Keep on the Borderlands Play Report 1

Quite a while ago I had started Keep on the Borderlands with my kids and we made it through the goblin section before trailing off. Since then we bounced around The Tower of Zenopus, some one page dungeons, and a couple Basic Fantasy adventures. But we haven’t managed a true campaign, and that is my fault. It is 2024 and I’m trying to spend a little more time actually playing D&D. Long story short, we got back to the Keep on the Borderlands because for me it is a great campaign starter.
 

House Rules (for those that care)

Here is the actual play report from today.

Snoh (MU1) and Rokan (F1), brothers looking for adventure, arrived at the Keep. After having a cordial conversation with the guards they entered and headed straight for the tavern. They spent all of their starting coin buying rounds to gather rumors and picked up four ne’er-do-wells who agreed to join them for a half-share each: Keld Marblegaze (D1), Grignok (T1), Hortus (C1), and Masud (F1).

Abilities were all 3d6 down the line. We rolled up 6 characters with the understanding that the 4 “unused” ones would be our starting retainers. This led to a couple interesting characters…

Masud (Str 5, Int 11, Wis 9, Dex 15, Con 14, Cha 6) the fighter was inspired by a Slinger (Mercenary in AD&D DMG) and outfitted with a sling, shield and chain.

Hortus (Str 5, Int 13, Wis 15, Dex 6, Con 9, Cha 16) the cleric is a fat priest who carries the torch and is outfitted with shield and chain.

Getting their group together pretty quick, they headed out to the caves. They did the predictable things and hit the goblin cave first (it is the closest ground level cave to the entrance of the ravine, I was never sure why the Kobold cave seems to be the assumed “start” of the complex). They were able to sneak in the entrance thanks to some lucky wandering monster rolls and surprise checks and got the drop on the 6 goblins in the guard room.

1 dropped in the surprise round. At the beginning of the next round 1 ran for the stairs, the other 4 stood to fight. The characters with ranged weapons shot at and missed the fleeing goblin and the melee characters whiffed… until Hortus was up to bat. “Back you foul creatures! Back I say!” Waving around his torch he rolled a 20 and did 3 points of damage to bring low a goblin.

20s always hit for max damage. He needed a 20 because he was rolling at -6 (-2 Str and -4 improvised weapon).

The players won initiative in round 2 and fortunately their ranged attackers were able to kill the fleeing goblin this time before he was able to make it up the stairs (he would have if the goblins had won initiative). 2 more goblins fell and the last 2 surrendered. They tied up their captives and were ambushed from behind by 6 more goblins. They fought their way out but Rokan was down to 1 hp so they hustled back to the keep.

The guards would not allow them back into the keep with the goblins and wanted to dispatch the goblins on sight. The party decided to set up a camp outside the walls with a rotating watch so that the goblins could be kept alive. The goblins, fearing for their lives, promised to show them where the ogre lived and a secret door into the goblin halls.

4 days were spent at the keep. The party made friends with a mysterious priest named Malros despite the warnings of the keep’s curate Borus who was openly suspicious of the other priest. Borus did tell the party that for 100 gold he could arrange a meeting for them with the Castellan.

The party plus Malros and his 2 acolytes went back to the caves. The goblins had trapped and fortified the main entrance, but party skipped it following the goblin captives to the hidden ogre cave. Another fortunate surprise roll and Snoh the Magic User cast Sleep on the Ogre. They murdered it, stole its loot, and then were prepared to head back to the keep. Realizing that the party was going to drag them back to the keep, the goblin captives started screaming. The secret door swung open and the party plus Malros and his acolytes made short work of the 6 goblins that jumped them. Their goblin captives did not survive the aftermath of the battle.

Feeling powerful, they decided to push further into the goblin halls. They came across 10 more goblins and their luck started changing.

House Rule Alert! Death: Standing at 0 HP (cannot be reduced below 0). If struck again save vs. death. If successful you are unconscious but have lost a hand, arm, foot, etc. If failed, you die. I tried death and dismemberment tables but they were a bit "too much." This way a player gets 1 round to break ranks and try to escape with their life.

Hortus went to 0 HP in the first round. 2 goblins fell, but Malros and his acolytes hung back. Snoh went to 0 HP in the second round and then Malros struck, hitting Rokan with Inflict Light Wounds in the back bringing him to 0 HP. Several more goblins fell, but with half the party one hit from death and pinned between a 4th level evil cleric and 6 goblins things looked grim.

Hortus used the hold person scroll that they found in the ogre’s cave on Malros who failed his save. Two more goblins were killed and the remaining 3 ran. They murdered the priest and the 2 acolytes surrendered after seeing their leader so easily dispatched. The party hightailed it back to the keep with new captives in tow before the goblins could return with reinforcements.

Session 2 tomorrow! And they already had a major power spike when they picked up a +1 mace, +1 plate, and +1 shield along with approximately 500 xp!

The Girardoni Air Rifle

 Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Girardoni_air_rifle

Someone over on Reddit today asked about some cool historical firearms that could be included in games. This made me think of a weapon that was like a firearm but was not actually a firearm - the Girardoni Air Rifle.

The Girardoni Rifle was used primarily by the Austrians for a brief period from 1780 to 1815. This gun was a contemporary of the early muzzle loading rifles, but it came well after the musket which was represented by the heavy arquebus as early as 1521.

The wikipedia article I linked at the top of the page is extremely interesting and I am not going to summarize all of it here, but basically the Girardoni Air Rifle used compressed air to shoot 9-13 gram balls at high velocity. Because it did not rely on gunpowder it had several advantages over a traditional musket or rifle:

• Quiet
• Smokeless
• No flash
• Could be reloaded from a prone position
• Could be used in wet conditions
  
• Could fire up to 30 shots consecutively (no priming)
• Effective range of 150 yards
  
• Steampunk as ****
  

 However, it was fragile, expensive, and re-pressurizing the tank required upwards of 1500 pumps (the tanks were modular so you could just take the empty tank off and put an already pressurized tank on if you had a spare). Also, as could be imagined the gun would progressively lose power as it was shot (although most sources I went to in my quick google around the internet seemed to agree that ~30 shots could be fired).

Now the important stuff: The Girardoni Air Rifle for your B/X Game. I'm using the firearms rules from Carcass Crawler #1 to model this:

Girardoni Air Rifle: 750 gp (includes 1 tank); 9 lbs, 4' length

• Damage: Equal to current Resource Die (Compressed Air)
  
• Range: 5'-50' / 51'- 100' / 101' - 150'
  
• Magazine: 20 musket balls (can be shot 20 rounds in a row without reload).
• Reloading the magazine takes 1 round
  
• Compressed Air: Start at d12. Roll with every shot, on a 1 or 2 it reduces one step. When 1 or 2 is rolled on d4 the air tank is completely empty.
• Tank can be recharged by 1 step by taking 1 turn (10 min) pump it back up. This is very tiring, 2 people working together can recharge it twice as fast (taking turns).
• An empty tank can be switched for a full spare in 2 rounds (1 round to remove the old tank, 1 round to attack the new tank).
  
• Fragile: Using as  a club (1d6) has a 2-in-6 chance of permanently breaking the gun.

20 musket balls cost 1 gp (you don't need to buy powder, wadding, and cord).

A spare tank (that is the tricky part to make) costs 500gp. If you use item saving throw rules, treat spare tanks as potions with a +4 bonus on their save.

 

 

 

 

Secret vs. Hidden: Perception in Old School Play

Refined "Old School Search Procedure" 

1. Declare who is searching and number of turns spent to create initial dice pool

• Clerics, Fighters, Halflings, Magic Users, Thieves add 1d6 per turn
• Dwarves (underground) & Elves add 2d6 per turn
• Only Elf, Dwarf (underground), & Thief hirelings add 1d6 per turn
  

2. Divide dice pool by squares being searched (round up). Max one square per dice.

3. Roll dice pool. A single 1 indicates a success.

Example:

A Fighter (1d6), Cleric (1d6), Elf (2d6), and Halfling (1d6) with two hirelings; a thief (1d6) and a dwarf (1d6) enter a 30'x30' chamber. Their "Search Pool" is 7d6.

DM: You enter an ancient chapel with a vaulted ceiling from the west. Profane tapestries raggedly sag from the walls, save one one the north wall to the left of the alter that looks almost new. The alter itself is basalt caked in grime that glistens crimson in your torchlight. Broken pews line the room. Another entry can be seen in the middle of the south wall.

Caller: We are going to spend 1 turn searching this room. I (Elf) specifically want to check out that tapestry, the Cleric is going to search the alter, and the halfling is rummaging through the pews.

DM: The room is 9 total squares so it cannot be entirely searched in 1 turn. Do you want to select 7 squares to search, or take 2 turns?

Caller: We will take 2 turns.

DM: I am rolling 2d6 (14 / 9 = 1.55 or 2). [Rolls 3, 5 - no success]. The tapestry elaborately depicts what looks to be prisoners being thrown off of a cliff into the shadowy jaws of some ancient beast. An inspection of the alter reveals heavy maroon book with silver lettering on the cover written in an infernal script that you cannot read. Among the pews you find a dead body, quite old but not as ancient as this place, in dark robes. Nothing else of interest is found. Do you want to do anything further with the tapestry, book, or body?

Elf: I want to look behind the tapestry.

Cleric: I cast detect evil on the book.

Halfling: I'll loot the body.

DM: When you reach out to move the tapestry there is a faint shimmer and your hand passes through it. It is clearly an illusion. The book most certainly radiates evil. The body has an ornate dagger with a black squiggly blade and a ruby set on the pommel along with a purse containing 7gp and 3sp.

Elf: I stick my head and torch through the tapestry to see what is on the other side.

Cleric: I'll leave that book alone.

Halfling: I'll take the dagger and the purse.

DM: On the other side of the tapestry a narrow 5' hall extends 30 feet north into darkness. As you pick up the dagger you feel your fingers tighten painfully around its hilt.

Halfling: Shit.

<End of Example>

I wrote the above example to show how the search procedure that I have begun using works in play, but then I realized it also demonstrates something else. A lot of ink has been spilled about "Perception Checks" in old school D&D. I frequent the r/OSR sub on Reddit and it is probably a top 5 discussion topic. As soon as someone asks the question they are assaulted with a chorus of "You don't! Player skill over Character skill! The answer isn't on your character sheet!" Heck, I bought that particular brand of Kool-Aid myself and I'm sure if you scrub through my comment history you'd find me singing that particular refrain.

One problem. I don't do it like that at my table. It is much more nuanced. After allowing it to take up more brain space than I probably should have, I'm ready to explore the topic here. It really comes down to do two similar, but fundamentally different, concepts: Secret vs. Hidden.

Secret: not known or seen or not meant to be known or seen by others.

Hidden:  kept out of sight; concealed.

Things that are secret AND things that are hidden are both not supposed to be found, however something that is secret was NEVER meant to be found. Something that is hidden was, presumably, at some previous point not hidden.

How are those differences presented in play?

A door behind a tapestry, a safe behind a hung painting, a hallway that has been walled off, or a trapdoor under a rug are hidden. They were not always concealed, they were once visible and then at a later point they were obfuscated. These things are easily identified through player skill. If a character looks behind the tapestry, removes the painting, breaks the plaster, or rips away the rug the true nature of the thing will be revealed.

The stone wall that slides away when the torch sconce is turned, the bookcase that swings open when you pull out the right book, and the desk compartment that pops open when the panel is pressed in just the right spot are secret. They were specifically designed to avoid detection, even under scrutiny. They were never meant to be found. These things require a roll, usually 1-in-6, to be found.

Back to the example the players found three hidden things because of their Player Skill. They found the hidden tunnel behind the illusory tapestry, they found the Book of Vile Rites, and they found the cursed Dagger of Sacrifice. These things were not readily apparent when they walked in the room and their descriptions of their actions revealed them. What they did not find was the secret sliding wall section on the east wall that is activated by pressing a certain stone on either side at the same time. For that they would have needed to pass their check.

It is important to note: Secret things should not be required to progress through the dungeon. On the other side of that sliding wall is some sweet loot, but not finding it will not impede forward progress through the dungeon.

Math behind the change on demihuman searching

Demihuman search abilities (dwarf, elf) detect secrets on 1-in-6 but they get to roll 2d6.  Mathematically rolling 1-in-6 on 2d6 has a 31% chance of success, and rolling 2-in-6 on 1d6 has a 33% chance of success. The difference is negligible (2.77%) but I think the change in approach can really increase speed of play by making search a single roll per room.

 In the example that 30'x30'x10' room had 900 square feet of floor, 900 square feet of ceiling, and 1,200 square feet of walls for a total of 3,000 square feet. To search it in its entirety it would have taken 30 total turns. With all six of them searching that would have been five turns.

If they ignored the ceiling (beyond maybe a cursory glance to make sure there were no murder holes) it still would have taken 4 (3.5) turns.

If they ignored the floor and they were just searching walls, as adventurers tend to do, they could do it in 2 turns. I'm throwing in the ceiling and floor for free because I'm not a dick.

Additionally, in those 2 turns they would have between a 17% and 33% chance of success on any of the 12 available 10'x10' surfaces searched to succeed. It becomes extremely important, and tedious, to know who is specifically searching which section.

Using the dice pool, the party took 2 turns and had a 30.56% chance of success, so slightly more generous than RAW which I attribute to the party working as a team.

"Hey dwarf, come over here and check out this stonework. What do you think?"

 

 

A History of Silence

Silence has always been a problematic spell for me. It is a wildly powerful AoE that shuts down enemy casters, often without a saving throw when players cast it on a rock, arrow, or other such nonsense. I decided to go back through the books and understand how we arrived at the modern incarnation of the Silence spell from its humble OD&D roots through the split of the AD&D and Basic/Expert lines (and did they treat it differently). Finally, I give the OD&D version a “B/X Treatment” to bring it back in line with what I am reading as “original intent.”

OD&D Supplement #1: Greyhawk (1975)

Silence, 15 ft. Radius

This spell allows the user to either cast Silence upon himself and his party so as to move with no sound or to cast the spell upon some object or thing to silence it. Duration: 12 turns. Range: 18"

This is the first time the Silence spell shows up (directly following the Little Brown Books) and it does not indicate that it interferes with conversation or spellcasting. In fact, the main thrust of the spell reads like it is meant to be cast on oneself or party to make them quiet. The spell does not indicate that there is a save against it, another nod that it is not weaponized.

Holmes Basic (1977)

Silence: 15' Radius

Level: clerical 2; Range: 180 feet; Duration: 12 turns

Allows the user to cast silence in a large area so as to prevent sound or allow his party to move noiselessly. It can be used to silence some object as well. Note conversation is not possible under a silence spell.

Here we have the Holmes interpretation of the Silence spell and it picks up the note about conversation. However, it also once again puts forward the idea that the intent of the spell is to help the party move noiselessly about the dungeon. There is also another subtle change in the language of this spell indicating that it can be cast over an area, previously the spell read as needing to be cast on (a) person(s) or object. Again, there is no save listed as the spell has not yet been weaponized.

“A New Look at Illusionists” by Rafael Ovalle (Dragon #12 February 1978)

Displacement 10’ radius: As clerical silence in description, duration and range, but the effect is

displacement.

Personal Silence: As clerical silence for caster.

The cited article is a fascinating look at illusionists building off the illusionist that first appeared in Strategic Review Volume 1 Number 4 and then elaborated on in Dragon #1. Hence, the spell references in these descriptions can only be assumed to harken back to the Silence 15 ft Radius spell introduced in OD&D Supplement #1 Greyhawk. “Personal Silence” in particular being added to the illusionist class makes me think that the Silence spell was not universally understood at this point in time to hinder spellcasting (otherwise this would be an extremely limiting spell slipped into an article that was generally pumping up the power level of illusionist).

AD&D Players Handbook (1978)

Silence, 15’ Radius

Level: 2 Range: 12" Duration: 2 rounds/level Area of Effect: 30' diameter sphere Components: V, S Casting Time: 5 segments Saving Throw: None

Explanation/Description: Upon casting this spell, complete silence prevails In the area of its effect. All sound is stopped, so all conversation is impossible, spells cannot be cast, and no noise whatsoever issues forth, The spell can be cast into the air or upon an object. The spell of silence lasts for 2 rounds for each level of experience of the clerk, i.e. 2 rounds at 1st level, 4 at 2nd, 6 at 3rd, 8 at 4th and so forth. The spell can be cast upon a creature, and the effect will then radiate from the creature and move as it moves. If the creature is unwilling, it saves against the spell and if the saving throw is made, the spell effect locates about one foot behind the target creature.

The weaponization of Silence appears to happen first in AD&D. Holmes made it an area effect that prohibited speaking, in the 1st edition Player's Handbook this was codified to mean that spells couldn’t be cast and its offensive potential was realized with the inclusion of a saving throw.

Moldvay Basic (1981)

Silence 15’ Radius

Range: 180’ Duration: 12 turns

This spell will make an area with a 30’ diameter totally silent. Conversation and spells in this area will be prevented for the duration of the spell. This spell does not prevent a person within the area from hearing noises made outside the area. If cast at a person, the victim must save vs. Spells, or the spell effect will move with him! If the saving throw is successful, the spell will remain in the area in which it was cast, and the victim may move out of it.

Moldvay takes the nod from AD&D maintaining basically the same spell. The only noticeable difference is the duration which does not scale like it does in AD&D.

Rules Cyclopedia (1991)

Silence 15' Radius

Range: 180' Duration: 12 turns Effect: Sphere of silence 30' across

This spell makes the area of effect totally silent. Conversation and spellcasting in this area are impossible for the duration of the spell. This spell does not prevent a person within the area from hearing noises outside the area. If cast on a creature, the victim must make a saving throw vs. spells or the spell effects will move with the creature. If the saving throw is successful, the spell remains in the area in which it was cast, and the victim may move out of the area.

As expected, minor wordsmithing from the Moldvay version. Now - indulge me when I introduce one more spell that is NOT Silence.

Cook Expert (1981)

Invisibility 10’ Radius

Range: 120’ Duration: Special

This spell makes the creature it is cast on and all creatures within 10’ at the time of casting invisible. This area will move with the person it is cast upon. This spell otherwise acts as an invisibility spell, but the creatures in the area of effect who move more than 10’ away from the creature the spell is cast on will become visible.

My supposition is thus: Silence was initially intended to be the counterpoint to invisibility, “auditory invisibility” could have been another name for it. However, it required more rulings at the table. If I say something, can I be heard? Dungeonmasters might rule that you can’t because you can’t make any sounds. That makes conversation impossible. Then it's a small hop to making casting impossible. The biggest deviation in understanding of the spell was perhaps Holmes when the spell transitioned from a spell that targeted creatures or objects to an area of effect spell with a radiating effect instead of a personal effect on those effected.  Clever players figured out that based on ruling they could use the spell to shut down enemy casters, so Dungeonmasters added a saving throw - and the weaponization of the spell was complete. The next spell that specifically strips spellcasters of their spellcasting cannot be obtained until level 5 Feeble Mind, which is not AoE and does not have the same out of combat utility - objectively a weaker spell than Silence 15 ft Radius at level 2.


I have a version of Silence 15 ft Radius if it stayed closer to its OD&D roots with a nice clean Moldvay/Cook update.

The Gibbering Blog (2023)

Silence 15’ Radius

Range: 120’ Duration: 12 Turns

This spell makes the creature it is cast on and all creatures within 15’ at the time move silently. This area will move with the person it is cast upon, but the creatures in the area of effect who move more than 15’ away from the creature the spell is cast on will begin making sound. If any effected creature speaks, the spell immediately ends. This spell can also be cast on an object so that the object creates no sound, for example it could be cast on a door before it is bashed down.