Moving on from Room 6 down the hallway the characters will come up to Room #8 on the right. Note: All rooms are on the right-hand side of this hall.

Special Note: Dwarf characters will notice a slight downward slope to this hallway as well. It parallels the halls above them.

The lock on this door is very difficult with an extra 5% penalty above and beyond the penalty for other locks here. The zombies attack as soon as someone steps into the room.

Inside this cell are 1d4+1 Zombies in terrible shape. Each only has 2 hp due to how long they have been here but are fast due to all the necromantic energies they have absorbed.  They turn as Ghouls and can attack at any point in the turn per normal initiative. They also have +1 to hit.

Their XP is the same as regular zombies due to their low hp. 

They guard a small chest of 500 sp. Obviously left by other adventurers and not the original prisoners of this cell.

This isn't going to be about a full conversion. Mostly because I feel the best conversions are done in situ by the GM. 

Today I want to talk about converting one of my D&D 5e campaigns, "Into the Nentir Vale."

A bit of background.  Into the Nentir Vale began as, obviously enough, a D&D 4e game.  I ran the intro adventures for it with a group, and the reactions were mixed. I tried again with some Pathfinder, a one-shot, but it never quite jelled the way I wanted it to.  Fast forward a few years, and D&D 5 was released. I did a series of posts on sunk cost analysis/bias and conversions leading up to it:

• RPGS and the Sunk Costs
• BECMI/4e Conversion, Ghost Tower of the Witchlight Fens
• Into the Nentir Vale (was BECMI/4e Conversion)
• Into the Nentir Vale, 5e Style

Once these were all done, the adventures went on under 5e.  Well...we know how this will turn out.

Somehow it seems fitting that I am converting it again to Pathfinder, this time 2e.

The adventures themselves are the HPE adventures from D&D 4e. Essentially I am removing about 1/3 of the content to make it play a bit faster.  I am scaling the monsters and encounters to fit a 20th level maximum (vs. a 30th-level one), but in many ways, the conversion between 4e and Pathfinder 2e is easier than converting between D&D 4e and D&D 5e.

The Character: Rowan McGowan

Rowan is my test character here. She is a reoccurring NPC and one I used as my internal tests of various combat situations.

Like the campaign itself, Rowan has seen some history and conversions. She began life as a witch for D&D 3.5. Her concept is a "Witch Knight" or "Witch Guardian."  This is a witch that takes up the sword to protect others, typically of their faith and/or other witches. Rowan is a protector of the "Old Faith." Some of her exploits found a home in my Pagan Witch book, for example. 

In D&D 5, Rowan was a multi-classed Warlock (Hexblade)/Paladin. Her background was an acolyte to cover her growing up in a religious order of witches. She picked up the blade when she saw others of her kind being killed.  Her devotion is like a Paladin, just to a different cause. Multi-classing her was pretty easy to do since Charisma is the prime ability of both Warlocks and Paladins.

When converting her to Pathfinder there were a number of key differences.

First, while warlock was a compromise in D&D 5 (I wanted a core book class) I can do a proper witch in Pathfinder.  But witch's main ability is Intelligence in Pathfinder (though I will argue with some authority that it should be Charisma). Also Pathfinder 2e does multiclassing VERY differently than what D&D 3.x/Pathfinder and D&D 5e do it. Interestingly enough, it is more similar to how D&D 4 did it.

In 5e Rowan's first level was Warlock (Witch) and then she took a level in Paladin. I have been leapfroging the classes. She is level 4 now with 2 levels in both Warlock and Paladin.

In Pathfinder Her class is Witch. I had her take Weapon Proficiency at level 1 so she could use simple weapons.  At level 2 she is still a witch but I had her take the Champion Dedication feat. This "multi-classes" her into Champion, the Pathfinder version of a Paladin. This is similar to the Multi-class feats of 4e.

Here she continues to 4th level.

The progression is more straightforward in Pathfinder with fewer options in the beginning.  The progression in 5e is less straightforward with lots of options. 5e Rowan has more spells for example, but her maximum casting choices will be limited at higher levels. Pathfinder Rowan will have access to much more powerful witch spells, even if she has fewer right now.

Rowan McGowanWitch 4Chaotic GoodMediumHumanVersatile HeritageHumanoid

Perception +7;
Languages Common, Draconic, Elven
Skills Acrobatics +1, Arcana +9, Athletics +4, Diplomacy +10, Intimidation +10, Lore: Scribing +7, Occultism +7, Religion +7, Society +7, Survival +7
Str +4, Dex +1, Con +0, Int +1, Wis +1, Cha +4
Items Half Plate

AC 22; Fort +6, Ref +7, Will +9
HP 32

Speed 20 feet
Melee Greatsword +10 (Versatile P), Damage 1d12+4 S
Devoted Guardian Requirements Your last action was to Raise a Shield. You adopt a wide stance, ready to defend both yourself and your chosen ward. Select one adjacent creature. As long as your shield is raised and the creature remains adjacent to you, the creature gains a +1 circumstance bonus to their AC, or a +2 circumstance bonus if the shield you raised was a tower shield.
Occult Prepared Spells DC 17, attack +7; 2nd ; 1st Command, Mage Armor; Cantrips Chill Touch, Daze, Mage Hand, Read Aura, Protect Companion
Arcane Innate Spells DC 20, attack +10; Cantrips Detect Magic
Arcane Innate Spells DC 20, attack +10; Cantrips Shield
Focus Spells (1 points) Pact Broker Range 30 feet; Targets 1 creature Saving Throw Will; Duration sustained up to 1 minute You offer to broker a pact of peace. If the target accepts and doesn't take hostile actions against you and your allies, you take a –1 status penalty to Deception checks to Lie to them. If they refuse and take a hostile action against you or an ally, they must attempt a Will save. If they accepted the offer and then take a hostile action against you or an ally, they must attempt a Will save and treat the result as one category worse. Regardless of the outcome, the target is then temporarily immune for 1 minute. Success The target is unaffected. Failure The target takes a –1 status penalty to attack and damage rolls against you and your allies. Critical Failure The target takes a –2 status penalty to attack and damage rolls against you and your allies.
Phase Familiar Range 60 feet; Targets your familiar You draw upon your patron's power to momentarily shift your familiar from its solid, physical form into an ephemeral version of itself shaped of mist. Your familiar gains resistance 5 to all damage and is immune to precision damage. These apply only against the triggering damage. Heightened (+1) Increase the resistance by 2.
Additional Feats Arcane Sense, Arcane Tattoos, Champion Dedication, Root Magic, Student of the Canon
Additional Specials Arcane Tattoo (Shield), Champion Archetype Cause (Liberator Cause), Familiar, Hexes, Patron (Pacts), Tenets of Good, Witch Spellcasting

--

Thankfully I still had her PDF from D&D Beyond. 

There are subtle differences to be sure. Pathfinder Rowan has better AC and HP compared to her D&D 5 counterpart on paper. I am not sure if those will make much of a difference though in play. 

I knew 5e (and 3.5s) Rowan had a tattoo on her shoulder blade but I was not certain of what yet. In Pathfinder I figure it is the symbol of her Goddess Desna.

• Rowan McGowan, D&D 5e (PDF)
• Rowan McGowan, Pathfinder 2e (PDF)

While putting these sheets in her folder I noticed I had also started AD&D 2nd Ed, Castles & Crusades, and DragonAGE versions of her started as well!

The conversion was pretty fast, to be honest. These systems still share DNA. In many ways, the Pathfinder version is much closer to my original concept of her so I am pretty happy about that. I will need to see how I can convert the other characters now.

Converting monsters will just be a one-for-one swap out. 

The odor from this room hits the PCs before they even get near the opening.

Free Art Assets - Grey Gnome Games - Jason Glover
Inside this room are 1d6+4 Zombies in this room. They are milling about the room aimlessly, but when the PCs enter, they will attack. Zombies always attack last. All the zombies have swords that look beat up and rusted. One zombie, though, has a sword +1. The only way the PCs can learn if it is magical is because it is not rusted like the others.

There is a fair amount of treasure here. In various bags, there are 100 gp, 35 SP, and 1000 cp. The PCs have no way to discover this, but they were left behind by a group of evil adventurers who killed an adventuring party and left these zombies to guard the loot they could not carry themselves. That evil party went deeper into the dungeons and has not been heard from since.  They even left an extra magical sword to make sure their loot was guarded well. 

The zombies look like they are a couple of weeks old. 

About a week or so ago, I talked about bringing in some "new" games into my life to substitute for D&D. Here is one of them.

Chivalry & Sorcery

When it comes to RPGs emulating an authentic Medieval experience there are generally only two games that people go to; Pendragon and Chivalry & Sorcery.  One could argue how authentic each of these are, but in general, they are far closer than D&D or anything else on the market. 

Chivalry & Sorcery has been around nearly as long as D&D (1977 and 1974 respectively) and like many gamers my age we saw a lot of ads for it in the pages of Dragon Magazine, especially the Fantasy Games Unlimited 2nd Edition.

Currently, it is in its 5th Edition and is published by Brittannia Game Designs.

I am not going to review it today, but this is a gorgeous book. It is also a huge book at 600 pages.

I picked mine up from my FLGS a while back for some ideas on various campaigns, but now I am going to try it out on its own instead. 

Brittannia Game Designs recently released the 5th Edition in a Print on Demand format AND a brand new "Basic Game." 

The Basic Game is just about 80 pages and will cost you a whole $2.00.  So well worth it for any D&D refugee.

I recently got my wife into the Showtime series "The Tudors," so maybe I could use that as an "in" for this game. 

Going back to Room #17 the PCs make a left (where they made the right before) and they turn left into a parallel hall to the one before (#18 to #24).

This room is empty save for some random glowing lights of unknown source or origin. The radiate magic (a wizard or elf can tell) but they don't actually do anything but float around. They are creepy all the same.

If anyone puts a weapon into one of the lights their weapon will glow for the next hour.  There is no magical effects, but it does look cool. 

Part of my goal this year now is to expand my game-playing a bit more beyond the realms of D&D and the clones.  But I am not venturing too far afield.  In fact, of late, I have been turning back to some old friends.

I have gotten these all in the mail over the last couple of days. 

Up first is an old favorite, Mage, in a new (to me) setting. Victorian Age Mage is based on the M20, Mage 20th Anniversary Edition, system/setting. I love Mage. I love the Victorian Age. So this one was a no-brainer for me when I saw it on DriveThruRPG's newest releases.

The book looks great, and maybe for the first time ever in Mage, I'll consider playing a character from the Technocracy!

I am also getting back into a really old favorite of mine, Chill 1st Edition via Cryptworld.

I picked up the two latest adventures from Yeti Spaghetti and Friends designed for Chill 1.0 and Cryptworld. Horror in Hopkinsville is good old-fashioned 50s UFO paranoid fun (or is it...) and The Blood Countess features a new take on the Other Side favorite Elizabeth Bathory. These do not have print options yet, I picked these up from Yeti Spaghetti directly.

The Fright Night Classics adventures are fun and would make for great NIGHT SHIFT or Dark Places & Demogorgons adventures too. 

Going through them reminded me how much I do love Chill. So I went back to look up some monsters. Imagine my surprise when I discovered I didn't have a copy in print of Monsters Macabre!

This one is from Goblinoid Games. Figure I'd toss them some coin while they work out what the next Labyrinth Lord will look like. 

So expect some more Chill/Cryptworld goodness from me soon!

Down the hall is the last room on the right. The room is the same sort as the rest on this side. 

The commotion in this room can be heard from the outside.

A group of Kobolds (2d6) are trying to spear a large boar-like creature (Dire Boar). They do not notice the characters until they enter the room.  Most of the kobolds have 4hp each, and the boar is down to 3 hp.

There is no indication of where the boar or the kobolds came from or how they ended up in this room.

The kobolds have 2sp and 5cp each (on average).

Down the hall is a half-flight of stairs to the right that meets up with a similar set, both going down and then meeting up with another half-flight going down. This is Encounter area #31 and will be dealt with then.

We have all seen the new proposed OGL. Honestly it looks like publishing under the OGL 1.0a  will soon be over, at least how it has been.  So, what am I do to with three separate monster-related projects?

Simple. I combine what I can and try to get something ready to go.

Here are the efforts of that.

Monster Mash

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/424046/Monster-Mash Here, there be Monsters!

For years brave adventures have been going into dark dungeons and fighting monsters. Now the monsters are fighting back.

Monster Mash is an Old-School Essentials Classic Fantasy compatible game supplement that allows you to take on the role not of a stalwart hero but as one of the monsters.

This book features 13 horror-based classes.

The Awakened Golem, Cat Folk, Ghosts, Haglings, Hobgoblins, Revenants, Shadow Elves, Shades, Werewolves, Wererats, Vampires, Profane Necromancers, and the Gothic Witch.

New spells for Haglings, Profane Necromancers, Shadow Elves, and Gothic Witches.
New occult powers ritual spells for Gothic Witches.

Fully compatible with Old-School Essentials and other Basic-Era games.
Fully compatible with other witch books from The Other Side.

Requires Old-School Essentials Core Rules.

--

I put in a lot of the art I was going to use for this, Monstrous Maleficarum and the Basic Bestiaries.  I had wanted to get this out for Halloween (naturally) but I had a lot going on.

Now I would LOVE to get a couple more of these out. I have nearly everything I need; I just have to put everything together. 

Will this be my last publication for OSE? I certainly hope not.

Continuing down to the next room on the right has a strange glow coming from it.

The glow comes from a room full of glowing mushrooms, at least 40 to 50.  

Among the mushrooms are glowing Shriekers. 

There are 15 of them and they are indistinguishable from the other mushrooms in the room.  Once they start shrieking (see your Basic-era rules), it will become nearly impossible to tell them apart. Each attack on a mushroom only has a 1 in 6 chance of being a shrieker. 

Down from Room #21 is another room.

Free Art Assets - Grey Gnome Games - Jason Glover
This room is empty save for some bones and an empty barrel, much like Room 14. There are rats, but they are of the normal sort.

Game Masters can add some random bits here if they like. The idea is that those room has not been used in over a century save for various random monsters. 

Moving down from Room #20 there is another room on the right (all rooms in this hallway are on the right).

Entering the room, there is a huge pile of gold and treasure with the bones of a dragon on top.

Jason Glover - Free Art Assets

When the first character touches the treasure or dragon there is a loud roar (Illusion) and all the lights and torches used go out (darkness spell).  Once the characters get the lights on they will find that the treasure and the character who touched it are gone!

The dragon and the treasure was a programmed illusion. The character who touched it has been hit with a Sleep spell and then turned invisible. If the character makes the Sleep save then the invisibility will not go into effect.

Otherwise, there is no treasure in this room.

Moving on down from the glowing portal in Room #19 there is another door to the right of the party.

 Jason Glover - Free Art Assets

This room is empty save for the bodies of what are believed to be other adventurers. Their weapons are gone but a care search will find a Potion of Heroism and a Potion of Healing (1d6+1). (Finding these is worth 50 xp to the party).

Likewise, their valuables such as coins are gone.

Frantically working on a lot of updates behind the scenes here. But one I want to address that I am looking forward too is what am I doing with the games I run.

Presently I am still in the middle of three different D&D 5e games. They are all part of my Come Endless Darkness mega-campaign:

• Order of the Platinum Dragon (my 5e run of the TAGDQ series)
• The Second Campaign (my run of other classic adventures)
• Into the Nentir Vale (my adaptation of some 1st ed and 4th ed adventures)

All are presently 5e.

My plan is to convert one to Castles & Crusades and the other to Pathfinder 2e.

The obvious choice here is to convert The Second Campaign to Castles & Crusades since it has a lot of old-school 1st material. The next obvious choice is to convert my Into the Nentir Vale to PF2 since it is a broader mix, and I think it is funny that D&D 4 is once again losing out to Pathfinder.

I am not sure how much I'll talk about them online. BUT I do want to talk about how the conversions go.

So in each case, I will grab a PC or NPC from them and see how they convert. I will post that since that is something people will be interested in. In fact, as I am writing this, I am thinking of two PCs in particular that would really make good examples of conversions.

I also might post the Big Bad for each in their new stats. The Second Campaign is overtly about Demogorgon, but I had always thought they would not actually encounter him.  The Nentir Vale is all about Orcus.

In any case, it should be a lot of fun.

Making another right, we come up on encounter area #19. To your immediate left is an opening to a small room.

In Room 19 there is a glowing portal. From the portal 1d4+2 Goblins are coming through.  These goblins look similar to the previous ones.

The portal opens from a nighttime world with several moons in the sky. Other goblins can be seen in the distance. The portal is one-way, Goblins can come into this world, but they cannot go back. 

Let the characters explore the portal as much as they like, but there is no way to go through it.

Turning right (for now) the PCs enter encounter area #18. The hallway is the same stone as before, but it is somehow darker. The hall is 20 feet wide and extends some 60 feet into deepening darkness. 

Standing in the hall, seemingly waiting for the PCs is a small group of goblins.

The goblins are not waiting, but they are not surprised either. They have come up from the lower rooms to investigate the noise. There 1d4+4 goblins here. They are all 1-1 HD (4 hp each, or 1d6). They have shortswords, short bows, and wear leather armor.

If combat goes against them after the first round, one will flee down the hall to bring back reinforcements that arrive in 2d4 turns.

The OGL 1.1/2.0 drama has thrown me for a loop. Not gonna lie.

My whole "Year of the Monster" was built on a foundation of doing monsters of various types all year. I still can, but I need to pivot.

Case in point. I have been silent for the last few days so I can get at least one of my planned monster books out. I am scraping nearly everything and dumping all the art I would use for other projects into it. Hopefully, I'll have something soon.  

I also admit that my enthusiasm for some other plans that were going to extend into 2024 is critically low. 

Even if WotC/Hasbro does some serious backpedaling, my trust is low, and my expectations are non-existent.  This is disappointing because I have enjoyed all editions of D&D. I have also enjoyed writing for all editions of D&D. But I am, right now, not willing to support Wotc/Hasbro and the new version of D&D and my support of 5e is going to be minimal here.

I am though looking forward to some Pathfinder 2nd Ed discussions and deep dives. Also, I am going to try to feature more smaller publishers here. See what they have to offer. Even ones still doing 5e. It's not their fault that Hasbro is doing what they are doing.

So bear with me in this pivot phase.

Past the last two rooms, the grand hall splits left and right.

There is a grand statue of the Vampire Queen. Inspection will reveal that the statue is made of newer material than the surrounding walls.

 Going down either hallway, there is a 1 in 6 chance that characters will notice the slope of the flow is taking them down.  The slope is not enough to send the characters down a full level, but enough to concern them.

Notes: Things should start picking up. 

I have seen lots of great maps online for others, and I thought maybe I could share mine. ;)

This room is identical to Room 15 across the hall. 

This includes a similar specter with the same warning. Though this ghost seems angrier.  If the ghost is touched or attacked, it will become a bloody specter and attack.  This is a true undead.

Bloody Spectre. AC 7. HD 3 (13 hp). Att# 1. Chilling touch 1d6. Special: Silver or magic is required to hit. Turned as a Ghoul (3 HD). No treasure.

Note: If the PCs encounter Room 16 before Room 15, then swap the contents so that this is always encountered after the first specter. 

 Up from Room #13 is another room of similar shape and size.

Within the room appears to be the glowing specter of a young woman. Her form wavers back and forth.

She warns the PCs from going further into the crypts and to turn back now.  

The specter is not undead but an illusion. 

Across from Room #13 is another room.

Free Art Assets - Grey Gnome Games - Jason Glover
This room is empty save for some bones, a rusted sword, and an empty barrel. There are rats, but they are of the normal sort.