Out of Character discussion:

so I actually have only two books for B/X. That being the Basic and Expert books by Moldvay or are there more to look for.Having the extra read magic spell makes more sense and really doesn't adjust the character power.

Nah those are the only two books you need for this game.

@GeneCortess: Yeah, like dominion said, those are really the only two books needed for Moldvay's rules. I actually use the B/X Essentials books, which are just a clone/reformatting of your two books, which makes everything easier for me to find when I'm DMing.

Just a heads up, It's been a week since we got started and everyone save one player has a character ready, it looks like. I don't think it will take too much of a feat of mental gymnastics to incorporate the final PC into the party once they are done with it, so I'm thinking that we'll start the game proper tomorrow.

A few things I can think of off the top of my head, which might help once we begin.
1. Unlike 5e, where everyone makes a single Initiative roll which lasts the entire encounter, in B/X, players, NPCs, and Monsters re-roll Initiative at the beginning of every round. I find it's a lot faster if I just make the rolls for each PC rather than taking up one or teo days waiting for Initiative to get sorted out every round. So usually at the end of a round, I make a roll for everyone and post the turn order.

2. When in combat, I highly recommend you wait to post your character's actions on their turn. A lot of players have a tendency to just all post what they are doing right at the start of a new round, and when their PCs turn comes around in the turn order, whatever they declared for their PC is obsolete because their target isn't in the space they were in at the start of the round, or their target has been killed by another PC already, or whatever. Then we get held up with the DM telling the player they can't do what they said they were going to do at the beginning of the round, we all wait a day for the Player to retcon their post and say something else, dice rolls have to be resolved, and the whole game is bogged down with players retconning obsolete declarations.
So usually I say "Round 1 ends, and Round 2 begins!" You generally if you post "my PC does moves her and does this", I hold you to it. If you declared for your PC out of turn and that movement/action option is no longer feasible when their turn in the Initiative rolls around, they forfeit their action for that round. So I strongly recommend waiting until your PC's turn is actually up to post.

3.I generally use theater of the mind for roleplaying purposes, but for combat we'll use a battlemap. Generally a battlemap looks like this:


You'll notice the map has grid coordinates. Generally, when you move, you say, "I move my PC to M13 and fire my bow at the goblin on J15", or something to that effect. I move your tokens around the board as we go, and at the start of every new round I roll new initiatives for everyone and post an updated version of the battlemap. If at any point between the the beginning of each round you would like to see the most current version of the battlemap, just request to see the updated map and I'll post a screenshot of it.

I believe most characters have a move of 120'. That translates to 40' per turn. On your turn you can move and then make an action, make an action then move, or move some then interrupt your movement with an action and then finish moving. However, if you move some, then make an action then finish moving, you only get half of your remaining movement rounded down. For example, if you have a movement of 40', and you move 20' to an goblin, hack at him with your sword, and then retreat again, you'll only get to retreat 10' (you move'd 20', had 20'feet remaining, but only get half of that after you make an action.
There are no "attack of opportunities (AOCs)" in B/X, so you can move up to an enemy, make an attack, and retreat again without worrying about AOCs, but be aware that you only get half your remaining movement to retreat, so you do put yourself at risk of your victim closing the distance on their turn and attacking you.

4. Most squares on the battlemap will be 5', unless posted otherwise. I count diagonal movement as 5' as well. I know that's not 100% accurate, but it's less complicated.

5.DYING!!! If you're reduced to 0 Hit Points or less, you make 1 Death Save roll only on your PC's next turn. If they pass the Death Save roll, they are unconcious with 0 HP, and have to be healed or heal naturally through rest. Once they have 1HP again, they are conscious. If you fail your Death Save roll, you're just straight up dead.

I'm sure there will be more stuff but that's all I can think of off the top of my head at the moment.

I cannot wait to start. And all the combat rules sound good to me.

Just a heads up, now that the game has started. You will occasionally see the following image when you log into the forum's thread:



I generally post this whenever I have to make some die rolls before I can continue narrating the post. Whenever you see the image above, I'm generally on the back end rolling dice, making notes, typing out my post for the day, etc., and if you want to give me five or ten minutes, I should be done. After I'm done, the image will be replaced with whatver text accompanies the dice rolls I've been making.

In other words, it's basically a "Please Stand By" sort of image.

One thing I forgot to mention before:

I'm a big fan of players making Ability checks in B/X. Some DMs hardly use these at all, but I'm pretty liberal with having players make Ability checks; it's the closest thing B/X has to skill rolls, which I think are important in facilitating a PC to act with freewill.
While the rules specifically state the likelihood that a character might hear something if they listen at a door, or later try and break down that door, they're sort of ambivalent about noticing clues, or deceiving a guard. So generally, when some situation arises that fits in this B/X Rules "gray" area, I like to allow a player to make an Ability roll.

Basically Ability checks work like this: If you're negotiating the price of some goods, and no rules state how your class does that, make a Charisma check. If you're looking for clues to a monster's recent presence in a swamp, make a Wisdom check. Currently Thieves are the only class with a "Climb" ability (a percentile roll), but surely other classes can attempt to scale a wall r climb things. In this case, I would allow a player to make a Dexterity check.

To roll an Ability check, you just roll a d20 and if your roll is equal or under, you succeed. If you roll over, you fail. If I think a check is somewhat easy for the character, I'll give them a "bonus" of -1 to -4 to their roll. If I think their check is complicated by circumstances, I'll give them a "penalty" of +1 to +4.

In other words:


When making an Ability check, your ability modifiers do not apply. So if you have an 18 Dexterity, which has an Ability modifier of +3, you don't get to subtract 3 from your roll. Having an 18 in Dexterity automatically makes it significantly easier to roll equal or under without an Ability modifier applied. A 1 is always a success. A 20 is always a failure.

Furthermore, for the purposes of expediency in our PbP campaign:
I often find one of the biggest issues that gum up the smooth flow of a PbP game is the GM having to ask the player to make a die roll after the player declares their character to do something and then everyone waits for the player to read the request for a die roll and make another post.
Things run a lot smoother and faster if either
1) The player declares their character's action, and if they think there's a chance a Ability check might be needed, they just add one to be safe, which the DM can use or not...
or 2) The DM realizes the PC needs to make an Ability check, so the DM just makes it for them and posts the results along with the die roll.

So for example, a player states that their PC would like to look for footprints in the area. The DM thinks a perception check (Wisdom) should be be made, so he makes a Wisdom check fpr the PC with any modifiers he feels appropriate, and posts the results of the check.
Its basically a situation where the DM is rolling for the player, which some players don't like (some player prefer to roll their own dice), but it keeps things moving along, which is really important in PbP-style games.

If I ever make an Ability check roll for your PC to resolve an action your PC takes, I will always make that roll transparent. You see the roll and the result with the post. If anyone is 100% adamant they roll their own dice, please let me know, and I'm happy to accommodate this. To my knowledge and recollection, I've never rolled an Ability check for a player without them declaring an action for their PC except in the case of passive perception checks (Wisdom). Sometimes you may be walking in an area where a clue may be, and I think there's a chance you may notice something despite not actively searching. In those cases I may roll a Wisdom check with a penalty (since you're not actively looking) and then either not mention it at all if you fail, or tell you you notice something of note if you succeed. I generally keep passive rolls hidden, because if I make a roll and you fail, others immediately see a roll was made and start meta-gaming active Ability checks.

On passive perception (Wisdom) checks, I typically make those rolls in secret (hiding the roll and result in GamersPlane). But the roll will be there on my end and if you ever want to see the result after the fact, I'll screenshot the post for you.

Sounds good

You know, when I first learned this game some 42 years ago the DM made all rolls behind a screen. The players never saw the roll. In the one game I'm running now I'm not making any rolls visible to the players. Of course, I detail the results of the action, but seeing the rolls makes planning for their next move easier for the players. That also offers me the opportunity to have things become apparent to the players without having to stop the game to roll dice. What I try to do in this way is to make a somewhat hack and slash game and bit more like a story. Players tend to tell stories about their characters anyway, so, as the game master, I like to use the environment and npcs to tell my part of the story. Anyway, the way you are handling dice rolling for other than standard occurrences seems quite appropriate to me.

I always thought that was how passive perception worked anyway, more as a tool for The DM than the Players.

But I am cool with all of that

@Aldrusian and @TheFoxofFinch: Alright, I'm fine with making the rolls behind the DM Screen then of you are. It will certainly make things run faster. That said, all the rolls will be made in GamersPlane, so if anyone ever wants to know the result of their die roll, or why they failed such an easy-seeming task so miserably, I can always screenshot the dice results and post them.

Lol, I often wonder how Gygax determined overland movement rates. I'm a backpacker irl and the idea of walking 36 miles in a day with a full pack using minimal exertion is beyond laughable.

Just a heads up, I didn't get any momentum going from the other players that joined, or any progress on their PC creation, so I removed them from the game and tomorrow the party heads out with 5 PCs escorting the wagon. That's pretty much the ideal size I was hoping for anyway, so we should be good.

@Aldrusian: Just a heads up, I was making a spreadsheet that tracks all of the information on the PCs the DM needs on hand quickly and I noticed on your GamersPlane character sheet that you have AC5, I assume due to your leather armor. Don't forget that you actually have an AC3 because your +2 Dexterity Modifier acts as a bonus to your AC.

Leather is AC 7 and the dex +2 would make it 5...

Oh! Yes. You're correct. Brain fart... Nevermind.

We're currently waiting for Jonas to take his action, but I haven't seen a post in this thread from OnceUponAnAxe in about a week. I sent a PM to see if they were still with us. In the meantime, I think the best way to handle it is if we don't hear from OnceUponAnAxe by this evening I'm going to rule that Jonas froze and forfeited his turn this round. I will then re-roll Initiative for everyone and we'll begin Round 2.