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View Full Version : I Wanna Be the Guy, Tabletop Eddition (3.5)



TabletopNuke
2009-12-04, 07:15 PM
"I Wanna Be the Guy (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/IWannaBeTheGuy)". This name has haunted freeware gamers from all corners of cyberspace for two years now. But should this why should this special experience be exclusive to PC gamers. I want to share the pain with tabletop players too.

You mission: Recreate every level of I Wanna Be the Guy using D&D 3.5 rules. Take the trap rules in the DMG and turn them up to 11. Put them in the cruelest locations imaginable. Stat out all the bosses; Zangief, Dracula, Bowser, the Guy, and so on. Create a plant monster of pure malevolence, who drops instant-kill delicious fruit when the players least expect it. Make your players scream with rage and break down crying.

You have your instructions. Now get to work.

Disclaimer: I Wanna Be the Guy is the creation of Mike O'Reilly, a man who will most certainly die a painful death and spend eternity in torment.

I have never played I Wanna Be the Guy, nor will I ever. My experience with this atrocity amounts the viewing of many hilarious "Let's Plays", numerous articles, and a creator interview (http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/issues/issue_230/6835-The-Pains-of-Being-The-Guy).

See, I'm what professionals refer to as "gaming challenged". If it requires any kind of coordination, I'm sure to fail. It took me 5 years and a walkthrough to beat Spyro the Dragon. I never got past level 1 of Metal Gear Solid 3 on super easy mode. With a walkthrough. I may hold the world record for most accidental self-kills on Halo in under 10 minutes. This is the main reason I play tabletop almost exclusively.

jokey665
2009-12-04, 07:27 PM
Don't they have one of these already? Some kind of horrifying tomb?

TabletopNuke
2009-12-04, 07:35 PM
Don't they have one of these already? Some kind of horrifying tomb?

This is news to me. Would you be so kind as to provide a link?

Eldan
2009-12-04, 07:36 PM
Pretty much. And you certainly can't be as bad at games requiring coordination as I am.

Edit: Ninja'd massively. He means the Tomb of Horrors, an old adventure which has also been updated to 3rd ed, which is famous for being horrifically sadistic, containing such things as spheres of annihilation in keyholes and an epic demilich boss for a low-level party.

TabletopNuke
2009-12-04, 07:51 PM
Pretty much. And you certainly can't be as bad at games requiring coordination as I am.

How bad are you? Spyro the Dragon is a kiddie game for the PS1 from the mid-nineties. It took me a week to be able to walk straight with the d-pad. I couldn't use the analog sticks for another 3 years or so.


Edit: Ninja'd massively. He means the Tomb of Horrors, an old adventure which has also been updated to 3rd ed, which is famous for being horrifically sadistic, containing such things as spheres of annihilation in keyholes and an epic demilich boss for a low-level party.
Wow. Where can I find this? Was it actually intended to be beaten?


spheres of annihilation in keyholes and an epic demilich boss for a low-level party.
That's even more sadistic than the last game I DM'ed. A 1st level bard kicked a beggar in the crotch. I announced that the beggar was an ancient gold dragon in disguise. The bard died.

Magnor Criol
2009-12-04, 07:53 PM
This is news to me. Would you be so kind as to provide a link?

Tomb of Horrors (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/oa/20051031a); read it and weep. Weep for your players' poor, poor, soon-to-be-deceased characters.

Mulletmanalive
2009-12-04, 08:02 PM
I played this back when i started gaming; the TOH is a special kind of twisted, though in fairness, it's just what a Lich of this guy's power and evil awesome would build

He REALLY didn't like being disturbed...

KBF
2009-12-04, 08:05 PM
The main features of I Wanna Be The Guy are impossible, expectation defying and thought provoking murderdeathinstagib traps, and infinite retries.

I'm not sure how well it translates.

Lunix Vandal
2009-12-04, 08:21 PM
A few tasters from the 3.5 version of ToH:

- The entrance is actually three tunnels, hidden and blocked by rubble. One dead-ends after thirty feet, and opening the (fake) door at the end or prodding the ceiling causes a cave-in, burying the party alive and dealing 16d6 damage, Ref 23 half. The second goes 60 feet in, but getting within 20 feet of the (also fake) doors at the end causes a 10-foot thick stone wall to block off the tunnel while the ceiling does its trash compactor shtick. The text suggests that the PCs can get out with a DC 30 Strength check (they're level 9) or a disintegrate (ditto). The actual entrance, naturally, has a half-dozen poisoned-spike pit traps.

- One of the off-branches from the true entrance leads to a set of 11 small rooms, four of which collectively lead to a dead-end, the other seven of which require finding hidden doors to advance. Also, none of the secret doors swing open like "normal" doors -- the players are supposed to guess how to open it, from the all of no clues the DM hands to them. Did I mention that all eleven rooms have automatic-reset magic arrow traps that fire every single round? No? How about that they reassemble themselves after 1d4 rounds if you break/disable them without using dispel?

- A few rooms further on from that, there's the aptly-named Chapel of Evil. Touch the altar once? A maximized lightning lolt tears town the aisle. Touch it again? A fireball centered on the altar. A skeleton on the ground points to a mist-filled, glowing orange archway set into one wall. On the first trip through, you get saddled with the effects (but not equipment) of a helm of opposite alignment and OotS's belt of gender changing. A second trip through (likely upon seeing that the arch leads to a dead-end) restores your alignment but does 1d6 damage. A third trip restores your gender -- but teleports you to the Tomb's entrance. Oh, and any nonliving matter in your possession (like, y'know, clothes, spell components, weapons, et cetera) get transported to Acererak's (true) chambers, in the deepest part of the dungeon. Where they are now guarded by the soul-stealing demilich that is Acererak himself. Hilarity ensues.

jmbrown
2009-12-04, 08:22 PM
The main features of I Wanna Be The Guy are impossible, expectation defying and thought provoking murderdeathinstagib traps, and infinite retries.

I'm not sure how well it translates.

Have you ever read Kobolds Ate My Baby?

TabletopNuke
2009-12-04, 08:46 PM
I am downloading the Tomb of Horrors as we speak, and I eagerly anticipate it. However, I would like to point out that part of the reason for this post was to re-create the levels I Wanna be the Guy in D&D format. Does no one else want to pit their players against delicious fruit trees?

The Dark Fiddler
2009-12-04, 09:05 PM
It won't work.

IWBTG is a platformer which is beaten by trying the level over and over and over until you succeed.

D&D 3.5 is an RPG which you do not 'win'.

UglyPanda
2009-12-04, 09:18 PM
I agree. And I Wanna Be The Guy relies heavily on things which don't transfer well to tabletops. Look at the second screen in the game when you first see the giant cherries. In I Wanna Be The Guy, all you can do is walk left and right, jump, double-jump, shoot, and climb on certain walls. The players aren't going to try to jump over the cherries. They're going to wonder why the hell they aren't allowed to walk around the cherries, summon monsters to get hit by cherries for them, dig under the trees, burn the trees, etc.

Anyone remember what 100,000 XP was worth in AD&D? It seems you were supposed to receive that much for going through the tomb in its entirety. Or maybe it's supposed to be split among the group, I can't tell.

DESTRUCTION OF THE DEMI-LICH EARNS A SUGGESTED 100,000 EXPERIENCE POINTS. THIS CONSIDERS ALL ACTIONS WITHIN THE TOMB OF HORRORS TO GAIN THE CRYPT. TREASURE TAKEN OUT SHOULD ADD AN ADDITIONAL 1 EXPERIENCE POINT FOR EVERY 2 G.P. OF VALUE.

KBF
2009-12-04, 09:23 PM
D&D 3.5 is an RPG which you do not 'win'.


This is a very narrow viewpoint. You can 'win' dungeons and kick in the door style play.

The problem with recreating IWBG is that it will unfortunately result in rolling a d20 several hundred times until you win, defeats the charm of the game. And a lot of the jokes are platformer genre specific and you'll lose a lot of what made it so fun.

Recreating it but changing the levels to adhere to (and mock) RPG tropes could be interesting. It would probably be similar to Tomb of Horrors, but.. Less 'cruel' and more 'schadenfreude'.

Siosilvar
2009-12-04, 09:31 PM
Anyone remember what 100,000 XP was worth in AD&D? It seems you were supposed to receive that much for going through the tomb in its entirety. Or maybe it's supposed to be split among the group, I can't tell.

Depending on level and class, about half of a level at when you "should" be going in (9-12 ish). Which is, comparatively, a lot.

TabletopNuke
2009-12-04, 09:48 PM
Recreating it but changing the levels to adhere to (and mock) RPG tropes could be interesting. It would probably be similar to Tomb of Horrors, but.. Less 'cruel' and more 'schadenfreude'.

That's exactly what I had in mind.

Seemingly innocuous background objects are a common threat in IWBTG (trees, fruit, the moon, ect), and this concept translates well into D&D.

I recall a section in the gag supplement "The Bride of the Portable Hole" that discussed psionic penguins. Apparently the author had actually used them, and they posed a real threat, because adventurers don't usually realize that the mildly amusing birds are responsible for the sudden barrage of of psychic attacks.