Building Bhakashal - Random Death
Character death in D&D is a trending topic, and I thought I would home in on one thing I see coming up a lot: that the lethality of random encounters is unfair to the PCs. Note that this will NOT be a post explaining why random encounters are a good idea, or if you should use them, it will be a post addressing the concern that the possibility of death from a random encounter is unfair. I will further assume that the concern is not with fairly easy random encounters that are lost due to player mistakes, but the possibility of encountering something above your weight class. E.g the first level party encounters the 10 HD ancient red dragon.
At its core this is an issue of “encounter balance”, and Bhakashal is built on the assumption that random encounters are not “balanced” to the PC’s level in any formal way. Instead, the players are expected to develop the skill, over time, to handle random encounters. In order for this to happen, there have to be game-mechanical elements that the PCs can engage with, you can’t be “skilled” at rolling a die, but you can be skilled at making decisions about what rolls to make, what resources to engage, etc.
So to evaluate the “fairness” of the system to players, it is necessary to outline decision points and built-in features that give the PCs some way to avoid encounters that are extremely dangerous to them. In Bhakashal, random encounters are rolled for when you are in the city or in the wilderness. To avoid danger you want to avoid dangerous encounters and avoid surprise. The surprise situation is of particular interest, as surprise is VERY deadly, and the “unfairness” concern is thus magnified in a surprise situation.
I should add as well that the points below are taken from Bhakashal as that’s my game and I want to show how awesome it is, but most if not all of them can be found in various OSR products and original D&D editions, I’m not doing anything innovative here, I have just gathered together the threads from the wildly creative OSR sphere to make a coherent and effective whole.
Obviously extremely dangerous things are not loose in the city very often, so we will focus on wilderness examples. So say the PCs have a destination in the wilderness, what are the decision points and rules available to the PCs to make smart decisions?
1. The first decision point comes with how they are going to travel, on foot, on a boat, or mounted. Travel on foot is the slowest so generates the most random encounter rolls, travel on fresh water in a boat is slightly less dangerous as many of the monsters/animals don’t harm you unless you are in the water. Mounted travel is the fastest, and as the mounts in Bhakashal are fantastic (e.g., giant lizards, giant frogs, etc.) they can also attack anything that attacks you, and often outrun it. So choosing to go by river or by mount is one way you can reduce your odds of a deadly encounter, and is the first decision point that allows for players to demonstrate skill in their choices.
2. The next decision point comes with route choice. There are several primary roads that traverse the marshes, they have comparatively higher traffic and are patrolled, albeit loosely, by soldiers from the city. If you travel overland on a road you travel faster (as it is not muddy marshland) and you have less chance of encountering something hostile. However, there are only two main roads so you can’t travel by road all the way. This is another decision point, to reduce your odds of encountering something dangerous, plan out as much of the route by road as possible, only leaving it when needed.
3. The next decision point is time of day, Bhakashal divides the day into four slices of six hours each, morning (6am -noon), afternoon (noon-6pm), evening (6pm -midnight), night (midnight-6am). The odds for encounters occuring vary by period, morning (1 in 12), afternoon (1 in 10), evening (1 in 8) and night (1 in 6). So traveling by day reduces your odds of a dangerous encounter significantly.
4. Another important decision point relates to outdoor expertise, choosing to have a slayer (ranger), trained guard dogs, or a guide/hunter with the party, can be crucial. Slayers have a reduced chance of being surprised that applies to the whole party, as do trained guard dogs, so if you do have an encounter, there is less of a chance that the party will be surprised. Local guides are even better, they shift your odds of an encounter down, so for example, a night time random encounter role for the party with a local guide is a 1 in 8 rather than 1 in 6 roll.
5. Intelligence gathering is another important way to reduce the odds of being attacked while traveling. The best way to do this is to find local hunters and enlist them for their expertise. This will drain the party’s coffers, but it is well worth it. Hunters, like guides, lower the odds of an encounter by one step. Spells are helpful here as well, and contrary to what you might think, they don’t have to be high level. Divination spells like Augury (2nd level) allow you to determine if your decision to follow the river rather than cross through the forest is a good one or not. That alone can make a huge difference. Another option is Speak with Animals (1st level Beastial/Druid, 2nd level Seer/cleric), a spell like this allows you to ask the local animal population where the predators are, and all species in the ecosystem would know about the threats from monsters and predator animals.
6. Watches/traps/wards are another option, when camping down for the night, parties can organize watches, set traps and cast various spells to protect their camp and reduce the likelihood of being caught unawares. Slayers and hunters/guides can set traps in the area around the camp. Seers have Glyph of Warding, Warlocks have Fire Trap or Mordenkainen’s Faithful Hound, phantasmists (illusionists) have spells like Massmorph.
7. Phantasmists are, oddly enough, an important factor here as well. Phantasmists can deceive and redirect opponents, so when you run into something way beyond your pay scale, a well placed illusion can be a life saving distraction for the party.
8. Parley is another important option for the party. If you can communicate with a creature (through possessing its language or using a spell) then you can parley with it, and roll on the encounter reaction table to determine if they will be hostile or helpful. For reference, even without modifiers (bribes, obviously superior force, etc.) there is only a 25% chance of a hostile encounter on the reaction table, so encounters with NPCs need not turn violent by default.
And of course the party can bribe NPCs, threaten them, etc. Bhakashal includes faction/setting modifiers in addition to the standard modifiers for group size and such.
9. Encounter Reactions for monsters are a feature of Bhakashal, most monsters can’t engage in “parley”, but their reaction on seeing the party doesn’t default to violence, monsters have their own set of modifiers for encounter reaction in Bhakashal:
Monsters and animals are more prone to violent reactions (note the base mods per HD) than NPCs, but , there are options here to avoid encounters, parties can offer food to the monster/animal, or “demonstrate power” in a decisive way to deter violence.
10. So far we have looked at options the PCs have for avoiding a dangerous encounter, but there are game mechanics that are designed to address this issue as well, that apply whether the party makes good choices or not. Perhaps surprisingly, the rules for surprise are not as clear cut as they look. Take the case of a party and a monster that both have regular chances of being surprised (2 in 6 - roughly 33%).
What are the odds of the party being surprised in an encounter? Both sides roll a d6, here are the possible outcomes
If you look at the table, the results may be… surprising!
Party surprised - 8/36 - 2/9 approx 22%
Monster surprised - 8/36 - 2/9 approx 22%
No surprise - 20/36 - 5/9 - approx 55%
So the odds of a party being surprised are 22%, not 33% as it appears, if they have a slayer, guard dogs or a guide on hand, those odds are reduced to 11%. Put in another way, there is normally a 78% chance the party will not be surprised, if they have a slayer/etc, those odds improve to 89%.
So in short, surprise is less likely than it looks on first glance as the 2 in 6 odds are for both sides, and if both sides are surprised, neither side is surprised.
SURPRISE!
11. Encounter Distance is a factor too, when two parties encounter each other in the wild they are not automatically in close proximity, they are 4-24 (4d6) x 10 feet apart. So let’s take the average for a moment and assume 140’ apart. Depending on the speed of the monster and the speed of the party, it is possible that the party may simply flee if they decide the opponent is too much for them.
Bhakashal has pursuit rules (I won’t post them here as it would make this blog entry much longer) but suffice it to say that flight is always an option, even after the fight has started.
12. Number appearing and HP are factors as well. In Bhakashal, random encounters involve a roll to see how many of the monsters appear, and as a result, the number can be low, reducing the risk of the encounter from a higher HD monster. In addition, in Bhakashal ALL HP FOR MONSTERS IS ROLLED AT THE TABLE, there is no “maximizing” or “averaging” of monster HP. So in many cases, you will not be facing an opponent with full HP.
13. Morale is a classic old-school mechanic that figures in here as well. When certain conditions are met (for example, when a group of monsters has lost more than half it’s members) you roll for a morale check, and if the monsters fail they flee. This rule ALONE addresses a significant part of this problem, just using morale means that fights go faster and the odds of the monsters slaying party members decrease significantly.
14. Bhakashal randomizes monster / NPC attacks. There is a tendency as a referee to optimize your monster/NPC attacks and capitalize on your knowledge of the competencies and vulnerabilities of the party, in Bhakashal the referee randomizes between viable attack modes, which ensures that the referee will not be optimizing every combat, and the odds of player death from a powerful monster are reduced.
15. But perhaps the most important built-in design feature of Bhakashal that addresses the concern about “deadly” random encounters is curated, weighted random encounter tables. Random encounters vary by terrain type, and are weighted to produce encounters of a particular kind more often than others. So forests, for example, have the highest odds of encountering monsters, and agricultural land has the highest odds of encountering NPCs (farmers, merchants, peasants, etc.)
Random encounter charts are also weighted such that the higher HD more dangerous creatures are less common on the whole, as their commonality would make travel impossible.
A curated table is the beating heart of a random encounter, and a well curated table means that the chances of having an encounter with something FAR MORE POWERFUL than the party is low but not impossible. That is, I would argue, the sweet spot.
Lethal Randomness
The point of the above list is to make clear that there are two things that prevent “lethal random encounters” from being a problem, and indeed, make them a feature of the game, not a bug. As a gamist in disposition, I want the game to be fair but exciting, and that requires risk.
The mechanics of the game are structured such that these encounters are not common, and the PCs have numerous options to reduce their odds of such an encounter, and for extracting themselves from that encounter if needed.
I would say that an encounter with a monster above the weight class of the party happens every 4-5 sessions or so, if they take slower and safer routes that reduces to every 8-10. My players have learned how to keep those odds low, and when it happens, how to reduce the odds of a deadly result by evasion, deception, negotiation or smart tactics.
Finally, in my estimation AD&D does 12 of the 15 things listed above, albeit sometimes in a slightly different form (for example, Bhakashal encounter distance is different than AD&D encounter distance). So for those concerned that lethal random encounters are a problem for most D&D and D&D adjacent games, let me assure you they can add immensely to it.
Knowing that there is even the possibility of encountering something very deadly creates an electricity at the table whenever you roll for things. Rolling for random encounters is an EVENT at our table. Because a random encounter is a nexus of possibilities, outside of the vector of your quest or job, it can be a crucial step in the party’s success. Random factors have taken our game in so many interesting directions. And random encounters keep the party MOVING, I hear people complain about meandering parties, but there is a mechanic that penalizes meandering in dangerous places.
The last advantage to keeping a very dangerous monster on the random encounter table is that, every once in a while, a party SLAYS one of those badboys. Maybe they get surprise and cast a key spell or get lucky with good rolls to compliment the monsters bad ones.
This is the stuff that legends are made of. And the BEST part, is that FLEEING the crazy powerful monster is still a cool story, AND SO IS DYING TO IT. So it’s really a win win win for your game to have these sorts of encounters around, either it’s an epic death, an epic escape or an epic slaying, but in a controlled way, e.g. not common.
It sometimes shocks me that people who have a narrative “story game” focus with D&D push back against encounters like this on the table, or against random encounters in general. Tables make these sorts of encounters rare and thus they create great drama when they come up. It would seem to me to be a perfect fit.
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