More Swords & Soerceries for my campaign

[Yora]

I finally got my long time dream campaign running and after five sessions its going really strong so far. It's an expansion on the original The Isle of Dread module, with much of the additional material based on the dungeons from Dwellers of the Forbidden City, The Hidden Shrine of Tamoachan, The Forgotten Temple of Tharizdun, and The Cavern of Thracia, and I am also adapting the Dungeon adventures Torrents of Dread and Escape from Meenlock Prison. Basically my whole "I want to run this one day" list.
The campaign is set in a homebrew world inspired by Conan and Elric, Barsoom and Dark Sun, but set in jungles, and Morrowind, but less civilized.

The players seemed to have grasped the general idea very well, and the current party consists of a Soldier Battlemaster, a Criminal Thief, a Sage Arcane Trickster, an Acolyte Tempest Cleric, and a Noble Warlock. (They are basically a Cimmerian, a Melnibonean, two Dunmers, and one wood elf. Soon to be all 3rd level.) All of a benevolent disposition but with flexible ethics. Couldn't have gotten a better Sword & Sorcery party if I asked for it.
I already asked my players how they feel about constantly getting giant snakes in their faces and getting trapped in claustrophobic caves, and they all told me to go knock myself out with that stuff. Great. :smallbiggrin:

I started the campaign running Against the Cult of the Reptile God to set things in motion and give the players time to get accustomed to the characters and figure out their personalities before sending them off into an open world. I had the great idea to reflavor the whole thing as the raid on Thulsa Doom's temple in Conan the Barbarian and even made the main villain a yuan-ti who turned into a giant snake in the middle of the fight. (And the evil overlord list was right: It never helps.) But I found that in practice when running the game, and also while going through the rulebooks and the original adventures, I keep falling back into a generic elfgame mindset. And at least to me the whole thing feels more like a Rated-12 Forgotten Realms campaign than a Rated-16 Sword & Sorcery adventure.

Now that they are setting out to reach the Isle of Dread and will be making a quite possibly extended stop in a pirate port, I really want to dial up the Sword & Sorcery style.

Since this is the first time I am running a 5th edition campaign, I've been trying to mostly stick it to the PHB as written without making big changes to the rules. But I also feel that there isn't really much need to make major adjustments to the rules as they are.
I reduced armor to leather, studded, scale, half-plate, chain mail, and splint and reflavored them to look more Bronze Age, and I removed crossbows, flails, and greatswords. Mostly a cosmetic thing.
For now we've been sticking to the normal resting times, but I want to try out using healing only with Hit Dice and not regaining all hit points on a long rest. (I see no sense to limit the warlock two two spells per week or something like that.)
For encumbrance, I am using a simplified system that effectively uses inventory slots with the slots for Encumbrance and Heavy Encumbrance being already marked, so you can see your Encumbrance rating without calculating weight or even counting the number of items you have. I use this to determine travel speeds overland, but since I no longer draw floorplans for combat, encumbrance only matters during combat once characters get into Heavy Encumbrance. Light spells and food and water spells are removed from the game to make light and food supplies matter during explorations.
Other than that, I've left the rules more or less untouched. The main changes are in what races and classes players could pick from.

To reflavor the Isle of Dread to a more Sword & Sorcery style, I am using tabaxi for the rakasta (no real change there) and aaracockra for the phanatons and choldriths (with swarms of chitine minions) for aranea. I also replace the two sad kopru with a whole expedition of yuan-ti that are trying to rebuild the ancient city in the center of the isle. (For which I surround the sad 21-room dungeon with the whole Dwellers of the Forbidden City module.)
For populating the isle with native animals, I think all the dinosaurs and giant insects from the Monster Manual work great. Sahuagin and merrows in the surrounding waters and wyverns and rocs in the sky seem like perfect fits, but I think other than these, using the classic D&D monsters wouldn't feel right. Which includes the green dragon on the island. Somehow dragons don't feel right for Sword & Sorcery to me.

As I said, the next stage for the players is a pirate port, where they will have opportunities to steal a map from a pirate ship, steal a magic horn from a rich smuggler's mansion, and rescue a navigator from the pirate queen's prision (which will be an Escape from Meenlock Prison). All of which will be really helpful to reach the Isle of Dread safely, but none of them are required to proceed to their destination.

The village Orlane from Against the Cult of the Reptile felt like a totally generic D&D town, and the dungeon ended up being mind controlled farmers in a cave, witha priest turning into a giant snake at the end. While it was great fun for everyone, I really think I failed at evoking any Sword & Sorcery style with it. What can I do to improve this aspect of the game? Any rules adjustments or additional content that might contribute to that end, or perhaps just general idea to run D&D in a more Sword & Sorcery way?

[Corran]

Although I am not familiar with most of your sources of influence, I've got to say that your game world sounds very interesting. Some parts reminded me a little of the Tomb of Annihilation 5e campaign (jungle, dinosaurs, yuan-ti, armor/weapon restrictions), so have a look at it if you have access to it (but take a second opinion before buying it, cause as I said, I am not very familiar with most things you mention, so it might not fit to what you have going as well as I imagine).

Regarding the long rest changes, I am guessing you want to make them to cause more attrition, so that journeying through the game world becomes something actually dangerous (without having to count constantly and too much on the higher CR monsters). After having played ToA (as a player), I got myself thinking how better that campaign would be if the jungle was actually dangerous (instead of an xp farm), which made me think of using rest variant rules should I ever play/run it again. So I think that you are in the right track thinking to mess with rests. I would be happy to just say that each night counts as a short rest and I'd reward a long rest if they could find a spot (that could be made to be) safe and comfortable enough (ie your change affects only hp and not anything else, so it makes resource management less of an issue, and thus traversing through the wild parts of the game world will be less of a problem).

[Yora]

I believe Tomb of Annihilation is based directly on all those 1st edition and BECMI jungle adventures.

The thing about rests is that there's a big difference between encounters in the wilderness and encounters in ruins. In two or there days spend in a ruin, the party is likely face many more encounters than in the two or three weeks spend travelling getting there and back. I think ultimately, the game should be balanced for the ruin explorations, not for the wilderness travel.

The only big dungeon we had so far was entered during the night, and the two rogues did very good work in finding the sleeping rooms of the cultists and silently blocking the doors from outside. So there really were only four fights in the whole dungeon, two of them trivial, with a short rest after the first one. And the whole thing happened at first level, so I really have no idea how staying power will actually work out at 3rd level and beyond. This is something I think I will have to wait and see and perhaps make adjustments as it becomes more clear what works and what not.

The probably hugely important house rule that I forgot to mention is, that defeated enemies only provide 10% their normal XP. Instead I give 1 XP per 1 gp of treasure that is hauled back to town. And my guideline is that the total amount of hidden treasure should be about 10 times as many XP, as the XP for defeating all possible enemies in the dungeon. So if the partly clears out 100% of a dungeon, defeats all enemies and find every piece of treasure, they come out with 110% as many XP as they would have gained for defeating all enemies under standard experience rules.
The idea here is that they can steal treasures without fighting anyone and basically get just as much XP as if they defeated everyone. And if a monster had to be tricked or distracted to get at a treasure, that monster also counts as "overcome" and get XP. This means in turn that the monsters in a dungeon can be a lot more than the party could handle. Because the party does not have to fight all of them. Fighting a monster or running away is a choice. Not an obvious no-brainer. Leaving a monster behind makes the party miss out only of a small amount of XP, but that fight could be potentially very dangerous if they try it. I did not really do that yet with them at 1st level, but once they reach 3rd level tomorrow, this will become an important factor.

[Corran]

Point taken about the difference in number of encounters in the wilderness as opposed to ruins. My immediate thought it to revert back to normal resting rules in extensive dungeoncrawling situations (or even to heroic resting if I plan to throw an impossible-ish scenario), keeping a modified version of the gritty realism for when travelling through the wilderness just to keep it dangerous without overloading the combat menu (although your xp system can allow you to throw few big fights to keep it short and dangerous, it also limits the enemies you will be able to use, at least without resorting to large numbers and thus to very time consuming fights for the lower CR's). The main reason why I would want the changes in rests to affect more than just hp recovery though, is for better balance between the classes (especially since you've got both s/r and l/r dependent classes in the mix). I haven't tried it, so it might not be as good a solution as I think. Or it might not be a good solution for what you want. I'd be interested to hear though how your rest variant worked for you after you give it some more time.

I think I've run out of useful things to say. So I'll just wait to read the responses from more experienced players, who are also more familiar with the theme you've got there.

[Trask]

First, could I recommend a few adventures?

The new Swords and Sorceries line by Arc Dream Publishing for 5e are very much in the mold of S&S flavor. Their first one, Sea Demon's Gold, seems like it would be just a completely perfect fit as a possible detour in their journeys into the sea.

Also the old adventure Night's Dark Terror has a decent S&S vibe, heavy on deep and spooky forests and tattooed goblin tribes, with an evil wizard machinating behind everything trying to find the lost valley of the ancient civilization that once ruled mankind before you do to plunder its treasures.

Lastly, Shadows of Forgotten Kings is a adventure about venturing into a jungle to explore a lost city thats normal by day but wretchedly cursed by night. Its a great little foray of the OSR location based style into a 5e context and I recommend it as well. It also has that sweet S&S flavor.

As for play, you sound like you have more experience on it than I do but I think with Orlane in specific it would be good practice to imagine towns and villages as more tribal, maybe even extremely primitive affairs. Emphasizing the rudeness of the huts, maybe the men wear wolf skins, lean, hard, and hungry looking. I'd avoid things like inns and guards in the more rural areas, even though filthy taverns are a S&S staple as well, the whole aesthetic of the tavern has been absorbed by generic fantasy. I'd take that opportunity to go in the opposite direction and emphasize the primitive element, which is one of the main things that separates S&S worlds from generic fantasy worlds IMO, instead of a tavern you have the chief's hall where he feasts you as a guest and lets you sleep and rest in exchange for tales of the wider world. If you do decide to use taverns, go for the sleazy and the sexy for the lower class ones (scuff marks on the floorboards where impromptu executions are held by the tyrannical bandit lord, pickled heads in jars, scantily clad girls throwing their affections at grizzled patrons splashing their blood money on the vinegary wine) and dreamy and magical for the higher class ones (full of sickly sweet smoke, perfumed wizards sitting delicately on silk cushions, long beards drooping into their black-purple wine goblets as they sway, trancelike, listening to the ivory masked maiden playing a sitar).

Also I don't know what you did for the adventure exactly so this advice might not be useful, but I feel like one of the strongest element to classic S&S tales (especially those of Conan ancestry, which is what feels most kin to your setting) is that the protagonist is either entirely motivated by picaresque gain, or is trapped in a bad situation that he has to fight his way of out. Motivation is one of the biggest divergences between heroic fantasy and S&S. If your PC's are motivated by their good hearts to liberate poor village folk, I think that wouldn't feel super S&S to me. Problem is, thats a player facing issue. If they want to be sainted heroes they will be, but maybe I would try and get their attention with shiny gold and treasures before pulling heartstrings. Also you could use some of the cheesy, but classic, S&S tropes of damsels in distress or princesses and chieftan's daughters taking a liking to one of the PCs. Not all tables are down with that kind of thing, but it is very S&S and helps bring a little of that grit and human element, especially when the chieftess' daughter who you tumbled on the tiger skins is now dangling over a pit of frothing one eyed vipers, being lowered more and more while you and your companions battle the gigantic snake priestess trying to eat you.

Another thing that S&S does well (particularly Moorcock) is introducing villains early and really making you hate them. Its done a lot in S&S stories, whereas I think heroic fantasy tends to go towards the Sauron approach where the villain is some unknowable but terrifying force in the background of all things. But in S&S, Glandyth-a-Krae butchers your family and mutilates your hand and eye before you plane shift out of his clutches, or Thulsa Doom reveals his skull face in the royal courtroom to taunt you before riding off into the sky on a flaming skeletal horse (ok we actually dont know what happened in the Kull story but thats not bad). It seems like your mind controlling high priest was in the shadows, as she should be, but perhaps there are ways to introduce characters like that earlier without giving away the surprise. If you do have some shadowy puppeteer villain, you give them an iconic lieutenant (like a Darth Vader type) who perhaps was a disguised village elder actually facilitating the takeover. Or maybe the high priests' great masked face appears flickering in the dusky smoke the sacrifice chamber and regards them with ophidian eyes before vanishing. For less enigmatic characters, they can make appearances in parley with heroes, trying to recruit them. Or the villains could come from the heroes own group, like if they hire passage into the jungled isles then perhaps their former captain ends up being their rival in the mad scramble for the map to the lost city later on after she finds out about the treasure. She might even try and imprison them or people close to them to torture the information out. Stuff like that can really work wonders at making the conflict feel personal, and its always more S&S when its about personal, human stories rather than the more grand, high concept plots. Even the most high magic S&S story (probably the Corum cycle) introduces a heinous villain in the first few chapters and closes the story with that villain's death, given far more poignancy than the destruction of the King of Swords, Ruler of Hell and Chaos and all his demoniac hosts. All that felt like background dressing compared to that moment Corum got to take revenge on the barbarian who murdered his family.

So yeah those are my long winded tips. Lemme say that I'm a huge fan of all your stuff and I've been keeping up with your blog for years now. Kind of weird for me to give advice considering that, but I hope that at least some of my ideas will help your game.

[Yora]

Some very good thoughts.

But I think while savage barbarians were very popular with painters and illustrators, they are not actually very common in the literature. Conan is the one prominent exception among the granddaddies of Sword & Sorcery, and despite his badmouthing of civilization, he has left his barbarian life behind in his very first adventures and never looked back. However, the civilization that is present is almost universally decadent. It's corrupt, treacherous, and greedy with few morals.
The Isle of Dread might not actually be a fantastic place for such a campaign, as it is really big and all settlements are crammed in one very small corner.

Looking back in hindsight, Orlane from Against the Cult of the Reptile God could easily be given a more Sword & Sorcery feel. I think all that is really needed is to make the well maintained houses look shoddy, and the shoddy houses look like moldy ruins. And all the people in the village more grumpy. Too many of them are described as friendly and welcoming. Though there has to be some balance maintained to not make all the local block every attempt to provide the players with information, or make the players feel that their help is not wanted.

But I think one of the most important things might indeed by the NPCs the players are dealing with. Everyone who can be expected to have some kind of conversation with the players should have a name and description. Pirate Captain or Mercenary Sergeant are not going to cut it. These need to be individuals that need to be able to leave a distinguishing impression with players in a conversation. It might not be important right now, but when the dust has settled and the fires burned out, those that are still alive can make for great NPCs that can cause trouble or provide later.
Right now, there are five such NPCs from Against the Cult of the Reptile God that ended up unaccounted for in the confusion. Two of which are already plotting their comeback but are unable to catch up with the party for at least a month or two. I might end up not doing anything with them, but it's nice to have them at hand.
In our game today, the players will either hire a ship to take them to the Isle of Dread, or hire a crew to work on a ship they acquired. Either way, I've made 10 very short notes for sailors, which each will have their own loyalty score. And while I was preparing the pirate port, three of the NPCs who can provide important information might also be interested in signing on as hirelings and get out of the place. So I'm also preparing for that eventuality.

The golden priestess in the hidden Temple actually got foreshadowed by accident very early on when the players captured the one talkative cultist in the first fight, and he was more than happy to spill the beans. His preparation was that he wasn't really loyal to the cult and only interested in saving himself if things started to look really bad. Since he got captured and his superior was dead, he simply told the players about the cult, their hideout, and the leader. Not how I intended it, but it gave the players hints of what awaited them. (When they got there, it was this (http://spriggans-den.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Szar.png).)
They also know the name of a captain (actually a pirate) who is transporting slaves captured by the cult to the Isle of Dread, and the name of his superior he delivers them to. I really like the idea of continuing to build them up more before the players get a chance to meet them. I had not really thought about that, but it should work really nicely.