Misbehaving Immortals - Dark Dungeons, Cha'alt, Godbound, & The Gathering Storm of Chaos

Everything changes & nothing changes when you turn fifty. For some its a milestone but for me it was a Tuesday. And it highlights something that I've been feeling for a while. The act of cannibalizing my campaigns into a coherent whole cloth. This means returning to Bucky The Black Ball's Dark Dungeons 
This is because of the immortals of Dark Dungeons which I have a very storied history. My immortals don't behave. 

This isn't because of Frank Mentzer's Immortal rules box set. Oh no not at all. Instead its my own round robin DMing that's sort of hamstrung me in. I created my own immortals from the ground up and its been interesting because they've caused me no end of grief in the past! NPC immortals would show up unexpectedly in campaigns cause mayhem & then vanish into the planar ether! 

So I've had to get things under control & wrangle these wayward NPC immortals in! That's right as the dungeon master one of my older players had a word with me about them. If your doing a Cha'alt/Godbound game in two or three weeks you've got plenty of time to get my PC's into the campaign stew. This is especially true with Cha'alt: Fuchsia Malaise  hitting the shelves in July! Several of the adventure seeds that I've been brewing in the background will come to fruit then.

There's basically a pantheon of immortals who want to make the lives of our godbound heroes a real & very practical living Hell. A few of them are at the moment hanging out at the Gamma Incel Cantina. They've got a nice comfortable prison plane picked out for the PC's when they catch up with them. My immortals have far more in common with Michael Moorcock's Lords of Chaos then they do their Mystara counterparts.


If anything my campaigns might be considered the anti Mystara. Everything is subject to change as the immortals go about playing with mortals lives. These are the opposite of Mystara's hands off immortals. The planes owe them a living & their going to take full advantage of it. So we begin to stir the pot a bit. 


Rodney Mathews version of Airoch is my definitive version of this chaos lord. 


But as events begin to boil the Earth is in the stew again. I'm not using Michael Moorcock's Lords of Chaos at all but they are providing the blue print for my own immortals. Then there's the gods who have been keeping an eye on events but nothing lasts forever & that's where things get very much on fire in the campaign.  But is it Dungeons & Dragons?! The immortals rules & Frank Mentzer's Immortal rules box set should be considered a whole cloth rules set within itself. Frank took it his immortals into a whole other direction. The powers that these immortals can bring to bare on PC's is nasty & could end a campaign before it begins. This isn't a criticism but a fact. 

OSR Commentary: Beer & B/X Dungeons & Dragons Chatter with B/X Essentials & Dark Dungeons By Gurbintroll Games

"You are way too hung up on your your retroclones!", came the squeaky voice from DM Xvart whom I've known since grade school. He quickly pulled back on the draft of beer as if it was going to get away from him.So last night I was rescauced from a quiet night of dinosaur movies from friends. It was the fellow dungeon master's night that our local group of 5th edition & OSR dungeon masters have every couple of months. "Uh Huh & Fifth edition blows B/X Dungeons & Dragons out of the water for your groups?!" 'Well kinda of but its not like there's a clone that does everything!?'
"Actually there are two such clones was my response, there's the B/X Essentials line from Necrotic Gnome which has everything you need to get started & keep a game running for years."

You can get a no cost version of the B/X Essentials books with no artwork in them for free from the link above through Drivethrurpg. The system is streamlined, very well laid out, & runs like a Swiss Clock. The feel is all there & everything is perfectly timed out with the D&D B/X aesthetic. That's fine & its fantastic at what it does! Personally I'd get print copies of the books & solid resources. Now we're working our way through the second pitcher of beer. Xvart starts in on his usual B/X Dungeons & Dragons rants. Xvart is a sawed off five foot bespectacled little engineer whom I've played with since grammar school. The usual B/X rants about 'race as class', the limits of the system, nostalgia clouding my judgement, in other words the usual beer fueled b.s. I've heard a million times. 'But its not complete', & that's when I knew I had him. But we've played in a long running Mentzer campaign back in the Nineties together. Yes but you know the differences between Dungeons & Dragons Basic  editions plus the difference between Basic, B/X and BECMI 

make all of the nuance.

'You mean that there's already a clone of BECMI collected?' 'Yes there has been one for years running now!'

"There's Gurbintroll Games Dark Dungeons retroclone system which comes as one collected BECMI Dungeons & Dragons cyclopedia style game."

"This system can support a Dungeons & Dragons game for years to come plus it includes the immortal rules, the planes, & sky ships!" "Its a pay what title on Drivethrurpg." " But there's a print hardback that up on  Lulu right now but wait till the latest coupons come out."

The other DM's shook their collected heads & we got into the ins & outs of our respective campaigns over the pizza that arrived. They'd heard all of this talk before between DM Xvart & myself. We talked about the usual OSR buzz or the lack there of. Bitched about certain D&D themes & fashions. The usual Grognard talk that comes with a Saturday night round table at the local nerd watering holes. For further information on Dark Dungeons go here.
There are ten things I took away from last night's round table;

Ten things I took away from Beer & B/X Dungeons & Dragons Chatter with
B/X Essentials & Dark Dungeons

1. Dark Dungeons is meant for the experienced players & dungeon masters whist the B/X Essentials is more for the middle ground group of players. Or as an introductory pick up & go game. Sure Essentials can & will sustain a group for years to come but they come in at two different places. 
2. The time factor - B/X Essentials is a perfect pick up & go style game. Dark Dungeons is perfectly suited for more elaborate dungeon & adventure design. 
3. Campaign & play styles are going to determine the right game for the right group. 
4. Dark Dungeons is an all in one package with your mileage varying depending upon the needs of the players. 
5. The parts is parts approach of B/X Essentials is the retroclone's strength allowing the DM & players to cherry pick elements that they want. 
6. B/X Essentials is the perfect Dolmewood system able to effortlessly pick upon the setting with built in adventure elements 
7. Tastes in Dungeons & Dragons vary with the players & this is a key factor for choosing the right retroclone for them & you as the DM. 
8. 'The play is the thing' there's going to be a very high point with players. 
9. OSR retroclones offer a safe & solid alternative to the costly collector's market. They can & will bring players to the table. 
10. Dark Dungeons has everything you need to run adventures for years to come. The design is well done & provides everything both the players & the DM needs. 

Hang overs suck folks & so for now keep em rolling! 

Labyrinth Lord Free Across The Planes! The One Man Crusade Continues!

So yeah, I've been on this one man crusade for Labyrinth Lord for the past three or four weeks now. Why?! Well because the game doesn't get enough attention damn it! So its been an interesting uphill battle to say the least.
So I've gone back to the source material in this case way back to the Saturday, April 21st, 2012 Black Gate article by Daniel Proctor as to why he created Labyrinth Lord.

Edit and now it seems that Dan just launched the Kickstarter for the Labryth Lord Advanced Companion with a dozen kickstarter cover options available today!

Already the kickstarter is half way funded! Seems that LL's on the uptick again! But how does the game stack up against Swords & Wizardry?Well in my research on the game I came across,  How does Swords & Wizardry differ from Labyrinth Lord?

Yes I totally posted this the other day but then I contrasted it with this Dragon foot forum thread; " BECMI, B/X, Dark Dungeons or Labyrinth Lord?"

" LL is derived from Moldvay/Cook/Marsh Basic/Expert but instead of a level 14 cap it goes up to level 20. LL is nice as it may not take your character up to level 36, but you do get to level 20 (with some classes) instead of level 14."
This was posted by MageInBlack
But the interesting bit was using classic AD&D modules with Basic

"Oh yeah, I use AD&D modules all the time. I convert the module to suit the PC's, not the other way around. Except for the obvious basics such as Armor Class, Damage, Hit Dice, Monsters, Saving Throws and Spells, there's really not a whole lot of conversion to do. Honestly, most of it can be quickly taken care of "on the fly" while running the module. As long as you're familiar with whatever version of "Classic D&D" you've chosen, it's really a no brainer."
This is entirely unnecessary when it comes to Labyrinth Lord because of the Labyrinth Lord Advanced Companion. The no art versions of LL & The Advance Companion are  entirely free by the way here.

If you still don't believe me then check out this thread over here at the RPG Geek site from 2014 about the Advanced Companion. 

Why would you want such a clone when B/X Dungeons & Dragons is readily available?! Not everyone has access to the B/X books folks. Seriously there are folks who still in 2018 don't have access to the internet & don't even know about the OSR. We have a tendency to think that the OSR is high profile. Recently I gave copies of both the Labyrinth Lord Rule book & the Advanced Labyrinth Lord Companion to a friend whose only now getting into the OSR.

One of this gentleman's players was a former Spelljammer dungeon master & was complaining that the OSR doesn't have any campaign settings like the classic second edition setting.
Now I've posted about this little matter before but another OSR clone that I love that I don't talk about is Dark Dungeons From Gurbintroll Games.

This wonderful little OSR retroclone has a number of  one very interesting wrinkles in it. One of those happens to be cross compatible rules for planejammers in it! They're not called that but that's exactly what they are so have at thee across the planes! Did I mention that Dark Dungeons is also a free PDF? Its one of my all time favorite clones & does an excellent job!

Dark Dungeons Is Available Free Here!

Some Quick Commentary On 'The Pay What You Want' BECMI Retro Clone Dark Dungeons From Gurbintroll Games

So before the Thanksgiving holiday I thought I share some thoughts on one of my other favorite retroclones Dark Dungeons. Dark Dungeons is a BECMI D&D rules cyclopedia retroclone but its more then the sum of its parts.


So why is this a better deal then that Rules Cyclopedia? Well its better organized & its a homage to the infamous Jack Chick tract with the characters from the anti-D&D religious characters from it in the examples of play. In some respects its better then the original work because all of the errors and errata have been eliminated and cleaned up. It has
improve thieves' progression and incorporated elements of Advanced rulesets,thus allowing far more flexibility with other OSR retroclone rule sets!

There are several reasons why I love this OSR rules set :

1.  This system can take your adventurers from basic delvers right up into divinity. 
2. All of the weirdness and errors from the D&D Rules Cylopedia have been eliminated and the whole affair streamlined. 
3. Its actually in print and easily affordable at fourteen sixty seven from Lulu
4. All of the magick of the original without sacrificing any of the neat material such as the monsters, magic items, or more. 
5. You can check out the system before purchasing a copy from Drivethrurpg. 
6. A solidly balanced system for the construction of old school style adventures. 
7. Monsters can be exploited for the level of PC's as needed. 
8. A vast array of systems that can be used to take PC's from basic levels up to retirement and beyond. I love the way that Dark Dungeons handles planar travel and exploits!
9. A system that ties in deeply to the old school but stands on its own. 
10. All of this is under one cover and in one place from the get go.
    
    
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