Summary
- System: BFRPG
- Quest: Something's amiss in Santa's workshop...
- Date: December 27, 2022.
- Time: 7:15PM EST (UTC -5).
- Duration: Reserve 4 hours, but I'm targeting 3 hours.
- Online: Google Meet (with the RPG Meet Chrome Extension)
- One-Shot: This will be a one-session, one-shot game, not an ongoing campaign.
- Content: PG
- Sign Up: PM me your e-mail address.
- Questions: Reply to this thread.
- Player Count:I'm looking for 2 to 5 players.
This will be a Christmas-themed dungeon crawl featuring Santa, elves, and... others.
House Rules
Instead of a 5-ft grid, the dungeon will take place in 14 rooms laid out as a hex-crawl. I've made a few tweaks to BFRPG to acommodate a more abstract dungeon; you can find these rules on page 2 of the attached Players Packet PDF.
Note: That PDF is a DRAFT. It's mostly good, but incomplete in parts. This game is partly a playtest for me.
Characters
Please either choose a pre-generated character or create your own character with the guidelines below.
- Pre-Generated Characters: I've attached a Player Packet to this post with pre-generated characters for every legal combination of race / class, including:
- Dwarf: Cleric, Fighter, Thief.
- Elf: Fighter, Fighter/Magic-User, Magic-User, Magic-User/Thief, Thief.
- Halfling: Cleric, Fighter, Thief.
- Human: Cleric, Fighter, Magic-User, Thief.
- Create Your Own Character: Please follow these guidelines to create your own character:
- Experience: Each character starts with 5,500 XP
(Humans start with 6,050 XP because of their 10%
racial bonus). - Abilities: Assign these ability
scores as you like: 15, 14, 13, 12, 10, 8. - Hit Points: Each character has the "maximum"
HD roll for level 1, and the "average" HD roll for
every subsequent level, rounding down (add CON per usual). - Starting Gold: Each character starts with
150 gold pieces to purchase mundane
equipment.
- Experience: Each character starts with 5,500 XP
- Device: Any device that can run Chrome Version 88 or higher (required for the RPG Meet extension).
- Software: We'll play this game in Google Meet, and you'll want to use Google Meet in the Google Chrome browser so that you can install the RPG Meet extension.
- Chrome Extension: RPG Meet for dice-rolling.
- Printer: I recommend that you print both your character sheet and the "Player's Map" on page 22 of the attached Players Packet, but this is not required.
I'm not an expert in accessibility, so forgive me if this section has errors or thoughtless issues:
- Breaks: I intend to break for 10 minutes roughly halfway through the session (at about the 90-minute mark).
- Hearing: Google Meet offers real-time, voice-to-text captioning. I've used this captioning for work, and—while not perfect—it is good.
- Speech: People unable to speak can use the integrated chat.
- Sight: I'm not sure if RPG Meet is accessible without sight, but if you have your own dice-rolling solution, you can roll dice on the honor system. I won't be sharing my screen or a map, so if you have a way to track the relative position of 14 rooms, you should be good to go.
- About Me: I'm an experienced GM in-person and online... with friends. I've only GM'd strangers four times, online twice.
- PG: This game should be rated PG. Think Indiana Jones or Harry Potter. Examples:
- Language: Let's limit it to "damn" and "hell." Try to think of fun alternatives to more serious profanity... "thrice-damned," "balderdash," "by Moradin's unwashed socks!"
- Violence: People get hurt and die in combat, but death is sudden (not lingering) and wounds aren't gruesome.
- Sex / Sexual Violence: Will not come up.
- Content Warnings: This game will include violence...
- Descriptions of Combat: If you don't think you can handle listening to the narration of fantasy, sword-and-sorcery combat, or narrating combat yourself, this isn't the game for you.
- Player Character Death: This is an old-school game, so the encounters are not balanced. PC death is possible.
- Non-Player Character Death: Depending on the actions you take (and how the dice fall), you may also be too late to save some NPCs that you might like to protect. If you don't think you can handle that result, this isn't the game for you.
- Inclusion: I think inclusion is an important topic, and this will be an inclusive game. Every courteous, conscientious player is welcome.
Heard enough? Still want to play in this game? Please PM me your e-mail address so that I can invite you to the game.
Anticipated Questions
- Why Google Meet? No real functionality reason... I'm just comfortable with it. And enough about this experience will be new for me that I'd like to keep some of the logistics familiar.
- Why "standardize" character ability scores / starting gold / etc.? That's not Old-School! No, it's not. But, in my opinion, all that 3d6-in-order stuff is great fun in a trusting group of players who are confident that others won't be bothered by their less-than-effective character. But for a group of strangers? Let's kill that anxiety. Besides, I don't think the ability scores make a TON of difference, anyway.
- What will you do if a player misbehaves? Gosh, I hope this doesn't come up. But I was asked this question once by a very shy player at a convention before I ran a game, so I thought I'd include it here to reassure anyone with similar fears. If I think something goes a little too far, I expect I'll ask that the player ease up. If I think something goes way too far, I'll just remove the player from the session.
- Will you use safety tools? Yes, but I don't expect to be watching video at all times, so I'm worried I'll miss an "X-Card." Instead, I'll ask everyone to use the phrase "let's move along." And "let's move along" can mean anything from "Oh my God, this is so boring, why are we negotiating the price of ale!?" to "Okay, this is making me cringe, let's get to the next scene."
- Why is this post so long? I think 3 to 4 hours of time is a HUGE commitment to strangers, so if a long post helps set expectations a little better to ensure everyone gets a little more fun out of their 3 to 4 hour investment, then I want to write that long post.
- Do you do voices/accents? Sometimes! But not well!
- Do I have to do voices? No! Not at all!
- Do you have the entire BFRPG system committed to memory? Ha! No! But I've GM'd a LOT of D20 (AD&D/OSRIC, 3.5/Pathfinder, 4e, 5e, C&C, BFRPG), so I won't be making it up as we go along, either.
