Dave Arneson's Gypsy Sayings

“Procrasti-tasking” from reworking the random events charts for Borderlands this morning, I reread one of my favorite quirky passages from Dave Arneson's First Fantasy Campaign: “Gypsy Sayings & Chance Cards.”

Although it suffers pretty hard from the lack of editorial backbone that haunts the rest of FFC (can we stop pretending that is a virtue, please?) --the second Legends section is near nigh and sadly incomprehensible—Arneson's wit and skill as a gamemaster shines through and present some interesting options for handling random events in a campaign.

From the first paragraph in the section, we learn that Arneson used a deck of chance cards, a regular feature of old school historical miniatures campaigns, to generate random events in Blackmoor on a monthly basis. (He notes though the cards were only used after the third year of the campaign, and only to govern events in the Outdoor Survival section of the campaign, the southern lands where the players were governing baronies.)

Interestingly, he drew the events a game year in advance “to allow for a logical progression of events.” With some kind of vague timeline in the works he could draw in the players with carrot and stick peeks behind the veil.

Take this for example:

“Unlike many other forms of advance warnings about upcoming events the infamous Gypsy Sayings merely state what might happen, and allow the players a chance to get out of the steamrollers way. Gypsy Sayings are also obscure, generally, and subject to numerous interpretations about their meaning.”

The meat is in the sometimes quite funny, 14-point example chart, one can almost just see players squirming bafflement and over-thinking streaming through.

A few choice bits, parenthetical comments are Arneson's:

“1. When the six vultures alight on the six hills, Doom will come in six turns. (The vultures are a giant variety that live above Wolf's Head pass. There were only four hills on the playing board, but the player's forgot about two towers in the area. Doom, referred to Wizard's Darkness and should have read “gloom.”)

“3. When three rule the land the Dark Lord will come. (Referring to the committee set up by three of the players to rule Blackmoor. Such a political mishmash would certainly cause the baddies to attack thinking the opposition was too divided to resist.”)

“12. The mists at noon foretell far reaching Doom. (If there is fog everywhere then the baddies are probably sneaking up on the walls. Or perhaps Doom just means Gloom. Gypsy accents are terrible.)

Love it. It just hits a good nerve for me, unpredictable gamey elements mixing and making for emergent story; the sheer goofy fun of that kind of subsystem.

Look for the “Oracular Sayings” tribute section in Borderlands. 

Blackmoor vs. Birthright, Round Two

In round one we watched Birthright fail to land any solid blows despite a flurry of footwork. Now let's see what that old champ from the 70s, the First Fantasy Campaign, has in store for us.

At first glance FFC doesn't look like much of a contender. The organization of the 92-page booklet is all over the map. Transitions are abrupt from section to section, and it reads more like the jumble of a GM's campaign notebook and working rules guidelines than a straightforward presentation of the history of the Blackmoor campaign. One certainly doesn't walk away with thinking “here's a complete system I can use right out of the box in my world.”

That unassuming surface hides some strong muscles though. Dave Arneson's much-talked ability to put on a helluva show really shines through in nearly every section.

More relevantly to this post are the (too brief) windows into how he handles domain-level play--or more accurately the kind of open-ended, ruler-level wargame campaign that spawned our hobby in the first place. Here a close reader sees a great deal of parallels to his contemporary Tin God, Tony Bath.

Neither man seems to have started his campaign with a single, unified system of rules. Both seem to have not only have grown their rules as loose guidelines over years of play, but to have also made big conceptual leaps at different stages (Arneson's largest one, of course, creating the foundation of D&D).

The beauty of that organic-growing evolution is that you see an accumulation of increasingly immersive details to each worldgame over time. Looking back through their respective books is like seeing snapshots of points in a development arc. As each layer of detail was added, subsystems were tacked on to handle this or that situation that grew out of the devious ingenuity of the players.

The best example of this in FFC is in the rules on internal investments, the meat of Arneson's guidelines for the civilian side of a player's options. What's telling about this whole section is that there is nary a single system tying them all together, instead each and every activity has it's unique elements.

Let's let Dave do some talking here. Take the following three excerpts from activities--that are utterly dull in most systems--to give you an idea:

FARMING: For every 20 GP invested one more family (five persons) will move into your area during the first twelve months of each of the years. These parties must travel in from the edge of the board, they are unarmed except for clubs (one [fighter] per group). You will roll at random for the months of APRIL, MAY, JUNE, JULY, AUGUST, and SEPTEMBER to see when these groups of five enter the board. Roll for each group of five separately...Then roll the four sided die for which week of the month, and the six sided die (no travel on SUNDAY) for which day...You can establish an escort service to bring in as many as you wish, at whatever time you wish during the months. However, you must then supply them with food while they wait, and when they travel, which will require additional money (not part of the investment) and wagons to carry the food for settlers and soldiers...

TOURISM: For every 100 GP invested in advertising one Tourist will visit your area, stay at your Inn, spend his money there, and become a non-player character. If he leaves the area safely he will return next year with a friend. The third year, three will come adding an additional person per year, up until the 10th year when they will come with their families and settle (50 people) as farmers or fishermen...

HUNTING, ARMORIES and ANIMAL BREEDING...Hunting will require the individual to go out in the square and have chances at encounters. A return of 10-60% of the investment is gained after each year and with 100 men conducting 12 hunting trips (not all right after each other but at least a week in between) during the year. The return is after deducting the cost of protection and weapons for the men (but not food or pay for them).

Quirky? Yes. A little cumbersome? Yes too. Inelegant? Definitely.

Yet unlike the bland abstraction of Birthright and similar systems in which what you do becomes a gamey (if rules elegant) way of spending points and ratcheting up this or that level, this kind of approach ladles on a whole lot more “face”.

In your mind's eye you can readily imagine the farmer/settlers nervously making their way across your campaign map to your stronghold or the mysterious traveler to your local tavern who gets taken in by the countryside.

Again compare having religion as an abstract “holding” level, as it is in Birthright, to this:

RELIGION: Most pertinent manifestation is the construction of impressive buildings and the equipping of same with riches like candle stick holders, statues, etc. It will also require the shipping of 10% to 60% (six sided die) of the contributions off the board each year. Wagons and protections must come out of the other 40% or wheedled out of the players. Normally 10% is given by all to the dominant religion in an area... Destruction of such convoys will require the sending of 10-60% of what is left, immediately to appease off the board patriarchs, in a new convoy. This is repeated until one of the convoys makes it, or the church is busted. Should the players give up on the convoys all law characters in the area go down two levels and PALADINS will go down three, while CLERICS will be reduced four levels. Destroyed religious establishments must be immediately rebuilt by LAW forces.

To my evil DM mind all these pieces positively drip with things to riff of when I get to the tabletop. It's also an approach that grows behind the open-ended play and tailors itself to the specific give-and-take of a campaign. Rather than weighing play down, this kind of granularity opens up more and more possibilities.

By decision, I declare FFC the winner.

[Editor's Note: The nifty map above lives on Havard's excellent Blackmoor site, a must-visit for anyone interested in that OG campaign.]

Tékumel in Miniature: Jeff Berry Interview Part III

We reach the last part of our interview today. What's amazing is there is a good deal more on the cutting room floor. A big thank you to Jeff for helping us explore this nook of our hobby. I will be attempting to sweet talk other old heads over the next few months, so look forward to more inside scoops.

All photos in today's interview are from Jeff's candy store of a Photobucket page.

A busy week ahead for the Hill Cantons with reviews of Clovis Cithog's Red Planet RPG and Michael Curtis' new Stonehell Supplement in the hopper. Plus we'll have more older-edition new classes, Holmes Expert set musings, news on the Pulp Fantasy Society, and more.

Hill Cantons: You said that you always considered yourself a modeler first, let's talk about those minis. I love the photos of minis of the original PCs and NPCs (noticed lots of Tom Meier-era Ral Partha and some Heritage minis--my own first figures!). Did miniatures play a big role in the campaign? How often were they used in play?

Jeff Berry: I had gotten started in historical miniatures gaming in the early 1970's, and had seen the Tekumel figures when they came out in 1975. I started painting them, collecting everything I could about Tekumel in order to do a good job on them, and as a result got invited out to Phil's to paint figures for him.

He'd buy bulk packs of the Tekumel figures, and I'd paint them up for him. The deal was that he'd keep half and I'd get the other half of the batch as payment for the work. That was the start of my collection, which is now owned by the Aethervox Gamers. There's something like 4,600 figures in the collection, as well as ships, buildings, scenery, and terrain.

The second night I was out at Phil's, the party was trying to find out what had happened to the garrison of a small fort in one of the player's fief. It was full of 'wild' Pe Choi, as it turned out, and the party started to debate (as players will) what to do about it.

Phil had just gotten a pretty good shipment of the Pe Choi figures in and done, so I suggested that we get out his little modular castle and fight out the assault that the players wanted to do in miniature. Phil loved the idea, we got everything out, and fought the battle.

We had to fake up the player-characters from what were mostly the military figures that we had, and I came back the next week with some individual player figures that I'd converted and painted up to represent everyone. Phil and the group really liked that, and it started the tradition of everyone having their own personal figure.

I kept that up for years, doing new figures as needed to reflect the changes in status and wealth of each player, and I still do it today for the Aethervox players.

Prior to that, about the only time the miniatures came out was to fight big battles or other military actions; at that time, that's what “fantasy wargaming” was. After I did the PC figures, we'd use them on a pretty regular basis.

When we went off on our first voyage to the Southern Continent, I drew up the deck plans of Dave's /Harchar's ship and we placed the figures on the plan to indicate where people were at any given moment.

Gary Gygax gave me one of the TSR RPGA miniatures cases at a Gen Con, and I used that for years to bring the figures out to Phil's every Thrusday night. They got used all the time as a sort of “tactical display”, and it did make combats much easier to run.

I had to do a lot of conversions because, back then, there was a much smaller number of figures available, from very few companies. There were some Hyborean and other fantasy figures I used, but until Tom Meier revolutionized the sculpting process by using epoxy putty the figures weren't all that great. I used some Garrison, Minifigs, and Heritage figures as well the Bill Murray Tekumel figures at first, but used mostly Ral Partha figures as ther ranges expanded. There's also a few Grenadier figures as well, but it mostly became Ral Partha as the figures of choice because there were so many options.

I would do everyone's PC, and their NPC servants and such, so we could put everyone on the table for game situations.

As for how often we'd use them, well, it got to be every game session. If there was a melee, of course, but they would also get used in social situations like parties and feasts so that we could all keep track of who was where. It was why we had sets of servants with platters of food, slave girls with fans, musicians, etc., as well as furniture and other stuff.

I'd be asked to do up room plans and drawings from Phil's quick sketches, and we'd play on these plans. I also had gotten some of Gary Rudolph's "Netherworld" sets, and we'd use either these or my collection of wooden blocks for underworld situations.

We still do this, and I've continued to build what amounts to the “scenery” and “props” for our games. I treat them as little stage productions, and it's always huge amounts of fun to watch a new generation of players peer at some detail and wonder what will happen to them next. Phil used to do this all the time, and I'm happy to be able to continue the tradition.

HC:It sounds like you are still running a campaign in Tekumel. How's that going?

JB:Pretty well, I think: I run two groups, on alternate Saturdays, and we have something like twenty players between the two groups.

I manage to keep them amused, and they seem to have a lot of fun exploring Tekumel. Several are really gifted artists, and have published their Tekumel work. Several more are equally gifted sculptors, and are doing masters for Tekumel miniatures.

We're in the process of becoming a formal organization, too; when we pooled all of our individual Tekumel collections, as you can see from the photos of the game room I've posted, we found we had a huge resource of books, documents, costumes, miniatures, and artifacts.

The collections keep growing, and we've working to set up a trust to maintain them for people to enjoy. There's over thirty years of history there, and we're hoping that other folks will enjoy the collections and Tekumel as much as we have.

HC: You said you were working on a book, tell us about that project.

JB: To Serve The Petal Throne will be a book, which I'm going to send through the approvals process that the Tekumel Foundation is putting together. It's a series of short stories taken directly from our adventures in Phil's games. I took notes every night our at Phil's for over a decade, and about all I'm doing is making the prose a little more readable. I'm just reporting what happened, really.

The first part of the book will cover the adventures of Anka'a, who started playing EPT the very first night they had a game: August 24th, 1974 [read her account of that night here]. Her adventures dovetailed with Chirine's as she came to play in our group and explored a lot of Tekumel with us. We'll see, we have a long way to go. 

Exploring the Jakallan Underworld, Playing with Arneson, and More: Jeff Berry Interview Part II

We continue the second part of our interview with Jeff Berry. If this section doesn't make you want to grab a copy of EPT, a big-honkin' piece of graph paper, and get to work on an underworld of your own; I don't know what would.

Hill Cantons: You mentioned that Barker's first maps were of three levels of the Jakalla's underworld. I remember reading somewhere that they were fairly extensive. His write-up on underworlds in the TSR rules are quite simply one of the most evocative descriptions I have ever read about so-called mega-dungeons--especially the section on "Saturday Night Specials". Do you remember anything about these specials as you played through?

Jeff Berry: Do I remember anything? Crikey! One of the 'special sections' would get seared into your brain when you went through them! Most of the levels were all what people would call 'Saturday Night Specials'; there wasn't a whole lot of 'normal' stuff in the underworld...

Let me backtrack for a second, and set the scene. This was back in the days where we all used 8 1/2" by 11" graph paper sheets for maps, with five squares to the inch; everybody, including Dave Arneson and Gary Gygax, worked to that 'standard', so one had a certain feel for just how big a dungeon was going to be. The 'mega dungeons' were collections of these standard pages, all linked together with passages and you knew instantly when you were going from page to page. That's all anyone had, as we all had to get our graph paper from office or artist's supply stores.

The main map of the Jakalla Underworld is completely different; it's an 18" by 24" sheet of ten square to the inch graph paper that Phil got from a drafting supply house. He had access to this kind of thing vis his academic career, like the blank globe he used to draw his Tekumel maps onto.

Nobody in gaming at that time had seen anything like it, and when he rolled it out onto the table your mouth just dropped open. It's over four times the size and four times the scale of the usual maps of that time, and the main map has what amounts to a dozen separate areas that all are owned by one or another of the Temples. Each of these areas, in turn, would have provided enough material for a complete adventure module with maps and room descriptions.

He had 'flattened' out the areas that made up the upper levels by vertically compressing the separate areas in order to get them all on one sheet, and then did two more larger scale maps of the lower levels. One is of the Garden of the Weeping Snows, and the other is more temple areas. It's an enormous area to have to try and explore, and I don't think we ever did. You could spend literally years down there, and never get through it all.

Mapping it, from our standpoint, was next to impossible. We came to know certain paths between some of the sections, like between the Temple of Vimuhla and the Temple of Chiteng, but that was about it. It was just too big, and too complex, to map in the usual way unless the party was willing to spend a lot of time doing it.

And it was full of life. Phil had a forty-page listing of just the major rooms alone, with the contents and decor. There were always people working down there in the shrines, and the supposedly “deserted” areas that formed the buffer zones between the Temple areas had a lot of traffic in them.

There were also a lot of creatures of various kinds, and you got to know about where you were by what you were running into. Each of the Change temples tended to specialize in their own versions of undead and underworld creatures, while the Stability temples tended to concentrate on really clever traps and mercenaries to guard their shrines.

The “special” sections were really hard to get to, usually approachable by very convoluted routes, and were loaded with the worst traps and guardians. You learned to be very, very careful once you figured out where you were, and you never, ever fooled around with anything unless you knew what it was or you had seen something like it before.

There were all sorts of nexus points (which we had no idea had existed, in those days) and bits of ancient technology in these sections which would transport you to other parts of the underworld or to other times and places. Usually with nasty results, unless you thought really fast and really quickly.

It was pretty obvious that the “specials” were all tied in with Phil's story arcs and plot lines, too. The guide is full of dangling plot hooks for people to explore, and the bulk of them never got picked up on by the players.

Other stuff that really threw us was the huge rotating section that would randomly rotate and completely change the passageway connections; the rolling tomb-car in one of the tombs that would roll around a circular passage and crush the party if they couldn't get the tomb gateway open; the crystal coffin of one of Nayari's lovers that was a time portal back to Bednjallan times; or even something as simple as the artillery emplacement that overlooks the River of Death. It has an ancient energy weapon in it, and more then a few players have gotten fried by pushing buttons that they shouldn't have.

EPT has a pretty good list of the areas, there's well over two dozen of what I'd call "Saturday Night Specials.” I could fill up pages on the subject...

HC: It's been detailed elsewhere (the Comeback Inn) but I love those stories about Dave Arneson as a player. What was it like to play next to the infamous Captain Harchar?

JB:It was a scream. He was really good, and really fast on his feet. We never knew what sort of nefarious scheme he was cooking up at any given moment, and Chirine normally had to keep a pretty close watch on him and his rascally crew to make sure that we got to where we were supposed to be going. It often didn't work, and we'd wind up someplace way off the map.

Dave was really one of the most creative people I'd ever met, and genuinely the most fun to play with. He was very nice, very genial, and would do his very best to rip your liver out and feed it to you with Tabasco sauce on it.

He, as well as a lot of the original Blackmoor players, were very competitive, but they weren't what came to be described as “power gamers.” They worked very hard at being very good at what they played, and they liked to win based on their own skills and ability.

They would be very kind and very helpful to a newbie until the guy got to about their level of skill. Then they'd treat him just like one of the other players, and you had to be just as good and just as fast to survive. There was nothing else like it. The excitement of playing against or with Dave was one of the most wonderful things I ever got to do in gaming.

Having Dave as a player out at Phil's was truly fun to be a part of. Phil was in awe of Dave, and Dave in awe of Phil. Watching the two of them try they're hardest to put one over on the other was awesome to watch. All you could do was hang onto your chair for dear life as they took off and ran with stuff. There was also a really distinct difference between Dave and Harchar. Dave was a good actor, you could always tell who you were talking to.

Dave played Harchar like a combination of Blackbeard and Don Vito Corleone, and he did it with style and energy. It was some of the very best gaming we'd ever done, having him there, and we all enjoyed it hugely.

HC: How close in the early years was play to the OEPT rules as published? I know y'all seemed to travel rules-lite, but how close/distant was it?

JB: We played EPT right out of the book for the first three years or so, in our original Thursday Night Group, until Phil thought he could trust us. He'd had some bad moments when the guys in the other group did things that messed up his 'future history'.

I was actually the transition character from EPT to what would become Swords and Glory. Chirine was unique, because he was a military sorcerer; as far as I have been able to find out, there haven't been any others as PCs.

I played Chirine for over a decade at Phil's, as we normally kept the same player-character from the start. It tended to make us all a little conservative as players, but we stayed alive that way. Phil would occasionally let us roll up what were basically NPCs to use in little side adventures, but normally we'd stick with the one character.

After that first three years, we knew Tekumel pretty well and didn't diddle with it. Phil did more story-telling then GMing, and went to the "you roll, I roll" system of adjudication. It worked very well with us, and seems to work well with my two groups.

I have players who have rolled up characters in EPT, S&G/Gardasiyal, and T:EPT. I do all the number-crunching “behind the scenes”, and I refuse to let the game mechanics get in the way of the story-telling.

This concludes Part II. Tomorrow we finish up our interview with a great discussion of EPT miniatures; the book of recollections Jeff is working on; and other matters various and sundry. Stay tuned...

Arneson on Experience Points for Special Interests

It's been often noted in the nooks and crannies of old school spaces on the Internet that D&D co-creator Dave Arneson used a heavily house ruled system in his Blackmoor campaign that eschewed a simple gold for experience formula. Experience points were instead given for loot spent on player-chosen special interests, a notion that intrigued me enough to adopt myself.

I had assumed, based on many second-hand accounts, that Arneson's system was either something a bit abstracted and arbitrary based on the stated goals of the players or very class specific. Something like “my character's special interests are in power, so I get an experience point for each gold piece spent on my stronghold, hiring mercenaries and the like; or I am a fighter so gold spent on swords, armor, and training gets me experience.”

A close reading of that wonderful and jumbled mess of campaign notes, the First Fantasy Campaign, reveals, however, an interesting sub-system with some serious rules-specific crunch. I have no idea to what degree these rules were used in actual play--for all I know they could have been closer to my former view in reality. At any rate, they point to ways a GM can inspire crazy fun by tweaking the exp. carrot and stick.

For starters, the FFC system didn't just limit a PC's choice to one area of interest, it gave them seven separate ranges of choices that had varying percentages for treasure spent in a primary area of interest. Gold spent on somewhat related pursuits give smaller percentages of return (80-90 percent) and less related ones smaller percentages or none at all.

A player who chose to have his character specialize in a love of wine, for instance, received 100 percent for all the hard-earned loot spent on booze, 80 percent on women (!), and a mere 10 percent spent on religion.

The specific areas of interest are where Arneson's quirky and fun genius as a GM are really on show--as is the sheer gonzo enjoyability and pulp fantasy sensibility of Blackmoor. Witness the following highly-amusing definitions:

“A. WINE: Spirits with a relatively High Alcoholic Content that is immediately consumed by the player to the limits of his capacity. This MUST be repeated after recovery, by the player until all the alcoholic beverages purchased have been consumed BY THE PLAYER [Arneson's emphasis] before he can proceed on another expedition. An exception to this is if he comes into conflict with other players and loses the purchased WINE, whereupon he can proceed on an expedition...Experience gained while drunk does not count but treasure does.”

Wow. I hope said character did not have to make a systemic shock roll for their liver between expeditions.

“B. WOMEN: The player will immediately-proceed to the local ESTABLISHMENT and expend all funds desired on ROOM plus EXTRAS at that place. Slaves of the appropriate type (left to player) may also be purchased with the funds and utilized to fulfill this classification. These slaves may then be sold at reduced value, the difference being credited to the players account. Money stolen does not count in this area.”

Ok this one is a little embarrassing. Could, ahem, stand for some post-millennial, post-feminist updating.

“C. SONG: The player proceeds to the local tavern and expends his wealth on other players present in either category A or B or C. Damages assessed by the tavern owner are counted towards the players expenditures in this area. Experience gained as a result of area C will count towards this area only if the player is not inebriated when this was done. Inability to pay all debts so incurred in this, or the above areas may result in imprisonment (if they can get you) or banishment (if you get away).”

Partying down to help out your buds. What's not to like with this one. But remember to stay sober to keep that exp award.

“D. WEALTH: Merely the stockpiling of Gold, Silver and similar items of value by the player, If these items are stolen, the player loses full value immediately upon discovery and may lose levels as a result.”

Maintaining said miserly hoard perhaps entailed the creation for strongholds—or dungeons—of your own. An interesting way to again get players busy in co-creation.

“E. FAME: This is gained by straight combat with creatures and players in the game. The qualifying factor is that there must be another player who attest to your prowess in public. Otherwise, no points are gained (referees may award partial point totals if bodies are discovered later by other players (who must also attest to your results up to 75% Normal value). Flunkies (non-Player Characters) can also attest to your success (you get half value then) but can also (depending on loyalty) attest to deeds that you did not do...”

So showing off finally has some in-game utility. Better make sure to hire up some retainers (and keep them alive) to spread word of your greatness.

“F. RELIGION or SPIRITUALISM: Awarded when the player gains experience points while engaged on a QUEST or otherwise co-operating with a Cleric (may be himself) on a task. Funds are given to the local Religious denomination (up to player) where upon he will gain the points. Real Player Clerics may refuse to accept the offering and the player will get no points. Refusal to accept may get the player in trouble, depending on what the CLERIC said. Money given to the denomination may be spent by the Clerical type once 40%-90% (roll six-sided die) is sent to H...See HOW TO BECOME A BAD GUY for other details.”

Leaving aside the puzzling, tantalizing incoherence (what or where the hell is the H that money is being sent to?) there are interesting implications. Clerics have clear obligations to religious institutions, but can also cash in on the piety of their PC brethren.

G. HOBBY: This is a catch all category left to the referee to award details on to the players. Examples of some of the more obvious pursuits would be SPELL research by Magic-Users specializing in say ANIMAL CONTROL or the raising and breeding of LYCANTHROPES. Even the taking of spare parts and building a new creature...One's hobby could even be the devising of better TORTURE machines, making GOLD, the building of flying machines, all up to the referee to outline and define within the limits of his campaign.”

Another simple wow. Who wouldn't want to be a player in this kind of campaign?