Finding Motivation to play D&D

[rlbeaver]

So, my sporadic gaming group sort of dissolved and the remainders (who haven't shown up to play anything of the other games) want to play D&D 3.5. I agreed to GM as there would be no game otherwise. I really haven't GM'd anything D&Dish for over eight years now (well, except for the fact that I played a couple of games of it, and GM'd a single session for my wife.)

Initially, I thought I could use the Midnight setting which sounds really cool (I was going to suggest the GURPS or Savage World conversion, but they are pretty clear they want D&D.) Then I realized that creating characters, background info, etc would be a problem as they only have the D&D Player's Book and nobody wants to spend money on anything more.

I'm suddenly finding myself having a motivation problem and think I may just pick up something like Rappan Athuk to save myself some work until I can get the spark to do something creative with D&D.

Since they all come from AD&D 1st edition days, I figure starting out with a dungeon crawl would give them a somewhat controlled introduction to the system...

Can you suggest any pre-written adventures that would work with the basic character creation choices, won't require a lot of effort (i.e. no porting), last a few sessions, and maybe prove to be somewhat interesting and expandable to less "rail-roady" type play?

[GhostInTheMachine]

The DnD website should have TONS of premade adventures there (updated weekly). You can just go through and pick one and if felt you can de-RR it.

www.d20srd.org has a watering down of the rules that your players can use. IIRC it can be printed and downloaded.

www.penpaperandpixel.com has a spell finder, monster finder, dice roller, and XP generator.

I'd recommend starting them off at the first level, but this can be pretty restrictive in terms of what they can do/fight. You might want to up the starting level (5 is a good one as I've been told. Haven't confirmed it yet though).

[Suriyel]

The SRD isn't so much watered down as it is 'censored' of character creation rules and 'trademark' monsters (such as the one with something pretty stuck in its eye). It actually has more material in it than the standard PHB, so you may wish to specify which classes and PRCs you are allowing, as well as which if any variant rules (as UA is in the SRD) will be used.

If you're willing to spend a few bucks (like 2-5) take a look at Green Ronin products. They've got a 3.5 updated Freeport collection that might be worth looking into, especially for its sale price (good through Dec. 14th it would seem). I played through part of Death in Freeport and don't recall anything glaringly bad about it.

[roguebfl]

Actually there are a few books coming out now such as the Spell Compendium and the Rules Compendium that brings together every thing scattered though out 3.5

It should also be noted these books are coming out now because by Mid next year the Core of 4th Edition will be out, and is something you should keep in mind before sinking a lot of money into 3.5

[GhostInTheMachine]

I believe the reason his players aren't going to be sinking $ into 3.5 is because 4e DnD is coming out.

[rlbeaver]

That's a big part of it. I have a lot of the D&D stuff because I have a compulsive disorder to buy RPGs that I don't play.

I figure if I can get something until 4th comes out, I might be able to get them to try GURPS since they'll have to go with a new system anyway.

I picked up Freeport at GenCon, I forgot I had it...hmmm...

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by roguebfl

Actually there are a few books coming out now such as the Spell Compendium and the Rules Compendium that brings together every thing scattered though out 3.5

Spell Compendium has most but not quite all of the additional spells available from the supplementary books. It actually does make spell-casting Paladins and Rangers a good bit more viable and helps out the toher spellcasting classes too..

Rules Compendium on the other hand has virtually noting tin it that isn't in the PHB or DMG. It's just gathered up in one place. I have a cople of buddies who think it's the greatest thing sine sliced bread but I have no use for it.

You don't actually have to have the Complete books. The prestige classes are a huge pile of sludge to sift through in hopes of finding _something_, but hardly essential. The additional base classes and the feats are a good bit more useful but are still a little hit or miss.

You can very reasonably go with just the PHB-DMG-MM. You especially don't need the later MMs. Any WotC module that has a monster not in the first one will reprint the stats.

However, besides the aforementioned SRD site there's HeroForge.

http://www.nzcomputers.net/heroforge/

I, personally would _hate_ to play D&D without HeroForge. The WotC people are going to have to work hard to come up with an "official" program for 4e as good as HeroForge,

It also happenes to handle all but the latest supplemetary material. The capsule descriptions in Spellforge are not _quite_ good enough to do without the Spell Compedium and the same for the Feats but you'd come a little closer with the variant classes.

As to modules, I've played all the way through Age of Worms and sincerely believe that its' authors should be beaten to death with spiked clubs. Actually, if you ignored the "worms" parts and stopped somehwre between levels 5 and 9 it might be okay. The later parts suck with a deep and abiding suckitude though.

We're at at about level 5 with savage Tides right now and it _might_ be better.

Nearly through with the 3.5 version of Ravenloft and it's okay. Went through the initial Freeport trilogy okay with the right DM. Started out Red Hand of Doom and that campaign crashed and burned but I put that one on the DM and not the module.

I ran most of the Moonsea book for Forgottern Realms. Another one that starts decently and then trails off.

I've run a lot of Eberron and find it generally quite cool but you would need the Eberron book. I'd say it's worth it to get that though. The path I would recommend would be starter adventure in thw back of the book to Shadows of the Last War to Whisper of the Vampire's Blade.

Then avoid the 3rd moduel in that tilogy, Grasp of the Emerald Claw. It's weak and your players would ahve about a 50% chance of totally screwing the set up for it anyway.

Instead, go tot he new Eyes of the Lich Queen module instead. Voyage of the Golden (whatever it was) could follow.

I've played in a few things from Goodman Games and run one too. They were fairly decent but in the one I ran (Jade soemthing, there may have been a curse in there too)don't trust the pregen characters. Those were badly, badly messed up.

Fred Brackin

[Rupert]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

Spell Compendium has most but not quite all of the additional spells available from the supplementary books. It actually does make spell-casting Paladins and Rangers a good bit more viable and helps out the toher spellcasting classes too..

It also revises some of the spells it includes (and it's good revision, IMO) and (also IMO) the ones it leaves out are generally not worth bothering with anyway.

You don't actually have to have the Complete books. The prestige classes are a huge pile of sludge to sift through in hopes of finding _something_, but hardly essential. The additional base classes and the feats are a good bit more useful but are still a little hit or miss.

I concur, except that IME the Complete Warrior makes a big difference to the attractiveness of high level single-classed fighters (or multiclassed fighters with many fighter levels) by having decent high-end feats that are fighter-only.

You can very reasonably go with just the PHB-DMG-MM. You especially don't need the later MMs. Any WotC module that has a monster not in the first one will reprint the stats.

Absolutely, and IME it's much easier to say "core books only" and then not have to worry about stuff than to keep control of content if you say "core books plus other stuff on approval" unless "on approval" really means "not ruddy likely". Were I to run another D&D3.5 game, I'd probably use "core books + Spell Compendium only".

[Pmandrekar]

Originally Posted by obatron

Can you suggest any pre-written adventures that would work with the basic character creation choices, won't require a lot of effort (i.e. no porting), last a few sessions, and maybe prove to be somewhat interesting and expandable to less "rail-roady" type play?

My vote: If you already have Freeport, you could start there, and not buy anything. You might find Sword and Sorcery books (Shelzar, Termana, Ghelspad) useful in developing a setting without being railroady.

We're in the opposite position. We're about to try out some of the Savage species character options, and I'm gearing up to run a pirate minicampaign in GURPS.

[Pmandrekar]

Originally Posted by obatron

That's a big part of it. I have a lot of the D&D stuff because I have a compulsive disorder to buy RPGs that I don't play.

There's a lot of that going around.

incidentally, my group is grumbling at D&D 4th edition (some of them more than others), and a few of them that haven't played GURPS have gone out and gotten the books, so we might try out GURPS for a bit.

-P.