Ready or Not

I've begun filling the role as a Dungeon Master for a 1st Edition Advanced Dungeons and Dragons game set in the Forgotten Realms and more specifically in the province formerly known as Sespech. The adventure began on the 16^th day of Tarsakh, 1367 DR and will pick back up next time on the

18th

***there are no spoilers on this page***

Every moment of refereeing this game was a rude awakening. There's something so raw about interpreting the data given in this scenario I've picked to run called Castle Xyntillan. ***spoiler at previous link***

From the reliance on percentile roles to the insane amount of modifiers applied to every weapon attack, I'm glad that I happened to stumble upon the .pdf for and craft the old school Combat Computer a mere 24 hours before the game. As I expected, the nearly constant amount of time that I spent reading and researching the rules since I was asked to ref the game was almost inadequate.

From here on, I will give highlights of the game for my own account and to help decipher how I'm going to figure the running total of experience points I've dictated will be doled out every time the newly created adventuring party returns to town.

Every player character in the party is starting at 1st level. There are 2 dwarven brothers, Gunner Tarneson, a fighter with an armor class of 3 (or 2 with a medium shield) and Folguth Tarneson, who is a cleric with an AC of 6. Alighast the Goat Wrangler is a human  magic-user with an AC of 10 who travels with a pet goat named Barry. This magician is also the master of a war dog named Ray who has been outfitted with leather armor and thus possesses an AC of 6. The last member of the party is Reardon Gray a half-elf multi-classed cleric/ranger/thief with an AC of 6. These classed characters are played by my new friends Jakob, Stefan, Bryce, and Vincent, respectively. It should also be noted that several times while in the role play part of the game the entire crew tried to convince nearly every Non-Player Character that Barry the goat was, in fact, Gunner and Fulgoth's poly-morphed father...

The characters started the game by visiting the hotel/restaurant/tavern named The Black Comedian. Then they proceeded to rent the 2 most expensive adjoining suites in the place and hire a guide to take them to Castle Xyntillan named Raudel. A carpenter by trade, Raudel was initially pleased to be hired as the guide and agreed to meet the crew the next morning in the Tavern of the aforementioned establishment. The crew then cleaned up in the luxurious suites they had acquired, followed by having their complimentary dinner in the restaurant. At some point Gunner heard a rumor from the owner/barkeep at the BC about tax collectors being in town and some sort of possible reward.

After dinner the party made their way to the prefects hilltop manor to inquire of the whereabouts of the royal tax collectors and were told that the rumor was incorrect and that group had left weeks ago. There was a minor exchange with someone unseen in a back office via a sort of desk captain. Nothing much was gained by the party except that whoever was in the office said they should report back any info from their expedition to the castle.

The boys then returned to the hotel and bedded down for the evening in their fine accommodations. Barry the goat and Ray the war dog had been left in the room during the foray and by the end of the entire stay in those rooms the goat had devoured a good portion of the carpeting in these fine suites.
During the night however, one of the dwarven brothers was awoke to the sounds of the ghostly cries of the elusive and incorporeal 'Black Comedian'. After some chasing, the ghost exchanged a +1 ring of protection for a promise from Reardon to avenge by way of the murder of Patrice-Malevol at Castle Xyntillan.

At daybreak the crew threw what remained of the ruined carpet from their room's balcony onto the roof, had the complimentary breakfast at the BC, met their guide Raudel, and before heading out of town made an unsuccessful attempt to do some horse trading at Findar's stable et al.  In the early afternoon of the following day, after traveling for approximately 30 hours the group arrived just barely within sight of their destination, encountering nothing along the way except the tracks of a group of humanoids numbering approximately 15. Along the way they had somewhat convinced their carpenter Raudel that he should stay on in excess of his guide obligation to attempt to fight in battles for which he had no experience. Finally they built a "blind" to partially obscure them from view and monitor the castle for "24 hours" before proceeding closer. At the final wandering monster check of the second day is when all hell broke loose.

A group of 20 humanoids approached from the south and upon spotting the expedition party and prepared to open fire with 20 short bows at 2 shots per round but not before the Ranger Reardon gained surprise for 3 segments! The half-elf ranger dropped 4 of them with 6 shots. Next the heroes won initiative and attacked in one of the early segments of Round 1. A sling from (I apologize, I forgot who uses the sling) crushed the head of a fifth opponent. Unfortunately when the attack segment of the opposing force came, the crew was rained upon by a volley of 30 arrows which wounded several and nearly slew Fulgoth the cleric. The next round was followed by another volley of 30 arrows. During this time, having never run a 1st edition game before, I as the Referee was experiencing a great deal of trial and error over management of the overall battle. In the end, while not entirely true to verbatim AD&D rules, the entire party managed to escape.

We all agreed to pick the game back up as the players are a bit farther down the road.

I learned a lot from this game. Mainly that I need to keep reading as much rules material that I can lay my hands on in order to better adjudicate the future games. I need a better grasp of percentage rulings with regards to social elements and other nearly inexplicable aspects. Combat rules need to be reread with this newfound experience under my belt. Finally, elaboration of notation of some unclear stats of opponents needs to be accomplished better before future game sessions.

The only experience to award the players that I am aware of at this early stage of my evaluation is the elimination of the 5 forest attackers. I do not believe the acquisition of the  magical ring of protection +1 to be worth XP until it's possible future sale.

Named NPC's encountered-

• Samuel - front deskman at The Black Comedian
• Zebb - bellhop at the BC 
• Raudel - carpenter/guide
• Fernand - owner/barkeep BC
• The ghost of the black comedian
• Findar - stable owner

Final thought- parts of this game felt damned good. Awarding that one magic item and when all players (myself included) came together at the end to learn the combat rules were my memorable high points. Uncertainty about deciding courses of action for NPC's in the absence of clear guidelines for adjudication left me sour and sweating at times. As far as the players, I believe the "so close" sensation of almost being able to set foot on the castle grounds will fuel a new type of game play at our next session. I believe strategy will be king