DCC Day: Dungeon Denziens

Arguably, the Dungeon Denizens (and the upcoming second volume in this series) are the more "DCC" of bestiaries for the system. The monster stats in these books are more in line with the main DCC rulebook, and there is a clear difference between the "soldier monsters" that are filler and the more boss-like creatures. This book, along with the core DCC rulebook, provides a wealth of monsters for the system, making the game feel complete and well-rounded.

DCC is often more like 3.5E than B/X, but the 3.5E values are frequently out of control, with high-end AC values in the 40-50 range, and hit points in the hundreds. So things are never a straight one-to-one conversion. There is a DCC way of converting a monster, and the main book's dragons and giants hit all the right notes.

There are plenty of "strange monsters" in the Dungeon Denizens book, and all the creatures seem to have a unique DCC twist upon them. There are also some 'old standbys' in here, like giant beetles, owlbears, giant lizards, and cockatrices. It's nice to see these back, and I would love to see more of the old standbys return to the game. Maybe in future volumes.

DCC is divided into several factions, each with its own distinct direction.

• There is a classic DCC crowd that primarily adheres to the core rulebook.
• Some people use DCC as a replacement for 3.5E.
• This is where you replace the monsters with the Aquilae versions, or not.
• Some try to rebuild the core setting of DCC into something inspired by the game.
• Tales from the Fallen Empire, Pax Lexque, etc.
• Some use DCC as a universal system.
• Comic Crawl Classics, Star Crawl, MCC, XCC, Weird Frontiers, etc.

There is an overlap in many areas, and everything co-exists and works well together.

Overall, DCC needs more strange monster books, with a few entries covering some of the classics. This is strongly recommended, and can be considered one of the "core books" of DCC.

DCC Day: Tome of Adventure Volume 4: The Purple Planet

What I love about the Goodman Games adventures is that they feel like they were written by writers on some really great mind-altering substances. The Purple Planet series is a prime example of that; you are thrust into an entirely new world, even at level zero, and it is a constant fight-or-die struggle in a world that is a strange mix of Dying Earth, Planet of the Apes, John Carter, Conan, Tarzan, Gamma World, Flash Gordon, and many of the other great campy but very fun adventure serials.

With Wizards, you ask them to write an extra-planar adventure, and it will be some nebulous adventure hub, often presented as an ideal society or mechanic, and a sort of adjective-noun game lobby (Radiant Citadel, Infinite Staircase, etc.), to safely visit the adventures in the anthology. It is a level selection dialog with a few shops and NPCs. Even your bastion floats out there in the ether, as another level to visit, without being grounded in the real world, at risk, or in an actual campaign setting.

With DCC's Purple Planet, you get a full sandbox with wandering monsters that can TPK you, strange locations to discover, warring factions, a full hex-crawl, and a list of adventure sites to take on in any order. You even have room for your own! And since you are "not in Kansas anymore," there is no easy way home, no safe place to rest unless you make one, and survival is difficult in a strange, new world. There is a "way home," but it is not easy, and many have died trying.

This setting blows my mind and is easily a whole campaign in its own right.

This is how you do a "strange world" setting, and it has the guts to leave the party stranded with no way home. In DCC, there is no easy way to "plane walk" and leave. In D&D, there are so many spells that break this style of game that you need to start banning them or coming up with reasons why they do not work here.

If Goodman Games were to create a version of "Alice in Wonderland" as an adventure module series or boxed set, I am convinced it would be an epic experience. This was done once for AD&D, and the list of banned spells was a paragraph long, since there are far too many "cheats" in that game. In DCC, it is much easier to run a "lost world" setting and keep players engaged in a sandbox.

DCC, with its "fish out of water" campaigns, is a far better choice than 5E, primarily due to the imagination factor and the fact that the characters are straightforward, while the rules are deadly. The threat of a TPK here is real, and you could just pick up again with a new party of heroes, and leave the previous group's corpses out there somewhere to find. They may have some good loot on them, after all.

The fact that a previous party died should be sufficient motivation to be more cautious, or perhaps more risk-taking, the next time. This is DCC, you accept this when you walk in the door.

Party loss and multiple campaign tries do not happen in 5E with that game's over-protected heroes. In DCC, it can, and that is thrilling. These adventures are simply a cut-above what we get in 5E, far more imaginative, and far more compelling to me than mass-market nostalgia and level-select compilations.

DCC Day: Aquilae: Bestiary of the Realm (Volumes 1 & 2)

If you are not happy with just 400 monsters, Infinium sells a two-volume set with over 1,600 monsters. Where the abridged set features only the classics, these two books encompass everything and are ideal for the true completist. They are nice volumes, and I have been giving these books a little more thought over the last day or so.

The fact that these monsters are a shade weaker than their DCC counterparts does change the game, almost as if you placed a mod on DCC and are playing it a new way. Across the board, hit dice, hit points, damage, AC, and attack values are lower than those of the monsters in the DCC book. To summarize:

• Lower hit points and hit dice.
• Lower AC values.
• Lower attack ratings and damage values.

But here is the rub. These monsters have three things going for them:

• Many have a "number appearing in an encounter" stat.
• Many have multiple action dice.
• Many have multiple special abilities, defenses, and attacks.

The first bullet point is critical. DCC typically assumes "each monster in the world is unique," and you only get one troll or ogre in a campaign. So the DCC values in the core rulebook will be higher for each monster, since each one is the representative "boss monster" for its type.

In this bestiary, we are back to the B/X assumptions. You roll for a "number appearing" in an encounter. So our ogre listing in these bestiaries is: single, double, a gang of 3-4, and a family or tribe of 5-16. All of a sudden, you will be wishing each ogre were easier to fight as the party encounters four instead of just one. You will love the fact that each ogre has a lower AC and fewer hit points, and your fights against groups of them will feel more heroic.

Also, remember that this "number appearing factor" will more than make up for the lower hits and damages. One monster with multiple action dice will be making numerous attacks on the party! Multiply that by the number appearing, and you will have a ton of damage coming your way.

On top of that, the special attack conditions each monster could inflict will take up an attack, but potentially be lethal to the party, as paralysis, poison, stuns, entangles, ongoing damage, special attacks, ability damage, and all the new options built into these foes start taking effect on the party. Multiply each special effect by the action dice and the number of monsters in the encounter, and this could get very lethal, very quickly.

Mix the monsters in an encounter where their abilities synergize (entangle, ongoing damage, and ranged attacks), and an encounter of what you think are "weak foes" turns deadly very fast. This is not 5E! We approach encounters differently here and consider attack synergies instead of CR as a balancing factor.

These books are not intended to augment or add to the core monsters in the DCC book, not unless you use those as the boss monsters. These bestiaries are better seen as a "B/X mod" to DCC, where you just use the monsters from these guides instead of the DCC monsters. You will be defeating more of them in each fight, but you will also get swarmed by them if you are not careful.

If I sounded negative, and I apologize if I did, it was because I realized how differently these books were balanced, and they are not supposed to be "official DCC versions" of the monsters in the core game. These books are more of a "more monsters mod" to DCC, and the fact that they are easier to defeat, but also much more deadly in number of appearances, action dice, and special attacks, sort of puts a new rebalance to the monster game, more in line with traditional B/X assumptions.

This is a strange case of DCC's "one monster per world" assumption clashing with the B/X design theories of "many monsters in the world." With DCC, each monster is a boss monster. With Aquilae's bestiaries, we are back to the traditional "many monsters of a type" world.

The best way to look at these books is like those old-school Diablo 2 mods that multiply the monsters, make them easier to defeat, give them many special status attacks, and throw hordes at you so you can feel like a hero as you cut your way through swaths of them. If you are not careful, you will get swarmed, piled on, debilitating conditions piled on you, and killed in the blink of an eye.

If you are more in line with the DCC thinking, these may not be the best option for you.

If the monster-swarm style is more your type of game, I highly recommend these books.

DCC Day: Aquilae: Bestiary of the Realm for Dungeon Crawl Classics, Abridged

While I love the idea of Pathfinder OGL monsters being converted over to Dungeon Crawl Classics, and having all the monster abilities laid out for DCC is nice, this book is different from the main DCC bestiary in a few critical ways.

First up, the hit dice are too low. An elite stone giant in this bestiary has 6d8+6 hit points. In the DCC rulebook, this is 12d10 hit points.

Second, the damage and attack numbers are too low. The same stone giant in this bestiary can do one of three attacks: a +7 melee attack for 3d8+4, a +2 rock attack for 1d8+6, or a +7 slam for 2d6 + 4. In the DCC rulebook, this is a +18 melee attack for 3d8+10, or a +10 hurled stone for 1d8+10.

Third, the monsters have a few strange action dice entries. In DCC, all monsters start on a d20 on the dice chain. In this bestiary, giants and two action dice (for the elite, again), of 1d20 and a 2d24 roll. 2d24 means two d24 attacks, and not one 2d24 attack. I got very confused by this.

The AC is also low, with the stone giant being a 12-14 in the bestiary, and a 17 in the DCC core book.

To use this, a few adjustments are required.

First, pick a scaling factor for hit points and multiply by one to three times, depending on the size of the creature.

Second, ignore the action dice and multiply the given attack bonuses by one to two times.

Third, add another 0% to 30% to their attack damage, which is up to another whole damage die for most monsters. Some monsters at the lower levels do a bit too much, such as the orc.

Up the AC of all monsters by +0 to +5.

I am using the stone giant here, but this is a generally good baseline example. A few monsters, like the orc, are very close to DCC and work fine. Having action dice for monsters is nice, but I wish they were more varied, with the d14 and d16 used more often for some additional but weaker humanoid and low-level monster attacks.

DCC is an odd game; it has monsters with similar hit points, attack values, and damage outputs to 3.5E or Pathfinder 1e monsters (And the Aquilae Pathfinder compilations have numbers closer to DCC). Pathfinder's AC values are too high and need to be reduced by two-thirds (multiply the PF 1e AC by 0.66) and capped at 10. In this case, it is a more straightforward recommendation for the Pathfinder bestiaries by the same publisher as the DCC ones, but I wish the DCC books were more in line with the DCC rulebook.

It still is a nice book as a compilation, but you still need to go by the DCC rulebook to get your monster's stats in the correct ballpark for the game, "as intended." A great selection of monsters, but some tweaking is needed to keep them from being pushovers. We are supposed to tweak everything anyway, so if you don't really care much about the numbers and want something that gets you close enough, this book works.

I still love this book, though. It's a hard one to put down, since it gives me so much. I love the monster abilities listed under each entry. The different levels of creatures are fun. The quality level is very high.

Here is the critical factor. This book assumes a different baseline for the conversions, though. You also need to factor in "number appearing," which, if a bunch of the DCC monsters, as is, appeared, the fights with ten stone giants would take forever using the DCC official stats, versus these with the lower hit points, AC values, and lesser damage attacks. Lower hit point monsters would be quicker, more epic, and heroic fights, where you can take on hordes without the game dragging. Since the AC values are lower, you will hit more, and the fights will be faster.

Conversions are hard!

And the number of creatures in a fight matters.

This may be for a different type of DCC entirely. Used as a consistent bestiary, it may be a fun game. the numbers are not DCC-like, but DCC assumes each monster is the only one in the world, and this bestiary assumes they are one of many.

The balance does change with multiple creatures in a group, and if all you used were these numbers, but tweaked slightly, you could be fine. Keep the monsters consistent and from one source.

In short, a helpful book that will enhance your game, perhaps for the better. Just keep consistent and use only these monsters, and see how it goes!

DCC Day: XCrawl Classics

 

XCrawl Classics is the closest we will ever get to a Shadowrun in the DCC ruleset. This is set in an alternate world, essentially an Earth where a fantasy world once existed, followed by a great cataclysm, and the world transitioned into a more modern age.

"Almost the entire population of the NAE lives in and around the major cities. The lands outside major population areas are simply too dangerous to settle, so for the most part humankind stays close to these urban areas." - XCrawl Classics, page 246.

The world is different than ours. All the cities are fortress cities, and the lands outside the outermost walls, past the farms and agricultural areas, and the uncontrolled wilderness.

"Commoners generally travel from city to city by automobile caravan. Trucks, buses and private cars arrange a start time and all drive to the destination in a convoy for their mutual protection. Some caravans take place every week or even every day, and many hire professional security experts to protect against bandits and wandering creatures." - XCrawl Classics, page 251.

The wilds are very much like bandit and monster-controlled zones, with highways patrolled by the imperial army and air cavalry, but are still largely dangerous places, only safe in numbers.

To expand the vehicle combat rules, check out the Vehicle Mayhem zine for a fun game that utilizes the DCC dice and game rules for car battles, featuring a car design system. This one is a must-have for vehicles and car battles outside the dungeons and arenas.

XCC also has a limited supply of firearms, and you can find more in a few zines, including Orbital Assault Vehicle and Crawl! number 8. Both give you a good selection, and Crawl 8 gives you black powder, science fiction, and cowboy guns as a bonus.

OAV has the heavy weapons, but many of the guns are simplified, whereas Crawl 8 provides a more in-depth look at each type of gun. Crawl 8's guns tend to be more overpowered compared to OAV, and the guns in OAV feel more like XCrawl weapons, giving you a good selection of the heavy stuff, like rocket and grenade launchers.

Overall, OAV is the better choice for XCrawl. It keeps the weapons simple, deadly, and within reason for damage output, and gives you a good selection of heavy weapons. You also receive a few modern-style classes that you can use for government operators.

"Outside the walls of the great cities of the NAE, dragons are the absolute sovereigns of the Empire. These fiercely territorial creatures claim huge tracts of territory in America and throughout the world, and destroy all attempts at permanent settlements near their lairs." - XCrawl Classics, page 250.

There is no reason why DCC classes can't be in XCC In fact, the rules say the following:

"The adventuring life has always called to half-elves, who perhaps seek to gain some of the acceptance from both the human and elvish communities who typically hold them as a breed apart. There are far more half-elves competing in Xcrawl than full-blooded elves." - XCrawl Classics, page 58.

So, if there is no elf class in XCC, and elves are in the games, then you can import any class from DCC or any other compatible game into XCC. That gives us a whole Shadowrun-style world populated with semi-modern technology (based on the 1980s), fantasy races, magic, and Mad Max-style wildlands populated with monsters and fantasy creatures.

I would set the timeline culturally to the period between 1985 and 1995, as evidenced by the presence of Sailor Moon-inspired outfits in one of the adventures. However, technology is still in the VCR (pre-DVD era), radio, cable TV, and BBS-style Internet era, with primitive computers like the Commodore 64 and the original IBM PC 8088 with 640K of RAM and a 320x200 CGA 4-color CRT. The best display you are likely getting is a VGA board (320x200 at 256 colors, or 640x480 in 16 colors). None of these did 3D beyond raster-drawn pixilated lines and solid-filled polygons.

Honestly, the world outside of XCrawl appeals to me more than the death sports inside of it, and this is the same way we felt about Car Wars when we grew up. The world around the XCrawl games feels like a place filled with violence, survival, criminal gangs, magic, fantasy races, crowded cities that are melting pots, vast areas of destroyed civilization, orc biker gangs, dragons that hold dominion, magic wastelands, and an oppressive central government barely holding the overcrowded populace at bay from revolt and revolution.

The game mentions inspirational media, but there are a few key omissions. I would include the Running Man movie (there is an in-joke in the art on that page referencing this, so it is hinted at but not directly mentioned). However, as a DJ running the game, please consider including rooms inspired by classic game shows, such as the original Price is Right TV show.

You know in your heart of hearts you have to do this.

Give these a deadly twist, such as the mountain climber game, where one player is chosen at random to ride the trolley up the mountain, and the other players have to guess the prices of items. If they go over the limit, drop that climbing player to their death, no save, and let it be. Toss these game show rooms in randomly every few adventures, don't overuse them, and watch your players slowly hate you and love you at the same time.

And you can use games from any game show, but The Price is Right is the all-time king of them, and one of the most imaginative of the bunch. Remember to include prizes like the home game, 1970s refrigerators, Bundt pan sets, washing machines, giant chrome 1950s vacuum cleaners with lights, and other items featured on the show! Create these as magic items if you wish, with unique abilities, such as the vacuum cleaner being able to suck up 1d3 small monsters per turn and toss them into a vacuum cleaner bag of holding (size A bag with filters).

Retro one-of-a-kind magic items with a twist are totally XCC.

It does remind me a little of the Umerican setting and game, and XCrawl feels like the spiritual successor to that genre, but with a magic-infused setting, 1980s culture, and the typical mix of fantasy races and monsters. Umerica is a cool game, worthy in its own right, but XCrawl has the Shadowrun vibe and magic.

XCC is a fun game, and an even more compelling universe around the games, completely worthy of a DCC-style Shadowrun-style world. Do not sleep on this game or ignore it as silly.

And... come on down!

DCC Day: Star Crawl

As a silly little DCC-style science fiction game for quick space adventures, Star Crawl is fun. The art is doodle-tastic, but it has a "notebook scribbles in class" sort of feeling to it, and I really don't mind it. It adds to the feeling that this game was discovered in a Trapper Keeper notebook.

The game even comes with a starship design and combat rules! It also features a simple random world section, a bestiary, psionics, patrons, races, random items, and a sample adventure. This can effectively turn DCC into a space game with star-hopping adventures.

I could envision flavoring this type of game after classic 1950s and 1960s science fiction comics, with explorers from Earth, rocket ships, laser pistols, and bubble helmets. All you need are a few inspirational pieces, perhaps a few Dimension X radio series for ideas, and you're good to go.

Gaming is supposed to be simple, fast, fun, and inspirational! If something works, just go for it and have fun. Worry about the details later, put on your rocket pack, and blast off to adventure!

DCC Day: Hubris

Of all the settings published for Dungeon Crawl Classics, I like Hubris the best. This setting includes several new thematic classes that support the world, as well as optional rules, new gear, and the book then provides loose descriptions of the world's areas, each accompanied by a lay of the land chart for random features, an encounter table, and several sample preset location descriptions.

We also get new spells, gods, and patrons! We have a bestiary, tables for random towns and adventure sites, and a bunch of very cool tools to make running the setting and keeping it feeling strange easy. 

"His intent with Hubris isn’t prescriptive (there is no Mike Evans’ World of Hubris Lorebook) but rather a stew of horrors and nightmares offered up as fodder for the imagination. Like that moldering box of Heavy Metal magazines up in your weird uncle’s attic, Hubris is meant to inspire." - Hubris, a World of Visceral Adventure, page 3.

The whole book is a fever dream of insane ideas and over-the-top craziness.

The only downside is that if the entire world is this over-the-top and insane, you may struggle to distinguish the normal from the fantastic. This world is already set on 11 on the crazy dial, and it almost has a Gamma World meets Rifts meets Dante's Inferno feeling to it with mechanical murder machines walking around as characters, demons, and mutants everywhere.

A core tenant of DCC RPG is that every monster should be unique. No more kobolds sacking merchant caravans, no more armies of orcs, no more cookie-cutter dragons. In DCC, whatever is threatening your PCs is some ancient horror, utterly foreign, utterly unknowable, and utterly terrifying. When you dismiss the familiar you make games magical again. - Hubris, a World of Visceral Adventure, page 3.

I can see towns and villages walling themselves off from the crazies outside, just trying to live an everyday life amidst the madness and squalor. Doing this and creating a healthy suspicion of outsiders can get you the contrast you need to run effective horror and fantastic world games.

I like having that contrast. Humanity is just trying to huddle up and stay alive. Inside a town, it could feel like a typical Middle Ages fantasy town. Outside the walls? All bets are off. This place is crazy outside the walls. This keeps the towns from looking like a Star Wars creature cantina, and holds what is outside the walls still insane, scary, unknown, and fantastic.

You could do "wacky world" with a town, and have murder machine bartenders and half-demon innkeepers, but that makes the extraordinary the ordinary. This is my problem with modern D&D, every character race lives together happily and is no different than each other. Nobody is special. It is all animal crackers, various shapes and tastes, all the same.

To do a crazy world like that correctly, you need to channel some of the Heavy Metal movie, and turn up the savage dial to 11. Just to live, you need to be a constant epic and kick-butt, over-the-top force of nature. The world is a terrible, brutal, dark place where death is easy, and survival goes to the strong.

And like the forward says, the world isn't a setting, but a box of inspiration.

If you want a good idea of a purely over-the-top version of a DCC world, Hubris is about as good as it gets.