Saturday Q&A (jun 1)

Griffin writes,

Regarding not using gold for experience for advancement, that might be worth investigating more contemporary non-D&D games. On the other hand, given how little you have in common with other D&D people online (theoretically your peers) I'm not sure you would find the non-D&D people a useful resource for much.

The tricky thing is that a system should still have experience and advancement that is separate from either PC or DM fiat, because people like it when number go up and more abilities are gained. So you need to hook it to something the PCs can do, action > result > (XP). I've pondered it once more (a topic that is a perennial subject with rpg bloggers so it rolls around in my brain occasionally) and have more or less settled on gold means experience because nothing else is as flexible and free of DM fiat (for the most part when the DM assigns the treasure) in my estimation. Though your experience system of points for damage is quite good.

Answer: Yes, and that's what I would rely upon should I choose to stifle the presence of coins and treasure. Mind you, I didn't say that's what I would do, only that it was worth investigating.

As always, experience can be given for a less valuable commodity. The exchange rate need not be 1 g.p. per x.p. If treasure for experience proves to be still required, that doesn't eliminate the possibility of reducing the party's overall income to a point where participating in something as lowly as farming couldn't become a rational way to ensure they're able to resupply themselves with vittles, as opposed to the exorbitant costs for foods at the town market.

For the record, I have nothing whatsoever in common with other D&D folks online, and haven't for a long time. I haven't found a single idea or useful feature from any officially published source, from any publisher, since before 2005. I do have peers, but they don't exist in those corners of the internet.

JB in Washington State writes,

I've pursued similar lines of thought, myself. Not about what the game becomes if followed logical conclusions and PCs end up tied to a plough or busking for coins (I do have an answer for that: not D&D), but rather the "why" of all those treasure hoards that monsters acquire.

And other then dungeons being built from the remains of ruined empires and lost tombs (where the treasure existed long before mindless monsters moved in), my solution to sentient creatures collecting wealth (orcs, ogres, dragons, etc.) is to give them some sort of economy...a USE for the treasure.

Ah, but then why are the players butchering these intelligent beings for their wealth? What kind of game are we playing here?

I've come to treat most of the description found in the Monster Manuals as hearsay from ignorant and/or racist humans...the kind of descriptions found in, say, the journals of historic conquistadors upon encountering hostile indigenous cultures during their exploration. All such descriptions, thusly, must be "taken with a grain of salt." My setting has humanoids that have regular interaction with human locals (usually in especially rural areas) for mutual benefit, and such interaction requires normal units of exchange (coins, etc.). The humanoids, also, mine and craft goods, make use of resources found in forest and foothill. The treasure is there for a reason!

Which doesn't mean the players are immediately motivated to murder and rob. No! Now that the humanoids are more than cardboard cut-outs, they can be dealt with, negotiated with. Players can do jobs for them: slaying pesky monsters of the type that have NO treasure, in exchange for reward, for instance. Of course, they can also have rivalries and warfare and find the usual reasons for murder and looting that all (real world) "adventurers" have found over the centuries: possession of land, food supply, resources, etc.

With such a mindset, orcs found in a tomb or ruin are simply a competing band of looters. They're hoping to carry that chest of coins back to their OWN society, where they will hoard it or spend it or trade it for influence and fame, etc.

So many options become available to the DM who's cut alignment from their game.

Nigel writes,

Regarding Dams ...

This was an interesting post. Thank you. I was on holiday and tried to write this on my phone but it didn’t really work.  The info that follows would be the exception to what you wrote, rather that the rule. I was inspired to do some reading about this. (I won’t dignify this with the word research, as I haven’t done deep dive into primary sources or read much in Czech.)

The Czech Republic (surprise!) has a very long history of fish pond building. It started in the 11th century and grew until the Thirty Years’ War, thereafter it declined before further growth in the 1800s. Wiki covers this reasonably well, e.g. here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fishponds_of_the_T%C5%99ebo%C5%88_Basin

(Note that the Trebon basin is just one of several basins. One of the ponds was and still is huge: the Rožmberk Pond, of about 4.9 sq km)

Here’s a verified source with a couple of facts, just the abstract:

https://link.springer.com/referenceworkentry/10.1007/978-94-007-4001-3_208

With these snippets:About 20,000 fishponds (180,000 hectares) existed on the territory of the present Czech Republic in the 16th century.  Its average annual amount per hectare has increased from 70 kg in the Middle Ages to the contemporary 450 kg.  So yes, barrels of fish absolutely, but most probably carp rather than perch.

Zilifant in Minnesota writes,

Your recent posts about your gaming group disbanding really hit home with me. Since members of my group moved away, I've been without a regular group for some time, and it's been very hard on me. I have tried gaming via Zoom and it's not satisfying for me at all, particularly when my work day is mostly spent in front of the computer and in Zoom meetings. I'm sure there could be folks who frequent my local gaming stores that might be decent players, but honestly every time I go into those stores and overhear the people gaming there it makes me cringe at the ridiculousness of how they're playing and how obnoxious they are. They don't seem like people I could see myself playing a serious campaign with.

I was glad to see your "Loving This Game" post yesterday, which displayed your optimism of finding a new group and getting a new game going soon. I am similarly between gaming groups, but my own outlook is a bit more pessimistic, even though I love this game too and desperately want to find a new group to play with. So my question to you is this: How do you intend to find a new group of players, and what advice do you have for others who are in a similar situation?

Answer:  Like you, I have similar ideals about people in game stores, though I've never actually been on zoom. But speaking as someone who also spends most of his waking hours on a computer, both for work and play, I don't understand why the game wouldn't be satisfying through a screen. I ran games by text on a blog and I absolutely enjoyed the D&D aspects of that process. Zoom, I think, would vastly streamline the problems that a blog created.

BUT ... for the present, I wasn't planning on finding a game group in the real world. It's probable that I can get a game going with humans online anytime I want, but I wasn't thinking about that either. The last few efforts to get something going online proved difficult because while I had willing players, like you, after starting they found it difficult to communicate and maintain their interest online. So, presently, I'm not going this route either.

My third option is to play ... with myself. I think I know how I'm going to do this, but I'm not ready to talk about it while I'm building up the wherewithal to dig in. Said game would be very simplistic, but it would be a way of going back to the roots of my style of play, while testing out and demonstrating aspects of the content existing on my wiki.

Just why people have such trouble with communicating through a screen is a mystery to me. I found it very easy to step away from everything to do with the internet for 7 days. Never opened my laptop, though I had one with me, never checked my email, never sent any email, didn't look at any webpages and didn't care. I did get eager to write, but not to see "what was new" online. There's hardly anything new online. But this said, I'm fully able to perceive you, reading this as I write, without actually needing to be in the room with you. Being in an actual room with you would just muddle our conversation with a lot of visual cues that aren't necessarily relevant to what you and I care to share just now. This is a pure relationship, without all the baggage of our lives and other predilections. Perhaps it's because I'm a writer; I chose a profession where I would do tons of talking to an audience that wouldn't be present when they could "hear" me.

Sterling in Maine writes,

Although lacking in the sorcery part of "S&S," I'm a big fan of Harold Lamb (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harold_Lamb). He wrote oriental adventure pulp prolifically around that same time as Howard. I think you and some of your readers might enjoy him.

 _____

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