Old-School Fantasy RPG Adventures and Campaigns

Progressive Dice for Effects Durations

In the first foray into the Deep Halls, Melqart is stunned by the defensive explosions of scarab beetles. The effect lasts for 2 to 8 turns.

Normally, the DM rolls 2d4 and makes note of the turn on which the character recovers. Playing solo or otherwise without a DM, though, we should not know when the effect is to wear off.

In Melqart’s case, had I rolled the variable duration immediately, I might be tempted to plan the next turns—or otherwise use the information unconsciously. “We guard Melqart until he can move again…” This breaks the narrative tension and challenges verisimilitude.

Procedure

For these occasions, I use what I call progressive dice. Instead of rolling for the effect duration at the trigger to know on what turn the effect ends, we roll the same dice at the beginning of each subsequent turn to see if the effect ends in that turn.

A dice result equal to or greater than the current subsequent turn indicates the effect continues. Roll again at the beginning of the next turn. A lower result means the effect ends.

Examples

Simple Variable Duration

A shrieker’s alarm sounds for 1 to 3 rounds after exposure to light. The next round is the first round of the effect duration. No need to roll this round, as the effect continues even on a 1. On the second subsequent round, the shrieking continues on a 2 or higher. Third round, the shrieking continues only on 3 result. In which case, it ends at the beginning of the next round, having reached its maximum duration.

Fixed Plus Variable Duration

A character quaffs an invisibility potion, which lasts a fixed period of 6 turns plus a variable duration of 1 to 6 turns (by my reading of Holmes, 37), which is 7 to 12 turns. For the first 7 turns, no roll is necessary. The character is invisible. At the beginning of the eighth turn—that is, the second turn of the variable duration—roll a d6. On a 2 or higher, the invisibility effect continues. Less than 2, the effect ends; the character becomes visible.

Table of Turns, Duration: 6 plus 1 to 6 (7-12) turns
Duration Turn
Fixed 1 2 3 4 5 6
Variable (d6) 7 8 9 10 11 12
*No. Subsequent Turn (1) 2 3 4 5 6
*The effect continues on a dice result equal to or greater than the current subsequent turn.
() No need to roll when the result can only indicate the effect continues.

Any Dice Combination

Melqart is stunned for 2 to 8 turns. Roll the same dice combination, 2d4, at the beginning of each subsequent turn, ignoring the first and second, when the result can only indicate the effect continues. But count all turns following the trigger as subsequent turns. At the beginning of the third turn of the duration, a 2d4 result of 3 or greater means the effect continues.

Table of Turns, Duration: 2 to 8 turns
Duration Turn
Variable (2d4) 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
*No. Subsequent Turn (1) (2) 3 4 5 6 7 8
*The effect continues on a dice result equal to or greater than the current subsequent turn.
() No need to roll when the result can only indicate the effect continues.

In Play

Disadvantage

More Dice Rolls: We are effectively replacing a single dice roll with a series of rolls, which we like to avoid as it takes more time.

Advantages

Fewer Notes: On the other hand, rolling the usual way, the DM must note and remember when the effect will end. Rolling progressive dice, at least one player has a vested interest in the roll, so it isn’t easily forgotten.

Player Agency: Even with a DM, the player may be allowed to roll the progressive dice.

Increasing Tension: There can be a lot riding on that dice roll. As the turns pass, the tension mounts.

While Melqart squirms on the floor, moaning, palms over ringing ears, the harpy is leading the rest of the party—all charmed—to its nest. Will Melqart come to his senses in time to save them…?

Dice

Statistically Equivalent?

I am uncertain whether there is a difference, using progressive dice, in the statistical chance for the effect to end in any particular point in the duration.

Rolling in the usual way, we have a 1 in 6 chance for the effect to end after any of six turns. At the same time, there is a 100% chance (6 in 6) for the effect to last at least one turn, a 5 in 6 chance it will last at least two turns, 4 in 6 for three turns, and so on.

With progressive dice, the chance to end the effect increases as the turns go by, starting at 0 in 6 in the first subsequent turn, 1 in 6 in the second turn, and so on, up to 5 in 6 at the beginning of the turn of maximum duration. If it doesn’t end on this turn, it will certainly end at the beginning of the next turn.

Intuition tells me it’s the same chance, but that guy has been wrong before. I’ve put the question to a smart math person. Your comments are also welcome. I’ll add an update when I get something.

Once again intuition leads me astray. The so-called “progressive” dice method described in this article is not statistically equivalent to the traditional method. This method is still useful in play, provided we accept the limitation. For further explanation and an alternative solution, see “Progressive Dice, a Misnomer.” [08:30 21 January 2022 GMT]

Further Adventures with Kaytar

“There’s a chest in an alcove. It’s open, and it’s full of jewelry and gold and sparkling gems.”

“Kaytar draws his dagger and touches the chest with it.”

“The chest and the alcove disappear. Your dagger pokes into a brick wall.”

Following my first adventure, the neutral human fighter joined Kaytar in Garth’s dungeon. Garth, Jarrod, and I sat in folding chairs around the card table. Jarrod and I with our character sheets and pencils. Garth set the blue folder in front of him to hide the dungeon map. The denim bag spilled dice on his right.

We were walking down a narrow corridor, Kaytar at the front. I wasn’t sure what just happened, but when I got there, I saw the same chest in the alcove.

“I reach for a gem.”

“The chest disappears. There’s only a wall in front of you.”

Kaytar said, “It’s an illusion.”

“Maybe it’s an invisible wall,” I said. “We could only see through it for a minute. The treasure is there, we just have to tear down the wall.”

“No,” said Kaytar, “it’s a trick to take up time.” Rocks jostled for position in Jarrod’s mouth. “While we tear down the wall, monsters will come, and we won’t find the chest either.”

I really wanted to get that treasure. With the money, I could have bought a helmet and a warhorse and been a real knight. But Jarrod seemed sure of his assessment, so I let it go.

Illusory Chest or Invisible Wall
Illusory Chest or Invisible Wall?

Later, Kaytar lost his dagger when he opened a door on a ten-foot square room. In the room was a powerful magnet that attracted any metal, including weapons and any suit of armor a neutral human fighter might be wearing. Kaytar closed the door and warned me against opening it. I didn’t argue that time.

After that we avoided a thing Garth called a “sludge monster.” Although I didn’t understand quite what it was, Garth seemed to think the name was description enough.

Then we went into a room with an archway inside it. Jarrod’s eyes lit up when Garth described it: “The archway is standing by itself on top of a dais in the center of the chamber.”

I said, “What’s a day-ess?”

“It’s a raised platform,” said Garth. “Three steps go up on one side.”

“Kaytar goes up the steps.”

Taken by Jarrod’s excitement, I sat up in my chair. “Me too.”

Kaytar turned to look at me, his eyes blurry through Jarrod’s glasses. “Be careful,” he said. “We don’t know what it does. Don’t touch anything.”

I don’t remember much about what happened next. Kaytar examined the archway up and down. He might have read some magic writing carved into the keystone. I didn’t touch anything.

Next thing I knew Garth said: “There’s a bright flash of light, and you’re teleported to the lowest level of the dungeon.”

He thumbed through a few leaves in the blue folder. Withdrawing the bottom sheet, he said, “Let’s see what room you wind up in.”

Garth rolled a dice and looked at the dungeon map. “Man, you’re in a room with a black dragon.”

I imagined a dragon, black scales glistening, crouched under a low ceiling.

Garth, lips pursed, looked at Jarrod.

Jarrod blinked. “Kaytar wants to talk to it.”

“The dragon doesn’t speak common.” Garth closed the blue folder. “There’s no way you’re going to survive this encounter.”

In a game where you can do anything you want, there’s always something to do. And when there’s only one thing you can think of to do, you realize it’s something you have to do—even if the possibility of success is remote.

“I want to fight it.”

“You can’t win a fight with a dragon.”

“I don’t care. I want to fight it.”

“You can’t fight it,” he said, exasperated. “You’re trapped under the dragon’s foot!”

Forty years on I still wonder, if we had just taken the time to tear down the invisible wall, we could have got that chest full of treasure…

The Thing About a Dyson Logos Dungeon Map

Watching one of Dyson Logos’s time-lapse videos is mesmerizing. Finger tips squeeze close to nib. Black ink trails as the pen glides along straight lines, jerks through hatch marks. Parallel lines become a long corridor, a protruding rectangle a door frame. Rubble strews across the floor.

Then the hatching. Short, quick strokes: one, two, three—one, two, three… That’s when we know: this guy’s wired different.

There’s a thing about a Dyson Logos dungeon map. By the hatching we recognize the style, because we’ve been admiring his work for more than a decade. But it ain’t the hatching.

The thing is the design.

To make the point, I chose a Dyson Logos map without hatching. Tunnels of the Shrouded Emperor is an example rare and fine.

Tunnels of the Shrouded Emperor
Tunnels of the Shrouded Emperor, Map by Dyson Logos.

The tripartite doorways either side of the entry hall, middle north, a blind stairway landing just south of it, rounded triangular daises in an octagonal room, a balcony overlooking half a chamber, stairs to the side, the generous use of dungeon furnishings—these catch the eye and draw us in.

But there’s more. Charting an imagined course through the dungeon, we follow branches, turn around at dead ends, weave one way or another along parallel routes, until we progress, via a wide thoroughfare, into the southern caverns.

This long trench reminds of a dry watercourse, perhaps a former Darkling tributary, which leads us to the dungeon’s end, where we find only stones and dry bones and lurking creatures. For we’ve missed the diamond-shaped central chambers where its priests work to repair “The Shrouded Emperor.”

That’s the thing about a Dyson Logos dungeon map.

Dyson Logos has been creating hand-drawn maps for fantasy role-playing games since 2009. You can support the creator on Patreon.

Dreaming Amon-Gorloth

Urgent cries in distant dark. Dying echoes, fading into empty space. A spark—a flash of light, flickering orange. Columns rise high above, stabbing gloomy shade. Tunnels twisting out of sight.

Stumbling, lost, behind lumbering figures, purple-cloaked. Under arch, stepping down. Between close walls, beneath heavy vault, cauldrons crouch on red coals. Chanting priests raise green goblets to a shadowed image. All eyes are closed…

Many are troubled by such nightmares. Some wake, seeking respite. Some lie yet in fitful sleep.

Scale: 10’
Dungeon Levels: Seven Levels Deep
Treasure Sequence: The Full Monty Squared
Contents: Flying Tables by Dungeon Geomorphs
Rules: Bluebook D&D

What I’m Doing

In “Dungeon Levels and Treasures,” I present several combinations of scale, dungeon level configuration, and treasure sequence. With the choice of rules and room contents determination method, there are myriad ways to run a Deep Halls campaign.

I want to try a few of them. I’m starting with the most deadly dungeon level configuration and an overly generous treasure sequence to see if it’s possible that player characters might survive to reach 2nd level. If it doesn’t work, it won’t take long.

First Delve into the Deep Halls
First Delve into the Deep Halls.

The Full Monty Squared

10-5-1(2)^1-1-1{44:10}[4,763 XP, 2,255 g.p., 3]

Using this Squared variant of the Full Monty treasure sequence, we award 2 XP per gold piece. While, in a 50-room Level 1 dungeon, there are more than four times the XP required to gain a level, in the seven level configuration of the Deep Halls, Level 1 has only four rooms. Worse, our neophyte adventurers enter on Level 2, which has only 15 rooms. Even these are not contiguous. Nor is Level 3. The 1st-level party must venture to Level 4 before any characters level-up.

So far in Dreaming Amon-Gorloth, Melqart and his companions are seven turns into their first adventure. The party rests beneath a harpy’s nest on Level 3. They have yet found no treasure.

The Full Monty

Not the film, we’re still talking about the game show. Sometimes experienced players grow weary of the low-level slog. We’d like to “rocket through the levels” for a change (Holmes, 22). Just for fun—and isn’t that why we play—use the base sequence from “A ‘Monty Haul’ Dungeon” with a generous increase in treasures per additional character.

What Means the String of Numbers Below?

This is a follow-up article to “Dungeon Levels and Treasures.” See also Notation in “More XP for Treasures.”

Treasure Sequence: The Full Monty

10-5-1^1-1-1{23:10}[2,508 XP, 2,255 g.p. 3]

Experience and wealth yet decrease with more player characters. The party of six acquires five magic items.

Five rolls on the treasure tables for a single treasure—this is the give away show. We were warned. Now the pressure is on the DM to maintain the thrill of adventure through a combination of insidious traps, imaginative hiding places, and clever wealth reduction strategies (see Wealth Extraction in “Running the Campaign”).

You know what you’re doing.

The Importance of Wandering Monsters and Tracking Turns

Wandering monsters are a DM’s best friend. They are indispensable to old-school D&D game play. By draining the party’s resources without hope of a treasure reward, the possibility of such a random encounter keeps the characters moving, keeps the players on their toes. It raises the tension in a way a DM can only hope some planned story will do.

Keeping track of turns is a basic task a DM must learn. Not only wandering monsters, but light sources, party rest, and spell durations all depend on time keeping. It’s a habit that isn’t so difficult to pick up.

I make a simple four-by-six grid in the corner of the map or, as in this case, in the adventure log. That’s four torches or a lantern’s worth of turns. In one square of six, the party must rest or suffer fatigue, and every third turn (Holmes Bluebook) brings a dice roll for a wandering monster. Durations measured in turns are noted in the appropriate square. The turn a spell is cast, for example, is marked, as is the turn in which the party rests.

Turns and Order of March
Turns and Order of March: Melqart (M) Leads Penlod (P) and Hathor-Ra (H) into the Deep Halls.
“Ps” marks Penlod’s scouting position. Also shown are the order of opening doors and order of attacks by dexterity score (Holmes).

Adventure Log Excerpt

The photo above is from Dreaming Amon-Gorloth’s adventure log.

First Turn: At the rubble-strewn entry, Melqart lights a torch (“t”). The party enters. Penlod notices a secret door, and the group inspects the contents of the room beyond: a dozen skulls set into wall niches.

Second Turn: Entering the grand entry hall, the group encounters scarab beetles at the north door. The giant insects scurry. A burst of three explosions shakes the vault as jets of acid shoot from their nether parts. Melqart, stunned by the noise (“St”), slumps in a puddle of sizzling acid. Penlod throws a spell, and the insects collapse unconscious.

Third Turn: Penlod carries Melqart toward the entrance, while Hathor-Ra, carrying the torch, guards the withdraw. Among the rubble, the two are halted by an enchanting song emanating from within. The explosions attracted a harpy.

Fourth Turn: Turning, Penlod lets the magic-user slide from his shoulder. He and Hathor-Ra move toward the harpy’s lovely voice. The harpy puts a hand on each of their shoulders.

Fifth Turn: Now charmed, Penlod and Hathor-Ra follow the harpy down the grand hall, descending stairs, as Melqart comes to his senses. Lighting another torch (“t”) from his pack, Melqart follows the harpy song.

Sixth Turn: The harpy makes room in her nest. Just as the she descends to fetch the waiting Hathor-Ra, Melqart arrives at the top of the stairs. He casts charm person on the harpy.1

Seventh Turn: The party rests (“R”) while debating what to do with their new friend…

Notes

1 Holmes on Charm Person: “This spell applies to all two legged, generally mammalian humanoids of approximately man size…” (14). We could argue that a harpy, being only half mammalian, is not subject to charm person. A counterargument is that her mammalian half is very much so.

Optional Rules for Steep Stairs

In “Vertical Scale,” we consider stairs which incline at angles greater than 45 degrees. At the DM’s disgression, such steepness impacts movement and melee combat.

Movement

At vertical rises of 15 and 20 feet over ten horizontal feet, the distance traveled is 18 and 22 feet. For either, we round to 20 feet of movement.

Considering also the extra effort to step up and, in the 20-foot case, a vertiginous decent, we justify halving the explorer’s move rate. So, moving up or down stairs—a ten-foot square on the map—costs 40 feet of movement.

Moving faster, an explorer must roll his or her dexterity score or less on a twenty-sided dice or tumble to the bottom of the stairs, taking d6 damage for each ten feet fallen.

Melee

Higher Ground

If your chosen rules do not address the issue, add 1 to attack rolls for melee combatants on higher ground.

Falling

When a melee combatant suffers a violent blow (i.e. takes damage), he or she must roll against dexterity or fall and suffer damage as above.

Vertical Scale: How Deep the Deep Halls?

Grand Entry Hall - Front Elevation
Grand Entry Hall — Front Elevation.

In “Channeling Amon-Gorloth,” we defined a “hall” as “any space two or more squares wide and at least twice as long.” Now, we consider the three-dimensional space, notably, ceiling heights, the incline of stairways, and how to handle intruding upper levels.

The following discussion considers only the built dungeon areas. The priests may or may not have given similar treatment to the natural caverns. We assume the horizontal scale is ten feet to the square.

The Deep Halls of Amon-Gorloth - Dyson Logos
“The Deep Halls of Amon-Gorloth” by Dyson Logos.

How High the Ceilings?

General rules are easy to remember and give us varying heights by how we define the space as well as its width. A particular space may vary from the rules.

Definitions

For the purpose of determining ceiling heights, we define the following spaces:

Hall: Any area at least 20 feet wide and at least twice as long as its width.
Chamber: Any area at least 20 feet wide and less than twice as long as its width.
Corridor: Any area less than 20 feet wide.

Using the entry way as an example (map above): From the outside, a corridor, part caved in, leads 30 feet into a hall. Through the door on the right, another corridor leads to a few chambers.

Halls and Chambers

As these halls are “used by the priests to some devotional purpose, including entombment” (“Channeling Amon-Gorloth”), I imagine impressive ceiling heights.

Halls and rectangular chambers are barrel vaulted, peaking at five feet higher than their width. Square chambers are groin vaulted, also five feet higher than wide.

Chamber - Groin Vault
Chamber — Groin Vault.

Corridors

Corridors are barrel vaulted at only ten feet high. This makes for a cramped space—a contrast to the halls and chambers.

Halls Chambers Corridors
Halls, Chambers, Corridors.

How Steep the Stairs?

Ever since I’ve had the imagination for such things, I assumed dungeon stairs go up and down at a 45° angle. Ten horizontal feet on the dungeon map means ten vertical feet. This makes imagining the dungeon in three dimensions simpler.

We see though, in our explorations, that these halls are not simple but “twisted and nightmarish.” The dreaming priests, in their oneiric interpretations, were forced to devise other solutions.

Typical stairs in our residential world step up at a 37° angle, rising 7.75 feet for every ten horizontal feet. According to the US Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration, standard stairs incline from 30° to 50° from horizontal.1 Up to 70° is considered steep. More steep is a ladder. Less than 30° is a slope.2

Slopes Stairs and Ladders
Slopes, Stairs, and Ladders.
Angles for vertical rises of 5-30 feet over ten horizontal feet.

Reaching into our backpack, we pull out a slide rule or a Pythagorean theorem calculator.3 In the table below, a is a stair’s vertical rise over a ten-foot horizontal distance (b), c is the distance traveled up or down, and α is the incline from the horizontal plane.

Table of Slopes, Stairs, and Ladders
a c α Term
35′ 36′ 74° Ladder
30′ 32′ 72°
25′ 27′ 68° Steep Stairs
20′ 22′ 63°
15′ 18′ 56°
10′ 14′ 45° Standard Stairs
5′ 11′ 26° Ramp or Slope

In our cartographic interpretations, we have considerable leeway between 30 and 70 degrees. The immediate impact of the incline is the height limitation on any space directly below another space, i.e., the distance between levels. For in the “convoluted mausoleums,” the halls and corridors of one level pass over and under those of other levels.

We find a good example in the entry hall, where we pass beneath a corner of an upper chamber.

Ten Feet, 45 Degrees: At 45 degrees, the stairs to Level 1, which occupy a ten-foot square, go up only ten feet. The lower the angle, the lower a level’s height. I would put 45 at the minimum angle. No matter the stair height, the upper level intrudes the entry. We could make it work at ten feet high, but deeper seems more appropriate in The Deep Halls.

Stairs and Steep Stairs
Stairs and Steep Stairs.

Twenty Feet, 63 Degrees: Rising 20 feet over ten horizontal, the incline is 63 degrees, approaching but not quite ladder steep. The precarious angle may well impact movement and melee (see “Optional Rules for Steep Stairs”) and might give explorers a moment of vertigo.

Upper Level Intrusions

Now that we have the ceiling height and the upper room’s position above the entryway floor, we can look at how to handle the inevitable intrusion. Here, we deal with the entryway. Other instances, encountered further on, might be handled in similar fashion.

The challenge is to respect the map. That is, we cannot add columns, walls, or other features. The best way I’ve come up with is modified groin vaulted ceilings of differing heights, side by side.

Entry Detail
Entry Detail, Showing Side-by-Side Groin Vaults Between the Second and Third Columns of the Grand Entry Hall.

I am not certain this structure would stand. A groin vault is normally square. The cartographer’s column placement imposes a length longer than the width. To accommodate the rectangular space, I dropped the long arch’s base a few feet below that of the shorter arch.

The right vault rises to 35 feet above the floor. The left peaks at 20 feet. The upper room is supported by the vault below it.

Notes

1 1926.1052 - Stairways, Occupational Safety and Health Administration.
2 Standard Stair Angle: Typical Pitch Of A Staircase Slope By Use Case, Lapeyre Stair Blog.
3 Pythagorean Theorem Calculator, Calculator.net. 

Spells End

Sometimes I just want to play D&D. Explore dark places, fight monsters, take their treasure. No complicated plot, no detailed record-keeping, no play report. Just a pick-up game, rolling dice, and enjoying the story as it emerges from the interaction of setting, character, and probability statistics.

Last winter I started “Spells End,” a pick-up game using Holmes Bluebook and Sets One of Dungeon Geomorphs and Monster & Treasure Assortment. The first character, whose name was Pengodain, came from “elf-land,” seeking knowledge and magic. He met with some success, learning of the doomed wizard Zenopus and recovering a magic sword from the dungeon below his old tower. But the elf’s career was cut short through party treachery due to a quirky alignment-determination system for hirelings.

The second character is Eydis. A former hireling, now with Pengodain’s map and magic sword, the lawful evil fighting woman led her own group into the dungeon. In one of the few remaining rooms yet to be explored, Celebrian, the party elf, charmed the thaumaturgist.

Friendly discussion ensued. All agreed that the party would assist the thaumaturgist in his endeavor to take over the level.

I added the thaumaturgist and his charmed fighter to the order of march as they proceeded north to dig out the dirt tunnel that leads beneath the cemetery. Celebrian knows his spell could wear off in a day.

Beneath the Cemetery and City Catacombs
Geomorphs squares are twice the size of the Sample Floor Plan. Beneath the cemetery, G-II, ghoul-dug tunnels lead from grave to grave, tomb to tomb. To the northwest, more undead roam the city’s catacombs, K-IV.

Settled in after a recent move, I’m ready to renew exploration of The Deep Halls.

Attack and Defense on the Fantasy Combat Table

“The possibilities for employing such creatures are almost endless, and the abilities and weaknesses of each should be decided upon prior to the game they are to be used in. For example, a giant spider might be unkillable by normal men, but will kill them unless they roll a save of 8 or better, and it would combat fantastic opponents as if it were a Lycanthrope” (Chainmail, 36, entry Giant Spiders and Insects).

In the last few monster descriptions (36-7), Gygax and Perren give examples of adding new creatures to the Chainmail system using the framework of the rules. Chimerea and other such mythical flyers, for instance, are treated “as the most nearly corresponding type of creature covered herein.” Giant Wolves attack as Light Horse and move as Medium Horse. Versus fantasy creatures, they get two attacks “as men” (which I read as two Light Horse), and they defend as a Wight. In the example cited above, a spider’s poison is modeled by a saving roll.

To assign attacks and defenses as an existing creature on the Fantasy Combat Table, some analysis is required. Scrutinizing the table, we see that each creature attacks with varying success against the others, and the creature’s defense is subsumed into the opponent’s attack. So, a dragon hits a wizard with a two-dice roll of 10, while the wizard hits the dragon with a 9. There is no separate defense roll.

Totaling all a creature’s attack target scores, we get a clearer, though simplified, view. Likewise, for defense.

The score required for each attacker-defender pair makes sense—or at least can be justified. Figuring out whether one creature is more or less powerful than another, however, is difficult. Totaling all a creature’s attack target scores, we get a clearer, though simplified, view. Likewise, for defense.

Fantastic Opponents by Attacks and Defenses

In the two tables below, creatures are ranked by best attacks and best defenses, respectively. The stronger attacker has a lower total. The stronger defender, a higher.

Order of Best Attacker
Rank Creature Attacker Defender
1 Dragon 82 130
2 Elemental 86 121
3 Super Hero 91 110
4 Giant 92 118
5 Treant 95 115
6 Wizard 99 121
7 Roc 101 109
8 Hero 117 76
9 Lycanthrope 118 78
10 Troll, Ogre 118 86
11 Wraith 119 108
12 Wight, Ghoul 121 67
Order of Best Defender
Rank Creature Attacker Defender
1 Dragon 82 130
2 Elemental 86 121
3 Wizard 99 121
4 Giant 92 118
5 Treant 95 115
6 Super Hero 91 110
7 Roc 101 109
8 Wraith 119 108
9 Troll, Ogre 118 86
10 Lycanthrope 118 78
11 Hero 117 76
12 Wight, Ghoul 121 67

Using these tables, we can more easily find the general power of a new creature. Once narrowed to a range of two or three existing creatures, we decide on an equivocal creature by a brief examination of those creature’s attacks and defenses, perhaps choosing one creature for attacks and another for defenses. One step further, if a couple scores vary widely from our vision of the new creature, we might assign different scores, taking the example of some opponents versus True Trolls (table, 34).

Comparing Creatures by Rank

Further analysis reveals the order of attackers mostly corresponds to that of defenders. Dragons and elementals, for example, are ranked first and second in both orders. Wights are last.

Rank Attacker Defender
1 Dragon Dragon
2 Elemental Elemental
3 Super Hero Wizard
4 Giant Giant
5 Treant Treant
6 Wizard Super Hero
7 Roc Roc
8 Hero Wraith
9 Lycanthrope Troll, Ogre
10 Troll, Ogre Lycanthrope
11 Wraith Hero
12 Wight, Ghoul Wight, Ghoul

In this table, we see that some types are ranked differently for attacks and defenses and that these are paired (italicized). Super-heroes are ranked third as attackers, sixth as defenders, while wizards are the reverse: third as defenders, sixth as attackers. The same with the pairs hero-wraith and lycanthrope-ogre.