GURPS Dungeon Fantasy Setting: Caverntown

[Steven Marsh]

Originally Posted by Pseudonym

Just posting it here before I forget.
Small typo on p. 37, on the 4th bullet in the aside. "rotherhood."

And, as ordained by prophecy, this has been fixed.

[RyanW]

Originally Posted by Kromm

It would also be fun to motivate players not with loot but with large, guaranteed payoffs in town after each quest

Is that not the standard? I've nearly always had the PCs hired to do a deed, with the recovery of loot as added bonus.

[Kromm]

Originally Posted by RyanW

Is that not the standard? I've nearly always had the PCs hired to do a deed, with the recovery of loot as added bonus.

In the early days, you mostly found dungeons, raided them, and dragged back loot. What the quest-giver did was provide a rumor and/or a map; that person sometimes even insisted on being paid for the information, which was the opposite of paying a reward! Story elements have since become more common, and most groups prefer adventures set in a larger context, with both a reason and a reward, but I'm not sure I'd call that standard. It's still pretty rare for, say, the temple hiring the PCs to take out an evil lich to offer the heroes a greater prize than "the entire fortune of an immortal wizard, including several lifetimes worth of accumulated magic items and a vast library of scrolls and spellbooks."

[Bruno]

Originally Posted by RyanW

Is that not the standard? I've nearly always had the PCs hired to do a deed, with the recovery of loot as added bonus.

That varies; I usually have it vary even from adventure to adventure. For small dungeons, I find either one patron with a quest, or simple "rumors of treasure" is enough, but for larger dungeons I like to follow the World of Warcraft and Skyrim model of having minor "side quests" available in Town (if the PCs can find them). The main "purpose" of the dungeon may be a big quest with a reward back in town, or a big treasure in the dungeon, but there's opportunities to pad the take either way with rewards for e.g. each werewolf head brought back, or some rare alchemical bit, or that one obscure book that the wizard wants.

Some of these quest items can be identified in dungeon as "probably a quest item" with use of Knowledge skills, and then they have to go on a quest to find who wants to give them extra money for it :) If you find a magic item and Hidden Lore: Magic Items tells you it's a 600 year old wand from a set of 12 wands made by the great wizard Garry Hotter with equally great collectors value, then finding out who has the other wands and might want to pay 3x value to get another wand for their set is a "quest". Noncombat quest, but quest.

[RyanW]

Originally Posted by Kromm

In the early days, you mostly found dungeons, raided them, and dragged back loot. What the quest-giver did was provide a rumor and/or a map; that person sometimes even insisted on being paid for the information, which was the opposite of paying a reward!

Chalk it up to another case of "old school dungeon crawl" not being a part of my nostalgia.

[Kromm]

Also be aware that a lot of new players coming to hack 'n' slash dungeon-crawl games have no memory of "old school" times when dungeons were generated almost at random, without rhyme or reason, using dice (as emulated here) or computer code. Nor do they remember the more story-oriented games that came later, or the computer games based on them. They're coming from digital games where random monsters can drop epic items of incredible power, and where the quest rewards in town are often lackluster by comparison. I remember generally selling the quest prizes in every incarnation of Diablo, because they were lame next to the great stuff the tougher monsters could drop. Other games let you craft things, which once again requires you to farm monsters.

So . . .

If that is your background, it will seem new and unexpected when the NPC quest-giver is actually paying you more gold than you looted and handing you cool items you want to keep in place of the ones you found. That will be an inversion of your expectations. Instead of, "Let's do this guy's quest so we can fight liches and find awesome magic stuff. Oh, look, he gave us a magic knife – how quaint. Anybody mind if I sell it?", it's, "Let's do this guy's quest. We'll have to fight liches and we'll probably find nothing but more dusty tomes we can't read, but he'll raid the family museum and give us a few more artifact-level items."

[Bruno]

Originally Posted by Kromm

Also be aware that a lot of new players coming to hack 'n' slash dungeon-crawl games have no memory of "old school" times when dungeons were generated almost at random, without rhyme or reason, using dice (as emulated here) or computer code.

I feel obligated to point out the Dungeons on Automatic project, where we aim to produce just this kind of dungeon, with GURPS stuff embedded. We're planning on extending it to do things like produce rumors about the dungeon, mysterious maps for sale that lead to the dungeon or are of the inside of the dungeon, and most relevant to the conversation, generate quests in Town linked to the dungeon, with quest rewards. Right now, however, if you want quests linked to the dungeon, you have to come up with it yourself.

[Stripe]

Under the Repairs and Refits heading, p. 46, in the Fixer-Uppers section, the rules state: "Craftspeople can also . . . restring a bow to a new ST[.] Cost is 10% of mundane artifact value; time is a week."

If one found a Balanced, fine, elven composite bow worth $22,800, how much would it cost to make it a lower strength?

Would it cost $2,800—10% of the bow minus any enchantments—or would it cost $90—10% of the cost of a plain composite bow?

Thanks!

[Bruno]

I'm pretty sure the intent is $2800. "Mundane" is contrasted with "magical" not with "fancy" (or "more adjectives"). A Balanced, Fine, Elven Composite Bow With Feathers And A Fringe And Gold Inlay And Elaborate Enamel Scenes with no enchantments is a mundane object, even if it's not something you can get in "the real world".

There's a point of debate about whether something made of Implausible Materials (a la DF8), such as a bow made of sky, or the songs of angels, would be "mundane" but the adjustment in cost for an implausible material is pretty modest so I'd count it anyways.

[Kromm]

Originally Posted by Bruno

I'm pretty sure the intent is $2800. "Mundane" is contrasted with "magical" not with "fancy" (or "more adjectives").

Correct. "Mundane" means "not special in a supernatural sense" – that is, not enchanted, blessed, made of pure thought, imbued with chi, or otherwise impossible without extraordinary powers. "Nonmagical" wouldn't quite cut it because lots of artifacts aren't strictly speaking "magical" but aren't "mundane," either.