Catullus64
2023-12-05, 12:19 PM
I've been invited to run games at a new gaming shop in my area. They've given me pretty free reign in how I run my table.
My intention is to run a West Marches game. For the unfamiliar, that means a game with a persistent world and characters, but no fixed party or story. Each week, the players who make up that week's table decide (either in the moment or beforehand via Discord) what adventures they want their party to go on. Those adventures are self-contained, but XP and treasure carry across games.
Here's an overview of the campaign rules/guidelines as I would present them to the players. Some have to do with this particular format, some are just my personal preferences for running 5e.
All characters start at 1st Level. There are three sources of XP. First, each character gains 200 XP for each session they survive; survival is far from guaranteed! Second, for each 1 GP worth of treasure (not counting magic items) that the party manages to get back to town and keep by session's end, each member of the party gains 1 XP. All party members gain this XP regardless of how the treasure itself is divided. Thirdly, the DM can give special XP awards. By default, characters do not gain XP for defeating enemies in combat.
Simplified carrying capacity system. Most of a player's adventuring kit is abstracted to a weight of 50 lbs. The only items a player need track specifically are: weapons, armor, food, water, treasure, and any object the DM rules is too large to fit into a backpack.
Darkvision. Player characters whose ancestry ordinarily includes Darkvision will receive a replacement feature; for instance, Dwarves receive a 10-foot tremorsense while in contact with earth or stone, while Elves can see objects up to 1 mile distant as if they were within 100 feet. Some ancestries will retain Darkvision, but suffer from Sunlight Sensitivity.
Pre-generated characters will be made available. If someone wants to make their own character, they should check with the DM about any non-core character options they wish to use. If they wish to roll for their ability scores, they should do so in full view of the table. If you take one of the pre-generated characters, that character is now yours, and will be reserved for your use in future play.
I want these rules to strike a balance between relative accessibility to players familiar with default 5e, or new to the game altogether, and gently nudging the gameplay towards a more old-fashioned Dungeon Crawl mode of play. Hence:
The XP system is in place to take players out of a combat-is-the-first/only-solution mindset. Unlike older wealth-as-XP systems, it isn't split up, so the pace of early game leveling is still quite fast.
Tracking encumbrance item-by-item is too much of a bother unless all of your players are super into it, which most won't be; hence most tables ignore it. This new system still keeps weight as something of a resource to manage, but reduces the amount of bookkeeping dramatically.
Prolific PC-Darkvision severely undercuts light-management gameplay, which I think is pretty essential to a good dungeon crawl.
I do have a particular world and setting, with which not every option, especially ancestries, will fit. I will try not to say no, but at the very least I want to work with players to make sure a given character fits the setting tone.
My intention is to run a West Marches game. For the unfamiliar, that means a game with a persistent world and characters, but no fixed party or story. Each week, the players who make up that week's table decide (either in the moment or beforehand via Discord) what adventures they want their party to go on. Those adventures are self-contained, but XP and treasure carry across games.
Here's an overview of the campaign rules/guidelines as I would present them to the players. Some have to do with this particular format, some are just my personal preferences for running 5e.
All characters start at 1st Level. There are three sources of XP. First, each character gains 200 XP for each session they survive; survival is far from guaranteed! Second, for each 1 GP worth of treasure (not counting magic items) that the party manages to get back to town and keep by session's end, each member of the party gains 1 XP. All party members gain this XP regardless of how the treasure itself is divided. Thirdly, the DM can give special XP awards. By default, characters do not gain XP for defeating enemies in combat.
Simplified carrying capacity system. Most of a player's adventuring kit is abstracted to a weight of 50 lbs. The only items a player need track specifically are: weapons, armor, food, water, treasure, and any object the DM rules is too large to fit into a backpack.
Darkvision. Player characters whose ancestry ordinarily includes Darkvision will receive a replacement feature; for instance, Dwarves receive a 10-foot tremorsense while in contact with earth or stone, while Elves can see objects up to 1 mile distant as if they were within 100 feet. Some ancestries will retain Darkvision, but suffer from Sunlight Sensitivity.
Pre-generated characters will be made available. If someone wants to make their own character, they should check with the DM about any non-core character options they wish to use. If they wish to roll for their ability scores, they should do so in full view of the table. If you take one of the pre-generated characters, that character is now yours, and will be reserved for your use in future play.
I want these rules to strike a balance between relative accessibility to players familiar with default 5e, or new to the game altogether, and gently nudging the gameplay towards a more old-fashioned Dungeon Crawl mode of play. Hence:
The XP system is in place to take players out of a combat-is-the-first/only-solution mindset. Unlike older wealth-as-XP systems, it isn't split up, so the pace of early game leveling is still quite fast.
Tracking encumbrance item-by-item is too much of a bother unless all of your players are super into it, which most won't be; hence most tables ignore it. This new system still keeps weight as something of a resource to manage, but reduces the amount of bookkeeping dramatically.
Prolific PC-Darkvision severely undercuts light-management gameplay, which I think is pretty essential to a good dungeon crawl.
I do have a particular world and setting, with which not every option, especially ancestries, will fit. I will try not to say no, but at the very least I want to work with players to make sure a given character fits the setting tone.