[D&D4Real] Long live the Uber-Guilds! Death to the Guildless!

It strikes me that the only likely means of stopping my Real D&D world disintegrating into a feuding pile of Superhuman Level-Warfare is alignment restrictions for Good and/or Lawful characters (so, all things being equal, about half the world then) and the potential necessity for training to gain a level! Now I have to admit that when I used to play AD&D on a religious basses I simply never witnessed the DMG rules for training ever to be used! And let’s be frank (whoever Frank is?) training is hardly the most sexy concept in the world (even in the unsex world of D&D). But interestingly training, or a variant of it, is one of the few esoteric rules from the original DMG to have survived the extensive cull of Gygaxian madness from 1^st to 2^nd edition – albeit as only as an optional rule.

 

Still, I guess this means that some gaming groups somewhere played it or demanded it?

I have no idea what the stance is of training in subsequent editions (and I don’t care), but looking at these rules again I think they offer plenty of potential and I don’t get why they are so widely dismissed or unused.

But before I go on, let’s look at them both in brief:

1. AD&D e1’s DMG says: upward progression in levels is never automatic. This is in upper case, so this is obviously not meant to be as an optional rule in Gygax’s mind. Instead, he says, that gaining the required XP just means that he is “eligible” to gain a level. The final decision rests with the DM! Now, this is interesting indeed! I wonder what a player would say if he was denied the opportunity to raise a level? Anyway, in brief: every session that a PC gains XP the DM rates his performance (between 1 and 4), based on how he played in relation to his class and alignment. Only a few brief examples of inappropriate performances is given here. When a player gains enough XP to raise a level, the DM then finds the average rating (total performance ratings/# of game sessions = number of weeks it takes to train). This requires a player to find a character of higher level to become his tutor. The cost of this training is: level x 1,500 = weekly GP cost, so it’s not cheap! However if a PC’s average performance rating is 2 or less then he can forgo training… But it takes twice as long and still costs the PC the same weekly money, due to the inherent cost of self-training. After name level training from others is not requited as such, although self-training still takes time and costs money.
2. AD&D e2’s DMG says: Again a tutor of higher level is needed, but with no name-level relaxation of training this time and with the additional complication of finding a tutor with similar skills, proficiencies and spells, etc… There are no set costs, but 2^nd edition suggests an average of 100 GP per level per week – so much cheaper than 1e. The time it takes is: instructors WIS-19 = minimum # of weeks. At this point the trainee must make either an INT or WIS check to see if he learns enough to gain a new level, if not then he checks in a week’s time at (stat)+1. It’s worth repeating tho that this is all an optional rule in 2e.

 

Interestingly 2^nd edition suggests the obvious natural consequence of all this is guilds or academies that might become quite powerful in the adventuring community. This is certainly something I want to run with, although ‘Zeb’ suggests the DM shouldn’t be too draconian in using this particular stick to beat his players; however I and more importantly my D&D world have less qualms about following this through to its logical conclusion… It also suggests that players might train each other, but they need to make an ability check to see if they have what it takes.

 

Now, both these approaches will have varying effects upon my AD&D game world. In a e1 world I find it interesting that the DM has ultimate power over allowing a PC gain a level. This might suggest to the denizens of my world that some supernatural and omnipotent force is at work in the universe that controls a C&L character’s rise to power. However, this feels a tad meta-gamey to my tastes, so I’ll stick it on the back burner for now.

It’s also worth pointing out that the cost of raising a level is very likely going to be higher than the number of GPs it’s going to take to reach the number of XP needed to cross the new level threshold! Another Gygax cock up, I’m afraid. I love him, but his rules to drift into the realms of nonsensical more often than not and it is further proof to my theory that AD&D in the form that it was published was largely unplaytested. Obviously this cost needs toning down, however it certainly adds to the importance of GP in the game as a motivator and with the hyper-inflation of an average D&D world certainly training should come cheap. Let’s spell it out: GPs give more XP than monster killing, they pay for training and the paying for training keeps the players poor thus like a negative feedback loop it forces the players to ago adventuring. Actually, for those who don’t like XPs for GPs, then this could justify it with XPs only being given for GPs going towards training…

The varying time (thus cost) with performance in relation to class and alignment is also interesting. I’ll make no secret that I’m going in a class guild/society direction with this, so I see this as an abstract game mechanic way of handling how a player’s performance is in line with the guilds code of ethics and how well their PCs have become at one with the ‘zen’ (for want of a better expression) of their class. Having guilds also has the advantage of not having to role-play out a scene of finding a tutor every time a player gains a level (although possibly outcast individual tutors might exist outside the guild system). Simply a DM just needs to plonk a guild or two in a few locations across his game world and there you go. Membership might be automatic and as abstract as you want or the finer points of guild politics can be role-played to as finer resolution as you heart’s desire.

I think e1’s performance criteria of class & alignment also suggests a schism in the class guilds between classes of different alignments. Thus more factions and more role-playing intrigue in the mode of Planescape factions and/or clans in V:TG. I think I’ll say more in a post or twos time about the different classes and alignments, as I just want to discuss training in global terms today.

Of course, PCs who perform their class and alignment well enough don’t require training… This gives the PCs a way out of the tyranny of the guilds if they can play true to their class and alignment enough. However, I think a DM needs to define the criteria of this performance rating scheme, otherwise it is all going to get a little arbitrary for my tastes.

The name level cut-off for training is however interesting and endangers everything I said. If after 9^th level a C&L type can just wave goodbye to the guild system, then what’s to stop them just going into full Nietzschean Nazis superman mode and wiping out all the minor threats or leaving them trapped in their sub-name level state? Possibly you could argue that at this point they are sufficiently indoctrinated into the guild system, but it wouldn’t take too many powerful individuals to go rogue for this not to be the case. Thus I suggest that either this top end to training is extended indefinitely or the guild polices any renegades with Soviet style ruthless efficiency…  This I like. While I can see some high level types embracing the ruthless hierarchy of the class guilds, I can also see others of a more egotistical or individual persuasion resisting this ridged system, seeking the individual glory of the outsider. And the mechanic for good performing characters to escape the tyranny of training might mean that those who truly embrace a class and alignment’s role might see themselves as belonging to a truly Uber-class… Or just see themselves as being removed from the orthodoxy of the guild system.

Unsurprisingly, 2e rules are a little more coherent and training is compulsory all the way to the top! Thus if anyone left the guild system then level progression would be all but cut off from them, unless they can find a few rogue tutors… It’s also massively cheaper, thus the tyranny of GP hunting is largely removed. However the guilds might still offer a form of ‘top up’ training at a cost of 1GP for 1XP, which would have the function of depleting the players of their GPs and rationalise the whole money = experience concept, which no matter how vigorously its defenders might evangelise it, to me it just doesn’t make coherent sense.

Overall, I see both systems creating a very similar world, but with a bit of tidying, I think I prefer 1e’s training rules, although I think their cost needs significantly charming down. However this might explain the ludicrous amounts of GP to be found in those early AD&D modules…

At the moment I see my class guilds as being

• highly hierarchical
• highly authoritarian
• highly secretive
• hard to join in the first place, possibly requiring significant payment for apprenticeships to escape 0-level poverty
• keeping the 0-level world in its place either indirectly or as serfs/slaves or see3ing themselves as protectors of the 0-level mortals
• having lots of internal rivalries, certainly driven by alignment differences, but also schools of magic
• possibly, a difference between members and more casual lay members, who might have more freedom but might have to pay more to access the guild’s services?
• lots of corruption
• C&L types who operate outside the guilds might be outcast and/or hunted down or tolerated if they keep a low profile or forced to go into exile (maybe promising never to go up a level or train others upon sentence of death)

I’m not sure how widespread these guilds would be? In every town or city or only in capitals? Or not in cities at all? Maybe in remote locations, such as hidden fortresses or dungeons? Too much remoteness however would make it hard for PC groups to exist… Single class parties?

Also, what status are the PCs? Members? Lay members? Outcasts? Rebels? All would give a very different complexion to a campaign and change how 0-level types react to them.

As much as I like the idea of a Superhuman Level-War erupting over my campaign world, I think I like enforcing some societal controls upon my D&D world and I see the requirement for training to be the mechanism to do it. Possibly the guild system could be a response to a pre-historic time of Level-Warfare amongst the C&Ls which nearly destroyed the world? Possibly dungeons are the remains of hideouts where the surviving population hide while the C&Ls destroyed themselves in a death spiral of Wish-wars, etc… Possibly a campaign might revolve around the attempt of a secret society that wishes to destroy the guild system, thus liberating C&Ls from the tyranny of society and back into the heroic demi-god status they once had. Possibly the deities and demi-gods to be found in the tome of the same name are the survivors of those Level-Wars? Possibly the PCs might be a member of a secret society operating within and across the guilds with the intent of stopping the Level-Apocalypse happening again?

Although strictly only an AD&D rule I think I’d port it over to other D&D editions, as it has a calming effect upon the Uber-class game I suggested previously, while still keeping it as a subtext, but injecting plenty of politics and intrigue. Also it helps rationalize the GP4XP rule. And it fits into the classic D&D fantasy city model with lots of player character type guilds dotted around, which I always liked, but always felt were massively underused!  Long live the Uber-guilds!

Okay, nothing I’ve said here is all that radical or ground-breaking, but it goes to show that these is some game value in some of those rules we all ignore and that by pushing the rules to a logical conclusion they help form a real D&D world that is a little different to the vanilla fantasies of Dragon Lance et al…