I had this idea back when I was just a lowly player in 2nd Edition DnD (though many probably had the same thought). I was reminded of it when Mice and Mystics came out.
(Warning: I have no idea when I would be doing this as I am apart of Two campaigns at the moment. I am trying to get advice for a future campaign and have opened this thread to help myself design one and to help those that had the same idea)
The players would be shrunk down or changed into very small (slightly anthropomorphic) critters by a powerful wizard or an ancient curse. They would have to survive in a world where an accidental footfall from a passerby would crush them flat and the goblins of the world would be like ogres or giants to them. Their whole quest would be to break their curse and maybe help those that they find in their same predicament along the way.
The problem I'm having is that even though I don't lack reference material for the flavor of how the campaign might express itself, I can find almost zilch for how the mechanics might work....
1. Should I expand the world (apply templates to everything else besides the players), should I shrink the players (apply templates or the "magic" to them), or should I do something different and house rule everything (like make custom races for them that they can choose from, etc.).
-The reason for me asking this is that different things happen when you do any of them. Would doing the normal thing (the first two) be very balanced (damage happens differently and so does attack roles)? Is there a better way to do it?
2. Magic.... How to handle this?... Magic doesn't change when a character's size changes. It still does the same damage, has the same range and area of effect. I don't know how to balance this..
3. Difficulty.... with rules as is, if the characters were shrunk down they would most likely deal non-lethal damage most of the time. I don't have a problem with this except for the fact that this is with everything. Dealing non-lethal damage to something so much bigger than you (like a human) is fine, its very reasonable that they can't take them down very easily. But what about something smaller but still larger (like a cat)? What about other creatures just as big as them?
-How should it be handled? Leave it alone or change it?
4. Other concerns: hit points, ac, etc. Other things you guys might come up with.
Thank you for your advice.
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I'm actually writing a 3PP product on this topic for January 2015 called Microsized Adventures. ;-)
Monster Advancement should be a good place to start. Scroll down to Adding Racial Hit Dice and it'll list some guidelines for increasing and reducing the size of monsters in Table 2-2: Size Changes. A (medium) human dropping to diminutive, for instance, would get -12 Str, +6 Dex and -6 Con. Moving on to Table 2-3: Size Bonuses and Penalties, they would then get +4 AC/Attack, -4 CMB/CMD, +6 Fly and +12 Stealth.
For damage guidelines, check out Universal Monster Rules and scroll down to Table 3-1: Natural Attacks by Size. Also, Weapon Damage by Size from the CRB. Scroll down to Table 6-5: Tiny and Large Weapon Damage to see guidelines on the difference in damage. They don't have Diminutive, but you could extrapolate from what is there. I would reduce the "Tiny" damage die by 1 or 2, as appropriate, so a 1d3 weapon made diminutive would do 0 damage, a 1d4 would do 1, 1d6 would do 1d2, 1d10 would become 1d4, etc. For magic, you could either have all the players be non-magical (after all, wouldn't they just fix themselves otherwise?) or just follow the equipment damage guidelines the same way.
Sounds like fun, good luck. =]
For magic, you could either have all the players be non-magical (after all, wouldn't they just fix themselves otherwise?) or just follow the equipment damage guidelines the same way.
I thought about that... I was thinking the curse would have been very powerful magic, the kind that can't be reversed without the death of the very powerful wizard (or other spell caster in the case of some being cursing the party), an equally powerful spellcaster reversing the curse, or a powerful artifact that can reverse the curse.
I could even make it so the curse has a clause for release and make it a very difficult quest. There are all sorts of things that I could do to make it so that the magic isn't undone quickly.
The magic damage, range, and area of effect is a hard one. I as a dm, feel that I should allow my characters the choice to play something if they want to play it, unless it unbalances the campaign to much (synthesist for example). With the rules as is, it doesn't change when the characters are changed, so you don't know what would be good balance wise... I don't image a few inches tall person, as the focal point of the magic, being able to use burning hands at the same scale as a normal person and doing the same damage...
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You're looking for the old Dungeon Magazine #18 adventure Chadranther's Bane. This is a lovely old 2nd Edition adventure when Dungeon Magazine was at it's best. It would be quick and easy to update it to Pathfinder.
The PCs come to an abandoned garden with a magical fountain. The fountain is cursed, such that anyone who comes too close is shrunken to about 1.5" tall.
The adventure contains all sort of applicable details about scale, context, and such. It basically addresses most of the OPs questions. Also it's a cracking good adventure, fun for both players and GMs. Players will never look at an ordinary garden toad quite the same.
You're looking for the old Dungeon Magazine #18 adventure Chadranther's Bane. This is a lovely old 2nd Edition adventure when Dungeon Magazine was at it's best. It would be quick and easy to update it to Pathfinder.
** spoiler omitted **
Thanks, nice reference material at least. I'm no good at conversions though... especially with the differences 2.0 had with 3.5 and pathfinder.
Thanks a lot for showing what the material was though.
....maybe I could run a 2.0 for old times sake though... hmm..
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I'd do pretty much what LazarX suggests. Let's say the entire party is reduced from medium to fine (or extra fine), say 1 tp 3 inches tall. Now you're playing "Land of the Giants", which is a fine campaign to run - expansive forests of lawn grass inhabited by normal (now giant) insects. (Use all the Bestiary giant insects, but in reality are normal insects.) For the PCs I'd just adjust the scale of size and make the current reduced size equal medium.
If using the extreme size reduction I suggest, I would have the curse adjust the range and size of area of effect spells to be relative to the size of the PCs that way fireballs aren't like nuclear bombs going off, but scaled to appear as if the PCs hadn't shrunk at all. Of course this would heavily curtail what PCs could do against normal medium sized creatures (extremely colossal to the PCs point of view).
I'd keep it so that physical damage by tiny PCs only causes non-lethal damage. Fitting more the fairy tales of giants, where killing a giant was a matter of causing physical attacks against them, rather if you want to kill them, make the giants fall down the stairs, get poisoned, have a coup de grace occur while they slept, or use a class ability like: knock-out or assassinate. You have to bypass hit points to kill them, because they're so damn big compared to you.
I could see a campaign taking place on a single property, wizards castle and surrounding properties, what might have been a day's horse ride to the wizard's castle is now a couple hundred miles in reduced scale. I would start the campaign with the PCs are normal size passing a gate way and crossing the property, small bridge across a creek, short expanse of forest, farmland, then the castle itself. Once the meet n' greet with the wizard is over, they become cursed, but the effects don't take place until they reach the outer gate. Now they have to follow their own steps at a much reduced scale and what was unthreatening countryside at adventure's start is now epic-monstrous terrain to reach the wizard's castle and remove the curse.
I could see a campaign taking place on a single property, wizards castle and surrounding properties, what might have been a day's horse ride to the wizard's castle is now a couple hundred miles in reduced scale. I would start the campaign with the PCs are normal size passing a gate way and crossing the property, small bridge across a creek, short expanse of forest, farmland, then the castle itself. Once the meet n' greet with the wizard is over, they become cursed, but the effects don't take place until they reach the outer gate. Now they have to follow their own steps at a much reduced scale and what was unthreatening countryside at adventure's start is now epic-monstrous terrain to reach...
That could be the basis for my campaign! I like this. Is it alright if I use it?
Maybe the wizard didn't do this to just the PCs and there is a whole community full of these people (made up of townsfolk from the surrounding towns that beseeched the wizard's aid only to "disappear") trying to get back at the wizard, but fail miserably each time they try. Then the PCs come about and the Npcs finally have a fighting chance!
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Its why I suggested it. Its sounds like it was the inspiration you needed. Good luck with your game.
If the bridge across the creek is a drawbridge, now that creek is a massive river with swamp on either side. You could include tiny fey that dwell in the creek swamp area - which now basically elves with dragonfly wings.
That short bit of woodlands, is now a massive thick forest with seemingly thousand foot trees, and roc sized sparrows living in them. An encounter with a chipmunk or groundhog might be equivalent to an owlbear. Gigantic hunting spiders might be a more common and horrifying encounter in the forest.
For the most part, you can avoid running into standard sized monsters as encounters, they probably seem more like nasty weather, steer clear if you see them on the horizon. And speaking of nasty weather, imagine a light rainstorm with gargantuan drops of water smashing and drowning tiny PCs diving for cover.
Even if you don't have to defeat the wizard (though you probably do), the wizard's familiar - imp, say, is now a medium sized flying demon to you. A cat familiar would be just as nasty an opponent to tiny PCs.
The fun part is since the PCs when they were normal sized crossed this bit of countryside to the castle twice - they know where to go, and what lies in between, so you don't need to give them a map. Now its your job to turn simple pastoral landscape into an alien jungle, with glimpses of the now gigantic world the PCs came from and striving to return. Include an encounter of someone normal sized passing by/walking over and not even noticing the PCs at all - while they run in terror.
Lots of potential for such a game.
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One thing though, if the party is "extra fine" (if there's such a thing) in size, but are considered "medium" by scale. I'd say the damage caused by the PCs are normal damge (lethal), to anything up to the adjusted version of gargantuan to PCs scale (small). Anything bigger than that falls into non-lethal damage territory, requiring some means to bypass HP to kill something that big.
So attacks against giant insects, frogs, fey, normally tiny woodland creatures up to the size of a cat or familiar is normal lethal damage. Anything bigger is a real challenge to kill. The wizard will probably have to be killed to help remove the curse, and will require creative means to do so.
Make all your encounters as innocuous and insignificant had the PCs been normal sized, but in Land of the Giants, an angry chipmunk or a hungry sparrow becomes a major threat. The players might appreciate normal beasts in a way they've never looked at them before.
Its why I suggested it. Its sounds like it was the inspiration you needed. Good luck with your game.
If the bridge across the creek is a drawbridge, now that creek is a massive river with swamp on either side. You could include tiny fey that dwell in the creek swamp area - which now basically elves with dragonfly wings.
That short bit of woodlands, is now a massive thick forest with seemingly thousand foot trees, and roc sized sparrows living in them. An encounter with a chipmunk or groundhog might be equivalent to an owlbear. Gigantic hunting spiders might be a more common and horrifying encounter in the forest.
For the most part, you can avoid running into standard sized monsters as encounters, they probably seem more like nasty weather, steer clear if you see them on the horizon. And speaking of nasty weather, imagine a light rainstorm with gargantuan drops of water smashing and drowning tiny PCs diving for cover.
Even if you don't have to defeat the wizard (though you probably do), the wizard's familiar - imp, say, is now a medium sized flying demon to you. A cat familiar would be just as nasty an opponent to tiny PCs.
The fun part is since the PCs when they were normal sized crossed this bit of countryside to the castle twice - they know where to go, and what lies in between, so you don't need to give them a map. Now its your job to turn simple pastoral landscape into an alien jungle, with glimpses of the now gigantic world the PCs came from and striving to return. Include an encounter of someone normal sized passing by/walking over and not even noticing the PCs at all - while they run in terror.
Lots of potential for such a game.
Thank you. Those are very good suggestions.
One thing though, if the party is "extra fine" (if there's such a thing) in size, but are considered "medium" by scale. I'd say the damage caused by the PCs are normal damge (lethal), to anything up to the adjusted version of gargantuan to PCs scale (small). Anything bigger than that falls into non-lethal damage territory, requiring some means to bypass HP to kill something that big.
So attacks against giant insects, frogs, fey, normally tiny woodland creatures up to the size of a cat or familiar is normal lethal damage. Anything bigger is a real challenge to kill. The wizard will probably have to be killed to help remove the curse, and will require creative means to do so.
Make all your encounters as innocuous and insignificant had the PCs been normal sized, but in Land of the Giants, an angry chipmunk or a hungry sparrow becomes a major threat. The players might appreciate normal beasts in a way they've never looked at them before.
But would non-lethal damage be balanced enough? Of course it seems ridiculous that something the size of a bug (baring poison and the like) would be able to kill something the size of a human, but pathfinder also has gargantuan creatures that can and are slain by medium sized adventurers. Of course it's very difficult though, something that size should be very hard to kill, but nonlethal damage isn't used for killing these creatures... They just have a lot of hit points and are usually armored like a tank.
I'm just saying is non-lethal damage the way to go? It works a little bit differently than extra hit points and armor class.... I could just be over thinking things....
Provided this is a relatively small campaign, and you're not going to continue into higher levels, perhaps if you gave the animals DR/—? As for how much would be appropriate, I'm imagining something like the number of HD plus the size of the HD, so for example: A Boar has 2d8+9 hp normally, so it would get 2+8 = 10 DR/—. A Dire Boar would get 5+8 = 13 DR/—. A regular centipede could use the stats for Giant Centipede, and an actual Giant Centipede could use the same stats, but with 1+8 = 9 DR/—.
This would be very effective at limiting damage while the party remained at low levels, but if you're planning on an extended campaign it would fall away too quickly to be the only method used.
I ran an epic level 4th edition game where all the characters were plucked out of their home plane by various gods and deposited on a beach where hundreds of grass long boats, a single blade of grass mind you, were pulled up and a large battle between the army ants and fire ants was ongoing. The players quickly found out that the Army ant queen had been kidnaped a Fire ant prince and was being held in their city/mound.
Basically I just ripped off the Odyssey story line, reskinned everything as if the players were ant sized, and made the setting a big pond in a fallow field complete with a giant raccoon/tarasque on the island in the middle.
I don't know if it was from a podcast, or a conversation at a game, but something gave me the idea to have a wizard place the souls of all the party members into Soulbound Dolls, and have the adventure be the party exploring the wizard's creepy castle/tower to get their bodies back. That actually might have been Alex and/or Ryan on Private Sanctuary or Know Direction talking about the product he mentioned above.
My plan so far was to adjust the characters' ability scores down to Tiny size using the rules in the Bestiary and let them keep their mental stats. I was a little stuck on how to affect spells, since the primary casters' effectiveness would be unchanged by the transformation. On the one hand I think that's unfair, but on the other, I'm thinking "So what?"
My goal was to do as little conversion to the world as possible. I think the story could be run just with the rules as they are. I don't really know how I'd try making the PCs smaller than Tiny, but I'm inclined to start out from the same position.
Personally, I don't use the rule that says "If penalties reduce the damage result to less than 1, a hit still deals 1 point of nonlethal damage." I think it's a terrible addition to the game, and means that not only are a lot of creatures no longer threatening in large numbers, but a lot of tiny carnivorous creatures would starve to death in days. If the damage is reduced below 1, it deals 1 point of damage. Just my opinion. Yeah, it means you could be nibbled to death by rats. So don't tick them off.
You know, "If a creature's nonlethal damage is equal to his total maximum hit points (not his current hit points), all further nonlethal damage is treated as lethal damage."
Yes, I know that rule exists. But the way I play it, Gremlins with spears don't have to wait until the adventurers go to sleep to break the skin. I don't want to threadjack but my group knows I don't use that rule when I run, and they were OK with it. It was in fact Gremlins that made me realize the rule existed. Well, Gremlins in the module, and a rules lawyer in the party.
In the party's favor, I was going to ignore this rule on the party's behalf as well when I miniaturized them. And I would recommend to the OP that your tiny or tinier party be lethal as well.
You know, "If a creature's nonlethal damage is equal to his total maximum hit points (not his current hit points), all further nonlethal damage is treated as lethal damage."
So.... "Prick" him until he's unconscious and then kill him? I think that's kinda hilarious.... I guess it could work though for those times where tiny creatures fought medium ones (solves the tiny vs big component)... But what about those times tiny creatures fight tiny creatures? It seems kinda ridiculous that they can't murder each other very easily now does it?
Those adventurers also have a lot of hit points compared to other tiny creatures if I was going to go the straight normal rules route.
My plan so far was to adjust the characters' ability scores down to Tiny size using the rules in the Bestiary and let them keep their mental stats. I was a little stuck on how to affect spells, since the primary casters' effectiveness would be unchanged by the transformation. On the one hand I think that's unfair, but on the other, I'm thinking "So what?"
I think their mental abilities should stay the same to.... But magic has to be affected in some way. If it isn't then spell casters have a very big advantage compared to other characters when the change comes around: "Ha! I've turned you sniveling adventurers into tiny ants! What are you going to do now as I crush you all! Wait? Ha! Are you trying to cast a spell? I don't see how much good that is going to do against someone of my si-" 'BOOM!' (Wizard just cast a full size fireball against bady.)
Sorry... But this is a self bump to see if I can revive my thread. If it dies again I will leave it be.
Anyway, thank you to those who previously posted on my thread. You guys were very helpful and I am starting the basis for the adventure. I still believe more impute would be helpful though and would like to hear more thoughts on the matter.
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Sorry... But this is a self bump to see if I can revive my thread. If it dies again I will leave it be.
Anyway, thank you to those who previously posted on my thread. You guys were very helpful and I am starting the basis for the adventure. I still believe more impute would be helpful though and would like to hear more thoughts on the matter.
There's a preview of Microsized Adventures in my company's Facebook group. I'm going to do another preview every week or so until its ready to be published (probably the first week of February atm).
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There's a preview of Microsized Adventures in my company's Facebook group. I'm going to do another preview every week or so until its ready to be published (probably the first week of February atm).[/url]Sorry... But this is a self bump to see if I can revive my thread. If it dies again I will leave it be.
Anyway, thank you to those who previously posted on my thread. You guys were very helpful and I am starting the basis for the adventure. I still believe more impute would be helpful though and would like to hear more thoughts on the matter.
I'll be sure to keep an eye on that. Thank you for bringing that to my attention.