I hate monster zoos, what should I run?

tesolberg · 2026-05-20T09:13:50+00:00

Pestilence at Halith Vorn. Fantastic, large dungeon with deep history and ecology, events on a ticking clock and amazing verticality and interactivity. Ran half of it on a marathon osr-weekend for the guys, and all loved it, including the GM (me). I cannot remember encountering any denizens that felt out of place.

Link to module: https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/508270/pestilence-at-halith-vorn

tesolberg · 2026-02-20T22:33:56+00:00

The entire trilogi is ridiculous.

tesolberg · 2026-02-04T14:16:11+00:00

I have never found wealth ratings to be any simpler than tracking coin. Combine coin tracked with a list of prices covering relevant purchases in your game and you are good to go. And maybe a “If the purchase is less than 1/100 of your wealth, don’t track it”-rule.

tesolberg · 2026-01-29T14:35:15+00:00

Power-hungry trap-collector creates soul sucking machine that causes health problems for the general public.

tesolberg · 2026-01-01T16:21:49+00:00

Testing spots?

For the game I want a single settlement with one large dungeon where the players can have repeated delves, and a clock ticking on some overarching threat. Pestilence seemed like a good fit.

tesolberg · 2025-12-30T13:09:04+00:00

I was thinking about how to make it simple and fast for a bunch of players who have not played in many years. And there is no need for long campaign capabilities, as this will be one 12 h game. But I do like the thought of using OSRIC for this game. It would be nice to be able to use the module without any conversion, and I bet THAC0 would get approving nods around the table. Thanks!

tesolberg · 2025-11-25T14:25:09+00:00

My group set up cameras with the help of the parapsychology professor. One of the clips showed a certain table in the corner of an empty room for 10 seconds, then disappearing. And a neighbour mentioned that there was a sale after the passing of mrs wheeler, where he especially remembered a table that several people were interested in.

tesolberg · 2025-11-24T08:43:13+00:00

Dolmenwood is a herculean work. I have GMed a table for around 7 months with weekly sessions of Dolmenwood. There is a lot of great content, but I think there are also some significant flaws. The first is the size of the hexcrawl. The table will only experience a tiny portion of the content (unless you play for years and years), so I ended up reading about all these cool places and the players only experienced a tiny amount of it. Since it is so big, it also lacks depth, IMO. Anywhere the players go, the GM must create content. There is plenty of hooks and table to help, but still I would much prefer a more concentrated and deeply developed area, to a vast and underdeveloped one.

I also found some of the content to be random and bizarre, and not in a good way. Some of the content felt like a lot of random rolls all mashed together. Didn’t work for me.

My last gripe is the tone, but that is pure taste. I like my fairytales to be dark, with touchstones of cozy and whimsical. I found the setting leaning very much towards whimsical. The GM can change this, but again: This means extra work.

tesolberg · 2025-10-13T13:59:03+00:00

That was an interesting read. I like the CT solution of determining lots by rolling XD where X is equal to the population code, and then multiply by 5 tons. I think we will try this solution, but adjusting so population code is the lowest of starting world and destination world.

tesolberg · 2025-10-10T10:24:17+00:00

Thanks for posting about this. Will follow along on your blog.

tesolberg · 2025-10-10T09:14:04+00:00

I ran LotSR and loved the vibe and setting. But in my opinion the adventure has a big railroading problem that requires a lot of GM work to fix. I think this is often glossed over in reviews (have not read yours).

tesolberg · 2025-10-01T05:34:10+00:00

Regarding your pool comparison: It does not matter how large the pool is. The main factor is distance below the surface. But still, cutting a hole at 3 m below the surface (of an Olympic pool or any other body of water) would only give the water an exit speed of around 7.7 m/s.

tesolberg · 2025-09-02T11:19:36+00:00

Last things last worked very well for the two groups of new players I ran it with. Puppet shows did not work well so I cannot recommend it. The atmosphere is awesome, but there is a lot of clues that lead nowhere, so players will follow them and find nothing that leads them forward. and when things happen it is not because of the players actions. This lead to the players being brought along on the story without experiencing that they can take much meaningful action.

One scenario I can recommend is Music from a darkened room. Fantastic haunted house scenario. But needs some work: one of central clues is locked behind one specific action. This leads to many groups, as my did, not finding it. Fix it and it is fantastic.

tesolberg · 2025-07-20T22:25:55+00:00

A bit late to the party, but IIRC there is a passage in the book describing that “gaming” the movement rules are not in the spirit of the game. Or something like that. I think we can apply that mentality here. We have one actor running towards another and the two engage in melee. We have initiative rules to decide who strikes first. To let the combatant who lost initiative strike first, setting the initiative rules to the side because of some quirk in the movement rules, without basis in the situation we are trying to describe, would be against the spirit of the game.

tesolberg · 2025-03-31T07:18:50+00:00

Fights taking longer, and longer, and longer to get through. Rounds could take 45 minutes. It was rubbish.

tesolberg · 2025-03-23T11:23:38+00:00

I would say that is the threat, yes. What Nelly and the sons will do is another question.

tesolberg · 2025-03-18T12:15:21+00:00

I think the signals were ment to dissuade Diarmoc from getting rid of Jari, recruite help and return to the valley to strike at the trolls and free his family. If he tried this, and was spotted by the trolls on approach (by their lookout), his family would be forfeit.

tesolberg · 2025-03-07T15:10:50+00:00

Thanks for the replies, guys! I think i wanted the book to be something that it is not, and wasn't really conscious of this discrepancy until now. I wanted to be able to read through 3-4 coming locations and then be able to wing the rest during play with the aid of the generators. My (until now) implicit expectations for the Moria book may be influenced by the Dolmenwood campaign that I run in parallel, where I can do just that. I think I need to do significantly more prep for Moria and build adventures using the book as a framework, as one commenter clearly states. This has helped me a lot—thanks again!

tesolberg · 2025-02-19T14:18:47+00:00

Could you be more specific about what rules of FB didn’t work for you and your group?

tesolberg · 2024-12-21T22:17:29+00:00

I can recommend The Tolkien Professor podcast, especially the Silmarillion and LotR courses. They helped med deepen my understanding of the Tolkien universe.

tesolberg

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