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Tuesday, June 19, 2012

Some Thoughts on Last Night's DCC Session - Short Funnel of Death

This is not a recap of the game session. Instead, its some observations I'd like to make about last nights game.

The Funnel - I didn't think I'd like the funnel but it seemed to work fine in actual play. We went initially with 4 characters each for each of five players. So, 20 peasants in the mix, which dropped to 16 when one player lost internet connectivity. Oh, and a cow. Can't forget the cow. Actually, by my reckoning, the cow saved 1 or possibly 2 peasant lives, as it took 2 of the limited stock of Flaming Finger of Death shots to kill the cow. That could have been 2 more peasants dead.

PC Death - quick and painless. Alright, relatively painless. I hadn't killed a PC in over 15 years, and I think I killed 8 last night (and a cow). I need to put some notches on my D20 I guess.

Adventure Length - shorter than I expected, but that was fine. It felt like a full adventure and the pace of the adventure was pretty quick for the most part. I specifically chose the Zero-Level adventure in the rulebook, as we just had a 3 hr window to work with, and I wasn't sure how quick the system will run. I'm going to assume things will slow down when we hit first level and start accessing the different tables.

The Set Up - I am, apparently, a sandbox style DM by nature. Not that I would have called myself that years ago, but it's obvious to me now. Starting fresh PCs at the front door of the dungeon and basically saying: "Seek Adventure!" as you shove the PC hoard through the entrance wasn't something I was all that comfortable doing. I adjusted fine as the adventure got moving, but there is a lot of flavor text, at least in this module. Which is fine if you like to hear your DM reading flavor text. Sure, I could rewrite it in my own words, but it will still wind up being "hear your DM reading flavor text".

2 comments:

  1. My experience is that DCC runs fast at 1st level, too. And at 3rd, which is the highest level I have yet run.

    In fact, it runs fast at 3rd level with a player who has never played the game before.

    During Free RPG Day, it took a scant 2.5 hours to run through 13 encounter areas/encounters with two players playing two characters each, one of whom was playing a wizard and was seeing DCC for the first time.

    ReplyDelete
  2. good to know - i'm aiming for 3 hr slots as like many folks, i have to work in the morning ;)

    ReplyDelete

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