Tenkar’s Thief how to video is gold

 https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=fUB5Yy5QSXs&pp=2Aa6AQ%3D%3D

Tons of great ideas on how to check for traps and stuff

B/X is lower power than ad&d

 As weitten, says Tenkar, BX is underpowered compared to ad&d 1e, much worse when including UA (Unearthed Arcana). 

See his text reply comments about Barbarian https://m.youtube.com/shorts/BkI8DJ33rIc

Do Wizards suck in Shadowdark?

 And similar type games?

DCC has Spellburn, and level 3 Wizards I have seen do some crazy stuff. Basically spellburn every time you cast for real. Use a familiar with an attack (giant wasp bee) for normal combat I guess. 

Shadowdark uses Luck, similar to spellburn i think. How muxh control u got tho?

Some say, you will cast more spells with eoll to cast. BUT others say, you just never get a spell off in two seasions. F that. 

https://www.reddit.com/r/shadowdark/comments/172lh87/dont_be_a_wizard/

Btw,  early commenter says warhammer 2e had this type of wizard. Was it before DCC?

 

Lichhouse article in general- https://dreamsinthelichhouse.blogspot.com/2025/01/shadowdark-good-bad-ugly.html?m=1

Lixhhouse says and a focus on theater of the mind (non-tactical movement and ranges) so the game plays very quickly at the table,

I'm usually running groups of 5-6 players.  Fast moving rounds with simple rules keeps the gaming moving quickly and everyone engaged.

Redsit says:

Do you use luck? Spell mishaps happen far less than 5% of the time in my games, and when they do happen they are more likely entertaining than lethal.

Honestly, unless a game is super tactical, having some chance to fail at spellcasting does so much to make it feel like I'm actually tapping into immense arcane power instead of just pew pewing everything.

I'd definitely only play a Wizard if I had at least a +3 INT at stat roll, though. 45% chance of failing to cast a Tier 1 spell and losing it for the rest of the day is too high.

“Not too long ago I ran 4 games of Shadowdark for my group as a test run, to see if we liked the system enough to play a full campaign. The biggest complaint about the system was roll to cast magic. They realized early on that spell casting might be a problem, so they brought 2 Priests to the table, both had a Wisdom of 14. In three of the four sessions neither of them was able to successfully cast a Cure Wounds spell, my players were not amused in the least.

If I were going to run Shadowdark again, I would lower the DC to 7+Tier, to increase the success rate to 70-80% and/or make it so they only loose the spell until they rest if they roll a natural 1.

Other opposite

•2y ago

I run an open table game RAW and have many enthusiastic wizards. It is the most powerful classes in the game. With careful use of luck tokens spell failure is rare, even more so with a bard or bless spell in the party. And on those occasions where important spells are used up PCs leave the dungeon, rest and return. Sometimes two or three times. Personally I love wizards and area spells like sleep, web and fireball.

Other other

The spellcasting system is the only thing I don't like about Shadowdark. I houseruled it out in favor of vancian magic which we prefer. If I had a player object and want to roll to cast, I'd let them, but none have so far. A 35% or so chance on your turn to do nothingand lose the spell is just too much for us. At least in ICRPG if you fail the casting check you can just try again next round.

I've found the Vancian vs. Roll-to-Cast divide to be one of the starkest in TTRPGs. Typically a person will love one and hate the other. I love Vancian and despise roll-to-cast, but I also know (just by reading the comments here, even) that others love roll-to-cast and despise Vancian in equal measure.

Other other other 

I'd probably use the damage values and many other effects from the B/X spells though, not Shadowdark's, since the wizard will cast fewer spells on average.

Hardcore 5e mode - ZERO grid maps???

 https://www.5esrd.com/gamemastering/alternative-rules-other-publishers/5e-hardcore-mode/#The_Hardcore_Way

For 

GM Devon on start playing https://startplaying.games/gm/gm-devon

FIRST AND MOST IMPORTANT QUESTION IS- are their grid maps and tactical fights? I think not?? Or does a VTT make that work fine? Thinking… u roll 10 dmg on fireball, that kills 10/2=5 ghouls in a Horde… did I see that on a map? 

ANSWER - no grids? Says u use an even simpler version of close near far, as in Here or There. 

Woah. Roll 3d6 down the line, zero ability score placement. Hooowwww do you play a wizard then? Like dc 10 spells all the time? Oooohhh, it’s shadowdark… player rolls and has to beat a 10 or something (monsters have no saving throws). It is sort of at the very end of the article. 

Oh I see. It is like SHADOWDARK AND DCC. Level 1 or above, Roll to cast. Might get a crit spell, might get a disaster. Seems like they mostly want you to use cantrips all day. Do they allow cantrips actually, i doubt it. 

*** you get way more spell “slots” tho as u level as a wizard. Just one extra at low levels 1-5, but 2 extra at level 6.  It is equal to ir level x2. I guess it doesn’t matter though because disasters every time u roll a 1, youll never be high level. (How do spare characters work?)  

***youll have waaaaay less known Spells tho. Cannot put extras in ur book. 

Sorcerer n warlock is forced to pick spells each morning also. Only cleric n druids have freedeom to cast whatever. 

Ohh, but cleric druid paladin can only use way less spells per day. Equal to level+2. 

Oh aaaand wizards level up the slowest. 

So like Shadowdark or DCC without spellburn. Plus the negatives of adnd 1e slow leveling wizards. I have heard the OSR folks say, some say, there shouldn’t be many wizards in the world. They r always dying. 

-;-;-;-;-;-;-;

Maybe this is the nail in the coffin, bcuzy it so depends on other players:

Much of any game’s table time is spent with players working to gain the upper hand on a situation. This involves use of cover, distance, henchmen or surprise.

Means slower pace and arguing on how to do stuff. We NEED torxh timer to speed this up. 

Hordes of enemies 

Hordes

When battling large groups of monsters or foes, which should happen frequently considering the heroic ambitions of your players, avoid chewing up time with lots of rolls and HP tracking by applying a HARDCORE trick: For each enemy in the horde, add 1 to your d20 attack. For each enemy, also add 1 to your damage outcome. On the player side, simply divide player damage by a constant and fell that many enemies at once.

10 damage from a fireball? Divide by 2, 5 ghouls are burned to cinders! Adjust your constant for tougher hordes. And yes, a horde of 10 or more will be terribly deadly given equal footing with heroes. Use this knowledge.

Tales of the Valiant rpg

 Seems fine, close to 5e  but w less crazy stat bloat  

https://gnomestew.com/tales-of-the-valiant-players-guide-review/

And buffs for each class seem good but fair. 

Wizard gets a little B/X aor adnd flavor with eventually getting some resist vs magic. 

DCC module to Appendix N matching

 https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=sojgtadpxk8&pp=2AadBw%3D%3D

See time 15:25.

Also more

• DCC on Zoom video calls also.
• Play dcc for free via zoom. Learn to play or anybody can play.
• See yt from official

=== HUMBLE BUNDLE deal, i bought it (sort of again? confused b/c i thought i kinda bought it b4).

$45 (or maybe $40?), plus a later hidden $10ish shipping fee to ship to USA. 

• This time you get 99 pdfs. Lots and lots of good ones. Old like DCC#1 through new like maybe DCC #108 or something. 
• ***Be sure you click on the "$18 tier" stuff to get the PDFS!! It'll redirect to DriveThruRPG. Make sure you log in to associate with your acct. 
• After pay $45 (or maybe $40) you gotta click a link they give you, it'll go to goodman games website. Not obvious, but it'll be like 4 things, then you gotta click ADD on their store. Then you gotta copy paste the Coupon Code to get stuff. I also clicked an "always available holiday coupon" that maybe did nothing, I dunno was confusing. But the main coupon worked tho, it reduced the $50 cost on their website to zero. But then added like $10.50 for shipping to USA (saw Europe guy say $50ish to ship to Europe).
• https://support.humblebundle.com/hc/en-us/articles/23625826028571-Goodman-Games-Key-Redemption-Instructions 
• You get 1 random physical adventure book (it let me pick between a MCC (mutant, no thx) and DCC, so I got the DCC. It was a good one i never had before. 
• Gods of the Earth is what I got. DCC Day #5, 2024. Physical module book, woo hoo! 
• And you (or at least I got) get 4 semi-useless-to-me but good for brand new folks physical things: 

• bad of dice, ok that's fine. I think BobtheWorldBuilder dice or something. 
• quick reference physical books, ok that's fine too, altho i just use the pdf.
• a SOFTcover main rules book. Well hell, i already had the main rules book hardcover. 

Some of the 99ish PDFs included:

1. DCC875-GrimtoothMuseumOfDeath.pdf
2. DCC825-DragorasDungeon.pdf
3. DCC_805-GlipkeriosGambit.pdf
4. DCC73_EmirikolReprint_2ndprint_screenRes.pdf
5. DCC70-Jewels-2ndPrinting.pdf
6. DCC90-DreadGod.pdf   =   The Dread God of Al-Khazadar
7. DCC765_Well_of_the_Worm.pdf
8. DCC775_Tower_Out_Of_Time.pdf
9. DCC_108_TheSeventhThrallSezrekan_complete_v1.pdf
10. DCC_103_BloomOfTheBloodGarden_combined_screenRes.pdf
11. DCC66.5-Doom-3rdPrinting.pdf = Doom of the Savage Kings - one of the ones we ran already, I love this one. 
12. DCC67_Sailors7p_Complete_screenRes.pdf = Sailors of the Starless Sea - also we ran it, love love loved it. 
13. Skyrim stuff, no idea what this is about.
14. Dark Tower volumes 1-3 ... same as the physical books I recently had gotten. Awesome looking, gotta read 'em. The reprint + revamp of the Jennell Jaquays stuff, classics. 
15. Tome_of_Adventure_Volume_4_Purple_Planet_PDF.pdf
16. DCC_FreeRPGDay2023_PiercingTheDemonsEye_screenRes.pdf
17. DCC_FreeRPGDay2022_DangerInTheAir_combined_screenRes.pdf
18. DCCHorror8_NightBogBeast_complete_screenRes.pdf
19. DCCRPG_Corebook_10thPrint_screenRes_Complete_links.pdf and #2 and #4,7,10. They are all the core rules. 
20. Dying Earth stuff, this is what I really wanted. All of them I think? I see some like:
1. DCC_DE0_PilgrimsOfTheBlackObelisk_complete_screenRes.pdf
2. DCC_DE1_PlayersLibram_complete_screenRes.pdf
3. DCC_DE1_TheLaughingIdolOfLar-Shann_complete_screenRes.pdf
4. DCC_DE2_The_SorcerersTowerOfSanguineSlant_complete_screenRes.pdf
5. etc.
6. DCC_DE8_The_HouseOnTheIsland_complete_screenRes.pdf
7. DCC_DE9_TimeTempestsNamelessRose_complete_screenRes.pdf
8. etc. Looks like probalby all of them. 

Danial Boone inspires D&D

 https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=FkNRw6aQevI&pp=2AbQAg%3D%3D

Vision at night. 

1. Indians chopping to make a raft to cross river to get em. Looked low under the fog… 

2. Vs panther. Dropped deer meat to avoid panther. *** fire behind him so could see panther eyes lit up but not affect his human night vision. 

Spellburn’s intro song?

 https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=KZDs5zpHK2A&pp=0gcJCYcKAYcqIYzv

What somg is this!? Been looking for 15 minutes no luck. 

Some lyrics sound like

“Riding your dragon to [ lands of] the wizard

Carry the sword that legends [are born]

Bilbrons advice on Spells

Remember throughout, Bilbrons is awesome, but he is very defensive minded. He's going for the safest route and doesn't mind if things take a long time or are goofy. Cool ideas, but I'm still going to be offense minded no matter what. 

Skills https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=aEIUNUYuR8o

• focus on combat of course
• Arcana is critical they say, and basically only the Wizard will be good at it. (Was this Bilbrons or somebody else saying that?)
• His S-Tier = Perception, Stealth, Athletics (Don't forget my new game DM doesn't do passive perception)
• His A-Tier includes Arcana and Insight.
• His B-Tier includes Investigation and Acrobatics (High Dex even if low Str, use it)

2nd level Spells top 10 (remember, he's defensive) https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=1xIJ394WgRo&t=453s

• Tasha's Mind Whip = level 2, 3d6 psychic or half, debuff = no reaction, can only do one thing next round. 
• Rope Trick is so powerful, many people use it sparingly b/c too cheezy. 
• Web
• Misty Step
• Levitate - use offensively too
• PwoT - Pass without Trace.
• Phantasmal Force
• Silence
• Shield
• #1 = FIND STEED - wow. Paladins get to keep it all day or something. 

Other spells:

• ~Phantom Steed my notes - LVL3, it is RITUAL spell. Lasts an hour... but it's a RITUAL SPELL. 
• ~Pyrotechnics - LVL2, obscurement no concentration! https://dnd5e.wikidot.com/spell:pyrotechnics …. Oops, dragons can have blindsight, problems. 
• ~Summon Greater Demon - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GJ4dmvcPvYc - level 4 spell, but changes when upcast of course. 
• Gotta say its NAME, how, gotta command it to give you its NAME (Does that take a whole round extra?). 
• Gotta Speak Abyssal! 
• Blood from a humanoid killed for a circle, not required. 
• A RP paladin might baulk, but... we have a Tiefling he is OK with so, fine eh? 
• We're going to kill the demon after anyway.
• Many Free spells, so consider that. 
• Bilbrons is a full obscurement + Blindsight nut, so that's half the reason he likes this. 
• 
  
• Infernal Calling (level 5 spell) - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D4vmKs71NnI&pp=2AZC 
• Devils are more a pain than demons, but this spell is better than some other devil spell. 

Cantrips https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=uOJlEyfIrcs

• Dancing lights can light up enemy, but leave u in dark hidden. Wait it needs concentration!!!!! Nevermind!
• Light. Says you need at least one of them, either dancing or regular light. I do love light to cast on a rock to throw constantly down hallways. 
• My ideas. Use prestidigitation to cover a tiny speck of a pebble in mud, dry it out. Now throw it and when the mud shatters, bam, light (but before shatter, maybe almost zero light? Ask DM.)
• Mold earth is meh for me. I like the comment "It's not for battles, it's for warfare and good at that. Digging under a castle wall to put a ~bomb~ thing. Redirecting rivers. Multiple casters using it to make a trench for trench warfare". 

—

Sleet Storm -   https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=VqSf-WOHT8c&t=314s

• Not so great unless your whole party does blindfighting. Then you'd only use it for retreat. 
• If everybody in the party can see through it, then it's awesome. 

Wizard builds from this site

 https://tabletopbuilds.com/basic-build-series-wizard/

Great ideas… read level 1 strategy

Rest casting mage armor not cheezy cuz have to save a slot https://tabletopbuilds.com/rest-casting-dnd-5e/

yukihiro akama art

 Super cool wood carvings of houses(?) that look sort of surreal medieval Japanese fantasy or something. Really cool. 

D3 - how to prepare -DmGeezerJim

 https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Gd8PCT3WCXw&t=443s

DmGeezerjim explains what to do around time 7:30 as in what maps to make youself. Maps of noble houses etc. 

Time 10:00 about mass combat. 40 baddies at once. Be ready. I say, represent 5 or 10 with one big mini or something. Better yet, 3x3 paper with the number 10… put a single mini or the orc or whatever… then uodate the paper number. 

Time 22:00, if ur party wont want to explore , ok. Don’t worry about this side blank area. 

Petroglyphs for d&d inspiration

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X7X2c9VTbJM

DCC or just d&d can use ideas