Adaptations by Jason Harp - Support Thread

[jharp]

I have several adaptations in the works and wanted to provide a support thread, in addition to the standard bug reporting mechanism, for those products.

Adaptations Published

Bestiary - 2E - Malevolent and Benign I - Expeditious Retreat Press
Bestiary - 2E - Malevolent and Benign II - Expeditious Retreat Press
Adventure - OSR/5E/PF1 - Dark Naga Adventures - DNH1 The Lost Temple of Forgotten Evil (Forge (https://forge.fantasygrounds.com/shop/items/294/view)) Available combined and separate.
Bestiary - 5E - 5E Foes: Lovecraftian Horrors (Forge (https://forge.fantasygrounds.com/shop/items/340/view))
Bestiary - 5E - Ultimate Bestiary: The Dreaded Accursed - Nord Games
Adventure - DCC - Dungeon Crawl Classics #71: The 13th Skull - Goodman Games


Adaptations Past Review




Adaptations In Review

2E - Advanced Adventures #5: The Flaming Footprints of Jilanth - Expeditious Retreat Press


Adaptations Awaiting Materials



Adaptations In Development

5E - Dark Naga Adventures - DNH2 The Buried Zikurat
5E - Dark Naga Adventures - DNH3 The City of Talos
5E - Dark Naga Adventures - DNH4 Confronting Hastur
5E - Dark Naga Adventures - DNH5 Carcosa
DCC - Dungeon Crawl Classics #72: Beyond the Black Gate - Goodman Games
DCC - Dungeon Crawl Classics #73: Emirikol Was Framed! - Goodman Games
DCC - Dungeon Crawl Classics #74: Blades Against Death - Goodman Games
DCC - Dungeon Crawl Classics #75: The Sea Queen Escapes - Goodman Games
DCC - Dungeon Crawl Classics #76: Colossus, Arise! - Goodman Games
DCC - Dungeon Crawl Classics #76.5: Well of the Worm - Goodman Games
DCC - Dungeon Crawl Classics #80: Intrigue At Courts of Chaos - Goodman Games
DCC - Dungeon Crawl Classics #82: Black Manse - Goodman Games
DCC - Dungeon Crawl Classics #97: Queen of Elfland - Goodman Games
DCC - Dungeon Crawl Classics #98: God Skull - Goodman Games
2E - Monstrous Compendium Annual - Volume III - WOTC
2E - The Ruins of Undermountain - WOTC - Currently researching map ideas


I'm certainly no expert so if you find something suspicious please let me know and I'll try to fix it in a timely fashion. Also, if there is an adaptation that you would like to see that seems to be of the kind above let me know and I'll see what can be done.

Jason

[jharp]

Bug Fixing

Submitted THAC0 corrections for:

Malevolent and Benign I - Expeditious Retreat Press
Malevolent and Benign II - Expeditious Retreat Press


Expect 2-3 weeks before this pushes live.

[ChrisRevocateur]

RE: 2E - Malevolent and Benign

I have a question since the source product is meant for 1st edition instead of 2nd, and I'm going to refer to the two different versions of OSRIC on the Forge as a way of explaining what I mean.

So there's two different versions of OSRIC on The Forge, one made by AlterZwerg and Sterno that is meant as OSRIC data but with 2e rules, and the other is made by the First Edition Society and is meant to be used with the AD&D 1e Properties extension to hew more closely to an actual 1e game.

As it's a store module, I ASSUME you formatted this more for 2E, but I wanted to ask to be sure which direction you went with this product.

[jharp]

It relies only on the 2E. No consideration to the 1e properties extension (or for that matter reference to any OSRIC). That said if you buy it and you have suggestions on improvements I'm more than happy to try them out. I will be eventually moving the treasure over to OSRIC instead of text based only. I had it linking to the 2E WOTC treasure tables but it turns out that violates the license with WOTC so I had to remove the linking.

Jason

[bayne7400]

Jason you could leave the tables in there, exclude.from read only and then let the buyer type in the name of the table. You could even tell them what to type.in this thread... Or maybe type it in the table but leave out the brackets....

[ChrisRevocateur]

I know prices are set by the original publisher of the produce (Expeditious Retreat), so I'm not blaming you, but do you know why Malevolent and Benign II is twice the price of the first one?

[jharp]

That could be my fault. It was the first product that I entered the adaptation information for. I'll email James and see if I priced it correct.

Jason

[Sterno]

First, thanks for doing this. Monster books are great!

One errata item I spotted in Malevolent and Benign was that the 36 HD Deadwood has a typo in its Hit Dice as 1836.

Also, it looks like you used the HD Thac0 progression for 2E, which makes sense, and while I know the chart stops at 16 HD in the DMG, I believe it's implied that the Thac0 decreases by 2 for every odd HD amount. I think something like the 36 HD Deadwood would have a better Thac0 than 5.

[ChrisRevocateur]

I believe it's implied that the Thac0 decreases by 2 for every odd HD amount. I think something like the 36 HD Deadwood would have a better Thac0 than 5.

Yeah, checking the DMG and High Level Campaigns both, the chart is just for easy reference, monster thac0 never stops getting better (well, except for very large herbivores that aren't known for being aggressive, their Thac0 isn't supposed to be as good as their HD would indicate).

[jharp]

Thanks, I'll go thru the THAC0 and check my end results.

[BangsNaughtyBits]

Would you in the future clarify the use of OSR in your products? Old School Essentials has a port on the Forge for example as do the OSRiC versions, compared to a strictly 2E "Classic D&D" (hate this terminology). And this neglects if DCC and C&C are considered OSR, which I assume they are not for this purpose.

The official conversions are hard enough to track. Do they use 2E creatures incrementing the character levels needed to complete an adventure or are the module's power matched to the original in some fashion. Smiteworks has 2E products using both strategies.

But love the idea of this and snapped it up the minute I saw it.

!

[jharp]

A quick quick reply on your purchase. The forge gives a Test channel which apparently still lists the product. That was not my intent but no harm or foul. I have moved it to the Live channel.

[jharp]

A more in depth reply which only applies to the DNH product set. The original author included OSR stat blocks but I don't have enough experience in that area to answer what he intended "OSR" to mean. Thus, I am unable to fully answer your question. I have followed the "OSR" stat blocks as included by the author. However, where necessary to adapt something that was mentioned but no stats were provided, I used the OSRIC information.

Samples of the authors' "OSR" stat block from the PDF:

Cultist Fanatic (4): Human SZ M; MV 30’; AC 5; THACO 16; ATK 1d6x2; HD 2; HP 24; INT Average; AL LE; LV 2; XP 225 SA/AD See Bestiary
Vyncis: Human SZ M; MV 30’; AC 3; THACO 16; ATK 2d10x2; HD 7; HP 100; INT Average; AL LN; LV 8; XP 900 SA/AD See Bestiary
Town Guard (4): Human SZ M; MV 30’; AC 8; THACO 18; ATK 1d6x2; HD 1; HP 12; INT Average; AL LN; LV 1; XP 100 SA/AD See Bestiary
Longshorement, Modified (12): Human SZ M; MV 30’; AC 8; THACO 20; ATK d4-2 (see above); HD 0; HP 6; INT Average; AL LN; LV 1; XP 50 SA/ AD: do not use minimum damage of 1, treat a roll of 1 as no damage.
Demon SZ M; MV 30’; AC 4; THACO 15; ATK 1d8 x2; HD 6; HP 60; INT Average; AL NE; LV 6; XP 550 SA: Soul Drink - if both claw attacks hit, take 2d8 damage, save vs. spells for half damage
Human SZ M; MV 30’; AC 2; THACO 14; ATK 1d8x2; HD 2; HP 24; INT Average; AL LN; LV 2; XP 225

If there are clear indications to you what "OSR" this is I will gladly clarify in the description in Forge for this and going forward products.

Let me know if there is anything else I can do that might help.

Jason

[BangsNaughtyBits]

Sorry if I forced a move. I was excited to see the cross-platform content. I posted the link elsewhere but just removed it. Very exciting to see how the cross-platform project works out.

[jharp]

You can post the link. It is live, I was just verifying as I've never done a bundled set before.

Jason

[BangsNaughtyBits]

The only consistent definition of OSR is "some assembly required" in that there are dozens of slightly incompatible rulessets based on different historical rulesets. Most are more or less compatible with the nGMs effort. And some have rulesets in the main FG store.

When I see OSR, I assume someing based on the BX ruleset more or less with Old School Essentials being a very faithful example. OSRiC is also getting love and is similar to 1E. All of these get shoehorned into the FG 2E ruleset adding additional complications.

My first thought when I saw OSR mentioned so prominently was you were staking out a niche for one of the free rulesets that have appeared on the Forge, especially with the multi-ruleset nature of the product. A way to get into FG, get in without the full expense of the 5E/Pathfinder/2E rules. Onboarding users that can't drop that in addition to an Ultimate license while providing a path to the more common rulesets. And you may have done just that. I'll have to pick up the PDF bundle and see what the original intent was and how it was implemented.

I actually think this cross-ruleset path is great and if FG is allowing it, I will be throwing my money toward it when I can.

[BangsNaughtyBits]

FYI In the combined Forge module DNH1 in all three rulesets, the Image Hastur's Symbol, Infinite Snake is missing. Just the missing element question mark is displayed.

[jharp]

Ok. I'll take a look and update. I found the issue. It seems to work before the packing process with SmiteWorks but then the package process does something that makes it not work. I'll get rid of the "'" symbol and see if that works.
I have renamed the file that it references and resubmitted builds to Forge. Gone live.

[BangsNaughtyBits]

It all looks good. Thanks.

[jharp]

I want to make certain I get this right for the higher end NPCs. I have an NPC with 50 hit dice. Based on the chart then 50 HD == THAC0 of -29. You would expect to see -29 in the NPC sheet?

Jason

[BangsNaughtyBits]

For AD&D 2E, monster THAC0 is 20- HD where HD is never even and rounds down to the previous odd number. If there are pluses to Hit Dice, THACO improves by one for every three HP. See pages 75 and 76 of the AD&D 2E deluxe DMG (the one DriveThruRPG sells.

So, yes, 20-49 means the THAC0 would be -29. Note in 2E a natural 20 always hits and a natural 1 always fails.

OSRiC or AD&D 1E is different in that the charts matter. You get several armor classes (six if I recall) where 20 will hit then it moves on to needing something that mathematically gets to 21, 22 etc. The charts on page 74 and 75 show characters top out at different levels up to 21 but monsters top out at 16+ HD with a THAC0 of 7.

OSR rules that follow the B/X D&D rules have monsters top out at 21+HD with a THAC0 of 5 per page 26 of the D&D Expert Rules (as written by David Cook, it changes).

OSR is a real mess as you can see. Blindly using 2E rules can add a lot of power creep to these edge cases.

[jharp]

Well the 50HD creature in M&B II is labelled godlike. :)

[BangsNaughtyBits]

I was gonna say at this extreme GMs can do what they like. People used to bounded accuracy of 5E and the concentration mechanic aren't used to seeing all the bonuses pile up. 3E and Pathfinder can get crazy like that.

[ChrisRevocateur]

For an NPC, by original core rules (PHB, DM's Guide, MM) Thac0 is unlimited for characters, so yeah, NPCs would continue to go down in Thac0 like that, but if you go with the later revisions (like DM's Option: High-Level Campaigns) then classed character Thac0 stops getting better after 20th level.

[BangsNaughtyBits]

The D&D Rules Cyclopedia has monster progression to 35+ HD and characters of 36 levels. I assume that is the same as the Masters rules. OSR rules may use this.

The Classic D&D label Smiteworks uses covers a lot of territory. Heck, the official Old School Essentials Advanced rules just appeared as paid content on the Forge, today.

[BangsNaughtyBits]

Did you see Old-School Essentials Advanced, a full paid ruleset, was released and it's Forge entry has a direct link from the FG homepage? And it doesn't currently have any OSR adventures for it currently listed?

[jharp]

New 5E bestiary is now available on forge. 5E Foes: Lovecraftian Horrors (https://forge.fantasygrounds.com/shop/items/340/view)

[jharp]

Did you see Old-School Essentials Advanced, a full paid ruleset, was released and it's Forge entry has a direct link from the FG homepage? And it doesn't currently have any OSR adventures for it currently listed?

I'll have to see how I can fill this void.

Jason