[DF] Advice for first-time Dungeon Fantasy GM

[Nosforontu]

Originally Posted by Icelander

Meh. You only need to finish the foe at all if he happens to have fallen on a spot that you, for some reason, absolutely need to occupy again, or if his death is the actual goal.

Absent these, which will usually be absent in practice, a foe that can't attack you isn't worth worrying about. Move on and forget about the crippled orc/minotaur/whatever.

But what about all of the wonderful loot the cripled monster has ;)

[b-dog]

Originally Posted by Kromm

Yeah, that reflects my experience. I'm not one to waste time worrying about ecology and enemy logistics on dungeon-crawls, but I do prefer to stage adventures sufficiently far from settlements that my players can suspend disbelief. Hordes of horrible monsters at the town limits or a day's hike away make no sense to me or, more important, to my players. Since my monsters are lurking far from conventional food sources, most often in places filled with traps, curses, poison slime, and Evil Runes, suspension of disbelief also dictates that they'll rarely be creatures with human-esque weaknesses. I save people who can be stabbed in the eye or have their legs chopped off for casual bandit encounters on the way to and from the dungeon, and for altercations in town. My standard dungeon creatures are Elder Things with unearthly biology, Homogenous golems, Diffuse slimes, semi- or wholly spectral undead, and so on, not to mention vast numbers of things with No Legs (Aerial or Slithers) – and traits like Doesn't Breathe, Doesn't Eat or Drink, Immunity to Metabolic Hazards, and Injury Tolerance are very common indeed.

Certainly, I still let the PCs use rapier stabs to the eye, poison on arrows, and so on. They paid points for that stuff. But that's fare for those bandit battles and town quarrels I mentioned. Once you go off to fight constructs, demons, Elder Things, spirits, undead, etc., all bets are off. For the most part, your best tactic is to hit as hard and as often as you can with a swung weapon or a high-FP spell, and pray that you can deplete HP faster than they can regenerate.

I think you should make a monster book with fairy races like they are depicted in myths. Ogres, trolls and giants with Injury Tolerance and other supernatural powers would be cool and there could some use from GURPS Faerie and Celtic Myth. Maybe the PC elves, dwarves, trolls and orcs are half breeds with humans and are thus weaker and mortal. But true faries might be superhuman entities from other planes like demons and spirits. That way a nest of ogres in a dungeon would be a challenge for 250 dungeon delvers instead of an easy boring slaughter.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by b-dog

That way a nest of ogres in a dungeon would be a challenge for 250 dungeon delvers instead of an easy boring slaughter.

A nest of ogres in a dungeon can quite easily be a boring slaughter of the PCs; it depends what template you apply 'ogre' to. There's nothing that says that you can't build your NPC ogres on 300 points.

[Peter V. Dell'Orto]

Originally Posted by Kromm

I save people who can be stabbed in the eye or have their legs chopped off for casual bandit encounters on the way to and from the dungeon, and for altercations in town.

I use a large number of "normal" type foes, but again - Skill 20+ (24+ I think, for two of them), Rapid Strike penalties at -3/-3, Trademark Moves, etc. and guys doing 3d+7 or +8 cutting. Average damage from one of them with a hit will inflict a major wound on a normal man in heavy plate with a body hit - and thus very likely inflict knockdown and stunning, which is as good or better than a crippled limb. Against lighter armor, average damage puts even a pretty good guy (HP 13 or so) into negative HP and making unconsciousness rolls or death checks.

I also use a modified mook rule I've mentioned a bunch of times. This is because the average hit puts people into the "unable to usefully keep fighting" category from a body hit already. So I'm just saving myself the handful of rolls required for the body-cut guy to try to be useful again before he drops anyway.

[Peter V. Dell'Orto]

Originally Posted by b-dog

That way a nest of ogres in a dungeon would be a challenge for 250 dungeon delvers instead of an easy boring slaughter.

If you play the ogres right, mundane or not, they're neither going to be easy nor boring.

[b-dog]

Originally Posted by Anthony

A nest of ogres in a dungeon can quite easily be a boring slaughter of the PCs; it depends what template you apply 'ogre' to. There's nothing that says that you can't build your NPC ogres on 300 points.

But it is more fun to have unique abilities and powers than to just tack on a Barbarian or Knight template onto a humanoid.

[vierasmarius]

Originally Posted by b-dog

But it is more fun to have unique abilities and powers than to just tack on a Barbarian or Knight template onto a humanoid.

Then give them unique abilities and powers. If you think you need guidelines, try out Mailanka's Homebrew Monsters thread.

[b-dog]

Originally Posted by Peter V. Dell'Orto

If you play the ogres right, mundane or not, they're neither going to be easy nor boring.

True but it can be exciting to have them more faerie-like. I had a couple of ogres sitting around a boiling pot, cooking what was left of the last adventuring party. The PCs got the drop on them but the ogres responded quickly. The archer shot out the eyes of one ogre but the ogre could use its smell and hearing to keep on fighting. The Injury Tolerance made the PCs have to continue hacking away until one one of the ogres dropped and let out a growl that stunned one of the party members. During this time the other ogre dumped boiling water on the stunned PC. The party was able to defeat the other ogre and heal the burned victim though.

[Dammann]

See that is fine, but I do not want to play, run, or buy material for a campaign where everything is faerie. I can respect that someone wants to do that, and I say more power to anyone who does. Dungeon Fantasy, as a line, tells us almost nothing about the setting. That is up to the people playing/running it.

That means that no one is saying stuff like "well, I'd buy that Dungeon Fantasy supplement, but I don't want to play a game about fighting faerie, I want to play a game where ogres and dwarves and elves are actually all elder things."

GURPS books have to sell to more than one person. My campaign notes, on the other hand, can have one customer (me).

[Peter Knutsen]

Originally Posted by Westerhaven

I'm a fairly experienced GM; I've just never GM'd DF before.

How much experience do you have GM'ing non-DF GURPS?