A Rasp of Sand neverender - gameplay report
A Rasp of Sand - how did it play?
Background to the Background
I decided I want to write some more and why not to do it by sharing my opinions on games I played? I am terrible judge when it comes to adventures on paper but once experienced it feels right to share it.
Background
We started our campaign in between bigger thing. Our GM decided to put it on Knave 1e as a just-another-generic-OSR-system-for-free (but adventure is also made for it). I must admit we're not necessarily OSR group currently - we did play in various systems and adventures but most of us didn't like most of them -> Mork Borg was a total flop, LotFP too, after one adventure we never touched either of them again. We played another short OSR adventure also in Knave. I'm not that keen on the system but you gotta do what you gotta do. So yeah, our track record of OSR games is bumpy at best.
A Rasp of Sand is very specific adventure. The kind that I'm not most fond of, where you are "locked" in a dungeon and cannot escape it. Okay, it's not strictly that - when someone dies in a dungeon then everyone else gets out. But then a whole generation passes and you don't roleplay that much before jumping into the dungeon again. That is basically whole roguelike loop of the game - get into dungeon, achieve as much as you can, someone dies and you get out with some loot. I was very surprised that it actually works. Well, you need to be ready that it is generation-grinder dungeon crawl, like an arcade game.
Basic premise is that your ancestors stole stuff from Deep Queen, she flooded the world and you try to get her crown back so your people don't die. World doesn't flood more because dying in a dungeon is enough of sacrifice for her to stop it for some time. Roll a character, choose your class and step into underwater dungeon.
Things that work but not
If you choose the same class as your ancestor you get better abilities with it. Which on one hand is fun, as you unlock more stuff as you play, on the other it locks you in one class because choosing another one would make you start with less abilities. I get it is the way to make people decide what is more useful for their runs and playstyle but it adds to the slowness of the game. Also it doesn't really allow you to further your agenda in the dungeon, like there are rules that let Academic learn the languages of dungeon dwellers but there are no rules that let you retain them. Our GM told us he'd allow it which would be really good if we weren't stuck with other classes.
Another thing is the Vault. If you make it out alive from the dungeon - meaning someone of your peers died instead of you - you keep your gear in the Vault and next generation can take one object from there. It is fun as it let's you keep most valuable stuff - like spell pearls, heavier armour, better weapons - for next runs and force you to decide what to take (and risk losing). On the other hand you don't really know what is going to happen in the dungeon as it is randomly generated so it is kinda random and decisions aren't informed much. There are obvious takes if you have good spell or item and the rest just gathers dust.
Every time you get inside it is different. GM rolls for each room out of the list and random encounter inside it. You might stumble upon a kelp forest with helpful otterfolk or kelp forest with hostile fishfolk and it feels different. But besides the character class and some items in the Vault and one sixth of XP you don't retain anything. You won't know which rooms and encounters will happen to you. The amount of rooms on each floor you need to explore before finding a way down is also randomized.
Dungeon is very replayable - as long as you don't feel bored with whole underwater theme - there is enough rooms with things and enough creatures you meet that it's not bad. But it certainly lacks the element of CRPG roguelike games where you get upgrades that stay with you and let you consistently run farther.
Big issue with retaining stuff
Since you retain only 1/6 XP of your previous character you need to gather more than 6000 XP with current character so that your next one will start at level 2. Which is hilariously a lot, we barely made it once to third level. I can potentially see that if all players give all the looted sand (XP) to one player you could potentially have that much but still it's not sustainable as the next character will be only second level.
There is this mechanic that if you have high stats your next character has a chance to have them higher but it's all random and you'd probably focus on developing one stat. When we played my Smuggler at one point had Charisma on 15 and our Warrior had 15 in Strength and we did that but my next Smuggler rolled Charisma on 12 even with this better stuff. It was nice chasing the prize but losing it was a bummer.
As for losing the non-fun stuff was... losing. At some point we got our vaults full of stuff, our classes were on 3rd of 4th rank, Smuggler had bonus to Charisma, Warror got bonus to Strength, we were on our way to maybe get out of the first floor for the first time and... in third room of this run one unlucky hit from a distance killed our Magician, I lost my bonus to Charisma, no progress achieved.
Starting at first level each time with all characters was tiring. We were constantly on the verge of dying, one unlucky hit from weakest enemy's weakest weapon was enough to put down at least one of us and then you do all of it again. I get that it is the OSR way but part of it is also growing out of being the weakest shit on the block. And with regular OSR rules you don't lose 5/6 of your XP every time another party member dies.
Like I said not having any means of communication with inhabitants caused us to regularly get into small fights, we didn't get much of dealing with warring factions, and even if the languages Academic learns would pass down with generations you need to stay alive for two rests after encountering it to be able to speak it. And if you don't know one used in lower levels you would need to bring Academic once again, encounter the language and rest twice and it feels like a lot of work to get ready for the late game of the dungeon. Do you keep one person constantly as an Academic in hopes you'll always be ready to encounter another language or do you switch it and hope bottom dwellers don't eat you?
Constant feeling of being unprepared even on seventh generation was a bummer too. We were on our best game, I had two one-off spells ready (magical slugs in jars), our Priest (who used to be Magician) had a spellpearl (cast once per rest) allowing us to freely fly in one room and our Warrior fought back his bonus to Strength and got some bonuses from mutations. I'm not sure what we could do to be better prepared at this or any point. Maybe if we got some legendary treasure and knew all languages?
We delved again and only by sheer luck we encountered a chasm in one room and GM let us use the spell to safely get to the bottom of the chasm. Which happened to be three floors deeper. We didn't even breach to second floor during all this time so it was totally new territory from first floor to fourth. We became crazy cautious and paranoid not to ruin it there was a lot of fleeing enemies and hiding. Somehow we made it to the elevator to the last (fifth) floor of the dungeon. We fought some, we traded some (thanks to language barrier our Priest sold his super spell for some junk spell that gave +2 to AC, ugh), we scraped the metaphorical and literal bottom, no rations, on our last torch that would last for another three rooms, everybody on 3rd level but HPs below 10. And then we encountered dolphinfolk who were screaming telepathically and we didn't pass our saves and Priest died. GM ruled that we survived, we gave the Queen her crown, the END.
Fun Stuffs though
I really liked the theme. And with locations, encounters and situations the rooms seemed different even after we bumped into a group of venomous fishfolk sitting on kelp for Xth time. There was a situation with fountain of special water that we took to the bucket and used cleverly in the Trench. Situations we ended up were sometimes very fun, like on time we ran away from fishfolk, stumbled upon a crab that traded with us and we sold our net for something else and then came one otterfolk, looked at us curiously, bought the net from the crab and went their own way to the fishfolk room (hunting for fishfolk?).
The vibe is distinct and consistent, I bumped info other fantasy underwater settings and I had mixed feelings but this one keeps it's tone, the floors feel different and are full of surprises. Our GM struggled a little with descriptions, I think mostly due to the need to translate from English but I cannot gave my opinion on how easy or hard the book makes running it.
I liked the creatures and the otherness, that spells were in pearls and instead of scrolls there were slugs, I liked the easily identifiable conflicts between otterfolk and fishfolk, the marine stuff. Mutations were fun, you keep them between generations and are based on creature you eat, might be fun to use in like pretending to be something else, scaring enemies and other shenanigans.
Even though I whined a lot about game not giving you enough of stuff I still like the arcade feel of it. You don't delve and go back to town to deal with BS as with regular game. I mean it is fun too but it's also complicated, and this dungeon is not. I was really surprised how well this razor focus on dungeon delving worked, our GM even made some actions to encourage roleplay in the village between delves but we just didn't catch it and went straight into the puzzle that is the dungeon.
Conclusion
I'm so sorry that it didn't stick better. I think it is the case of replayability - if you give the players too good tools for the job they could potentially speedrun it. On the other hand if not our GMs intervention I think we'd abandon the game if we had to try another delve. It's all fun but at some point you understand you won't get better advantage over this dungeon, you'll still start at first level with mostly random gear and would need to claw your way through EVERY TIME. Your knowledge won't give you much advantage, neither your gear, class or XP. I think we could realistically never finish this dungeon. It can be potentially neverender, with limited food and light and low HP and the fact that dungeon needs only one person down to make you repeat it makes it so easy to slip and start again.
Next Time?
If I was playing/running it next time I would definitely change some rules to make the game easier with more runs. Maybe to retain more XP between generations or let characters take ALL the gear from previous generations so with each successive run you get better and better equipment until you just change gear for comfort?
Rating?
Fuck ratings X out of 10, it's bullshit that doesn't say anything. One person gives 5 to movies that are mid, another gives 7, who fucking need 10 grades of this shit or even more if some people get grainy enought to give 8,5 or 6,5 ratings. It is utter fuckshit (not enough cursewords in English, I rate this language 2/10 stars) and you can quote me on that.
In ratings there are like four states maximum. Let's call it Three Donuts scale.
Best is Three Donuts - I would recomend it with all my heart, would play it again on the spot.
Next one is Two Donuts - solid stuff, would play again.
Another is One Donut - it is something but it has flaws, not really recommending and won't play again.
And last one is No Donut - it is so bad it doesn't even deserve a rating. 0 out any number you can think of, potentially even those you can't.
Final Verdict
And on this scale A Rasp of Sand lands on Two Donuts - I had fun, it is a solid product, I would play again but I would make certain adjustments to make it play better for me.
https://dastardlydave.itch.io/a-rasp-of-sand
Next in line I plan some posts about enemies in games, how could Giant Spiders or flying enemies work just as I did with Slime Moulds. I still think about this one Pointcrawl post that shook me and I want to address it. And of course Blog Carnival, I'm gonna do me running Blades in the Dark restrospective.