Folks,

Dug out that wonderful classic module, the Temple of Elemental Evil, and I'm going to start running it using the Desolation system. That or the updated Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil. Wondered if anyone had any pointers for doing the conversion...

I'll be doing the conversion piecemeal, enough to cover an hour or so of gaming each session - keep the kids interested but not overwhelm them!

If people are interested, I'll post what gets done...

I'm very interested! Keep us posted on how it goes!

Hullo, Imajica,



While I don't own the "Temple of Elemental Evil" scenarios in any format, I'd certainly be interested in hearing and/or seeing how the conversions work out.

That sounds pretty damn neat... let us know if anything jumps out that seems to be "untranslatable" (especially the magic)!

Good luck... I seem to recall playing the module, but never actually making it to the Temple itself.

Work has (sort of) started on this one. I've been reading through the scenario, trying to get a feel for what will work, what will need some major work, and what just won't work at all. So far, most stuff falls in to the "will work but will take some work" category. Glad there's monster-creation rules in the Desolation core, otherwise the whole thing would be on hold until Mysteries of the Hollow Earth hits the shelves. Anyway... I'd forgotten just how hung up on Alignment the old AD&D was! I've been gaming outside of AD&D's standard parameters for so long it came as a shock. And magic users! Damn! How were wizards supposed to last? I mean, once you get to the higher levels and get the juicy spells, sure. But you've got to last long enough to make it to Level 2 in the first place! 1d4 hit points and a single spell a day? Ouch! You run into one more skeleton than you're expecting and the party's re-rolling characters.

The magic system's going to take a major chunk of work. Trick's going to be building some sort of framework to hang the spells off. Something similar to Ars Magica where the magic system is so flexible and fluid but there are "standardised" spells, usually named after the wizard who perfected them (that fits in nicely with AD&D, your Bigbys, Mordenkainens and so on), that are "easier" to remember and cast. Maybe 1 guaranteed die that won't burn if you fail with it if you use a "known" spell rather than try and make something up.

Should know more after I've had a chance to look this over at Christmas...

A very interesting Idea.

When HEX first came out I considered how to best adapt it to a Sword and Sorcery style setting. The first two that came to mind was Robert E. Howard's Hyperboria, and the various D&D modules I've got kicking around. I was very pleased when I found out about Desolation over on the Exile boards.

Magic wise I'm tempted to leave it alone mostly, the free form aspect is very appealing to me. In regards to giving it a more D&D feel with the named spells, I'm thinking of two methods. In both cases knowing that spell costs 3xp, the same if you were specializing in a skill.

1) Giving a -1 on the spell casting difficulty.
2) Reducing the Burn by 1 when casting that spell, in essence a phantom success.

I would consider adding a few more traditions. Arcane and Druidic Magic seem well represented, not sure about Clerical magic.

In regards to the clerical magic, I think the current system would work fairly easily, especially if you create spheres for each particular deity and really define the scope of their dominion.

We decided that we wanted the gods (if there are such things) to be invisible to the world and undistinguishable from luck or change, but if it weren't for that we would have used the same magic system we used for the other traditions.

As for converting D&D spells... I need to give that a little thought. Even when I played the old 2nd and 3rd ed. I preferred a set of house rules for using spell points instead of daily spell lists.

Could you go over your thought a little bit more? Essentially for 15 xp you could have 5 spells... which doesn't seem terrible... I am not sure if you would still need the skill aptitude talent... much to ponder.

Matt

Spells would work as advertised in the Desolation book. You'd get the Magical Aptitude Talent and the Skill to go with it.

The named Spells would be a add on aspect to this. Think of them as a Specialty being added onto the Spell path Skill. In this case it's giving them a break on casting an Iconic and well known spell.

There would be limitations as well. First off as a price for being able to cast the iconic spell easily, the spell itself is fixed. An Aganazer's Scorcher is always fire damage, and only effects a certain area. If the caster wanted to do Cold damage or change the area of effect from a line to a sphere she'd be casting a different spell and would not get the bonus.

At the same time, give the caster is using a well known spell. This allows other mages / clerics to recognize and counter the spell more effectively.