Goodman Games

Hello Fellow DCC'ers,

I have a question to anyone who has read or run People of the Pit Area 1-19 The Looping Maze. I'm a little confused about the intentions of this maze and how it's setup. Is it a flat design on the ground that PC's have to walk around. Is it a tall marble maze with black walls and white marble floors?

They mention at one point standing on the black marble but my initial impression was that the black marble was the walls not the floor so was that just for levitating mages or climbers? I realize there's a psychic impulse to go forward and backtracking hurts you, beyond that i'm confused lol.

I get the feeling my party will all huddle together and push forward as a group but I want to make sure I run this properly to get the full effect of the designers intentions.

It's sort of a call-out to the Pattern in Zelazny's Amber novels, I believe.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Pattern

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SoBH pbp:

Cathbad the Meek (herbalist Wizard 1): AC 9; 4 hp; S 7, A 7, St 10, P 17, I 13, L 8; Neutral; Club, herbs, 50' rope, 50 cp; -1 to melee attack rolls. Hideous scar.

Hmm interesting call-out. I think it could be better explained in the module but it could be that i'm not the sharpest crayon in the box.

Look at the picture on page 10. I think that makes things pretty obvious. The maze is a flat design on the ground. It is made of inscribed black and white marble. You get shocked if you step on the black. The walls of the room are also made of black marble.

Yeah the picture made me think that but the walls of the pic are kind of odd looking so I wasn't 100% sure. I'll roll with it like that and see how it goes.

There are nods to Appendix N works in many GG DCC modules.

I've been putting them in to the work I've done as well, with Purple Duck Games, in the patron book, and in the Squid Sorcerer project I am working on......they're just fun little "aha" moments if you know the work they refer to. There's a blatant reference to The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath and some less blatant references to Michael Moorcock's novels in my Through the Cotillion of Hours, for instance.

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SoBH pbp:

Cathbad the Meek (herbalist Wizard 1): AC 9; 4 hp; S 7, A 7, St 10, P 17, I 13, L 8; Neutral; Club, herbs, 50' rope, 50 cp; -1 to melee attack rolls. Hideous scar.

That is really cool. One day when I learn the spell to create my own pocket plane i'll read through some of the Appendix N works.

You could probably learn that spell from this guy:



His pockets have their own plane!

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SoBH pbp:

Cathbad the Meek (herbalist Wizard 1): AC 9; 4 hp; S 7, A 7, St 10, P 17, I 13, L 8; Neutral; Club, herbs, 50' rope, 50 cp; -1 to melee attack rolls. Hideous scar.

Have any of you guys ever done something like The Looping Maze in a PbP format? I have some ideas but i'm always interested in tips from more experienced DM's

I'm guessing this is how the area is to be played out by players (not characters):

GM describes area.
GM hands each Player the handout.
Each player has 1 minute ( ? ) to draw his solution to the maze (with pen).
At the end of the time, GM collects all papers. Each player is marked as follows:
- Each instance the pen mark touches a black line: roll 1d4 damage (DC 10 Fort for half)
- Each back track of pen mark: same damage as above.

If a character says he wants to 'study' the maze before rushing in (i.e.: writing his solution on the paper), explain thier compulsion to move forward.

We ended our last session at the maze. I'm not sure how I'm going to do it. But I'm going to guess that I'm going to have to print out a few copies of the maze. The maze is "just" wide enough for someone to walk along. I might throw a few luck checks in there to see if they get confused and lose balance. If they have chalk and use it, I may let them share a "successful" try. Otherwise I'm taking the copy back, saying it swirls around when you look at it.

The first victim gets the map and uses a black pen and traces a route. If they back track, ZAP. If they bump touch the black, zap. IF they make it across, poof...

Next?...

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Reverend Dakota Jesus Ultimak, S.S.M.o.t.S.M.S., D.M.

(Dungeon) Master In Chief of Crawl! fanzine. - http://www.crawlfanzine.com/

"[...] there is no doubt that Dungeons and Dragons and its imitators are right out of the pit of hell." - William Schnoebelen, Straight talk on Dungeons & Dragons

Yeah the PbP format is what seems harder to work with but I think I turn it into situation where the players push how they handle it and i'll dole out the consequences as I see fit. I think the only thing i'll start with is the feeling of being compelled and see how the players take it. In person I agree the print outs for all would be simplest.

I always give the physical handout to the players (the PLAYERS not the PCs) and tell them to trace their way through. In ink! No take-backs, no checks, no dice rolling, just actual tracing the path through the maze. Make a mistake and touch the edge, and your PC takes the shock damage. It sounds easy enough but most of us haven't traced a maze since grade school! About 1 out of every 3 players makes a mistake and has their PC get shocked...

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Joseph Goodman
Goodman Games
www.goodman-games.com

Any chance of free pdf downloads for things like the map for players to draw on?

That would be really useful.

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Playing since about 1980
Latest games: DCC RPG of course!
Quote I like: "I am on a computer therfore I am" (Alan Plater)

Sure, here you go:

http://www.goodman-games.com/downloads/ ... t-Maze.pdf

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Joseph Goodman
Goodman Games
www.goodman-games.com

Thanks very much!

That's just dandy. Jolly good.

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Playing since about 1980
Latest games: DCC RPG of course!
Quote I like: "I am on a computer therfore I am" (Alan Plater)