the 0 level funnel and small groups - some thoughts

I was looking at the 0 level scenario The Portal under the Stars. It said that the preferred number of victims was 15 0 level pc's or 8 level 1 pc's. It made me consider how viable the funnel was when dealing with smaller groups of players. I run games for a small group of friends, but we find ourselves one short, just leaving the three of us. Even at level 1 or above, we tend to run 2 pcs each in any dungeon bashing game. I ran 6 level 0's in a solo test of the aforementioned scenario. At the end I had two survive the ordeal. If I ran 8 or 10 then maybe I would have 3 to 5 at the end of it, unless the dice were cruel, none at all. I am on balance disinclined to use the funnel with such a small group. I would let the players make a some 0 level characters and then decide what classes are best suited to them. So they start off with the profession, some sellable goods or items and some weapons they may want to trade up. That establishes a base history for the character, then the player chooses a class that best fits the stats. Its pretty close to the Lankhmar book for DCC. Any thoughts?

I agree, it is hard to run a funnel with just 2 or 3 players. I feel like you need at least 4 players running 4 zeroes each, shooting for 15-20 total. I mostly run pick-up games, so I don't run too many funnels, and honestly they're not my favorite part of DCC. What you're doing would work for me as a player. Since funnels have perhaps some element of survival of the fittest, you could allow them to roll 3-4 PCs and choose the best one (or more if you're playing 2 PCs each). I always liked the hopeless character rules from AD&D where you re-roll if no ability scores are 15+ and more than one is very low - say, 3-5 in DCC. With starting gear at level 1, I usually allow some basic selections without worrying about cost because starting gold is fairly restrictive.

While I love the funnel, you have to cater to your groups needs. Do what works. You can run 5+ 0s per player, reduce the difficulty of the encounters, use a modified Lankhmar approach. Any of the above can work. Get your player's input for how they want to do things and then run with it.

For that adventure my advice would be to put reenforcements throughout the adventure not just the tower. Always keep them with two or three villagers. I've run this one twice and the last one was with only four players.

They started with two players each.

Hmm food for thought here. I could go with my suggestion with elements suggested by Leozelig or go into the module again and re-tool it slightly. I will have a word with the players and see how they feel about it. They very well want to try both methods.

Tunnel tonight folks!
https://fantasygroundscollege.net/ev...rozen-in-time/

I would love to take part in that, but it runs a little late for me - I'd have to bail after a couple of hours