Shadow of the Demon Lord vs. Dungeons & Dragons: Ancestries and Races

My comparative review of Shadow of the Demon Lord and 5e D&D continues! This time we're looking at ancestries and races.

Somewhat presciently, although perhaps the writing was already on the wall in 2015, Shadow of the Demon Lord eschews "race" as a designation, substituting instead "ancestry." The ancestries available in the core book include humans, changelings, clockworks, dwarves, goblins, and orcs.

Overall, I like the way SotDL presents the game's ancestries. They are briefly described, but there are interestingly elements here that give even the usual suspects a bit of additional interest. For example, orcs in Shadow of the Demon Lord are a magically engineered race who were used as slave soldiers by the Empire, but they have recently cast off their shackles and claimed the Empire's throne as their own. 

Each ancestry entry also gives a brief set of starting special abilities. Dwarves, for example, have darkvision, a hated enemy they're especially proficient at fighting, and a heightened ability to resist poison. One thing I really appreciate about SotDL's ancestries in comparison to D&D's races is that the amount of abilities an ancestry adds to your character sheet is far less than what the typical D&D race adds. And, frankly, D&D races add a loft of cruft, abilities you feel obligated to note but will get very little use out of; when was the last time you used your wood elf's Mask of the Wild ability or even remembered what it does?

Shadow of the Demon Lord's Ancestries also determine your character's starting attribute scores. You don't roll your ability scores in SotDL; rather, each ancestry lists the typical attribute array for each ancestry. A goblin, for example, starts with: Strength 8, Agility 12, Intellect 10, Will 9. (Yes, SotDL has four attributes compared to D&D six ability scores; frankly, this is a great way to cut down D&D's obligatory six ability scores in a way that makes more sense.) 

You can customize these starting attributes a bit in SotDL by raising one of them by a point and lowering another by a point. I do wonder how well this fits the recent move toward the idea that ancestry (or race, species, etc.) should not determine "essential" attributes as a bulwark against biological determination in fantasy rpgs. Personally, I don't mind how Shadow of the Demon Lord does it; although you have to penalize one of your attribute scores to get there, it's still possible to make a dwarf with above-average intelligence who would make a competent magician.

Each ancestry entry is capped off by a series of random tables to determine things like age, appearance, background, personality, etc. The kind of backstory material that D&D offloads to its backgrounds is rolled into ancestry in SotDL. In general, I like the array of starting ancestries available in SotDL's core book. There are some familiar faces, as well as some intriguing additions that give the game it's own flavor. D&D gives you the races that long-time players have come to expect; SotDL, on the other hand, marks a point of difference by offering clockwork automatons and changelings. 

One thing you may have noticed is that elves are not available for play in SotDL's core book. Not to be all Talislanta about it, but no elves... Although they are included in the fey-specific supplement, and they're given a makeover as horrifically cruel, beautiful, and alien, not putting them in the core product for SotDL is another way of setting some expectations about how the game is different.

Other ancestries, including some now-common fantasy types omitted from the core book such as halflings and the tiefling-like cambions, can be found in the game's supplements. SotDL even goes to some surprisingly weird places that D&D seems too timid to attempt. For example, it's possible for players to play both tiny pixies or huge jotun. The jotun are especially satisfying, particularly in comparison to D&D's goliath. Both are "giantkin," but because D&D's goliaths are still "medium" in size, the don't really have any abilities that play into the hulking and powerful story that the race promises. Jotun, on the other hand, use larger, more damaging weapons and are designated as a "powerful ancestry," meaning they get their own suite of giant-flavored abilities where characters of other ancestries are instead getting abilities from their "paths" (we'll get to them, but for now all you need to know is that a path is like a class in D&D). In a direct comparison, jotun "feel" like giants, whereas goliaths feel like any other "strong" D&D race.

SotDL also isn't afraid to get a little weird. There are cockroach people, mole-men, undead revenants, just to name a few of the more exotic choices available.

One last thing I want to mention before moving on to those paths I mentioned above: each ancestry grants an additional ability to a character at level four. Players usually have a choice between taking this ability or having their character learn a spell if they are magically inclined. I like that ancestry continues to be relevant and not just something you pick at character creation. D&D sometimes does something similar; some races gain additional abilities as your characters levels up, but that isn't true across the board and it's often easy to overlook that your fallen aasimar gets a Necrotic Shroud at 3rd level. In SotDL, every ancestry potentially gives you a little flavorful ability at the same level.

Demon Lord vs. DnD: Comparing Core Mechanics

Some fans of Shadow of the Demon Lord maintain that the game is very different from 5e Dungeons & Dragons, but I don't think that's a particularly accurate claim. As I stated here in my Four-Way Grimdark Shoot-Out post, I think SotDL is a great alternative for a group already familiar with D&D who want a darker experience. Although SotDL is a dark fantasy rpg, most of the familiar elements of D&D are present in some fashion, albeit that the tone of SotDL is much more apocalyptic and grimdark; SotDL's default setting exists in a state of upheaval and things are headed toward a horrific end as the titular Demon Lord begins to exert its world-ending influence more strongly. D&D doesn't usually get that dark, even in the Ravenloft or Dark Sun settings.

Comparisons of Shadow of the Demon Lord to Dungeons & Dragons feel inevitable, as Robert J. Schwalb, SotDL's author, also worked on fifth edition D&D before lighting out for his own territories. This is the first in a series of blog posts detailing both the similarities and differences between SotDL and D&D as a way of examining where the resemblance and divergence of the two games might matter to a gamer choosing between them. Let's start by comparing the core mechanic of both games. Shadow of the Demon Lord clearly springs from the same mechanical design principles as the latest version of D&D. 

The core resolution mechanic in SotDL is a d20 roll modified by an attribute penalty or bonus and possibly a number of boons and banes. Boons are d6s that are added to the roll; boons are gained from a variety of sources, such as special abilities or favorable circumstances, but you only ever take the highest number rolled among the boon dice. For example, if you make a roll with three boons, you'd roll 3d6 but only add the highest of those three dice to your d20 roll. Banes represent penalties; you subtract the highest bane die from your d20 roll. Boons and banes cancel each other out on a one for one basis; if you make a roll that has three boons and two banes attached to it, you'd make the roll with a single boon.

This core mechanic is clearly similar to D&D's, but in D&D the core resolution mechanic involves rolling a d20 and adding an ability score modifier and a proficiency modifier. In SotDL's system, boons are obviously taking the place of a proficiency bonus that scales as you gain levels. Even with this difference, however, they arrive at similar results because the more boons you roll with, the more likely you are to add a higher number, which approximates a rising proficiency bonus that is added to your roll. 

To spell it out more clearly, this is the breakdown of the core mechanic of each game:

• In 5e D&D, mechanical resolution is d20 + attribute mod + a proficiency bonus that ranges from 2-6
• In SotDL, mechanical resolution is d20 + attribute mod + the possibility of boons add an additional 1-6

The similarity is impossible to miss. Where they differ is in the potential for randomness. D&D's proficiency bonus is a static number; you can count on a +2 proficiency modifier to always add +2 to your roll. In contrast, SotDL's mechanic makes things a bit swingier; a single boon is as likely to add +1 to your roll as it is to add +6. Personally, I tend to find SotDL's greater randomness more exciting; in my experience, it leads to bigger moments of triumphs and memorable catastrophes. On the other hand, I could see gamers who prefer consistency preferring D&D's system, even though any d20 roll is bound to have a measure of unpredictability no matter what.

However, one area in which SotDL's core mechanic that diverges from D&D is that boons and banes are also used to in place of D&D's advantage and disadvantage rules. In D&D, when a character has advantage they roll two d20s and take the higher roll; when a character has disadvantage on a roll, they roll two d20s and take the lower. Mathematically, advantage and disadvantage is approximately equal to a +5 or -5 modifier.

In SotDL, situations or abilities that would grant advantage or disadvantage instead add boons or banes to the roll. This means that mathematically the benefit and penalty would be smaller, except that SotDL allows for multiple boons and banes to apply to a roll. In D&D, circumstances that grant advantage or disadvantage cancel each other out, even in cases where you might have multiple sources granting you advantage or disadvantage; for example, if you have two sources granting your character advantage and one giving you disadvantage on a roll, they cancel each other out entirely--you make a straight d20 roll. 

In SotDL, if you have two sources granting you a boon and one penalizing you with a bane, you still make the roll with one boon because banes cancel out boons on a one-to-one basis. This gives more granularity, but also potentially increasing the "handling" time of figuring out how many boons or banes you actually need to include as part of your roll.

An interesting difference between the core mechanics of the games is what you compare your roll against. In D&D, your d20 roll is compared against either the Armor Class of a foe you're trying to hit in combat or a range of possible Difficulty Classes if the roll is an ability check or saving throw. In SotDL, rolls are compared either against an attribute (such as Defense for a melee attack or Intellect for a mind-effecting spell) or against a flat 10 for challenge rolls. (Challenge rolls are most often analogous to "skill checks" or "saving throws.") Instead of adjusting the target number to represent varying difficulty in SotDL, that is instead handled by boons and banes. Ten is an easy target number to remember, so I like that for ease and speed of play. 

Another benefit that isn't readily apparent in the way SotDL does things is that there is no Difficulty Class that scales out of reach as characters face ever more deadly foes. 5e D&D has a problem with this at higher levels, particularly in regards to saving throws. Because only two of a characters six saving throws tend to increase as they gain levels and the saving throw DCs of their enemies increase similarly, saving throw DCs eventually reach a place where characters are unlikely to make successful saving throws against baleful effects. For example, a high level fighter can easily be locked down by an ancient dragon's fear effect, which runs contrary to the fantasy of being a dragon-slaying warrior of renown. Although powerful foes in SotDL might have abilities that are resisted with a bane or two, the roll needed to resist those abilities remains 10 or higher, which feels like the characters at least have a shot at survival even against horrific monsters.

Next up: D&D's races vs SotDL's ancestries.

Drearborne House (Part One)

Photo by Alberto Restifo on unsplash.com

This was the first time I've run Shadows of the Demon Lord...and the events that are chronicled within are as best I can remember now that a week or more has passed.

Characters

Arno dwarf priest

Dyer orc warrior

Glazier changeling magician

Events

Arno, Dyer, and Glazier were criminals being transported to a prison island until the cruel hand of fate intervened. For reasons unknown, the ship transporting them was wrecked; they escaped death in the frigid sea and managed to climb onto shore with what meager items they could scavenge from what washed ashore. Then their real problems began as they attempted to head north through the frozen wasteland. They found themselves harried by fey hunters who occasionally attempted to run them down for sport.

Cresting a snow-covered ridge, they surveyed the territory ahead of them and saw two landmarks of note: a ruined tower sitting amidst a forest of skeletal black trees and a building of stone whose chimneys lazily streamed smoke into the cold air. Considering that the latter building appear uncannily out of place given the geography, the group first opted to head to the tower. 

After a day's march to the ruins of the tower, they discovered a few corpses strewn about in front of it. The bodies showed signs of both slashes and blunt force trauma; they appeared to be fairly fresh. The corpses were looted of armor and piled up in the doorway to form a makeshift barricade of the recently departed when the party decided to stay overnight within the tower's shelter. However, during Arno's watch that night, the pile of corpses was disturbed by something outside pulling one of the corpses free and dragging it away into the forest. After finding a better vantage point, Arno was able to determine that the corpse-thief appeared to be a small, humanoid woman whose face was obscured with some sort of chaotic mask.

In the morning, the group set off for the building they had spied from the ridge. As they got closer, the two-story stone building seemed even more strangely placed against the landscape; it was an institutional building and the stone arch before the front door proclaimed the building to be "Drearborne House." 

The party entered the house through a back door. Exploration of the first floor revealed the house to be an orphanage. Glazier changed into a dress found in the headmistress's closet. A torn up and defaced pedagogy manual that recommended corporal punishment and deprivation as learning aids lay open on a desk in the library. A ransacked dormitory with a child's diary--the entries telling the sad tale of bullying that the headmistress refused to believe--posed more questions than answers. 

In the basement, the group discovered shelves full of pickled foods, tools and a workbench, and what appeared to be a hastily dug grave. Dyer was given the task of unearthing the skeletal remains, which appeared to be of a woman. She was given last rites by Arno and reburied.

And strangely, despite encountering no living beings within the house, it appeared to be warm, well kept, and in pristine condition. Just...empty, abandoned.

However, that is not to say that the house was completely unoccupied. The menacing figure of the headmistress, she who had stolen a corpse from the tower the night before, was spotted roaming the hallways, her heavy cane rapping rhythmically against the flooring. Her face was obscured by a mask made of torn paper--the pages from the book of pedagogy they had found in the library--which identified her as the creature who had stolen a corpse from their barricade.

More ominous still was the figure to be seen in the inner courtyard accessible from inside Drearborne House via a locked door that Dyer jimmied open; beneath a dead tree from which hung a noose sat a creature seemingly encased in ice--the body of a small child was trapped within. Approaching the rime-frosted creature caused it to stir from its rest. It extended menacing claws of ice and attacked the group. Things went badly for the group as the creature slashed at them with its claws and they failed to land any decisive blows. They fled to the kitchen, hoping to use embers from the oven to melt its icy armor. And yet they continued to take fearsome wounds from the creature.

Respite only came when Glazier assumed the form of the headmistress, roughly approximating what she had seen in an oil painting previously in Drearborne. It helped, of course, that she was already wearing the headmistress's clothes. Glazier's guise stopped the creature in its tracks. A sepulchral voice proclaimed, "Bring me the headmistress," and then it stalked away back to the courtyard.

To be continued.