Duration is still something I struggle with making work well whenever it comes up, to be honest.
That’s not why I’m back though–
I wanted to ask if anyone has a quick and dirty guide to converting DW monsters on the fly. I feel like I remember someone talking about that on G±-maybe @jasonlutes or @Maezar? But I couldn’t find anything.
Thanks!
@jexjthomas, you mean converting monsters from other rulesets to DW? Here’s the page spread from The Perilous Wilds that compresses the steps from the original DW rules.
You can also use the rules from Beasts & Booty – they’re longer, but once you get used to them you can run through the steps pretty quickly. I often just glance over the first page to figure out hit points, then add details on the fly based on whatever monster I’m adapting. Like, I won’t worry about exact armor value until the first time the monster gets hit in battle, etc.
Sorry, meant converting from DW to Freebooters. I’ve been using the Beasts & Booty rules but was wondering if there were any tips for doing so on the fly, since I don’t yet have my Freebooters “monster manual” completed but can easily have the DW bestiary open in front of me. That makes sense re armor and stuff. HP and damage seem to be the things that change the most in my experience so far.
I’m not sure what needs to be converted or changed. Overall though I would encourage making new creatures. Herbivores, predators, sentient plants, things that your players have never seen or encountered before!
One of my biggest gripes with DW is the size of the bestiary. Far too much effort covering what was, rather than what can be.
I mean, yes, this is my intention–hence the Freebooters “monster manual” I referenced, which is just my own collection of homebrewed monsters of all types. But I don’t have a lot of prep time, and I find using the B&B rules on the fly take too long, so if I need a monster in a pinch, I’ll pull up the DW bestiary and reskin something from there. Which works alright, but the problem is that I’ve found–both through doing conversions using B&B and through play–that Freebooters monsters are a decent bit tougher than DW ones.
So ultimately not a huge thing, of course–and fictional positioning helps even things out a lot–but I figured I’d see if Jason or anyone else had any tips for doing on-the-fly conversions.
I’m sure one of these was meant to be DW, but not sure which.
Oops. Edited my post to reflect what I meant–that Freebooters baddies are tougher than stock DW
It’s not super important, whatever the case. I think I’m just going to try to devote less of my prep time to rolling up NPCs and more to rolling up monsters.
MOAR MONSTERS!!!
We should crowdsource some sort of document with FotF monsters that we’ve rolled up. Maybe a thread here on Gauntlet Forums?
My favorite is a reanimated quasi-cyborg version of one of the PCs who died early in the campaign. I call it The-Thing-What-Once-Was-Thulgrim.
A fellow on the Dungeon World Discord channel by the name Marcus made up a random freebooter generator for 2e! Check it out on the DW Discord bot channel with the command !freebooter.
Nice! I was confused by a level 1 dwarf having a riding horse until I realized it must have been rolled up on the Random Item table.
I would say they were a lucky Dwarf, but that is clearly not the case. Probably murdered someone for it.
Couple more questions heading into game #2 this weekend.
First I am trying to understand Followers. The “Recruit” move seems straightforward enough, to identify the type of person and their availability. When looking for the cost (which seems a departure from the motivational-based costs found in DW and PW), the Marketplace does provide guidance. However, what is the difference between a Hireling and then if they hired skilled labor, or a porter, or an armed escort? How do you pick between the cost per week folks and the cut-of-the-booty folks?
Second, also with Followers. In the NPC Follower chart, it has options to give them Tags. Are you all just using the PW tags or am I missing something?
Thirdly, on the Thief playbook it says on their “Pick Locks & Disarm Traps” move requires proper tools. lock picks are in the tool section of the Marketplace, but what tools do you all use to disarm traps? Is it situational and they have to say in the fiction what they use? Or do you house rule in a “toolkit” of some sort? Or maybe use crafting tools with a specialty in traps?
Finally, speaking of crafting, the way the move is designed, an item is going to cost twice it’s value to make over just buying it (excluding rolling 10+). Is this high cost intentional? or do you find in practice that players usually roll 10+, having the end result be cheaper than buying it?
Thanks! And hopefully you don’t mind the question dump!
Question dump is welcome!
@Haaldaar, the follower stuff has not yet been cleaned up, for which I apologize. People do a fair amount of winging it and filling in the blanks with some parts of these rules.
The marketplace prices are examples., but the distinction between the cut-of-the-booty folks and the paid-by-the-week folks is in what they’re being asked to do. If they’re being asked to accompany some crazy adventurers on a dangerous treasure-hunting expedition, they might want to be treated like any other party member, and ask for an equal share. If the PCs need a few porters to carry gear to establish a base camp at the edge of dangerous territory, maybe the porters will ask the going rate; if the porters are being asked to venture into that territory, they might ask for some kind of hazard pay bonus.
Rolling alignment and traits for them can help figure out a given hireling’s asking price. Let’s say the PCs go to Recruit a skilled burglar and it turns out she’s [rolls dice] evil, mad, arrogant, and an addict. Yikes, the life of a burglar is not pretty. Because she’s arrogant, she’ll likely ask for a lot – looking at the marketplace I see a “specialist” can earn 18 silver/week, so I decide she’ll demand, I dunno, 25 per week. The PCs can try to Negotiate with her, but she is mad, so good luck.
The short answer is, think of the follower as any NPC, an individual with their own wants and needs. Some will ask for market rate, some will want a piece of the action, some might ask for favors. Maybe our burglar will do it for free if the PCs can hook her up with whatever substance she’s addicted to.
If the traits don’t point in any particular direction, you can start with the market rate, then Check Reaction and wing it from there.
You’re not missing anything on the tags. I haven’t put together the Freebooters tag list yet. You can use the PW tags list, but I will likely do away with the mechanical aspects of those. Quality and Loyalty are the important mechanical bits.
Proper tools for a trap will depend on the trap. That’s up to a conversation between Judge and player. using the crafting tools from the marketplace as a ballpark is a great idea, but maybe the player wants to negotiate a lower price and has some good rationale for doing so.
Re: Crafting, if an item costs 20sp retail, each use of supplies will cost 4sp and it will take 2 progress to finish the item. So on average, it’ll cost 8sp to make that item. I could probably rewrite that to be more clear.
@jasonlutes I’m not seeing anything about the WT value of carrying coins; am I missing that? There’s the coin pouch in Random Items that holds 3d6 coins for 0 wt. But I’m not seeing how carrying hundreds of coins of looted treasure would affect Capacity.
Also, will you be providing notes for carry capacity or other distinctions between Containers in the Marketplace section?
Cheers!
Thank you @jasonlutes. To follow up on crafting, I guess I was looking at more expensive items. So, using the current formula, anything up to 50sp will be a discount (although progressively less). Then above that, you start paying more.
For example, if someone wanted to craft plate armor (200sp value) they will have supplies at 40sp and then 20 process. So that would be 800sp, ignoring any 10+ bonuses.
Might want to think about a flat supplies cost (cost /2 or /3) instead of having them multiple by the increasing progress needed.
@Atlictoatl, weight capacity for containers were intentionally left out because it’s more about volume – the expectation is that PCs will explain how they’re carrying stuff given the containers they have, and negotiate edge cases with the Judge. I included capacity for horses and vehicles since they are “weight-bearing agents” like the PCs.
I’m still considering the coin weight question. Something in the 250-500sp = 1wt range would feel about right, but my current working number is 100sp = 1wt for simplicity’s sake.
@jasonlutes happy to help. Also might want to consider adding either a requirement or bonus for using the crafting tools. Since, there are actually crafting tools in the game, might as well tie them in.
@Haaldaar, that’s left up in the air purposefully. There’s a “zone of obscurity” in the rules that I want to leave up to the players and Judge in each playgroup to sort out on their own. One of the functions of the Know Something move is to allow PCs to propose what they might know about a given thing (say, crafting beer), subject to Judge approval. The final rules will cover this more explicitly.
