Basic Fantasy RPG Forums

Hello everyone, I'll start off saying that I am totally new to pen and paper RPG's, and started a new group with some friends to play basic fantasy. I kind of winged the first game with the Morgansfort adventure, and it went pretty awesome. However, I do have some questions about the game that I think will make things go smoother.

1) Monsters with multiple attacks, how do you role them?

2) Is there a penalty for PC's if there is no light-source, and they do not have darkvision?

3) We went without keeping track of time or resource use for the most part. How can I keep track of rounds/turns/days and the water/food they consume. Are they supposed to carry 7 wine skins apiece just so they can stay in the dungeon for awhile?

4) Do you have the players make a map as you describe the setting, give them a map, draw them a map as you go, or what so they know where they are and where they've been.

Any help on the above questions would be great, we had a blast, I just think we can get more out of each game by understanding the structure a bit better.

Thanks a lot,
Fredder

I am sure others who play more often than I do might have some better answers but here goes..

1. I roll them all at once. So if a monster has 3 attacks I roll 3 d20's or roll a d20 3 times. Of course before I do that I choose which characters (if their are multiple characters within reach) are being targeted by which attacks. I hope that's clear enough.

2. If their is I can't think of it off the top of my head. I know in later editions of D&D characters suffer like -2 to -4 to hit and a similar penalty to AC.

3. I know some games have tables you can print out that keep track of that sort of thing. To be honest its one of the things I have the most difficulty dealing with when DMing. Time keeping and resource tracking are just not my strong suit, which is a shame because a few excellent adventures I have read depend on just those things to keep pressure on the PC's.

4. You can do it any of those ways, but I have found letting the characters make the map themselves as you describe it works wonders for them getting mixed up and lost. Which can be exciting as then they have to use their wits to find their bearings and a way out before torches are exhausted and food/water runs out (told you tracking stuff can be fun if you know how to do it).

If you have any other questions ask away! Their is a lot of smart people on this board who know way more than I do.

~MM

Awsome thanks for the help, I have another question though, if you have a group of say four monsters, do you roll 4 inititives and have each take a turn, or group them as one monster that just need to be whittled down? And does each attack in one round, or just one attack from the group per round?
Thanks again for the quick reply!

The core rules state that you roll initiative for each, just like the party does, and each monster and party attacks on their initiative number. Everyone involved in the encounter on both sides may act each round. Some may choose to hold their action or do nothing, and others may not be able to move close enough to act. But everyone gets an action.

about your first post:

1. Just make sure you keep the die in order of say, claw, claw, bite. Some people use different color d20s so they know which is the first, second, third, etc attack, but you can use closest to farthest or some other method.

2. Well, you can use your imagination for the most part. It will be pitch black and not even outlines will be seen, And you can truly not even see your hand an inch from your face. Just picture them as blind. And use the blind rules for encounters. they are on page 52

3. This will depend on what kind of game you want to play. I prefer some realism there, but not overly so. I say be flexible, but assume every 200' of dungeon is an hour (180' for 10'/rd, 360' for 20'/rd, 540' 30'/rd. - 200 is a nice even number easy to use) and every encounter is a 1/2 hour (combat then cleanup and looting bodies). Then say every room searched is an hour. I ignore water unless they are in a desert or the situation specifically requires you to consider it. Just assume they find water sources as they travel.

4. I like it when the party draws the map, but thats only when the DM is good at giving directions. Too much left/right mixed in with east/west and "the corridor curves a bit" can really screw up a map. Especially if they say something like "the door is in the northwest corner" well is it in the north wall or the west wall. I play in a lot of online games and they already have the map on teh screen so no need to map. Unless the DM is using fog of war and you want to see where you have been Its all dark so you will still need to draw your own map.

It is much easier if the DM provides the map. Just depends on how well you describe and they draw.

For monster initiative I tend to roll similar monsters as groups. IE all goblin warriors act on the same Initiative, it can be faster, especially if you have large groups of similar creatures, but it also conflicts a little with the rules as written.

All I can think about is the "Raid" encounter from Scourge of the Slave Lords where its the PC's vs 71 humanoid enemies. I can only imagine rolling that many initiative dice, every round no less!

Sounds like the giblin attack on suskykyn in Nights Dark Terror.

If you have large groups you can look at them like fire teams or squads and break them up into groups. A team will work as one - role same Init, attack same person, carry a ladder to climb a wall together, etc. Then, in my opinion, you are still working within the rules. If they have a strong leader maybe one or more teams will work together or even the whole group if it makes it easier.

Along with that, you can roll morale for each "squad" and if it fails then one creature breaks and runs, and then roll another morale check for that same group. If if fails, then the whole squad will break and run when they see their squadmate run. If you feel jumpy, you can then check to see what effect that squad breaking may have on the squads on either side of them. Could get crazy though if the failing squad has squads on all 4 sides. lol. A squad to the right of a failing squad could save, but a squad ahead of them could fail and the chain reaction move around such that the squad to the right of the saved squad ends up failing. Now with squads on both sides running, they may run themselves. If that makes any sense.

I roll each attack individually, I don't mind the extra time required as it lets me describe what the monster is doing and lets the players to roleplay some defensive moves.

I roll each monster initiative per group if there lots of them or individually. Remember that a monster (and character/npc) does not attack on its turn, it ACT on it, he can attack or do some other nasty or clever thing available to him.

You can manage and record time in a lot of different ways (or lets some player to record combat and exploration time) One nice thing to do is: do both! So you know the exact time, but if a players looses track of time, oh, well, they will have to find out some way.

I make the players draw the map on a grid paper, so they don't know what lies ahead and makes the game more exploration-like.

anybody else roll to hit and damage at the same time to speed things up?

@dymondy

I did in the last game I refereed. Its works pretty well.