Archived from groups: rec.games.frp.dnd,rec.games.frp.misc (
More info?)
On Mon, 25 Jul 2005 22:49:59 -0400, Nikolas Landauer
<dacileva.flea@hotmail.com.tick> wrote:
>Oberon wrote:
>>
>> What problems did you face? In particular has anyone DMed
>> 'Dragon Lords of Melnibone' out of the box or did you need to
>> modify the rules?
>
>I played Stormbringer a long time ago. I disliked the random home
>race generation, but that may have not been standard rules (I did not
>GM).
>
>As for 'Dragon Lords of Melnibone', I found it to be pretty useless.
>If you want a d20 Moorcock world, you're better off designing it
>yourself. There were major balance issues throughout, including some
>of the biggest mistakes I've ever seen in a d20 product not published
>by Nightshift Games (the ones that stick out particularly in my mind
>are the +1/-1 racial modifiers to stats).
Thanks for the reply Nik, and for everyone else I'm not replying
to personally.
I had intended to have a go at running some of the early
Stormbringer Chaosium modules (I have) with DLoM rules. But...,
I've been reading a lot of old posts and looking at messages in
the EternalChampion yahoo group:
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/eternalchampion/>
From what I can see, no one there is actually running DLoM. They
seem to be using either Stormbringer 3e, 4e, 5e, Elric rules or
something entirely different. For instance rather than use DLoM
there is some discussion of using Slaine d20 instead.
I, myself, just bought the DLoM book for about $2.20 on Amazon
which indicates that there isn't a huge market for it.
I may change my mind and try to use Elric instead, which would
mean having to buy yet another version of the game. [Although I
have the pirate net book I will need a hard copy to actually run
the game]
DLoM did look a bit rushed in places but I can't comment much on
"balance issues". An early review of Stormbringer 3e I read
commented that the game looked unplayable due to imbalances in
it. That is what I thought too - it's been sitting, unplayed,
on my shelf for years. Well I know that part of D&D philosophy
is that D&D is as much a "game" rather than a "role-play"
product - so things are supposed to be more balanced (gamewise)
throughout and I know that people who play D&D give a lot of
thought to game issues (advancing levels, getting XPs, etc)
rather than just the RP stuff. To be honest I, too, like a
mixture.
If I run DLoM - I intend to ditch D&D magic mentioned in it
wholesale in favour of Elric/Pan Tang/Bronze Grimoire magic
conversions + maybe some CoC spells and some I've thought up
myself with a herbal potion healing system (I'll write myself).
I do want to keep the demon magic though - and I always regarded
that as ridiculously unbalanced.
I personally think it's up to the GM to try to maintain balance
by just giving weaker PCs some kind of help. [Such as allowing
them to befriend a powerful NPC or luckily getting hold of a
useful magic item, etc.]
If I run DLoM, I'll be dishing out XPs very stingily and maybe
halving the HPs gained at each level gain.
On random racial generation - if I let everyone do as they wish
they will all be playing Melnibonean sorcerers - I want some
players to play other characters as well. [Is that one of the
lack of balance issues you mentioned?]
I didn't understand your comment on the racial stat modifiers
above. [I didn't think that was a huge issue]
Can you elaborate more on the lack of balance in DLoM? - this
still worries me.