then forget about it. Don‛t worry about encumbrance, because the value given does not necessarily mean that you actually found that many coins – it could indicate that you found some small easily transportable bauble worth that much. The only importance non magical treasure has in this game is as sort of barometer of your success in the dungeon. For instance, victory conditions in some scenarios are based entirely upon the amount of gold your party found. Note: Magical treasure is not assigned a gold value, its inherent importance is based upon the manner in which it effects the characters attributes – and those benefits far outweigh anything as trivial as gold. 8.2.4.3 Goodies Goodies (Magic equipment) can enhance the combat value of a given character - as such, +1 armor increases dv, +1 weapon increases av, boots of speed increase mv, girdle of ogre power increases the cd (fighter now uses a d10 instead of a d8 for example) possibilities are endless. See section [16] to determine what specific goodies have been found. 8.3 Special event encounters - Shrines, Alters, & Strangely Glowing Statues Other items that characters may encounter as the wander around are “objects of potential importance”, such as shrines, idols, pools, alters, and whatnot. These bits of dungeon dressing are placed more or less randomly throughout the gaming area by the players when the dungeon is first laid out, or, depending on the scenario, may be arranged purposefully by the evil overlord as quest pieces to be sought out. In a truly random game, all of these items have the same ultimate potential. They could be a beneficial encounter, they could be a detrimental encounter, or they could be a completely irrelevant encounter. We are going to turn once again to standard playing cards to provide the results for such an encounter. Any specific “object of potential importance” will only activate once per party, and they may not have the same effect on a different party that encounters them. In other words, if party “A” encounters a shallow pool, and drops their dead cleric into it, they might get lucky and find their cleric is miraculously brought back to life. This would be construed as a good thing. If party “B” later encounters the same pool, and the player controlling that party has everybody jump in, thinking they will all be healed to full health, he may be somewhat surprised to discover that his entire party is randomly teleported 24” away. Or, everybody who jumped into the pool may take 1 automatic wnd from acid damage. Magic is fickle that way. Here are the guidelines for setting up these “objects of dubious benefit” - I advise that these be a whole lot more scarce than chests and containers and whatnot - so if you are setting up a dungeon for 3 players, and you have 20 or more chests, bags, barrels, crates, etc, spread throughout the gaming area, you probably would want no more than 3 or 4 of these special encounters placed. Be sure that all players recognize them for what they could potentially be, and use tokens, or models, or something significant that will keep them from being overlooked during gameplay. To activate one of these encounters, have 1, or more, of your characters touch it, and then draw a card from the aforementioned deck of randomized numerical values. (standard playing cards)

33

8.3.1 Pick a card, any card - And here‛s what happens .. If a black number card is drawn, absolutely nothing happens. The party may attempt to activate the encounter with a different character – on the next turn - if so desired, but the character that failed to activate it is not affected by any further results of this encounter – although he is not immune to the effects of critters that might result once the event is activated. This character is ignored by any face card results – he will not have his attributes affected, he will not be healed, he will not be benefited or hindered directly by the eventual effects of this special encounter. If the result teleports the party elsewhere within the dungeon (or out of it) he will get dragged along with the rest of the party. But that‛s it - all other effects will ignore him. If a red number card is drawn, then a new encounter token is placed 8 to 16 inches away from the party, out of line of sight, by the previous player. So in essence, the shrine has apparently done nothing, but something may happen in a turn or two, when/if the party encounters the token. That token is tested when line of sight occurs, and behaves as a standard encounter from that point on. Now, should you draw an Ace or Face card, interesting things could occur… Ace of Hearts - the shrine produces 1-3 healing potions. King of Hearts - A wizened old man appears, collects an admittance fee of 500 gold per party member, thanks you for visiting, asks you to wipe your feet on the way out, and disappears. (there is no way to avoid this financial deduction) Queen of Hearts - A red-haired woman appears, instantly heals all models within 12” (even critters & bad guys - raising dead if needed) and departs. Jack of Hearts - The entire party is teleported 12” to 24” away in a random direction (at the discretion of the previous player) Ace of Clubs - Wealth - 500 to 3000 gold suddenly appear (1d6x500) King of Clubs - A random party member has their wnds value increased by one (randomly determined by previous player) Queen of Clubs - the character that activated the shrine has their standard av increased by 1 Jack of Clubs - A random party member has their movement reduced by 2 Ace of Spades - Death - the model that touched the shrine, dies (magic resistance roll applies, but that‛s it - hope it wasn‛t the cleric) King of Spades - Dark-haired man appears, tells you you are trespassing, and teleports the party to the entrance they started from. Queen of Spades - Little old woman appears, does 1-2 wounds (no dv, no mr roll) to a randomly determined party member, who is then granted an increase of 1 to their magic resistance (mr) if this action killed the character, they do not gain the benefit mr if revived by a cleric. The old woman fades away immediately after bestowing her cursed blessing. Jack of Spades - all models within 6” take 1 wnd (mr applies to avoid damage) Ace of Diamonds - Change - the character that first touched the shrine has their cd increased by d2 (d6 becomes d8, for example) King of Diamonds - A frail little old gnome appears, steals a random magical goodie from the party, and raises the specialist av of a random party member by 1 (mage‛s magical attack, cleric‛s banishment attack, thief‛s backstab, or archer‛s ranged attack) results are unavoidable. Queen of Diamonds - a ravishing woman appears, and (roll d6) 1-3 gives 2 random goodies to the party, 4-5 summons a high lvl critter to deal with the party, or 6 teleports the party out of the 34

dungeon. The party may re-enter the dungeon from a different entrance after skipping 1 turn time taken figuring out what happened - or they may just count their loot and head back to town - player‛s discretion. Jack of Diamonds - 2 random party members have their movement increased by 2, and one random goodie is teleported 12” to 24” inches away. The party is “aware” of what got teleported, and they are “aware” of the where it went - basically, the gods of chance expect them to use their new found speed and go racing after it. The item in question will be lying out in the open for anyone (other parties included) to take and use. 9.0 Combat procedures ... So, we have targets, we have weapons, what do we do? Combat will occur pretty much whenever you encounter something. Face it, your adventurers are not here to sell raffle tickets, they are here to kick butt and collect goodies. 1 – Each side rolls initiative die (d6) – side note, for combat, the critters are controlled by and rolled for by the previous player. If combat is the result of a just activated token, then the critters automatically move first, and the characters may have already expended their own movement this turn. 2 – Side with initiative moves first. 3 - If the encounter occurs after the party has already moved – aka, they moved up to a chest, investigated it, and out popped a ravening beast – then only the critter gets to move. Consider the party to have been surprised, and unable to proactively move till next turn. In addition, characters who have already performed a task (the thief who was checking out the chest for example) can not attack this turn. They can still defend. 4 – Any movement thru the attack zone of an enemy will allow that individual to make an attack of opportunity against the moving target. This attack does not count against other activities that the character may be attempting, and the moving target is allowed to defend as normal, but not counter attack. 5 – The attack zone of any given model includes all squares in front and to either side of the model. Unless specified for a particular critter, the attack area does not include the rear flanks, or the square directly behind the model. 6 – Resolve free attacks(those resulting from crossed attack zones) immediately – if a critter is killed rushing by the fighter in his haste to attack the mage, then he will never make it to the mage, and we don‛t need to resolve that declared attack, as it isn‛t going to happen. 7 – All standard combat occurs at the same time, so everybody who can attack, declares their intentions. 8 – At this point, if there is a thief who has reserved movement, that movement may now be used to place the thief into position to deliver a backstab. Providing the thief avoids crossing an enemy models attack zone, they are considered to move unnoticed, as all other models have already declared their intentions, and are therefore somewhat preoccupied. 9 – All combat rolls are resolved one after another, till all declared attacks are concluded. 10 – Attackers roll their combat die, add it to av, add any modifiers appropriate, and compare it to the defenders combat roll + dv . If the attack result is greater than the defense result, then the attack gets thru, and wnds are subtracted from the victim. 11- Any characters or critters at 0 wnds are now dead. (characters in this status are only mostly dead, and if they receive the ministrations of a cleric asap, then they will live to kick butt again) Remove dead critter models to be recycled and used against the hapless party at a later time. 12- Once all critters are dead, the good (?) guys can heal the fallen, collect their loot, and press onward. 35

10.0 An example of play Let‛s say we have 2 players, we‛ll call Player A “Bob”, and Player B “NotBob” On Bob‛s turn, he moves his adventurers down a hall and enters a room. In the room, there is a possible encounter token from initial dungeon setup. As soon as one of Bob‛s minions have completed movement (except possibly the thief,if he has held his move in reserve) a d6 is rolled to determine if an encounter occurs or not. A “1” is rolled, which indicates that nothing occurs, but that the potential encounter remains in play. It will stay there until activated, (tested once per turn that a player‛s character is within line of site) or until a “6” is rolled, which causes the illusive potential encounter to wander away. Potentially to be encountered later. All of Bob‛s adventures have moved, all line of site encounter tokens have been tested for, there is no combat occurring for Bob, so his turn is effectively over. As nothing of consequence occurred during Bob‛s turn, he chooses to place one of his “hindrance” tokens near his opponent‛s party. He places it 6”s away from his opponent‛s thief, roughly in the direction that NotBob seems intent on traveling. Since it is in line of site, it will be tested for immediately at the beginning of NotBob‛s turn. Bob‛s turn is now complete. It is now NotBob‛s turn. At the end of his last turn, which has not been detailed here, NotBob‛s party was left strung out in a corridor, with his thief in front, then his fighter, cleric, mage, and finally the archer.

As NotBob‛s turn starts, the very first thing we do is roll for the hindrance token since it is now in line of site. If we roll a 1, nothing happens with the token, and NotBob can run his turn thru as if it were not there, and we will roll again on his next turn, providing he still has an adventurer within line of site of the token. Alas, such is not to be, as we have rolled a 2. Therefore, a critter pops up. We roll a d6 to determine what value of critter – a “2” indicates it will be a low value critter. A quick roll on the low value critter chart [16] tells us he will be facing goblins. 2d4 of them .. dice roll says .. 5. So I need 5 goblin mini‛s … looking thru my critter box produces 5 goblins, and it just so happens that the first 5 I find are 3 with hand weapons and shields, and 2 with bows. Ok, the critter lists indicate that missile weapons are possible for these guys, so Bob (who is going to run the bad guys for this encounter) has that as his goblin force. The goblins are going to start their deployment from the spot that the token was located, and since the critters get to move first when first encountered Bob deploys them as such:

The thief is allowed a free attack on the goblin to his immediate right since that goblin passed thru the thief‛s attack zone. We quickly roll for that before NotBob moves his characters. Thiefs av= 2 cd=d6 (it‛s a Halfling thief) Goblins dv=3 cd=d6 … thief rolls 2 added to the av = 4 for his total combat value. Bob rolls a 2 as well, when added to the goblins dv3 gives the goblin a 36

total combat value of 5 – therefore, the thief‛s free attack missed. What about the other 2 goblins within his az, you wonder. Well, merely ending a move in an opponents attack zone does not allow a free attack, it just means that you will probably be attacked shortly, and presumably you are on the defensive, and ready for action. It is the act of exiting the attack zone which elicits the free attack, so if the first goblin had stopped in the first square of the thief‛s az, then no free attack would be granted. Since the other 2 goblins did not pass thru one any of the squares making up the thief‛s az, they did not instigate a free attack against them. They are ready to engage, and are on guard. NotBob now has the chance to deploy his minions….He does this:

Both the fighter and cleric are now in HTH range. Both the archer and mage are intending to launch ranged attacks. Since the archer did not move, he may fire twice. Both Bob and NotBob declare what their minions are going to do. Bob indicates that the single goblin who may do so is going to attack the cleric (ignoring the fighter.) the other two hand weapon goblins are going to attack the thief. Both of the ranged weapon goblins are going to fire at the mage (yes, they will each suffer a -3 penalty, and may shoot their comrades in the back, but Bob is pretty sure these guys are going to loose anyway, so he wants them to make a play for the big gun. Since Bob is running the goblins, he can do with them whatever he wants) NotBob decides that the mage is going to target the opposing archers with a fireball. He further decides that his archer is not going to do anything, because he doesn‛t want to risk shooting either his fighter or cleric in the back, and he pretty much assumes the mages fireball is going to take out the goblin archers anyway. The fighter is going to attack the goblin in front of him, and the cleric is also going to attack that same goblin (in case the fighter misses, and besides, the cleric can‛t reach anything else.) The thief is going to attack the goblin directly in front of him. Ok, so at this point, both sides have moved, and both sides are about to have their opportunity to attack. Every model that can attack will do so, and every defending model will roll their defense against any and all attacks placed against them. There is no limit to the number of times that a model may roll for it‛s defense in a given turn. For instance, the goblin to the side of the thief has already defended himself against the thief‛s free attack, and is about to defend against both the cleric‛s, and the fighter‛s attack. All attack and defense rolls effectively occur at the same time. It is therefore possible for opponents to kill one another, and it is also possible for a combatant to waste his attack against a target that has in essence died as the result of some other models actions. So what, combat is like that. Without going to the trouble of detailing every individual die roll of the above combat, here is what happened. Starting with Bob‛s attack plan and following thru in order, here are the results… The goblin who attacked the cleric, missed. 37

The first of the 2 goblins attacking the thief, missed, the second hit, the thief takes 1 wnd. The first of the goblin archers firing at the mage(wonder of wonders) hit. This is even taking into count the -3 to his attack roll for the intervening models. This is what happens when the goblin rolls a 6, and the mage rolls a 2. Mage takes a wnd (human mage, so he has 1 wnd left) Um, ok, the second goblin archer also hit – rolled a 4, added to the av of 3, subtract 3 for intervening models, = 4 … mage rolled a 1 added to his dv of 2 = 3, so the mage loses another wound, and is going to die. Sucks to be him. But with his dying strength, the mage blasted the archers with a fireball, and it … killed both of them (magic attack av5 d8 .. rolled a 6 for a combat value of 11, neither goblin can even get close to that with a dv of 3and d6, so they each take 2 wnds, and are toast) The archer does nothing, but if he has a healing potion, he is probably getting ready to use it on the mage – during the next turn. The fighter hits, the goblin is dead. The cleric also hits, the same goblin that the fighter just killed, so the goblin arrives at his maker with a mace crushing his skull, and a sword thrust through his vitals. Ahh well. The thief missed. So the field of battle now looks like this:

NotBob now has the opportunity to place a hindrance token in the vicinity of Bob‛s party, but he decides to save it for later use, presumably when it will most effectively screw up Bob‛s survival chances. Thus ends NotBob‛s turn. In this example, 1 turn has passed for both players. Not much happened during Bob‛s turn, but NotBob‛s turn involved nitty-gritty combat, and the unfortunate death of his heroic mage. Most likely on NotBob‛s next turn, he will annihilate the remaining goblins, and have his cleric apply emergency resuscitation techniques to the mage, thus bringing him back to the land of adventure. Of course, it‛s always possible that Bob will continue to make things interesting for his opponent by placing another encounter token in his vicinity. 11.0 Ending the game Well, either the game ends when the scenarios victory conditions are met or you have flat run out of playing time. If one player has accomplished the scenario objective, then that player is the winner, and that particular game is over. If you are playing the game as part of a campaign, all players may determine which characters are eligible for RND points, decide which goodies they would like to keep, and mark them on their party sheet accordingly. For specifics as to what individual characters may carry over from one game to the next, check here [13.3]. Now, if the reason you are ending the game is because you ran out of time (apparently somebody wants the use of the dining room table, and they just don‛t understand the importance of your quest, or some of the players feel they need to go home and get some sleep so that they can be at work in 3 hours, or some such lame excuse, whatever) then what you want to do, is either 38

agree as a group to continue the game another time, in which case you just record the parties status at that moment – gold tally, goodies, wnds suffered, etc, and then just drop them all into a fresh dungeon the next time you can all get together. Or if you just want to determine a winner as things stand at that moment, then use total gold aquired to determine the winner. Deduct 500 gold from each parties tally for each member of that party which died during the adventurer. Each death counts for this deduction, even mostly dead ones. If a particular character died multiple times, he incurrs multiple penalties. This is to help keep things balanced for those players who may not have acquired as much loot, but did manage to keep everybody alive. Now, congratulate the victor, and start helping to put all the toys away. Good mnners are important, or you may not be invited back to play again. 12.0 Game variations 12.1 Basic All parties seek to obtain the most gold, and get out alive. This variant typically is played for as long possible, and effectively ends when all placed encounters have been activated, at which point everybody counts up their loot to see who won. 12.2 Capture the Flag: Find the Flag (which represents some all important long lost quest type object) and get out of the dungeon with it. Victory Conditions: Have a minimum of 1 living character survive to exit with the flag. Setup dungeon as normal. Randomly determine a location for the flag somewhere in the dungeon. This is accomplished by picking 4 or 6 possible locations while the board is being set up, and after everything is set, but prior to determining party entrances, roll a die to determine where the flag is. Place a flag marker in that location. Then, randomly determine player entrances, and play continues as normal. (yes, I know that some party will get lucky, and invariably start closer to the flag than the others - oh well, such is fate - deal with it.) Optional - Leave the potential flag locations on the board while play commences, but do not check to see if the flag is present until after a party reaches that location. At that point, flip a coin to see if the flag is there or not - heads = it is, tails = it isn‛t. There is only one flag in the game, and once it is located, remove all of the other potential flag markers. (hint, there has to be one flag, so if all of the previous encountered flag markers came up as tails, then the final marker automatically is the flag.) Once a party acquires the flag, they want to get it to an entrance/exit as soon as possible. Options -

A: Require that the party must exit the dungeon using the same entrance they started from. B: Require that the party must NOT exit via the same entrance they started from; instead, they must find an alternate exit route. C: Randomly determine a specific exit once the flag is originally picked up. D: Allow the party to use any exit they want. E: Require that they use the exit that the previous player started from.

In my humble opinion, all players should agree on one of the above options prior to determining where the parties are going to enter the dungeon. Invariably, all these random factors are going to contribute to make the quest easier for some players, and more difficult for others. (again, Fate is fickle, deal with it.) Any character may carry the flag. A successful HTH attack upon that character by another players character will steal the flag away. If a character dies while carrying the flag, then any 39

other character who passes within 1” may retrieve the flag. (all other goodies that character was carrying/wearing/using are likewise dropped, and may be used by whoever picks ‘em up.) The flag may be picked up in passing, actually looting of the dead requires that he character stop and devote their action to the process. [5.8.4] The flag may only change hands once per turn - if a model carrying the flag is attacked, and is hit, then he loses the flag to his attacker. This model may be entitled to a counter attack, which may very well be successful, and cause a wound, but it will not regain the flag. A successful attack will need to land on the next turn in order to regain the flag. The exception to this would be in the case of the counterattack causing the death of the model which just stole the flag - it that happens, then the original holder of the flag does get it back immediately. Random encounters occur and are checked for as normal. Hindrance tokens are placed as normal. Critters will not take the flag away from party members. If a critter kills the flag bearer, then the flag is left on the body waiting to be found by someone else. 12.3 Death Match: Find and defeat your opponents, before they find and defeat you. Victory Conditions: Be the last player to have surviving party members. Setup dungeon as normal. Randomly determine party entrances as normal. Random encounters occur and are checked for as normal. Hindrance tokens are placed and checked for as normal. In essence, everything is normal, but instead of attempting to survive the dungeon with the most loot, now you just want to survive. 12.4 Crusade: Your fateful adventurers are on a quest to destroy a great evil. Could be a dragon, a demi-liche, a demon lord, a giant turtle with a taste for human flesh who currently has a toothache (it makes ‘em meaner) - whatever. The point is, it‛s something big, bad, and powerful. Victory Conditions: The party that strikes down the great evil wins the day. Even if they all die in the process, their names will live on in legends, etc, etc. First off, determine what your great evil is - check your available mini‛s and pick the biggest and baddest. Then find it on the Elite value critter table, and for the purposes of the crusade, make it even bigger and badder than the standard for that type of critter. Add 1(or 2) each to av and dv, and give it an extra movement allowance. Maybe it has an extra immunity. Or it can fly. Whatever. The point is, tweak it a bit to make it suitably impressive as a legendary evil to be overthrown. Setup dungeon as normal. Now, determine the possible locations of its lair. Similar to Capture the Flag, you will want to generate 4 or 6 different locations throughout the dungeon which might (or might not) be the lair of this penultimate evil. Each of these locations is going to contain some sort of nasty high level critter, and as a party of adventures achieves line of site on the encounter token, flip a coin. Heads, it is the big bad dude himself - the party has achieved the first part of their objective, they have found the source of legendary nastiness, now they just need to survive to brag about it. If the coin comes up tails, then the party has not located the big bad guy - but they have earned a role on the standard high value critter 40

chart, which should make for an interesting encounter anyway. Randomly determine party entrances as normal. Random encounters occur and are checked for as normal. Hindrance tokens are placed and checked for as normal. 12.5 Snatch & Grab: Enter the dungeon, get the goodies, and get out. Quickly. Similar to a standard game, but any player may force the game to end by getting his (or her) party to an exit. Game play ends as soon as all of the surviving members of a one of the parties has exited the dungeon. At that point, total up the gold, and determine a winner. Setup dungeon as normal. Randomly determine party entrances as normal. Random encounters occur and are checked for as normal. Hindrance tokens are placed and checked for as normal. In essence, everything is normal, but as soon as a player feels that they have a significant loot total, they can attempt to force a win by hightailing it out of the dungeon. Options: As with capture the flag, where a party is allowed to exit can make the simple act of trying to leave more interesting. A: Require that the party must exit the dungeon using the same entrance they started from. B: Require that the party must NOT exit via the same entrance they started from, instead, they must find an alternate route. C: Randomly determine a specific exit prior to the commencement of play. (aka, many ways in, only one way out.) D: Allow the party to use any exit they want. E: Require that they use the exit that the previous player started from.

All players should agree on one of the above options prior to determining where the parties are going to enter the dungeon. Invariably, all these random factors are going to contribute to make things easier for some players, and more difficult for others. (it‛s that whole Fate thing, remember?)

41

12.6 Other Game variations? These are the variations that I have come up thus far, if you come up with one you want added to the rules, drop me a line - [email protected] - and I will consider it. 13.0 Optional Rules – extra stuff This is the stuff that has no direct bearing on a one off game, but is of potential importance for ongoing campaigns. 13.1 Party experience and campaign play Also known as, growing more powerful through the time tested method of not dying. Players of DungeonCrawl may desire to have the survivors of this weekends adventures return to play in later dungeons. This is fine, and parties will tend to get stronger merely through the acquisition of newer and better goodies discovered in the underworld. But, it is not unreasonable to assume that the intrepid adventurers who survive these hardships would tend to become stronger and more badass in their own right, regardless of the trinkets they have collected. To allow for this, any character who survives a session of gameplay without dying – or becoming mostly dead – gains one “remain not dead” point – or 1 rnd pt. These rnd pt‛s are saved up, and may eventually be used to enhance that character‛s base abilities. A player may use 2 RND points to accomplish any of the following: Raise CD value by d2 – aka, a d6 becomes a d8, a d8 becomes a d10, a d10 becomes a d12 – cannot increase past d12. Raise Attack Value (AV) by 1, to a maximum of 8 (also applicable to specialist AV‛s like the mages magical attack) Raise Defense Value (DV) by 1, to a maximum of 8 Raise Wnds by 1, to a maximum of 5 Raise standard movement rate (MV) by 2” to a maximum of base 12” – magical enhancement may still increase this. Raise Magic Resistance (MR) by 1/10 to a max of 6/10

13.2 Higher level parties encounter roll modifiers If you are playing a campaign with ever more powerful parties, or if you have chosen to play a one time game with more powerful characters, you may find that the game becomes unbalanced if you use the standard encounter charts. To remedy this, higher lvl parties are subject to an encounter modifier when they roll to determine encounter results. There are 4 party levels: basic, advanced, heroic, and elite. Basic parties have earned less than 10 RND‛s total, and have no encounter modifier. Advanced parties have earned between 10 and 20 RND‛s and have a +1 encounter modifier. Heroic parties have between 20 and 30 RND‛s and a +2 modifier. Elite parties have over 30 RND‛s and have a +3 modifier with all encounters. You will need to exorcise your best judgment with regards to the need for this enhancement to the encounter table. If the various players parties are reasonably well balanced, then it may not be necessary to “stack the deck” against one of them. Work this out among the players prior to the start of the game, modify it (with player consensus) during the game if necessary. In other words, if the veteran party has barely survived an encounter with a Greater Demon, and has already lost some choice goodies to the Taxman, then maybe it‛s time to drop the +1 to the encounter table. 13.3 What can the characters keep at the end of the adventure? When the dungeon is completed, add up all the gold, compare it to the other parties, to determine who won, then throw it away. There is no value to carrying over gold from one adventure to the next. Assume it has all been spent on expensive rest & recuperation for the party, and that the very reason that the party is adventuring again, is that they have run out of funds, and need to replenish the stash. 42

Each character can carry over 1 magical weapon, 1 suit of magical armor (or robe, whatever) 1 helm (if permissible by character type) 1 shield (ditto) 1 set of boots, 2 rings, 1 cloak, 1 set of gauntlets, and as many potions as they have left. Basically, assume that characters keep the stuff on their backs and their favorite goodies, but sell the stuff that they can‛t use, or have multiples of, in order to support themselves in the manner in which they have grown accustomed. 14.0 General commentary and other notes As you may have noticed, encumbrance is not part of this game. If it makes you happy, assume that all characters are issued a bag of impressive capacity when they enter the dungeon. This harkens back to the theme of “are we here to kick butt and take names, or are we here to worry about which party member is overloaded?” If you want to worry about the logistical realities involved with carrying around all this stuff, then perhaps you would better off offering your services to friends who need help moving from a 3 bedroom house into a 1 bedroom apartment. They will truly treasure your assistance. Should you have gameplay questions, please bring them to my attention – [email protected] – and I will decree the answer from on high. Please remember, this is intended as a tongue in cheek rapidfire dungeon combat game, not as the be all end all of realistic dungeoneering roleplaying – I mean, consider the fact that I have an evil tax collector as a high value opponent – read into that as you will. 15.0 Charts Character attributes Cost 1 1 1 1 1

Class Fighter Cleric Archer Thief Mage

Cost .5 .5 .5

Racial attributes Race MV Human 8 Elf 10 Dwarf 6 Halfling 6

Spells Spells Fireball Lightning strike Open Lock Hocus Pocus Quickening Shield

5 4 2 2 1

AV DV 5 4 3 2 2

3 2 2 2 2

WNDs

D (HTH) d8 d6 d8 d6

Area of Effect 3”x3” Square single target single target single target single target single target

Special break down doors - bash open chests - 2 attacks if he hasn‛t moved. turn undead (counts as av5 CD d8 attack) - heal 18” ranged attack (av5 CD d8) - can shoot twice if hasn‛t moved detect/disarm traps/pick locks & backstab attack (av5 d8) fireball/lightning attack 36” range (av5 CD d8) - mr = 3/10 Special none wnds -1 wnds +1 DV+1

Magic Resistance (MR) = 1/10 MR = 1/10 MR = 1/10

Range line of sight line of sight 1” 3” 6” 1”

Attack Strength av5 cd8 av5 cd8 av4 cd6 av5 cd8 n/a n/a

Encounter Tables Whenever a party achieves a line of site for an encounter token, roll a d6. On a roll of 1, nothing happens, but leave the token, and re-roll each turn the party remains in line of site. On a 2-5, an encounter occurs; determine critter and bring ‘em into play. [8.2.2] On a roll of 6, remove token, place it 4 to 16 inches away in a random direction. [1.1.3.1]

43

Determine the specific critter encountered, roll d8 & add the appropriate party modifier. 1-4 low 5-7 med 8-9 high 10 elite

Low Lvl Encounter Chart - d20 & Add party encounter modifier to roll. d20 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19

Low Value: Giant Rats Giant Spiders Giant Scorpian Giant Ant Swarm Giant Bat Skeleton Kobolds Goblins Orcs Zombies Brigands Crazed Dwarves Imps Evil Pixies Lizardmen Gargoyle Gelatinous Cube Icky Ooze Blob Giant Cave Frog

# of 1-6 1-2 1-2 3-12 1-4 1-6 4-10 2-8 2-8 1-6 2-5 2-5 1-3 1-4 2-5 1-3 1 1-3 1-2

20 jump to the mid lvl chart 21 jump to high lvl chart 22+ straight to elite.

MV 6 6 6 6 10 6 8 8 6 4 8 6 10 10 8 8 4 4 8

AV 3 4 4 3 3 3 3 3 4 4 4 5 3 3 5 6 3 3 4

DV CD WND #attacks Special 3 d4 1 1 none 3 d4 1 1 Poisonous bite – av3 d4 4 d6 1 1 Poisonous sting – av3 d4 3 d4 1 1 none 5 d6 1 1 Flying 3 d6 1 1 Undead 2 d6 1 1 may have missile weapons 3 d6 1 1 may have missile weapons 3 d6 1 1 may have missile weapons 4 d6 1 1 Undead 4 d8 1 1 may have missile weapons 4 d8 2 1 none 4 d8 1 1 Flying 4 d6 1 1 Flying, 1/10 mr 4 d8 1 1 none 6 d8 1 1 Flying 3 d6 3 2 Poisonous touch – av3 d4 4 d6 2 1 Poisonous jet of ooze, 4” range av4 d4 3 d8 2 1 may utilize Tongue attack instead of standard attack

Mid Lvl Encounter Chart - d20 add party encounter modifier to roll d20 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19

Mid Value Lost Adventurers Trolls Ogres Monstrous Spider Monstrous Scorpian Earth Elemental Water Elemental Air Elemental Fire Elemental Hill Giant Orc Champion HobGoblin Carrion Crawler Ghost Ghoul Minataur Vampire Bats Mud Gollum Rock Gollum

20 jump to high lvl chart 21+ straight to elite.

44

# of MV AV DV CD WND # Attacks Special 2-5 as per standard adventuring party - each will have and use one random magic item 1-2 6 5 5 d8 2 1 Regenerates - Must take 2 wnds during 1 turn to be killed 1-2 6 7 5 d8 1 1 none 1-2 8 6 5 d8 2 1 Poisonous bite – av5 d6 1-2 8 6 6 d8 2 3 Claw/Claw/Poison Sting – av5 d6 1 6 7 7 d6 2 1 Immune to lightning attack 1 8 6 8 d6 2 1 Immune to lightning attack 1 10 5 8 d6 2 2 Immune to lightning attack 1 8 6 7 d6 2 1 Immune to Fireball - cast Fireballs as mage 1 8 8 6 d10 2 1 1 8 6 5 d8 2 1 Will have a standard orc party with him 1 8 7 5 d8 2 1 Will have a standard goblin party with him 1-2 8 7 6 d8 2 2 Poison – av6 d6 1-3 8 4 6 d6 2 2 Undead, Insubstantial, Immune normal weapons, 1/10mr 1-3 6 4 6 d6 2 1 Undead, Poison attack – av3 d4, 1/10mr 1 8 6 5 d8 2 1 none 1-4 10 4 6 d8 2 1 Flying, Immune to normal weapons 1 8 5 6 d8 2 1 1/10mr 1 8 6 7 d8 2 1 2/10mr

High Lvl Encounter Chart - d10 add party encounter modifier to roll

D10 High Value 1 Wight 2 Beholder 3 Hydra 4 Taxman 5 Fire Giant 6 Vampire 7 Vampire Bunny 8 Lich 9 Minor Demon 10+ Jump to elite chart

# of 1-2 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1-2

MV 6 8 8 8 10 8 8 6 8

AV 6 3 7 6 8 6 4 5 6

DV CD WND # Attacks Special 5 d8 3 2 Undead, Immune normal weapons, cast lightning, 1/10mr 3 d8 3 3 Can cast Fireball & Lightning as per mage, 2/10mr 8 d10 3 3 7 d8 4 2 Immune to normal weapons + Tax attack, 3/10mr 8 d12 3 1 Immune to Fireball 6 d8 3 2 Undead, Immune to normal weapons, Flying, 2/10mr 7 d8 2 1 Leap attack – goes for the throat, attack does 2 wnds 6 d8 3 2 Undead, Immune normal weapons, mage spells,2/10mr 6 d8 3 1 Can cast Fireballs as per mage, 2/10mr

Elite Critters - d10 add party encounter modifier to roll D10 1 2 3 4 5

Elite Basilisk Wight Vampire Bunny Minor Demon Dragon (young)

# of 1 2-4 2-3 2-4 1

MV 6 6 8 8 10

AV 6 6 4 6 8

DV CD WND # Attacks Special 6 d10 3 1 Death Gaze - range 12” av5 d8 victim dies 5 d8 3 2 Undead, Immune normal weapons, cast lightning, 1/10mr 7 d8 2 1 Leap attack – goes for the throat, attack does 2 wnds 6 d8 3 1 Can cast Fireballs as per mage, 2/10mr 8 d8 3 3 Flying, Fire Breath attack rng 18” av6 d8 6”x6” radius

6 7 8 10

DemiLich Greater Demon Medusa Dragon

1 1 1 1

8 6 7 10 9 9 8 7 7 10 9 9

11 12

Greater Basilisk Dragon (ancient)

1 1

8 8 8 d10 10 10 10 d12

d8 d10 d8 d10

3 4 3 4

2 2 2 3

4 5

2 3

- causes 1 wnd Undead, Immune normal weapons, mage spells, 3/10mr Immune to fireball, mage spells, 2/10mr

Death Gaze - range 12” av5 d8 victim dies

Flying, Fire Breath attack rng 18” av6 d8 6”x6” radius - causes 1 wnd

Death Gaze - range 12” av5 d8 victim dies

Flying, Fire Breath attack rng 18” av6 d10 6”x6” radius - causes2 wnds

Special Notes: Flying = enhances units DV, unit is not bothered by obstacles which would prevent movement to a critter on foot. Insubstantial = As flying, but in addition, unit can move through walls, and is immune to normal weapons Poison Attack = attack causes an additional wound based upon poison attack roll. Death Gaze = only effective against closest target. Immune = Target takes no damage from whatever type of attack it is immune to. Cave frog Tongue attack – a successful tongue attack (av5 d6 range 6”) drags the target into its mouth, it will get +2av on its attack next turn. Tax Attack = successful attack removes one magic item, and 1000 gold from victim. Does not cause wounds.

Rewards

If he has taken 2 wnds, he will attempt to leave the area with his collected taxes. If he escapes line of sight (he ends turn not in line of site of any members of the party), he is gone. And the goodies are gone with him.

Encounter type Low value encounter Moderate value encounter High value encounter Elite encounter

Gold 200-1200 300-1800 500-3000 800-4200

(d6) Goodies 0-2 (d4-2) 1-4 2-5 (d4+1) 2-8 (2d4)

17.0 Goodies

Here‛s where we determine the rewards for your troubles. First, find out what kind of goodie your party has discovered. Main Table Roll 1 d6 1-2 = Defensive Goodies 3-4 = Offensive Goodies 5-6 = Misc Goodies Then, discover specifically what it is, using the following tables.

45

D10 Defensive Goodies 1Armor +1 dv Plate – useable by cleric/fighter 2Armor +1 dv Leather – useable by archer/thief 3Robe of protection +1 dv mage only 4Robe of the Magi +2 dv mage only 5Shield +1 dv – useable by cleric/fighter 6Cloak +1 dv - Usable by anyone 7Helm of defense +1 dv – useable by cleric/fighter 8Shield of Shielding – add d2 to cd for defense only – fighter/cleric only 9Ring of Protection +1 dv - Usable by anyone 10Boots of Avoidance +1 dv - Usable by anyone D20 12345-7 8-9

Offensive Goodies Weapon +1 av Big hammer, mace, sword, whatever – useable by cleric/fighter Weapon +1 av Bow – archer Weapon +1 av Shortsword, big knife, etc – useable by thief or archer (HTH only) Weapon +1 av Staff – mage Silver Weapon – useful against critters that are immune to normal weapons - randomly determine weapon type Poisoned weapon – as normal, but inflicts an additional av4 d8 poison attack if wnd is scored – randomly

101112131415-

Helm of offence +1 av – useable by cleric/fighter Ring of lightning - av4 d6 rng24” 1wnd damage - Usable by anyone, in place of their normal attack - 10 charges. Staff of the Magi – av+2 cd+d2 weapon only useable by mage – the av bonus counts toward spell attacks as well. Wand of fireballs – av4 d6 rng24” 2”x2” blast 1wnd dam – as the ring of lightning above – 10 charges Boots of Butt Kicking - av+1 – HTH only - Usable by anyone Potion of massive whupass – one time use grenade – can be thrown up to 12” - use throwers standard attack to target and throw – failure indicates that the ‘grenade‛ misses by 1-3 inches in a random direction. Which

determine weapon type – does NOT grant the ability to damage critter immune to normal weapons.

is not too bad because the resulting av6 d10 wnd3 fireball will have a 4”x4” coverage, so the target will still be covered, but so might unintended targets. MR will reduce damage by 2 wnds.

16171819-

Gauntlets of Wuss slapping +1 av – HTH only - Usable by anyone (Yes, I stole these from Hackmaster) Holy Mace of the True Believer – Cleric only +2av, improves cd by d2, also applies to “Banish Undead” Quiver of wondrous plenty – Archer only (naturally) infinite supply of +1 av arrows Big Honking Sword of Righteous Vindictiveness - +2av, causes 2wnds per hit, -2 dv (who worries about defense when you are

20-

BackStabbing Weasel – Thief only, +1 av, +1dv, causes 2wnds during backstab, only 1 in standard HTH

kicking butt, anyway?)

D12 Misc Goodies 1Potion of Healing - one time instant Cleric – usable by anyone. This will even bring back the mostly dead. 2Amulet of Magic Resistance – increases mr by 1/10 when worn 3Gauntlets of Power – improves cd roll by d2 – fighter/cleric only 4Girdle of giant strength – cd raised to d12 – fighter/cleric only 5Gauntlets of the Thief – grants thief skills to any wearer at av4 d6 6Gauntlets of Nimbleness – increase thief‛s av by 1 and cd to d10 for thieving skills only 7Boots of speed – mv increased by 4” 8Ring of Hardiness +1 wnd - Usable by anyone 9Ring of Magic Resistance – increases mr by 1/10 when worn 10Boots of water walking – Allows wearer to walk across water, lava, and similar liquids. 11Winged boots - Allows wearer to fly, at their normal speed, unhindered by terrain features which might otherwise impede their movement (pits, chasms, furniture barricades, etc) Does NOT enable the wearer to carry other party members (they don‛t have the “lift” for passengers) 12Escape Key – Small gold key that instantly teleports complete party back to their entrance. Only useable by a mage, useable at anytime during party‛s turn. Only works once. Ever. Effects are cumulative aka - Cloaks can be worn in combination with armor, robes, shields, etc. Multiples of the same item may not be worn. You may not have a single character USE 2 shields, 2 helms, 2 weapons, etc - but a character may CARRY extra gear – this may prove helpful when audited by the Taxman. Weapon bonuses to “av” do not count towards non physical attacks – aka, a cleric with a magic weapon does not get a bonus to his “banish undead” attack, unless so noted. In like manner, an archer with a magic hand weapon does not get a bonus when firing arrows. Note: custom goodies and critters are encouraged, and if you would like them added to this master list, details of such should be mailed to [email protected]

46

18.0 Work in progress stuff and miscellaneous rambling thoughts... Q. Whats with all the chests and barrels? How come there are no trapped floor tiles, or a panel of levers that you have to work correctly to get doors to open, or evily thought out fiendish puzzles ? I kind of envision the abundance of chests, bags, boxes, crates and such to not so much indicate that the dwellers of the dungeon were “container happy” so much as they are a useful contrivance to get the characters involved in fooling around with stuff. I think it would get unrealistic (and unplayable) if players would start having characters begin searching/checking every oddity of set construction and/or dungeon dressing. Some of that stuff is just there for ambiance, and we need to keep it separate from potential “important” bits. Having 2 main (well, three if you count doors, but since they act similar to containers, we will lump them together) - so two main foci for the characters attention with regard to potential encounters - container/doors, and skulls - we know that not every one is actually going to amount to anything, but most will probably do something. So we know that these things need to be approached with caution. I can‛t think of a reasonable way to have skulls trapped, since they initiate with line of site, so to have things like “that possible critter 8”s away just caused me to fall in a hole” occur, just doesn‛t make much sense. But, investigating this “static encounter device” chest just caused the floor to open up beneath me - seems more feasible and playable to me. Now, the current rules do allow for falling, and leaping, and attempting to get out of water prior to drowning - so I consider these workable with the idea of pits as traps, but obviously, some playing will need to be done. Plus we have water walking, boots of flight, and other potential new goodies with effective non combat uses. We can make the size of the just opened pit variable, and characters will get their standard dv+cd roll against some appropriate value to try and avoid the problem. Or at least avoid damage. I want to have traps that were significantly different than just -”boom” I took damage! - Sort of thing. Fall in pit - well you may not take damage, but now you are down in a hole, and you will probably need help to get out. Or if its a water pit, the now you are trying to avoid drowning, and again, it will take time to get out. If we have a 5x10 water pit across a corridor, it doesn‛t mean the way is completely blocked, but now we need to attempt to leap over it. and maybe we will get trapped between it, and a big critter. Q. Your rules seem kinda fast and loose with HTH, What‛s up with that? Things need to stay simplistic. Base to base is not necessary, but being reasonably close (within 1” or in game terms, roughly 5 feet) is. Combat is a dynamic thing, and we are trying to represent it with little static tokens. No matter how you portray combat, it is unrealistic. Period. Fully realistic combat is impossible to achieve. The more realistic you try to make it, the more variables you need to introduce, and the more intrinsically complicated it gets - a la encumberance, fatigue, the emotional state of the combatents, visibility, all sorts of variables pertaining to types of weapons and armor involved, and other factors to numerous to list. 47

I wanted to boil things down to a format that allows for a wide range of values (for the sake of different encounters) while still having a fundamentally symplistic mechanic. Therefore all combat is actively opposed. In other words, the attacker has an attack value (base value +/- modifiers as appropriate) + an active die roll, which is compared to a defenders defense value (again +/- modifiers) + a die roll. If the final attack value is greater than the final defense value, then the attack lands, and the defender takes damage. ties favor the defender. This allows for quite a variety in attack, defense and combat die values. Which allows for a wide variety of critter types. A critter with an av 2 cd12 is at a distinct disadvantage against a dv8 cd8 critter - but it is possible tht he could land the attack, depending on how the dice roll. I prefer a game where it is possible for a pawn to take down the queen, however unlikely. Q. If this is a turn based game, then how do you account for “simultaneous attacks” ? All combat results/effects are simultaneous. Again, combat is fluid & dynamic - both opponents are seeking every opportunity to carve up the other fellow. None of this “my turn, your turn” approach. During combat, both sides may be entitled to attack, and if both roll well on their attack, and poorly on their defense, then they both may die. It happens. If you ever have the opportunity to take up the modern sport of Fencing, or even just study it so you understand what‛s happening, you will begin to see this a bit more clearly. For the purposes of this example, I am going to discuss foil and epee for a moment. (all you sabre fencers are being ignored.) Modern foil fencing is descended from the efforts made to teach soldiers (and/ or young noblemen) how not to die when confronted by somebody who was intent upon sticking them with a sharp pointy blade. Therefore, special attention was made towards defending yourself before making an attack of your own. This introduced the concept of “right of way” which breaks down to this - If the other guy is threatening me, I can not attack him until I defend myself from his possible attack. Fine in theory, but in practice it has created a format wherein this priority of attack is more important than the result of the attack. For example: if one fencer leaves himself wide open while attacking, and the other guy sees this, takes advantage of the opening, and lands a touch before he himself is hit, IT WON”T COUNT. His attack will be disallowed, because he failed to defend himself against the initial attack. Now, if he does defend, then it becomes his “right of way” and the onus of defending falls on the other guy. It literally becomes a situation of my turn / your turn. Epee on the other hand, was descended from dueling. He who hits first, hits best. In the modern sport of epee fencing, it is possible for both fencers to loose. In competion, if both fencers land attacks within so many thousands of a second, it counts against each of them. And it is possible, and not entirely uncommon, for both fencers to end up counting the bout as a loss. I have always considered this to be a more realistic approach to combat. Akin to this is the rationale for each opponent to have an attack during each echange of blows. Except during a free attack, when the victim of the free attack is merely attempting to evade and survive, not counter attack. In all other combat situations, both participants are doing their level best to poke the other guy with out they themselves becoming the pokee. Therefore, each gets their chance to hit (the attack roll) and their chance to not get hit (the defense roll) Simultaneous combat means you need to be very selective about who attacks who, because you can‛t alter your combat decisions once the dice start rolling. I do not condone altering your selected target, just because your target has suddenly become dead. In other words, if 2 characters both decide to attack a particular enemy, the second one is not entitled to choose to attack somebody else if that enemy becomes dead during the attack phase currently in progress. When the next opportunity occurs to select targets, then certainly the characters in question 48

may choose to attack any viable targets. For instance: a fighter and an archer both attack the same bad guy. for convenience sake, the fighter happens to roll his attack first, and kills the bad guy. well, based upon the concept of simultaneous combat, the arrow fired by the archer is likely to pierce an already dead bad guy. this may seem like a wasted arrow, but I do not believe in wireguided optically controlled smart arrows that can change target mid flight. Sorry, too bad. It could also occur the other way - aka, the fighter swings his mighty axe, only to notice that his target expires with an arrow through the throat, just as his axe bites into dead flesh. oh well. Q. How come the encounters always entitle the critters to first initiative? Well, this is one open to interpretation. In essence, when an encounter token is tested, it is after the characters have already moved (except maybe the thief) and therefore, if critters are encountered, they get to move when the characters are unable to. (since they have already expended their move for the turn.) To fully address this one, there are a couple of things that I would like to point out: 1) you are trespassing on the critters turf - they get homefield advantage. 2) you (the player) knew there was the potential of something being there, and thus had the opportunity to deploy your forces in a manner that could be reasonably capable in the event that something did pop up. 3) there is a 1/3 chance that nothing is there (on the encounter table, a roll of 1 or 6 leads to no encounter that turn.) 4) the format of the game itself (all player opposed/controlled instead of a game master vs player approach) forces some form of compromise be made on how this things are resolved. and 5) it doesn‛t actually give the critters all that much of an advantage anyway. Q. But if they get to move and I don‛t, that has to be a disadvantage for me, doesn‛t it? No, because your people are most likely already deployed in some paranoid manner, anticipating the possibility of an attack. (because, lets face it, as the player, you saw the token, and you knew something might go down, so you didn‛t have your poorest HTH go stand next to it while it was tested to see if an encounter occurred.) You probably have your fighter as the point man, and your more fragile teammates spread out away from the most likely danger areas. And whatever critter pops up will most likely have very restricted options for moving anyway, as it will need to try and thread a course through the various attack zones of your deployed party. Whatever combat occurs will still be simultaneously, so the critters won‛t get a cheap shot at you, and considering the typically cramped spaces involved in a dungeon, the critters will most likely be all bunched up, and therefore prime targets for a mage‛s fireball attack. Q. Aren‛t the mage‛s fireball and lightning strike attacks too powerfull for a low level party? Well, maybe, but since you have the inevitable randomness factor for determining encounters, you can not assume that only low level critters will pop up for low level parties. You must remember that the dice of fate are fickle, and high level nasties may crop up early, and you are going to need all the big guns available in order to survive. The mage can deliver a powerful punch, but he breaks easily, so it is not as if he can just wade through encounters without concern, dealing death with each flick of his wrist. He must be protected, so that his artillery can be called upon when needed. 49

Each character type has its strongpoints and weaknesses, and they may seem extreme if you were to compare them against entry level characters in an RPG. That is because this is not an RPG, and comparisons of that type will not hold up. A player‛s party, at the very begining, is assumed to be composed of functionally adept representatives of their particular classes, not neophyte beginners barely more compitent that knowing that you should aim the pointy bit at the bad guy. As such, it is reasonable to assume that they will face encounters that barely pose a threat to them (providing that they don‛t totally foul up the dice) but those encounters will serve to bolster their confidence for the nastier surprises to come, and they may provide a few beneficial magical goodies, which will definitely help advance the party‛s strength. Q. Why is the cleric so powerful? Answer - see general rationalization for the mage above. But seriously, the cleric has an awesome healing capability, because it is necessary. Characters are going to take damage, and there must be some way to mitigate that, or this will be a really short game. I could have given all player characters lots of wounds, so they could absorb a lot of damage before worrying about dying, but that isn‛t the sort of game I wanted to play. I wanted a game where avoiding death was a constant worry, where you definitely needed to think about consequences when you position your minions, but where there was a way to recover and continue to play even if things go wrong. (cause, inevitably, they will.) Enter the cleric - reasonably tough, so as to avoid casual danger, but not so tough as to warrant becoming a shock troop. Useful in the extreme to have around, as she can pretty much patch anybody back up, so they can wander back into battle. Add to that the the bonus of the banishment attack - highly useful, but not the answer to everything - and you have a character that is a definite asset to the party. But, she can only heal one party member at a time, so you can‛t be too overconfident of her powers, and if she doesn‛t reach a downed comrade fast enough, her healing capacity may not be enough to bring ‘em back. And banishment only works on the undead - on everything else, it‛s just posturing. While the cleric is undeniably powerful, there are limitations. She is a character you will want to keep safe, in order to fully benefit from her abilities. Q. Is there actually a purpose to the thief? Actually yes. The thief has the best chance of opening locked stuff, and the only character with the ability to disarm traps. Both the fighter and the mage have the ability to force open locked containers and doors, but each will automatically set off a trap if there is one present. So the thief is basically a glorified locksmith. But hey, that serves a purpose. The ability to avoid traps could be very useful to the party, providing for the avoidance of unneccessary damage, which is always a good thing. The thief is very ineffective in combat. Unless substantially augmented by goodies (and there are some pretty effective ones out there) he will want to stay out of direct HTH. The reserved movement ability should allow for this, and at the same time allow the thief to get the occasional devastating attack in, if he can set up a backstab. This will be a rare opportunity though. There is no character useful for everything. The thief exemplifies this concept. 50

Underworld Rapid Transit System (the URTS): In order to ensure that our intrepid adventurers have the opportunity to more fully explore the bounds of your sprawling underworld, you may find it advantageous to install some form of rapid transit system. URTS Portals can be designed however you see fit, but should be recognizable as such to the players. Their basic purposes is to allow players to more fully travel throughout the board, but as with everything in the game, the hand of Fate will have full control of destinations when utilizing the portals. It will work thusly: All party members must move within 3”s of the portal. and one characters needs to touch the token/model representing the portal to activate it. Note, all characters and critters within a 3” radius of the portal will be transported when the device is activated. Also note - critters with any reasonable degree of intelligence may activate a portal if the player controlling them so desires. If you have 4 (four) portals in play, number them 1-4 and whenever a party elects to use them, roll a d6 to determine their destination. 1-4 will cause them to teleport to the apropriately numbered destination, and the party may be deployed as desired within 3”s of the arival portal. (if they roll the same # as the portal they are attempting to use, then nothing happens that turn, and we must assume that the portal was temporarily off line for maintainence.) If they roll a 5, they are transited directly to a randomly determined dungeon entrance. If they roll a 6, they are taken back to the entrance that the party started off from. Use the above format with different, even numbered amounts of portals (ie, if you have 6 portals, roll a d8, if you have 2, roll a d4) If you have an odd # of portals, then use the following format: 3 portals 1-3 determine location as above 4 - determine a random location 12 to 24 inches away in a random direction (d12 +12 for distance, d12 for direction as per the clockface analogy) 5 & 6 as above. So if you have 5 portals, roll a d8 and use the above format. I advise utilizing between 3 and 5 portals, enough to keep it interesting, but not so much as to get out of hand. You might want to have an area of the dungeon that is only accessible through the use of a portal, or an area of a room surrounded by deep water/lava/chasm/etc that can be attained through boots of waterwalking, or flying, or the portal, but is otherwise unapproachable. magical goodies which activate as single use portals may be added to the lists (we already have the “escape key”) Portals (and the like) typically have a 6”diameter effect, and all party members/critters caught within are transported. If this breaks up party integrity... um, well, too bad. If a player‛s party becomes devided, then the player will in all likelyhood desire to reunite his characters expeditiously, and for the sake of gameplay, he is allowed to begin maneuvering the various components of his party to an area where they once again link up. I fully realize that the individual characters would have no way of knowing in what direction they would need to travel in order to join up with their lost teammates, but we should allow this inconsistancy as a bit of lucky fate guiding the adventurers back to their comrads in arms. 51

Divided parties still share the same turn, and the player controlling the party members still decides their movements and actions exactly as if they were still an integral party. Yes, having your party get split up will be unfortunate, but it could lead into some interesting gameplay. Roll with it.

52

This Space intentially left blank to accomidate clipboard use

Player name:

Party Name:

Party Gold:

Character Name:

Character Name:

Character Name:

Class:

Race:

Mv: Av:

Dv:

CD:

Class:

Total Wnds:

Mv:

Wnds taken:

Av:

MR:

CD:

Race:

Dv:

Class:

Total Wnds:

Mv:

Wnds taken:

Av:

MR:

CD:

Race: Total Wnds: Dv:

MR:

Special Ability:

Special Ability:

Special Ability:

RND's earned:

RND's earned:

RND's earned:

Goodies:

Goodies:

Goodies:

Character Name:

Character Name:

Character Name:

Class:

Race:

Class:

Race:

Class:

Mv:

Total Wnds:

Mv:

Total Wnds:

Mv:

Wnds taken:

Av:

Wnds taken:

Av:

MR:

CD:

MR:

CD:

Av:

Dv:

CD:

Dv:

Wnds taken:

Race: Total Wnds: Dv:

Special Ability:

Special Ability:

RND's earned:

RND's earned:

RND's earned:

Goodies:

Goodies:

Goodies:

Wnds taken: MR:

Special Ability:

53