You See Two Doors: What do you do?

I go left... no, right!

The question posed in the title is essentially meaningless. I imagine we've all been in this situation though, whether as a player or a Judge. Which door do you take? Well, what's the difference between a door and a door? You might as well flip a coin. The result will be the same, as far as you know. This isn't a choice, it's the illusion of one.

This isn't always a bad thing. Sometimes it's just a symptom of a freely explorable environment. If you're in a large enough dungeon, there are bound to be choices of which direction you will explore next, and you're not likely to have information about those choices until you explore them. That's kind of why you're exploring.

The problem of Quantum Ogres is well known and much discussed. These are related problems, because in order to have Quantum Ogres you must first give the players a decision they don't have the information to answer. If you want the ogre to be behind whichever door they choose first, you can't tell them the left door has ogre-prints leading up to it or they'll feel cheated when the right door has an ogre behind it. No, you have to have presented them with two seemingly ogre-less doors.

I would suggest that, wherever possible, you shouldn't pose a question like the title's to begin with. Now, this isn't always reasonable; sometimes there really are just two doors. But as Judges we generally have the capacity to make something known about those doors before you open them.

The Swamp in the Portal

The Portal Under The Stars presents exactly this kind of choice (don't get me wrong, the module is a great start and this really is a nitpick). After making it through the traps guarding the entrance, the players are literally faced with a choice between three doors. Yes, the module has determined what is behind each of those doors, but the players don't know anything about any of them. It may not be a Quantum Ogre behind those doors, but it's the perfect habitat for a Quantum Ogre - which I suppose would be a Vacuum Swamp.

The point is, the players wouldn't notice if you shuffled all three of those doors' destinations around as they opened them. You could easily decide on the fly that they will explore the other two rooms before heading to the final chamber, because you don't want them to miss that content.

I don't think you should even give yourself that opportunity.

When I ran The Portal Under The Stars for my group, I figured I should give the players something to base their decision on. I didn't give them much, just this: 

• The door to the burial chamber had a funeral mask mounted on it to match the ones inside.
• The door to the gazing pool had a faint blue glow shining through the crack underneath.
• The door to the hallway leading to the scrying chamber was left just slightly ajar letting them see the hallway into the darkness beyond.

The ajar door was intended to be tempting - both because I wanted the players to go there and because the demon-snake did too. He's a cheeky li'l fella. It worked, but it would've been totally fine if it hadn't too.

None of this was much information to go by. The players still aren't completely deciding "do I go to the burial chamber, or do I go to the chamber guarded by a demonic snake?" - they don't know that yet. There's still discovery involved, now with the possibility of a minor "aha!" moment when the players find out where that blue glow came from, or realize they were led down the dark hallway as a trap.

Why does it matter?

This is a totally different experience than just being given three doors to the Vacuum Swamp. There's now a real decision being made (if still an uncertain one) and a connective thread linking the decision to the consequential discovery. Comparatively, choosing a door at random (and if you have no information, it is random) might as well be drawing from some sort of location lootbox at best, and indeed, Quantum Ogres at worst.

And the worst thing is, players cannot tell the difference. Some Judges see this as a good thing, an opportunity to direct the journey.

After all, why shouldn't I use all my prepared content?

Well, for one, they can totally tell the difference. They can also reason that there is no purpose to giving them a meaningless choice unless you are trying to sell them an illusion. Realizing this kills not only the illusion you were attempting to sell, but the entire illusion that this game matters in the first place.

Some players don't mind, but for others the game means nothing when you do this. I like to foster trust between my players and myself, such that when I do need to do something sneaky in the interest of a fun surprise or reveal they know I'm not doing it to be unfair. They know I'm not just choosing the path for them in advance. And for that trust to grow, I need to be honest.

Not only do I need to let their decisions matter, but I need to make sure the information they have allows for decision-making in the first place. That way they know in advance that their decision matters. They know I follow rules too. These tiny hints and connective threads are proof that their decision mattered all along. It may seem like I'm taking this too seriously, and maybe I am, but nobody can come out of one of my sessions wondering whether I pulled a switcheroo behind the screen. I like that. It makes me feel like I'm playing fair.

Sometimes there are just two doors.

The more complex the layout of an environment, the harder this will be. A dungeon with multiple entrances makes this pretty difficult; now you have twice as many clues to lay out for rooms you can hit from multiple directions. Does every entrance to every room need a hint as to what the room is? Does a hallway with 6 doors lined down the sides need something special for every single door, to give a choice to make?

No. These aren't Vacuum Swamps, for a few reasons.

The more complex the layout of the dungeon, the more expected it is that there will be some meandering around and creeping into unknown rooms to progress. The layout of the dungeon will be informed by its purpose and its place in the world. If your game involves drawing or revealing a map as you go, the world itself provides clues. If you've got a map of the place, it becomes harder - but not impossible - to fake it. And on top of that, if the players have a ton of options, it becomes overwhelming quickly. Those 6 doors will just end up being opened sequentially no matter what you do, because nobody is weighing up that many options before deciding where to go. Either that, or the players will convince themselves it must be a puzzle, there's no way you'd give them something that complicated otherwise!

The Portal Under The Stars is an example of a tightly controlled space. This is what makes it stand out to me. The intention is clearly to give players a choice after reaching this room (up until then it has been linear) and yet the choice they are given is not a choice at all. It's not an open-ended question like exploring a megadungeon, it's a multiple-choice question that simply asks you "1, 2, or 3?". You might as well just roll a d3.

Bizarre Mishaps Table for PCs with zero Luck

You have cheated death one too many times and now you're going to get Final Destination'd. Or you have cheated on Death and now he's throwing all your belongings out the second-floor window. Either way, your favour with the Gods has dwindled to nil, so now there's a divine target on your back.

DCC RPG (p. 96) states that a character who reaches zero luck suffers such constant, bizarre mishaps that they are effectively unable to get anything done. It's worth noting that falling to zero in any other stat effectively incapacitates a character entirely. Falling unconscious or becoming a babbling mess might as well be a death sentence under any circumstances where you're likely to take that ability score damage to begin with. In this spirit, it seems entirely fair that if a character falls to zero Luck the consequences are just as bad.

On the flip side, this is a situation a player chooses to get into. Not in the same way that someone chooses their death by making poor decisions that lead to taking damage. Players would generally need to actively choose to burn their Luck down to zero. At first glance, this seems like further justification for the consequences to be deadly. It's your own fault, don't do it if you don't want to die. You are literally out of Luck, after all.

The problem is, that's a choice nobody will ever take, which makes it a boring choice. It's really a non-decision - nobody is going to just press the suicide button. Burning Luck is for getting out of a jam. As such, the consequences for reaching zero Luck should be really bad but not guaranteed death. To further encourage it, it should have an element of fun. I recommend using a random table of bizarre occurrences that frequently hassle the PC until they make it up to the Gods they've offended by restoring at least 1 point of Luck - however that happens at your table. Some results should be potentially deadly, some should be relatively harmless but funny.

It doesn't need to be a huge table, because it shouldn't come up often and shouldn't last very long - in fact, increasing the likelihood of being struck by lightning three times in a row will only drive home just how unlucky this character is. Plus it's hard to come up with unlucky events that aren't just total bullshit.

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When a player's Luck score hits zero, the Judge rolls on this table at least once per in-game day. If the party is actively adventuring, such as in a dungeon, increase this to every six exploration Turns (1 in-game hour). These rolls are to continue each day/hour until the character returns their Luck to 1 or greater. The first roll should be made immediately when zero Luck is achieved. The Judge should keep the result a surprise until it occurs, as the surprise is part of the fun with these unfortunate events.

If the event is a singular occurrence without a specified condition or timing, the Judge may determine its timing randomly throughout the day/hour or simply choose an inopportune time for it to happen. If it cannot happen at that moment (for instance, lightning striking while underground) it happens instantly at the first possible opportunity.

Bizarre Mishaps (d12):

1. At the beginning of your next combat, you drop your weapon and it lands 5' away from you.
2. At the beginning of your next combat, your armor comes unfastened and falls off. It takes at least a Turn to reequip it and make sure it is fastened such that it won't happen a second time.
3. You are surprised in your next combat, even if you snuck up on them. They saw it coming.
4. You slept wrong (or if mid-adventure, an action or attack triggers this), and a twinge in your shoulder forces you to attack at -1d for 1d3 days. This can stack.
5. You can't find the next item you try to use. Later you will realize it was exactly where you left it all along.
6. An arrow falls from above, from an unknown source. 1d6 damage.
7. A Wizard's failed teleport causes him to land directly on you, knocking you prone. He quickly apologizes, dusts himself off, and teleports away.
8. Spontaneous combustion. Take 1d6 fire damage per round until you succeed on a DC 10 Reflex save.
9. Struck by lightning. Take 1d12 damage and have a 50% chance of catching fire.
10. A meteor falls from the sky and lands on you, and only you. Take 4d8 damage and be knocked prone.
11. Stepped on a snake - subject to randomly selected snake poison from Appendix P (p. 446), 1d4: (1) adder, (2) asp, (3) cobra, (4) viper
12. It rains on you and only you for several hours.

And don't forget that when enemies are unsure who to target, the character with the lowest Luck is first in line!

Primal Servants of Neutrality

DCC's Monsters chapter suggests that 1% of Chaotic or Lawful creatures should be Primal Servants, selected to be stronger, smarter, more magical, and more important to the cosmic struggle than their peers. This article provides a variety of Neutral types of Primal Servant. These are merely examples that fit my views on Neutrality and - as with the Law and Chaos Primes given in the book - creativity is encouraged.

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It is widely believed that agents of Law and Chaos hide in plain sight, enacting the wills of those too great to directly involve themselves. This is, of course, entirely true. What is lesser known is that the forces between spawn agents of their own. The disparate nature of the Neutral Alignment necessitates that its Servants are just as varied. Balance, Nature, and servants of indifferent or incomprehensible motivations should be considered similar but different types of entities.

As with Lawful and Chaotic Primes, Neutral Primes have 50% more hit dice and are typically stronger and more intelligent than their normal counterparts. Their magical features depend on which kind of Neutrality they manifest from.

Primal Servants of Balance

There is a 1% chance that any Neutral soldier, lawman, or more rarely a commoner or construct, is a paladin of Balance. These Primes are designated by the Gods for a certain role. They are typically rebels and renegades, fighting against the status quo for what they believe is right. This does not mean they oppose Lawful society - they might oppose the "might makes right" of a Chaotic tyranny. Constructs who are Prime can be in latent opposition to the cause they were created to serve. Paladins of Balance have Luck on their side, which may manifest spontaneously or be willfully manifested through sheer drive. High level paladins of Balance can have an intelligent magic weapon and can use it to step between the mundane world and a Neutral plane from which the weapon originates.

Primal Servants of Nature

There is a 1% chance that any Neutral animal, plant- or fungus-based monster, beastman or wildling is a warden of Nature. These Primes typically have a connection with the landscape around their home, and may affect the weather with their emotional state, sense water in the desert, command animals and manipulate plants, or sense distress among the trees in a forest. Often, they manifest these abilities unconsciously and may even be unaware of their power. They actively endeavour to hold back the encroachment of civilization onto the wildlands, and hunt down Chaotic invaders looking to exploit natural resources. They can step between the mundane world and whichever of the infinite para-elemental planes their ancestry is tied to.

Primal Servants of the Old Ones

There is a 1% chance that any Neutral aberration, outsider, extraplanar entity, or worshiper of an Old One is a priest of the Old Ones. Priests of the Old Ones receive deranged visions from far beyond the astral seas, pushing them to act out the will of their God. They appear insane to anyone who is not a follower of the Old Ones. They typically have psychic powers that can alter the mind of others, such as enthralling them, driving them insane, locking them in a nightmarish dream, or forcing them to joyfully rush to their own annihilation - though they do not necessarily choose to use these on everyone. They can step between the mundane world and the outer realm of an Old One, and can even temporarily drag another being with them (Will save 10+HD to resist). Even brief exposure to these realms is sure to have permanent psychological effects.

Unaligned Primal Servants

There is a 1% chance that any Neutral monstrosity, goblinoid, ghost, ooze, elemental, or other Neutral being is a Primal Servant of other allegiance (or no allegiance). The allegiance may be known (for instance, a Prime Air Elemental would likely be a Servant of Ithha, Prince of Elemental Wind, and the PCs may know of the Prince) or unknown and need not be made clear. They are leaders of their race or exemplars of their type - for instance a goblinoid Prime will have underlings, a Prime hybrid monstrosity may have extra body parts, a Prime ooze may have extra or more powerful ooze special properties. They can usually extradimensionally step to their lair and back again, as long as they haven't strayed beyond adjacent planes.

Extended Ability Score Modifiers Table

DCC's table for stat modifiers ranges from 3 to 18. There are obvious circumstances where stats can go below 3, those being damage and all kinds of burn (luck burn, spellburn, and the more obscure battle rage) but the book simply doesn't cover what happens to your modifiers. Maybe they can't go below 3? Well, it mentions what happens when they hit zero, so it just seems to be an oversight. Stats can increase too, and some monsters call for opposed checks with greater scores, so what about scores over 18?

Here's the chart I use, ranging from 1 to the obscenely high 40. Below the chart is an explanation of how I arrived at these numbers.

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Score	Mod	Score	Mod	Score	Mod	Score	Mod
1	-5	11	none	21	+5	31	+10
2	-4	12	none	22	+6	32	+11
3	-3	13	+1	23	+6	33	+11
4	-2	14	+1	24	+7	34	+12
5	-2	15	+1	25	+7	35	+12
6	-1	16	+2	26	+8	36	+13
7	-1	17	+2	27	+8	37	+14
8	-1	18	+3	28	+9	38	+14
9	none	19	+4	29	+9	39	+15
10	none	20	+5	30	+10	40	+15

... and so on, adding +1 per two points ad infinitum.

For scores 5 or less:

Strength: Can carry shield or weapon, but not both.
Stamina: Takes double damage from poison and disease.
Intelligence: Cannot read or write.

When scores hit zero:

Strength: Unable to move.
Agility: Unable to move.
Stamina: Unconscious.
Personality: Incapable of thought or action.
Intelligence: Incapable of thought or action.
Luck: Constantly subject to frequent and bizarre mishaps.

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And here's how I reached these numbers:

The base DCC rules cover all possible starting scores, 3-18.

Each point someone is reduced below 3 - the literal human lower limit - should be significant, so each one drops the modifier 1 further until incapacitation.

18 is also a limit, the natural human peak. Breaking this is significant, so 19 should come with an increase of 1.

Ogres are defined in the Monsters chapter as having 22 Strength with a +6 modifier. Interestingly, this conflicts with an extended modifiers chart provided in MCC, but we're going to ignore that. Technically MCC is a different game anyway. 

Elsewhere in the Monsters chapter, opposed Strength checks are called for at 20 Strength (Water Elemental) and 24 Strength (Minotaur). There are others which don't specify a score or modifier, so they aren't useful to us. Since the book specifically calls these numbers out, we can deduce that their modifiers must be different than the Ogre's and from each other, but their modifiers are unspecified. We'll just place them up and down by 1 compared to the Ogre - it fits, and we can justify it with the next observation.

The Primeval Slime specifies a score of 12 + 2 per 5' section. 12, 14, 16, 18, 20, 22 and 24 are all already defined as having different modifiers, so if we extrapolate with the assumption that each defined Strength score must have a different modifier, every second point should increase the modifier. I admit this one is a bit of a stretch, but it's a rule consistent with defined values.

The only numbers left uncertain are the odd ones. We have to make it up from here, so I will rule that 21 is +5 because this makes the curve after breaking the natural human limit slightly less steep.

30 sits at a nice round +10. This isn't meaningful, the numbers just line up nicely.

Continuing this up into godlike numbers, I feel like it makes sense to have another peak at double the natural human limit (36). Think of this as breaking a second limit. 3-18 is human, 19+ is superhuman. 36 is reaching deific levels, and sits slightly above the values given in Deities & Demigods back in 1980 (which were maybe a little low for literal gods). As such, 36 and 37 are treated like 18 and 19, and each have a modifier increase. This also puts the first point past double-human at a level where, in a contest, it would take two dice chain movements for the average inferior being to have any chance of success. That seems reasonable for man vs god.

From here onward we continue the pattern of +1 per 2 points forever. I can't think of any further meaningful breakpoints past this and these numbers are already absurd anyway. For the most part, you probably shouldn't even bother giving creatures this powerful any stats.

Barbarian Patron for Warriors by Reddit user RithKingWill

Reddit user RithKingWill has been inspired by my post where I talked about Barbarians (among other classes)! I personally see this as an accomplishment. I am thrilled that people have been engaging with my posts, and now at least one person has taken it upon themselves to expand it into a fully usable demipatron with Invoke Patron effects, patron taint, and spellburn tables. It almost functions as seven patrons in one, because there is a choice of animal totems to draw power from.

It does contain two AI generated images in the margins if you care about that sort of thing.

Here it is.