Gaming 2016, and into 2017

I don't care what happened to anyone else in 2016. What I know is that I didn't game enough.

I ran quite a bit of Advanced Fighting Fantasy 2e (AFF), a few sessions of Labyrinth Lord, and I think we also squeezed some OpenQuest 2e in at the start of the year. All fantasy - no other genres, despite constantly toying with the idea of running a sci-fi game, a historical fantasy game, or a pulpy horror game. Things for 2017 then?

We did a bit more boardgaming, playing Pandemic and its variant, Reign of Cthulhu, Ticket to Ride, a game or two of War on Terror, Munchkin Conan, X-Wing, Elder Sign, King of Tokyo, Sun Tzu, Jaipur, Commands and Colors: Ancients, Memoir 44, Antidote, and gods knows what else. Probably a few rounds of Settlers - which has become a bit of a standard for the wider family.

We even started a regular gaming night - playing every week on Wednesday nights for the last couple of months up until Christmas.

So, what for 2017?

1. Resurrect this blog, with at least a couple of posts a week. Shouldn't be so hard if we're actually playing regularly, should it?

2. Play some new RPGs. In particular, I would really like to see if I can run Fate, and if my group takes to it - which is more or less the same thing. I've been reading Fate books for a few years(!) now - I couldn't help but buy Starblazer Adventures way back when - and think that in some regards it might work for my group of players, who aren't really interested in learning crunch, or games of bean counting (which is why my preference for an OSR sandbox, with resource management being a key aspect of player decision making, isn't a goer for us). In conversations with people on G+, especially Paul Mitchener - author of Age of Arthur and Hunters of Alexandria, Fate has solidified a little in my mind as a pretty traditional game, all in all, which offers a system for giving mechanical weight to things that aren't contained in standardised skills or special abilities. We'll see.

2.2 Other systems I'd like to have a run at include Barbarians of Lemuria, as well as dusting off Traveller and keeping some AFF going.

2.3 Play (well, run) RPGs in some other genres. Whether I use Traveller, or Diaspora, or Stars Without Number, I'd like to get some sci-fi gaming going. I might even get the chance to use Stellar Adventures, the AFF2e sci-fi ruleset! I'd also like to run some historical fantasy, which is perhaps where I will be able to differentiate my experiments in Fate from my more fantastical AFF games. I doubt we'll be able to squeeze in any pulp horror, but as that is well suited to isolated one-off games (whereas fantasy and sci-fi games shine in campaign mode) it might be an effective 'filler'.

3. Actually get an Advanced Fighting Fantasy fanzine off the ground - this will depend heavily on the rhythm and intensity of my actual work. But as I'll be playing AFF, I should be creating content for AFF. Shouldn't I? 

4. Paint some miniatures, and play some miniature games. I could easily(?!) rattle off a couple more BloodBowl teams, which would be an accessible game for most of the players in my circle. And I have enough painted fantasy miniatures for some healthy games of Songs of Blades and Heroes. I doubt we'll be able to do much more than that, but that is something.    

5. Keep up with the boardgaming, basically. Play Small World - my 'Christmas game' - and find a couple more 'standards' from my cupboards that everyone enjoys and is familiar with, so we can get some gaming done whenever we have a quiet night with no deadlines the next day.

What does this leave out? Well, there is no mention (with the exception of Stars Without Number) of any OSR games! Gasp! Horror! I've juts bought the Frog God Swords & Wizardry bundle too! No doubt I'll rest my AFF games (and maybe other games too) on my hefty catalogue of OSR adventures. I might even run some, depending on what my players enjoy. But it is not my ambition for 2017. Ditto a d100/BRP game, though again I could see us breaking out the percentile dice if, for instance, my players don't take to Fate. The thing I'm most reluctant to leave off this list is WFRP, and if that reluctant grows to remorse, my 'gaming resolutions' for 2017 will end up being tossed in the bin!

   

New Players and Magic

Lister: All we've got is us guys, us and our own resourcefulness.

 

I play with new players a lot. As well as players of some experience who are seemingly unable to read a rulebook. I can’t blame them. Rulebooks are for GMs. The trend to producing player-focussed rulebooks – AD&D2e, you started the rot! – has exploded the crunch on both sides of the table. That’s not for me, or for my players.

 

One of the things that I find hardest to deal with in any game is magic. And high-technology, but, let’s face it, that is the same thing as far as matters in a sci-fi RPG. It is particularly difficult with new players. It is one thing for a player to say, ‘My character does X, where X is something within the ranges of human potential’ as a GM and the players can use a combination of common expectations and a – hopefully – straightforward resolution system to adjudicate the success of this action. Magic tends to create ‘exceptional’ rules, introduce new resolution systems, and threaten the common understanding shared by the table, at least until the table has absorbed both the rules and the setting.

 

This is just a long way round to saying that I tend to find it easier to GM games for my group in which access to magic (for PCs and NPCs) is pretty restricted, at least at the start of a campaign.

 

So, you know, WFRP!

 

Cat: My God, it's worse than I thought!

A player's view of Kakabad

In lieu of a post about contemporary gaming, what with the sunny weather, afternoons in the pub, and the odd barbecue - and for anyone not in the UK, we get so few really sunny days these must be seized upon - I thought I'd dig out some old player maps and let you see how one of my players interpreted our journey across Kakabad in pursuit of the Crown of Kings.

  Khare

The Baklands

Mampang

Preparation for a jungle expedition... delayed

I was busy making my own version of a very familiar map, and adapting the encounters for Advanced Fighting Fantasy, when my brother invited me down the pub. Ah well, hangover cleared, that gives me time for a bit more polish then...

Why I play Advanced Fighting Fantasy... #43

"This A4 sci-fi comic, with 20 pages of strip and a six page text story, displays a penchant for the twist ending and poetic justice. The tales of killing, cloning and interrogation are written as if by someone who takes life very seriously. It’s impressively drawn by Bolt-01, with grey tones by Richmond Clements and backgrounds that convincingly evoke the worlds in which the stories penned by Andrew Bartlett are set. 7/10."

In a past life I had a short crack at writing small-press comics. This was the review of one of them from Comics International. And this sums up my problem: 'written as if by someone who takes life very seriously'. And I do, to my own detriment. I'm always in danger of draining the fun from things, for intellectualising (and politicising) the things that I enjoy, rather than just enjoying them.

Fighting Fantasy (Advanced, or otherwise) operates as a necessary corrective to my tendency, when running games, to strive for too much 'realism' and too little of the fantastical and 'adventuresomeness'. I'm just the kind of Games Master who would ruin a Star Wars game by beginning a campaign with this:

"Turmoil has engulfed the Galactic Republic. The taxation of trade routes to outlying star systems is in dispute.

Hoping to resolve the matter with a blockade of deadly battleships, the greedy Trade Federation has stopped all shipping to the small planet of Naboo.

While the congress of the Republic endlessly debates this alarming chain of events, the Supreme Chancellor has secretly dispatched two Jedi Knights, the guardians of peace and justice in the galaxy, to settle the conflict...."

Fighting Fantasy is Steven Spielberg to my George Lucas.

Ruins of a Future Past

Sometimes, you see an image and the GM in you thinks, 'There's an adventure site!'

Well, this article, in Creative Review, about Danila Tkachenko’s photographs of Soviet-era ruins is full of them. 

This kind of thing so makes me want to run a post-apocalyptic campaign - something that I've never done. I have Other Dust, Mutant Future, Barbarians of the Apocalypse, and, of course, I could turn out a D100 or Advanced Fighting Fantasy based post-apocalyptic game too. Mind you, I think I'd have to work hard not to let my natural tendencies take over and end up with a campaign that has all the joy and vitality of The Road!

Can YOU climb?

Can you climb walls? I can. Can you scale sheer surfaces without rope and gear? Err...

When I run D&D (and clones thereof) I always try to remind myself that the Thief 'skill' percentages are so low because they are not, in fact, skills. Anyone can climb or hide, and any competent locksmith can open a normal lock. The *proper* (ahem!) interpretation of Thief 'skills' is that they are preternatural abilities, beyond that possessed by ordinary humans (and beyond that of even the extraordinary people with classes and levels with whom they adventure).

This, though, takes some overlooking of what the rulebooks actually say. The rulesbooks often describe most of these abilities in utterly mundane ways, and in the case of the Thief's 'climb' skill/ability I had been dimly aware that, at some point, even the name was mundan-ised, from a version that refers to scaling 'sheer' surfaces to one that merely refers to climbing walls. Bah! I thought I'd check through the versions of TSR D&D that I own to see what each edition has to say. 

Moldvay Basic. Promisingly, the Thieves' Abilities table has 'Climb Sheer Surfaces'. Unfortunately, the accompanying text has the ability listed as 'Climb Steep Surfaces'. The description of the ability does, however, lack the kind of specificity that prevents the ability being interpreted in a preternatural way. (Moldvay B88)

Mentzer Basic (and the Rules Cyclopedia) boils down the ability into the boring and not at all preternatural 'Climb Walls', and the text is unhelpfully specific, saying that this ability "applies to any steep surfaces, such as sheer cliffs, walls, and so forth." (Mentzer B44)

Note: Both Mentzer and Moldvay promisingly describe what we commonly call Thief 'skills' as 'special abilities', which is at least suggestive of these chances being something different, over and above what a mundane person ought be able to do.

AD&D1e has the ability - in the 'Thief Function' (ack!) - table as 'Climb Walls'. The description is utterly mundane. Also, in an amusing Gygaxianism, at high levels, this 'function' is not adjudicated by way of a normal percentile roll. After 10th level, the base chance to 'climb walls' increases beyond 99% by a tenth of a percent each level. Talk about marginal gains! The player (or DM) therefore needs to roll a D100.0 - three ten sided dice. My goodness, AD&D1e is one of the least lovely editions of the game. (PHB1e 28)

AD&D2e might have 'reduced' the special abilities to 'skills'. It might have 'Climb Walls' rather than Climb Sheer Surfaces. But by Crom it gets the description right! "Although everyone can climb rocky cliffs and steep slopes, the thief is far superior to others in this ability. Not only does he have a better climbing percentage than other characters, he can also climb most surfaces without tools, ropes, or devices. Only the thief can climb smooth and very smooth surfaces without climbing gear."(PHB2e 40)

I had expected to find that earlier editions of the game were open to a more preternatural interpretation of the Thief's climbing ability, and had expected that, at some point (under the influence of skill-based RPGs) that this would become mundan-ised as a general climbing ability, effectively disallowing other characters from climbing. What I didn't expect to find was that AD&D2e (which I already have quite a soft spot for) is the only edition of those that in which the Thief Special Ability/Function/Skill is expressly something above and beyond that possible for other characters.

  

How do you like your 'historical' settings?

It seems to me that there are a variety of way in which to use 'history' in fantasy RPG settings. While the degree to which an RPG setting uses 'historical elements' is related to the level of magic in the setting, that's not all that there is, I'd suggest there are five levels of 'historical-ness' in fantasy RPG settings:

1) Little to No Historical Elements: I haven't played any of this kind, but a setting such as Eberron or Planescape probably counts as belonging to this category. In those settings, the level of magic renders the world quite alien from any particular historical analogues, but I'm sure one could imagine a low-magic fantasy RPG setting that is similarly devoid of historical elements.

2) Loosely Inspired By History: Here, I'm thinking of setting such as the Forgotten Realms or Mystara. The historical analogues are fairly clear, which enables the players and GM to collectively imagine the game world. However, the level of magic (and the bricolage of historical-like elements) means that while the setting might superficially appears to be (say) 'medieval', the way in which the world works is actually quite different.

3) Strong Analogies To Historical Elements: In this category I would put settings such as the WFRP1e Old World and Dragon Warriors' 'Legend'. In both these cases the game world isn't Europe, but it isn't too far off. It is probably not a coincidence that both settings are pretty low-magic, which means that the close cleaving to the social and political structures of the historical inspirations are not implausible. These settings allow the players and GM to use their rough knowledge of a historical era while placing few demands to 'get things right'. Of course, it needn't always be not-quite-Europe - Kevin Crawford's Spears of the Dawn is not-quite-Africa, for example.

4) 'Real World' With Overt Fantasy Elements: Here we get things like RPGPundit's Dark Albion of Cakebread and Walton's Clockwork and Chivalry. In these settings, the fantastical and magical is certainly part of the world, but many of the historical elements are drawn straight from history.

5) 'Real World' With Subtle Fantasy Elements: While the level to which the fantastical intrudes depends on the GM and the play-style of the table, settings such as Mythic Iceland and Mythic Britain, or TSR's Historical Reference series for AD&D2e are built almost entirely (as closely as is gameable) from 'historical elements'.

What sort of levels of historical-ness do you enjoy playing? And running?      

Skills as Saving Throws

As someone, somewhere, somewhen said, a knight never fell of his horse until they invented the 'ride' skill. I've had PCs fall over when running because the GM, seduced by itemised skill lists and the possibilities that they present for demanding a dice roll, has called for an 'Athletics' check!

I detest skill systems in RPGs. No, that's not quite right. I like the idea of a skill system in principle, the way in which they can add texture to a PC and give colour to the world in which the PCs live. But I detest the way in which skill systems are usually implemented, either through the advice given to the GM in the rulebook/s, or the way in which published adventures set the precedent for their application. Introductory adventures (in particular) for RPGs with skill systems all to often 'teach' the game by demanding that GMs ask for a whole series of pointless, inconsequential skill rolls. Look at Through the Drakwald for WFRP2e, or Caravan from RQ6's Book of Quests. Whatever the other merits of these scenarios, the extent to which they 'teach the system' involves skill tests being called for at inappropriate moments; moments that are either not the result of player choice - railroad skill rolls - or that have no consequential bearing on the adventure - quantum skill rolls - or, worse BOTH. 

But I do run (and sometimes play) a whole host of games which have some kind of skill system - a variety of BRP-derived games, Advanced Fighting Fantasy, Traveller, Warhammer Fantasy Role-Play, even RC D&D etc. - while always feeling a dissatisfied with the way in which I find myself applying the mechanics of the skill system.

And why is that? That's because most skill systems are written as if they are 'rolls to accomplish'. Rolling to accomplish means either a lot of failing on the part of the PCs, or dice being rolled where, whether by way of modifiers or very 'competent' characters, there is little chance of failure. It wasn't until I read this post on Tales to Astound! that I 'got' how I ought to be conceptualising skills systems, and refereeing their application in my games. Take out the Traveller specific stuff and concentrate on this extract:

You poke and prod things fictionally (that is, through conversation between the Players and the Referee), building the world and the situation, until something involving danger happens. [...] No one will be making a skill roll to see if they are competent in some way with their skill. [...] there really is not such thing as a Pilot roll [...] There are Saving Throws… and certain skills and and Characteristics can act as D[ice] M[odifier]s to those rolls.

This! Yes, this. Couple this with an understanding of Saving Throws that stresses player agency (from Courtney Campbell) - "The saving throw versus death, especially at low levels is a roll called for when the player has already made a poor choice that results in certain death. It is a chance to avoid death caused by a bad choice" - and we have a way of interpreting RPGs with skill systems in way that is consonant with 'old school' play, which stresses player agency (and player skill) and which reserves dice rolls made by the players for moments of peril and danger (perhaps not always physical). You're not rolling to accomplish. Rather, as in combat, you are rolling to see if your PC escapes without something terrible happening.

So, under this interpretation, skill systems present a more granular breakdown of Saving Throw categories. Of course, Newt Newport's Crypts & Things, a Swords & Wizardry variant, uses Saving Throws *as* the 'skill' mechanic, which is a neat and simple way of doing things. In a D&D alike such as Swords and Wizardry Saving Throws start off around 15 or so (just over a 25% chance of success) and reach about 5 (a 75% chance of success) as PCs reach name level. Which is just about perfect for a skill percentage, where it is understood that this represents a roll to prevent something awful that would otherwise happen from happening. It puts the skill ratings of starting RuneQuest, and even starting WFRP characters, into perspective.

Now, perhaps none of this is news to you. Great, you've been playing a better game than I have. But given the precedent set by the examples in the rule books and in published adventures, it is something worth putting down in explicit terms, even if only to remind myself to referee skill rolls in a better way.

The Cobwebbed Shrine and the Dark Pool

After making mincemeat of the cultists, the Adventurers push deeper into the caves...

5. The Cobwebbed Shrine

The Adventurers’ lanterns light a heavily cobwebbed room. Cocoons of spider-silk hang ominously about the chamber, which is obviously a shrine. A SPIDER-MONK, sits cross-legged suspended in webbing, chanting before an altar crawling with normal-sized spiders. A tapestry spun from spider-silk hangs behind the altar, showing Arhallogen astride an astrological representation of the Heavens. If the Monk is inspected Adventurers will notice that he has two small extra sets of legs growing at awkward angles from his hips. Compared to with withered, aged skin of the rest of the Monk, these legs have bright pink, babyish skin. The Spider-Monk is in the midst of metamorphosis – being most blessed of Arhallogen – and is unable to respond to the Adventurers.

If the Adventurers do not take care in this room, they will pull on the webs. If they do so, they will alert 1d6+2 GIANT SPIDERS to their presence.

There are four exits. To the [north] there is a climbing rough cut stair-way, from where can be heard the clang of metal and brutish shouts. To the [south] there is a tunnel that slopes up, back to the entrance chamber. To the [east] there is a climbing tunnel, which is illuminated by flickering firelight. Also to the [east] there is also a smaller, downward sloping tunnel. This tunnel is utterly silent and utterly black.

GIANT SPIDER

SKILL 7 STAMINA⑧⑦⑥⑤④③②①             

Weapon	1	2	3	4	5	6	7+
Bite	2	3	3	3	4	4	5

Giant Spiders can make 2 Attacks.

Armour	1	2	3	4	5	6	7+
Bristly Hair	0	0	0	1	1	1	2

Snaggletooth the Dwarf decided that he would use his battleaxe to clear a path through the cobwebs... so any real investigation of this room had to wait until after the Adventurers had dealt with the Giant Spiders that he had alerted. Once that was over, and much of their recent rest and recuperation undone, the Adventurers had the chance to inspect the Spider-Monk. Unable to break his meditation, Rhoda Red-Tress hacked off his head.

5a. The Dark Pool

At first glance, the pool here seems to be filled with water, but is impossibly black, no matter what illumination is used. The pool is made of the essence of Krazan Krazan’s magical webs, and is an extremely sticky and utterly black substance. It can be collected, perhaps, and used imaginatively. It is, however, also partially in Eternal Web, the Realm of Arhallogen, and so will act as a homing beacon, should Arhallogen turn his attention to the Adventurer carrying the stuff. 

Naturally, enough, after poking the blackness with their weapons and finding it almost aggressively sticky, the Adventurers decided to 'chuck stuff in'. They cut down several of the cocoons from the Shrine and tossed them into the pool. Tendrils of black climbed up the cocoons thrown into the pool, dragging them down, but before they were fully submerged the cocoons faded out of existence. Puzzled, the Adventurers decided to throw the body (and head) of the SPIDER-MONK into what they presumed was a cosmic dustbin.  

The Cultists

I've been a bit quiet on the blog, but here's the first of some encounters from last week's AFF2e game.

4.  The Cultists

This is the rough dormitory of the spider cultists. At any time there are 1d6+3 ACOLYTES here; cooking, eating, sleeping, engaging in ritual scarification, including inserting glass beads into cuts on their foreheads, in order to mimic the multiple eyes of a spider. But hey! They’re not Orcs, so they won’t be found round a table idly rolling dice until the Adventurers show up.

The Acolytes are a mix of peoples. A few are red-haired Vynheimers. But there are also acolytes who appear to have come from the Isles of Dawn and some that resemble Old Worlders in their appearance. Any with curious mind will realise that this is not a local cult, springing up solely from native corruption.

ACOLYTES

SKILL 6 STAMINA⑤④③②①             

Weapon	1	2	3	4	5	6	7+
Dagger	1	1	2	2	2	2	3

Poisoned Daggers. After successfully causing damage, victims of the Cultists must Test for Luck of lose 1 SKILL for the remainder of the combat, as the weak poison on the daggers saps their strength.

The Acolytes carry vials of antidote to spider venom. However, as this is a potion concocted in the service of Arhallogen, those using the antidote will find that they ‘owe’ Arhallogen a death, and he will seek to collect this debt. This is not a problem for cultists. Arhallogen will visit any using the antidote in their dreams to remind them of what they owe, and how their debt can be paid.

Tunnels lead [south] to the daylight of the entrance, and off to the [east], sloping down into darkness, from which can be heard the chanting in a dark, alien tongue.

Thanks to the assistance of Midweek One-Eye, the Adventurers knew that this room contained a number of cultists. They planned to lure the cultists into an ambush, but spent so long loudly arguing over their plan that they disturbed a GIANT SPIDER (the 'scuttling corpse') and alerted the cultists to their presence. So, instead, it was they who were ambushed!

Despite the substantial difference in effective SKILL - the 6 for the cultists was outmatched by any Adventurer, with martially inclined beginning Adventurers starting out with an effective SKILL of 9 in their chosen weapon - the poisoned daggers made for a moderately threatening encounter. With LUCK a diminishing characteristic, and with falling SKILL resulting in an increased frequency of Tests for Luck, this was not the cakewalk it might have been. Nevertheless, the Adventurers eventually made a bloody mess of the local congregation of Arhallogen, but did need a good rest, during which Provisions and Potions were consumed.

  

The One-Eyed Birdkeeper and the Scuttling Corpse

Another giant spider, but this one only woke from its gorged stupor after the Adventurers had made a lot of noise planning to lure out the cultists from one of the room deeper in the complex. How did they know that there were cultists down that tunnel? Well, they persuaded Midweek One-Eye to give them an idea of the layout of the first few chambers of this cave complex.

3. The One-Eyed Birdkeeper

An one-eyed old man wearing a wide-brimmed hat sits in the corner of this chamber, bird droppings caking his hat, cloak and long beard. He offers the Adventurers a genial welcome.

He struggles to remember his name. Or anything much for that matter. He thinks his name might be MIDWEEK ONE-EYE, and he seems to think that he swapped his eye for something magical, though, patting down his cloak, he can't seem to find it anymore. If pushed, he seems to think that he came into this forest to keep an eye on things, and he will tap his nose theatrically as he says so. 

His ravens (see 3a) bring him food; mice, voles and the like. He will crunch through one of these noisily, and will offer the Adventurers a snack. Adventurers eating a small mammal raw will recover 1 STAMINA, but it is absolutely vile. Midweek will say that the birds also bring back other bits and bobs, and invites the Adventurers to take a look 

There are two exits from this chamber, both on the 'east' wall. The first slopes down to the entrance chamber  (2), the second slopes up into a sunlit chamber noisy with the caws of ravens.

Midweek is actually a powerful ancestor-spirit (practically a demi-god) of the Vynheimers. He is able to see through the eyes of his ravens, and even to shapechange himself but is loath to intercede - it should the through the heroism of Humanity that they are saved from evil. When he does use his powers, he will still do his best to seem like a befuddled old man. In fact, he might actually be that befuddled.

3a. The Ravens’ Nest

This open cave is home to innumerable ravens. They have collected a pile of trash, but among the bits of wood, leather, bone, shiny stones, etc. there is the off glitter of gold. In an Adventurer wishes to search this trash pile, roll 2d6. On a roll of 8+, the Adventurers have found 1d6GP, but on the roll of a double the Adventurers have enraged the ravens who inflict 1d3 points of STAMINA damage before they calm.

Midweek actually transformed himself into a raven to explore the caves on behalf of the Adventurers. However, after transforming back into an old man he didn't seem to realise that he had explored the caves himself, appearing to take his description of the layout from the (silent) raven resting on his shoulder.

2. The Scuttling Corpse

Inside the cave entrance there are more be-webbed corpses. One appears to sprout giant, articulated arachnid legs and scuttle towards the adventurers. It appears as if the corpse is riding the spider, jerking like a puppet-jockey on its back. The first 4 points of STAMINA damage involve chopping away the corpse. Only then will the Adventurers strike the GIANT SPIDER.

GIANT SPIDER

SKILL 7 STAMINA⑧⑦⑥⑤④③②①             

Weapon	1	2	3	4	5	6	7+
Bite	2	3	3	3	4	4	5

Giant Spiders can make 2 Attacks.

Armour	1	2	3	4	5	6	7+
Bristly Hair	0	0	0	1	1	1	2

There are three exits from this chamber. To the ‘west’ a tunnel slopes upwards, from which the Adventurers can hear the caws of birds. To the ‘northwest’ there is a roughly level tunnel that appears to wind somewhat, but from which can be seen the flicker of what might be firelight. To the 'northeast' there is a tunnel that slopes downwards into darkness, from which the chanting can be heard.

The Adventurers made short work of this disturbing sight, but having taken a long time loudly discussing their plan of action, any hope of a stealthy approach have evaporated.

Choices & Consequences - a go read someone else post

There are some things that you *know* that you ought to do (which you might even have written about), but that you don't always put into practice. One of these things, for me, is making explicit to the players choices and consequences that are the axis upon which an RPG turns. The game is not about rolling dice or CharOp or any of that jazz, but about making choices as your character and playing out the consequences. 

Anyway, Chris McDowell, author of Into the Odd, has recently written a short and interesting post of operationalising these ideas into an suitably concise and gameable format. 

The Cave of the Spider God

13. The Cave of the Spider God

The Cave of the Spider God is an obscene sight. The stone face of the cliff has been carved and crudely painted so that the mouth of the cave appears to be an egg laid by a spider drawn from a child’s nightmare. The cocooned, dessicated husks of men and beasts litter the ground. As the Adventurers approach one of these cocoons will burst and tens of immature GIANT SPIDERS will vomit forth from their first feast, scuttling away into the undergrowth.

A chanting can be heard coming from within. 

The working map. The numbers don't match the locations on my working document, because I like making things difficult.

The Adventurers explored the forest a little further, pushing to the Shiver Water in the south before following the well-trodden path from the 'hatchery'. There they found the entrance to the Cave of the Spider God.

The Hatchery

After defeating Jorus Eyebiter and his wretches, the Adventurers freed Aevaron the Wild-Elf. As we began session 2 of the Frostholm Campaign, Aevaron became a PC, played by E (my sister), and was fleshed out as a Shaman (using Priestly Magic) of Galana. Bjorn was retconned as Rhoda Red-Tress, and was played by (A), my mother. Her sex change appears to be incomplete, as my mother's sketch of her character appears to have a beard. With Klimt Bluestone and Snaggletooth, played by my wife and my brother, we now have a fair sized AFF2e party.

The Adventurers pushed deeper into the forest... 

12. The Hatchery

The forest floor falls away into a broad shallow sinkhole. This area of the forest is damp and dark, with the leaf litter a boggy mulch crawling his worms and centipedes. The sinkhole grows gradually more and more cobwebbed as the Adventurers move towards the centre, beginning with the think, glistening filaments of ordinary forest spiders until the trees are draped with the rope-like webs of GIANT SPIDERS. In the middle of this depression there are many tens of Giant Spider eggs, and hanging from the trees are the missing woodsmen, wrapped in thick spider silk cocoons. They will be the first warm dinner for the newly hatched Spiders.

As they approach the hatchery, the Adventurers will hear a tuneless signing in a curiously small but deep voice. This is the lullaby of the SPIDER-MAN, a grotesque hybrid – the head of a man and the body of a spider – just a foot or so in size. He is GAVRON, a worshipper of Arhallogen whose hate of Humanity only grew after he received Arhallogen’s curse. He will be furious if he spots the Adventurers intruding, screaming obscenities and making terrible threats. If the Adventurers attack he will attempt to scuttle away, singing a keening song in a forbidden tongue. This song will attract 1d6+2 Giant Spiders, who will defend the eggs at Gavron’s (barely) musical direction.

GAVRON THE SPIDER-MAN

SKILL 7 STAMINA⑤④③②①             

Gravron will only cause one point of STAMINA damage on a successful attack, but opponents must TEST THEIR LUCK or die from his venomous bite.

GIANT SPIDER

SKILL 7 STAMINA⑧⑦⑥⑤④③②①

Weapon	1	2	3	4	5	6	7+
Bite	2	3	3	3	4	4	5

Giant Spiders can make 2 Attacks.

Armour	1	2	3	4	5	6	7+
Bristly Hair	0	0	0	1	1	1	2

While the Adventurers were discussing their course of action, Snaggletooth and Rhoda decided to take ACTION!, charging the cluster of eggs and hacking away with their axes. There they disturbed Gavron the Spider-Man, who scuttled, screaming and cursing, into the trees chased by Snaggletooth. While the Adventurers debated whether they could get at Gavron, he summoned four Giant Spiders with his song. Aevaron invoked Galana to have the trees seize one, and the party chopped and skewered the Spiders in pretty short order. Snaggletooth took the head of a Giant Spider, with the idea that from it a hat could be fashioned...