Dungeons & Delvers 2nd Edition Playtest, Part 2

After resting the party continued exploring the arbitrarily eastern side of the dungeon complex. They encountered a door, and the cleric of all people decided to check it for traps. I found this odd. Not because she gave it a shot (no one else in the party had any particular knack for finding traps), but because this was the first time they had tried to and it was actually trapped.

She failed and was struck by a ceiling block, knocking her all the way to -5 WP. Not dead, but getting there. It took one Healing Touch to get her to 0 WP--stable, but barely functional--and a second to get her back into fighting condition. Despite being down to 1 Favor, she opted to press on.

The door at least wasn't locked or stuck, and the room beyond was filled with rubble and some grimlock zombies. While the zombies busied themselves trying to escape the rubble, the characters got some decent hits, killing three before they had a chance to act. Luckily it was a zombie, and it could only try and fail to get a bite in before the barbarian bisected it relatively cleanly.

Four grimlock larynxes later, they were on to the next room!

The door was also trapped, though this time for added variety it was a pit trap and the nomad fell in. They hauled him out with a rope, and he was back on his feet figuratively and literally one Healing Touch later. This room seemed to be empty, but an extensive search turned up a secret passage.

It opened into a very lengthy hall, which eventually led them to a fairly expansive chamber inhabited by a pair of goblins. Since the PCs had to use light they couldn't get the drop on the goblins, but the ensuing fight was over pretty quick, anyway. They gathered up the goblins' torches and candles, and after another lengthy search uncovered some functional metal greaves and a bunch of gold jewelry.

Figuring that they'd been pretty lucky thus far, especially given the cleric's lack of Favor, they decided to try and hunker down in one of the dead-ends they'd discovered (only need to defend one entrance), but while trying to harvest firewood from a door heard a loud scuttling noise: a horse-sized centipede was nearby, and heading right towards them.

We had to stop there because the baby woke up. Good cliffhanger. Try and get back to it tomorrow.

DESIGNER'S NOTES

While we didn't get to see the Defense/AC mechanic in action, I did get to explain Dead Man Walking a few times. It adds to survivability somewhat, but not much since it doesn't scale with level, and you only get a few minutes of acting before you fall unconscious and likely die, anyway. What I like about it, is that it adds a logical state between perfectly fine and unconscious/dead.

I'd considered adding a Bloodied condition for when you get to half WP or less, but it would need to do something all of the time, like impose a -1 penalty to d20 rolls and ability/Talent DCs. Something simple and easily remembered. But this I think would be more of an issue for the PCs, as many monsters might get Bloodied and die off in the next round.

Depending on the class and/or monster, it could also do other things. For example, I could see barbarians getting a damage bonus or something while Bloodied. Sorcerers could gain non-stacking bonus Mana on a round-by-round basis. Clerics could get a bonus on Divine Intervention (they're really in trouble). Something to think about.

Ganging Up was useful, as always. Thanks to it at one point the barbarian got +2 damage from Overhitting against a zombie.

The greaves added +1 Armor Class for each one worn. The players were confused who could use them, as they were used to classes having armor restrictions, but when I told them that anyone can wear any armor without penalties (so long as they have the Strength to carry it), they slapped them on the nomad. So now his Defense is 12, and his Armor Class is 19 (up from 17).

Still easy to hit, but good luck bypassing the armor.

Speaking of the nomad, he still hasn't used any psychic powers. Seems content to hack monsters apart with his arming sword, which conveniently bypassed the zombies' DR (they get 3 against piercing and bludgeoning weapons).

A feel like they need hirelings, as "in-game" are already preparing to rest again after only exploring for a half-hour. It makes sense they'd want to wait, as their heals-on-wheels is tapped out. Going to suggest they just head back to town, hire some potential victims, and buy some mending potions with their massive windfall of ill-gotten gold.

Assuming they aren't killed by the random encounter, that is.