Review Originally Published January 15th, 2001

The Vemora is a short module for Forge: Out of Chaos supposedly designed not only for beginning adventurers, but beginning players – containing “explanations and guidelines through the text for the first-time Referee to follow.” I have yet to figure out what these “explanations and guidelines” are supposed to be, because the entire module looks exactly like an old-style D&D module.

The “plot” goes something like this: The PCs arrive in a small town. They are told that the town guard has been blinded by an attacking group of monsters. In order to heal the guards, the town needs to find the Vemora – a great healing artifact which was lost many years ago when the underground Thornburg Keep was devastated by a plague. The PCs go into the keep/dungeon, beat up on some monsters, find the Vemora behind a secret door, and go away happy with a bunch of treasure and a rather nice reward.

This is a village, mind you, which is described in four sections: The Blacksmith, The Supply Store, The Temple of Shalmar, and The Drunken Dragon (bar).

In short, the cliches run thick on the ground, the pre-written dialogue would make your players’ ears bleed if you ever dared to utter its stilted clauses, and the artwork will make your eyes bleed (having dipped from the rulebook’s mediocre quality into the truly pathetic).

Writers: Mark Kibbe
Publisher: Basement Games Unlimited, LLC
Price: $7.95
Page Count: 26
ISBN: 1-892294-01-X
Product Code: BGU1002

Tales That Dead Men Tell is, at face value, a far more substantial value than The Vemora: Background information is given on the Kingdom of Hamsburg and the Province of Lyvanna, along with some regional political history – and the adventure does a fairly sophisticated job of hooking the local events which make up the adventure into the larger political affairs of the world.

The plot, in brief: A decade ago the Kamon family was charged with high crimes against the Province of Lyvanna. When the soldiers came to arrest them, however, something went wrong – the household guard became agitated, and the evening ended in disaster: Kamon was executed, his wife arrested, his children missing or dead. Kamon Manor was left abandoned.

But then, years later, the bells of the Manor begin to ring again. Graves are found opened. And the guardsmen sent to investigate never return.

Enter the PCs.

Unfortunately, what is set up as a really top-notch horror adventure degenerates rapidly into a standard dungeon crawl: The PCs move into the manor/dungeon and commit a mop-up operation on a group of necromancers who have moved in to search for some sort of hidden treasure on the property.

Some products have a really good setup, but then don’t quite manage to get the dots connected just right. Tales That Dead Men Tell has a really good set up… but manages to miss the target by the length of a battlefield.

Writers: Mark Kibbe
Publisher: Basement Games Unlimited, LLC
Price: $9.95
Page Count: 44
ISBN: 1-892294-02-8
Product Code: BGU1003

Past me was definitely unimpressed with these adventures, which I received as review copies alongside the core rulebook for Forge: Out of Chaos. If you’d like to see a more positive review of The Vemora, you can find one here (including notes on converting the adventure to other systems and some light remixing).

RCC asks:

I just ran my first game and got into a sticky situation: The NPC quest giver asked the party to clear the dungeon, but the PCs stopped after the first room and came back because the entrance to the second room was blocked. I ended up just having the quest giver pay them because I couldn’t figure out what to do. What should I have done?

It sounds like your players thought they’d accomplished their goal, but hadn’t. You can also run into this sort of situation if the PCs are deliberately trying to con their employer, of course, and the way you can handle it is largely identical.

It basically boils down to a broader GMing principle: Figure out the consequences of the PCs’ actions, then look for how those consequences can be vectored back to and intersect with the PCs’.

In this case, those consequences and that intersection is probably obvious and, in a long-term campaign, pretty easy to bring into play. For example, let’s say that the PCs were hired to clear out a mine infested with rust monsters. They told the person that hired them that the rust monsters were all gone, but they weren’t. What happens when the person who hired them discovers that?

An angry customer demanding that they finish the job might actually be the least of their problems! If the mine owner sent workers back into the mine believing that the dangerous creatures were no longer present, innocent people might have been killed. Has the mine owner been imprisoned due to endangerment? Are bounty hunters trying to round up the PCs to come testify? Does the brother of a slain miner try to track them down for a little vengeance?

Or flip it around and look at the consequences of the mine remaining closed: Does the local economy collapse? Was the silver flowing from the mine an essential income for a local duke, whose political power is damaged as a result of its loss?

Also: Where did those rust monsters come from? What consequences might there be from a herd of (breeding?) rust monsters having longer access to such a prolific feeding ground?

Your most immediate goal might just be to prompt the PCs to go back and finish the adventure, but often the splash back to their reputation and the ancillary fallout from their failures (or con jobs) can be just as interesting or even more interesting.

For a discussion of similar techniques, also check out Running the Campaign: Aftermath of Adventure.

ONE-SHOTS

If this scenario was being run as a one-shot, on the other hand, the real-world time pressure would obviously make it more difficult to explore all of these possibilities. So if I ran into this “whoops, they ditched the scenario” situation while running a one-shot, there are a couple things I’d look at.

First, did we already fill a goodly portion of our time and did everyone seem to have a good time? If so, it can be just fine to shrug and say, “Great adventure!”

On the other hand, if we have a whole bunch of time left in our slot and/or the experience seems unsatisfying, then I’d probably try to figure out how to let them know that they missed the adventure.

If you can figure out how to do that diegetically, great! For example, as the PCs — standing in the first room of the dungeon — conclude that the job was a lot easier than they thought it would be and make preparations to leave, that might be a great moment to have some hungry rust monsters, drawn by the smell of all the succulent metal the PCs are wearing, burst through whatever is blocking the entrance to the second room of the dungeon and attack!

But if you ultimately just need to say to the players out of character, “Hey, folks. The rest of the dungeon is on the other side of the boarded up passage with the signs saying, ‘KEEP OUT!’,” that’s not necessarily the end of the world.

Another way to do this, though, is to look at some of the long-term options you might use in a campaign and to the same thing, but at a faster pace!

For example, the PCs go back to town. They get paid. And then — BAM! — you skip a bunch of empty time and jump straight to, “We fast forward two weeks and the mine owner is in your face! ‘What game are y’all trying to play?! You only cleared out the first room!”

Then take a five minute break and use the time to sketch in a few new details to the dungeon suggesting the passage of time:

• The blockade has been removed by returning miners.
• Signs of fresh violence where the miners were surprised to encounter the rust monsters they were told had been cleared out.
• A creche or two of baby rust monsters that had time to be born because the PCs didn’t get the job done immediately, potentially complicating the situation in any number of ways.

And just like that, you’ve turned frustration into a fun and memorable scenario that’s made even more special because it came not only from you, but from the choices of your players!

Go to Ask the Alexandrian #1

When it comes time to roll the dice, figuring out which skill to use is an essential part of how a GM makes a ruling in most RPGs.

D&D 5^th Edition is no exception, even if its skill system is a little janky. When making these judgment calls, however, there’s one pair of skills that seems to cause more head scratching than any other: Athletics and Acrobatics. When a PC is trying to do X, should it be an Athletics check or an Acrobatics check? Or should you allow the player to roll whichever one they’re better at?

(Fill in whatever action you want for X.)

Sometimes and at some tables, it can feel like the overlap between the two skills is almost complete. As if they were really both the same skill and completely interchangeable with each other. And this only becomes more true if you use the variant rule where any skill can be paired with any ability scores. (Which you absolutely should, since it dramatically increases the flexibility and utility of the skill system.) At least Dexterity (Acrobatics) vs. Strength (Athletics) gives you some guidance based on the ability score, but what’s the difference between Strength (Acrobatics) and Strength (Athletics)?

But if they’re both basically the same thing, why do we even have these two different skills?

ORIGIN STORY

The distinction between Athletics and Acrobatics makes sense if you know that Climb, Jump, and Swim were separate skills in D&D 3^rd Edition and were then combined into the single Athletics skill in later editions. Athletics, and its antecedents, can therefore be coherently understood as, “Are you doing something movement-related that requires a skill check while moving in one of these movement modes?”

Acrobatics, on the other hand, is essentially just a slightly expanded version of D&D 3^rd Edition’s Balance skill and can be understood as, “Are you doing something movement-related that requires a skill check while moving, but NOT in these movement modes?”

And that’s the tip: If you simply and consistently apply this distinction – Athletics is climbing, jumping, and swimming; Acrobatics is everything else – then the overlap between the skills shrinks to almost nothing.

There will still be exceptions, particularly when it comes to complex actions involving multiple modes of movement – e.g., running along a banister and then leaping to grab a chandelier – but that’s all right. It’s okay to have some overlap between skills; it’s only a problem when the overlap becomes a total eclipse. In the now-rare circumstances when it does come up, it shouldn’t be too difficult to check your gut and figure out whether running along the banister or jumping for the chandelier is the most important part of the action. (Or, alternatively, just let the player roll whichever skill is better for them.)

Bonus Tip: Generally avoid forcing them to roll both skills in sequence to succeed. This drastically reduces the odds of success, which will sadly encourage your players to become much more drab and boring in their future action declarations.

The important thing is that you’ve established a clear distinction between the skills so that you can make consistent rulings and the users of both can flourish. (The general rubric here boils down to, “Is there a reason someone would want both skills?” If not, then you’ve probably got a problem. The other solution, of course, would be to house rule one of the skills out of existence.)

… AND THUS CONFUSION

If you find yourself in the position of needing to explain your rulings to a player who has very different preconceptions (and very strong opinions), you may also find it useful to understand why there’s so much confusion between Athletics and Acrobatics, particularly because this confusion is likely to only grow as a result of the 2024 Player’s Handbook reducing skill descriptions to a single sentence and further obfuscating the original reason for both skills existing.

In practice, I think there’s a couple key reasons.

First, people associate the word “acrobatics” with jumping. As a result, common usage – e.g., “You want to jump the chasm? Make a Dexterity (Acrobatics) check.” – immediately dissociates from the rules as written.

Second, DMs have a bias towards calling for skill checks instead of ability checks. (This is, at least in part, because “make a proficient Strength check” isn’t an established concept, so if you want characters to be benefit from their proficiency bonus you NEED to figure out a skill to call.) Therefore, when faced with a PC tackling the fairly common tasks of breaking down a door or lifting a heavy item, they start looking around for a skill and… hey, there’s Athletics!

This very common usage of Athletics isn’t wrong, per se, but further obscures the intended distinction between the skills – i.e., movement-related checks vs. movement-related checks when using a special movement mode. Once you’ve obscured (or never spotted) the intended distinction, you’re generally just left with the common dictionary definitions of the words, which gives you “physical feats featuring strength and coordination” vs. “physical acts which require strength, agility, or stamina.”

And I’m guessing, unless you happen to grab the same dictionary I just did, that you probably can’t tell which of those definitions belongs to which word.

Thus, the endless debate.

DISCUSSING
In the Shadow of the Spire – Session 41D: Back Amongst the Rats

They returned to the temple and found four watchmen standing guard before the outer door. The surrounding buildings had been evacuated.

When Tor went to speak with them he learned that a major operation involving watchmen from across the city had attempted to “root out those filthy rats”. But eight watchmen had been killed in attempting to explore the areas below the temple and now they were simply bricking up the basement to seal the problem away.

The watchmen weren’t supposed to let anyone through, but since it was Tor they didn’t think it would be a problem…

The PCs are called to adventure; they venture forth; they triumph over evil or claim the treasure or kiss the prince… and now it’s time to move on to the next adventure.

Something we don’t often think about, though, is the often-quite-literal wreckage that the PCs leave in their wake. In this session, for example, they return to the site of their previous adventure and discover that (a) the city watch has attempted to clean up the site; (b) failed rather badly; and (c) is now boarding the place up.

This establishes that the world is in motion — that stuff keeps happening even when the PCs aren’t there to see it. It also shows that the PCs’ actions have consequences. (Would those watchmen have been killed if you’d finished clearing out the rats?) Plus it’s an opportunity for exposition (as the PCs learn more about the watch and how they handle the dungeon access points within the city).

You don’t need the PCs to specifically “return to the scene of the crime” to make this work. For example, if they burn down a house while fighting gangsters in an urban campaign, you could add that to your list of landmarks (as described in So You Want to Be a Game Master) and have them notice it while traveling through that district in the future.

Such locations can develop over time: The house is rebuilt. A new family moves in. And so forth.

How things change over time will help set the theme and tone of the campaign. At the broadest level, are things getting better or getting worse? (Either in general, or in response to the PCs’ actions.)

MOVING IN

One of my favorite schticks along these lines is to look at a dungeon freshly emptied by the PCs and ask myself, “Who would move in here?”

In a previous session, we saw this happen with an ally when Sir Kabel moved into Pythoness House. We can also imagine infrastructure being claimed (or reclaimed) by local authorities: The town reopens the mine now that the skeletons have been cleared out; the tunnels discovered under the tavern are repurposed as a granary.

But it’s just as likely that the answer is a new villain! “Thanks for arresting all of Dr. Cairo’s minion,” says the Red Death. “A good secret lair is so hard to find these days!

The activities of such a villain, of course, will quickly vector back to the PCs, intersecting their path and creating new scenario hooks that will pull them back to the familiar location.

Done too often, of course, this can become repetitive and frustrating. (“We have to go back to the old lighthouse again?”) Used judiciously, however, or as part of an open table, this can be a delightful way of, once again, showing the players how their actions are affecting the game world. It’s also a fun experience because the players can take advantage of their existing knowledge of the location while also being surprised by how the new tenants have remodeled the joint.

(For similar techniques, also check out (Re-)Running the Megadungeon.)

Of course, sometimes the PCs will gun down all the cartel members at a mansion in Miami and then they’ll never see or think about the place again. (It was probably bought by some incredibly boring, but very rich, neurosurgeon.) If you want to evoke a living world, the loose threads are important, too. Not everything should play out as a closed loop.

Campaign Journal: Session 41E – Running the Campaign: Tactical Traps
In the Shadow of the Spire: Index