Re: A new beginning

> Well, the four vampires didn't do the trick and neither did the three
> red dragons nor the countless phase spiders...
> In the end I had to ask my players to retire their characters in
> order to start with level 1 again, because I simply could not kill
> them anymore without being unfair.

Hmm, interesting. I think it could be done if the monsters are played
correctly. Personally I doubt any character, or group of characters, can be so
powerful so as to kill not only four vampires b8ut Three Red Dragons. You
might want to try fudging dice rolls as well. Like telling the players taht
they have been hit. There are obviously details that I don't know so I would
be interested in being enlightened.

> 1. No more Dual class characters: If someone has the extraordinary
> stats needed for a dual class character, I do not think he should get
> even better by becoming a dual class character.

I agree. I hate dual-class characters, and multi-class characters. That are
slow, annoying, and generally the realm of power monsters. Watch out
especially for the losers that create the 1st lvl warrior and dual to
something else so as to gain weapon specialisation at lvl 2 and 18/00 strength
(which I believe is only for warriors, though I could be wrong).

> 2. I am not going to use the maximum number of spells rule for
> intelligence in this campaign. However the chance of a spell failure
> for low wisdom now applies to clerics and wizards alike in my
> campaign.

Good idea though I don't understand what you mean by the max-spells rule.

> 3. This is going to be a single sphere campaign, since most of my
> spheres were empty or poorly designed anyway. When concentrating on
> only one sphere I can put more effort into it.

Your choice.

> 4. The bard is going to have spelljammer related songs as discussed
> on this list (the Macross / Robotech approach...).

Don't know this one.

> 5. Level Drains suck big time, so monsters with the level drain
> ability will instead have an automatic "vampiric touch" attack as the
> wizard spell of the same name.

I agree but this is what I do. Level Drains have a saving throw vs Death
Magic. I think Level Draining is too much of a bastard otherwise. And this is
what I do as well:

Wright: 1 level loss temp
Wraith: 1 level loss Perm
Spectre: 2 Level loss temp
Vamp: 2 Level Loss Perm

There are probably other level draining creatures but I can't think of them.

> 6. Warriors advanced too slowly in comparison to wizards, so I
> modified the warrior advancement table: lvl / exp ; 1 / 0 ; 2 / 2000
> ; 3 / 4000 ; 4 / 8000 ; 5  / 16000 ; 6 / 32000 ; 7 / 48000 ; 8 /
> 72000; 9 / 108000 ; 10 / 220000 ; 11 / 330000 ; 12 / 660000 ; 13 /
> 1000000 ; 14 / 1250000 adding 250000 more per level to 20 / 2750000.
> Paladins and Rangers need to earn 10 % more instead of the 12.5 %
> more.

I don't think this is really needed. It sounds as if your changes are going to
make the characters more powerful rather than less powerful.

> 7. The age is decided by the characters and not rolled for.

Your choice.

> 8. Fumble and Critical hit tables and Richard Gant's hitpoint-dieroll
> modification table as discussed on this list made it into my new
> campaign :).

Once again, your choice. I would use such tables if it were not for player
protests, and if I remember to bring them.

> 9. When a character dies, the player's next character receives half
> the experience the old character had, so that the new character is
> "fit enough" for the party.

By all means.

> 10. Negative armor classes were annoying (to me as a DM), so magical
> armor is going to be RARE. At least magical plate armor will be.

But 20's always hit, and you needn't let the dice dictate to you what it says.
One way to get pass high armour class is the word "you are hit." and to keep
weaker NPC's alive the words, "you miss" also work wonders.

> 11. On the same subject there will be more weapons with a magical
> damage bonus and very few weapons with a to hit bonus instead of the
> "normal" magical weapons which increased both damage and to hit
> probability.

Simply kill things quicker. I don't think you are solving the problems of
unintentionally creating a monty haul campaign. The best way is to keep on
reminding the players that they are mortal and not gods by beating them up
(though not killing them - game terms not real life) and maybe even strip them
of magic items.

> There are a few more changes but odds are I bored you guys / girls
> already, so I better stop now.

The fact that I replied to this message shows you that it did not bore me.
Send the others by all means.

> With regards,
>
> Kai
>
>
> "[...]And then the butterfly said to the ant:'look,
> I can fly!'"
> Unknown poet, probably Frank G. Dietrich
> ___________________________________________________
> optimus@????.???.????-??????.de
> ***************************************************************************
> To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@????.com with the line
> 'unsubscribe spelljammer' as the body of the message.
>