Donjon Last-Minute questions!

[Andy Kitkowski]

Last-Minute because our first one-shot session is tomorrow. I've got a great group of folks, so I'm not expecting any balance, conflict, keeping on track, etc issues.

I'm going to run a game based loosely off the classic computer "DonjonQuest" experience, The Temple of Apshai, tomorrow night for a one-shot (a member of our gaming group who moved is back in town, and it was literally a perfect fit for the occasion).

Had a couple questions about the rules, though, and some ways attributes work:

1) First of all, for experienced players of Donjon out there, what do you consider an "average" amount of Flesh Wounds for a character? 2-3? 3-4?

2) I'll be using d10s, as between all of us we have maybe 10 d20s total. And 8 of them belong to me :). But I've got dozens of d10s. I checked the d6 Donjon combat thread, but I'm still wondering: What's the overall effect of using d10s (in NON-combat situations)? I assume there's a LOT more ties of highest number (10)- What do you do in those cases? Do you end up with a CRAPLOAD of "facts", or fewer "facts" than with d20s?

2) Ability nitty-gritty: OK, say my main ability was "kill things with weapons"- I'm assuming that I'd add that to all attack rolls. Have you ever made a ruling on players who wanted an ability (MAIN ability, that is-I wouldn't let it fly with a sub-ability) that affected attack and damage? Even if it were more specific, like "Axe Mastery" (attack and damange bonux with axe)?

3) Martial Arts: How have you all dealt with this one?  I'm sure that people have tried to do all sorts of weird things with martial arts (adding to rolls of acrobatics, leaping, healing, attack, dodge, etc etc etc). Would you think that, say, if a player chose MA as a Main ability, giving them a damage of 0 (as opposed to -1) would be acceptable? Any other issues that people have seen with martial arts?

Finally, I just wanted to say I'm really excited to be running this, and all the players are intruigued as well.  I was thinking that, out of all the fantasy games that I can think of, this one can emulate the whole "Tinker Class" the best: Using successes to amp weapons, equipment finds, etc. I've always been fond of those types, like in the old FF6 game (the prince/tinkerer with the sawblade launcher, chainsaw, power drill, etc), and realized that the rules of Donjon can let these kinds of characters be inventors AND combatants at the same time.

Thanks!
-Andy

[jdagna]

Question 1:
I think Flesh wounds between 2 and 5 are pretty common for starting characters.  In my experience, having less than 3 is a big disadvantage.

Question 2:
d10s should be fine (its what I've used more than any other die type).  You don't wind up with too many ties (especially at lower levels), but it is more likely than with a d20.  I'd say that d10 and d20 are essentially equivalent at low levels.

Question 3:
I think the book specifically forbids abilities that add to both attack and damage rolls.  You'd need two abilities - "Attack with weapons" and "Do massive damage" or something like that.

Question 4:
Martial Arts is one of those abilities that really covers several abilities and therefore needs to be narrowed down somewhat (especially if its a secondary ability).  In my understanding of the game, Martial Arts would have to be either healing or acrobatics or attacking or damage, not more than one of them - even as a primary ability.  As a primary ability, Martial Arts would let you attack with any appropriate weapon (for example), while as a secondary ability, Martial Arts might only cover unarmed attacks.  

Now, all the fancy ninja stuff doesn't have to be thrown out the window - the PC can use those as facts if he wants and describe them in kung fu terms.  So a three success attack could be described as "Fact 1: I climb the wall and leap down.  Facts 2 and 3: I knee the goblin in the head on the way down (doing damage)."  But if the task were actually climbing up a wall, the ability wouldn't help.

I might be wrong on this last one - I'm sure someone will jump in if I am.

PS: I recommend that players NOT use fancy names for abilities like the ones used in the Donjon book.  I tend to think "Kill things with weapons" is a better ability name than "Martial Arts" because players (especially novices) are more likely to remember what it actually lets them do.  If they want colorful words, I have them write the specific effect in parentheses.

[Clinton R. Nixon]

Justin is on the money with all his answers. In addition, I also like writing out what each ability can be used for before play.

[Andy Kitkowski]

Hey Clinton- I was reading through a bunch of the Donjon topics, noticing that similar issues come up and all, and I was thinking: If you had, say, a tesseract room, and could somehow excrete free time, I'd love to see you or someone put together a post like Jake Norwood did for TROS: A thread that links discussions of particular topics together, like a Forum Index of sorts.

Maybe something to think about?  After the tesseract room, of course.

-Andy

[anonymouse]

re: question 3:

I'm beginning to think that this is almost a necessary option for a Main Ability, with the restriction that it must be limited to a specific weapon type, or other similar tightly-defined restriction.

The problem comes in when you start thinking about class concept.

Ren wants to play a guy who's really good with swords; the sword is what he's all about, especially using them to make other people feel bad (read: dead). So he decides to play the Swordsman class. Main Ability? Well, obviously, Use a Sword Like Nobody's Business.

Now, rules state that an ability can only affect one kind of die roll, and that a Main Ability should affect every die roll of that type.

And that's great, except Ren doesn't want to be able to attack someone with a chair, or a knife, or a cleverly concealed platypus; nor does throwing a boulder to cause damage have any appeal. He just wants to poke (and slash, cut, main, et cetera) people with swords. Psychological issues aside..

He'd have to effectively weaken his character to play this way.

Okay, so now I'm just sounding like a munchkin. =/ Still, I think it's a valid point.

[TAROT]

OK. Then maybe try to come up with some other Main Ability, like Analyse Fighting Style, or Notice Enemy's Weakness.

Then take Poke 'em With a Sword, Cut 'em to the Bone, and Shield of Steel as Secondaries. :)

Chris

[dunlaing]

First of all, to answer one of Andy's original questions:

While d10s may work fine, keep in mind that "'pure' Donjon players may feel free to mock dice deviants relentlessly."

On to abilities:

I concur that if you want to play a kick-ass Swordsman you need to take something other than Swords as your Main Ability by the rules. Perhaps you could take Swashbuckling as a Main Ability and Attack with Swords as a secondary. Then you could use Swashbuckling for all sorts of Agility-based tests, like leaping up onto a chandelier before attacking someone, or leaping onto a sail and using your sword to slow your descent, or some such thing.

Just because an ability is the core concept of a class doesn't necessarily mean that it should be the Main Ability as defined by the rules. (much as that seems inelegant)

[Andy Kitkowski]

Thanks for your help, all!  I'll see if I can make some time to post some session notes later.

Thanks again!

[RamblingMan]

When my group played DragonQuest (TSR), the martial artist usually upgraded his damage by getting blessings from the temple.  It might be a good way to allow your martial artist to increase his unarmed damage to a respectable level.