Solitaire BFRPG

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PureSparta
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Joined: Tue Dec 18, 2018 5:47 pm

Solitaire BFRPG

Post by PureSparta »

Ok, i know this has been probably asked a thousand times here but this will be question number thousand and one. Are there any modules/adventures/one-shots i can play solitaire? I'm not looking for anything intricate, or even a story at all. Just want some old-school monster bashing dungeon delve. Meaning, i create one (or more) characters and just go kill stuff and collect items.
I figured Basic Fantasy is the one system that could allow that with ease, but is there anything specifically for that purpose? If not, can i play solitaire any of the adventures or campaigns provided here?
MastaOcto7
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Re: Solitaire BFRPG

Post by MastaOcto7 »

I haven't seen any modules built solely for solo play, sorry. I have read articles online in the past however about how to play D&D modules solitaire. I'm sure if you really wanted to, you could do a quick Google search for "solo dnd" and you'll find at least a handful of articles on the topic. You could use the same guidelines with the modules available here.

It does spark some ideas within my head though. I might tackle the idea of creating a solo adventure in the future. But there's a lot of variables you have to worry about like, what if this spell was casted, or what if the player tries to use the environment. The only way I know to solve this is to provide pre-determined actions like in Tunnels & Trolls adventures.
PureSparta
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Re: Solitaire BFRPG

Post by PureSparta »

Thanks for the reply!
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blueJedi
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Re: Solitaire BFRPG

Post by blueJedi »

Hi PureSparta,

I have had success running Basic Fantasy solo. In fact, it is solely responsible for me getting back into, and enjoying, the hobby. And I only play solo.

That said, everyone plays for different reasons, some enjoy combat mechanics, and others love the discovery aspect. I like both.

Pre-made modules will provide some bad guys to fight, however, there will not be any sense of "discovery", since you have to read it ahead of time. For that sense of discovery, you will want some Random Tables.

You will want to make these Random Tables yourself, since you know what you want to encounter. At first, I took the modules, like Adventure Anthology One, read through it and took the parts I liked and added them to the encounter tables.

Over time, these "Random Tables" have grown considerably, and change almost every day, and for every "campaign" I come up with or find.
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merias
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Re: Solitaire BFRPG

Post by merias »

There was another thread recently with a similar question, and I suggested using the Wizardawn tools:

viewtopic.php?f=2&t=3200#p65119
merias wrote: Mon Jun 11, 2018 10:42 am If you're looking to play alone, this is indeed possible and is a fun way to experiment with house rules or just get experience running combat. The best way to do this is to go to http://wizardawn.and-mag.com, select Basic Fantasy in the 'Fantasy Game' dropdown, then click on 'Dungeon Door', pick a level and check off 'Include rules'. You'll get a nice set of tables you can use to generate a random dungeon that can be played solo, on the fly, including monsters, treasure, traps, etc.
and I'll add that you can use a GM emulator like Mythic or the tables in Scarlet Heroes to help answer questions during solo play, but those are not needed. I've played a few solo sessions with just the Wizardawn generated tables and it is as you describe - a monster-bashing dungeon delve.
PureSparta
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Re: Solitaire BFRPG

Post by PureSparta »

Thanks for the replies guys, much appreciated.
jw76
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Re: Solitaire BFRPG

Post by jw76 »

As is my normal operation, I was lurking around the site and I started thinking about this idea for solitaire BFRPG. I checked out the wizardawn site mentioned by merias, and had it create a random dungeon for me.

I copied the map of the dungeon into roll20 and set the fog of war DM opacity really high so that even the DM can't see. Then as I explored the dungeon I simply revealed areas a little at a time as I explored. Revealing areas was a bit slow since you have to do it little by little so you don't see too much ahead of time. It was fun to see what was there because I didn't really have a sense of this dungeon. My only glimpse of the dungeon was the couple of seconds it took me to set it up in roll20, and I tried to not study the map too hard. Little tip if you are interested...you will need to reveal room number 1 before you set the fog of war opacity up :roll: .

Then I took the description of each room and cut/pasted that straight from the Wizardawn site and into a macro. That way when I entered room #3 I called the room 3 macro. It posted the description of the room and I read through it. I didn't read very much of the text while making the macros, so I was basically seeing the description for the first time. I made macros for stuff you might find if you searched and for monsters you might meet. You only have to call the appropriate macro for that room. If there wasn't anything to find in that room, the macro returned nothing.

The challenge for this would be to make sure you don't read too much while you're setting it all up, but for a 20 room dungeon with a robust random encounter table it only took me like 20 minutes to set up. One could spend more time and make it prettier, but I was just trying out an idea. Not sure how useful this is, but i'm going to put some more effort into this and see what I can come up with.

If anyone cares, I can post a follow-up at some point.
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merias
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Location: Ottawa, Ontario

Re: Solitaire BFRPG

Post by merias »

That is a really great idea - I hadn't considered using the fog of war like that. If you get a chance let us know how it goes.
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orobouros
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Re: Solitaire BFRPG

Post by orobouros »

The Basic Set I got in the early 90s contained a solo-play adventure. The rules are a bit dumbed down to fit into the go-by-numbers choose-your-own-adventure, but you could always use the full BFRPG rules. It wasn't a very big dungeon, meant to just give you a taste, but it's an option. It's copyrighted material but you can get legit copies for cheap in the right places.

I wouldn't mind trying to collaboratively put together a simple solo-play adventure. A mostly-random 16-room dungeon stocked discreetly with monsters, traps, and treasure -- and maybe a light plot, too -- with the organization of the choose-your-own-adventure style books.
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