Ocean D&D - Test Dive
I was lucky enough to play in the inaugural test of Ocean D&D over on the Gay Beholder Discord. I've been following the development of this game for a while - intelligent sea creatures of the Reef, a proto-society in an endless (as far as anyone knows) ocean, venture from their home out into the great blue unknown in search of food, resources for their community to use, and remnants of the old world. Current classes of sea creature available include: axolotls, amphibians who lack direct offensive capabilities but can manifest strange powers through the nanites infused within their bodies, hermit crabs, armoured warriors of the reef who cannot resist the lure of a grander shell, octopods, very intelligent multi-armed tricksters capable of unleashing a flurry of blows with grasped clam shells, and stomatopods, individualistic and aggressive crustaceans who pack a mighty punch.
Players
Referee - spuk
Mantle-of-Cloud (axolotl) - Me!
Amby (axolotl) - Kirko
Magnifico (hermit crab) - Weird Writer
Creel Crusher (stomatopod) - Arkbrik (absolutely read his summary of the session, it's gold)
Crabraham Lincoln (hermit crab), later Blubbub/Octo-Potato (octopod) - Princess Pizzabones
Events
Inspired by Arkbrik's session recap, I've written this in the style of Mantle-of-Cloud's recollections.
A most fascinating aspect of Reef life, as we have come to understand it, is the myriad languages deployed by its inhabitants. All organisms possessed their singular forms of intra-species communication, and a crude Reef proto-language had developed to allow communication across species boundaries. This is well established in the historical record. We had assumed, until this point, that all histories passed down among the Reef were oral. The underwater environment is hostile to conventional writing media, and the Reef's technological base precluded the ability to carve into rocks.
Our breakthrough came unexpectedly from a routine investigation of the seabed beneath the northern spawning grounds. What we had previously assumed to be a random collection of stones and coral fragments in a sheltered location instead showed themselves part of a larger pattern of carefully stacked and arranged pieces. Through painstaking reconstruction and interpretation with extant Reef histories, we have pieced together fragments of this 'writing' as follows:
I Mantle-of-Cloud, second season, of the Reef. I make algae glows and pull strange metals close. These are gifts of my silver1. I saw great clouds above water when small. I remember. What else lies beyond? We all of us must explore - Crabraham and Magnifico for new shells, Amby for silver that lives beneath our axolotl skins. Creel Crusher desires only violence.
West we go, deeper. Rocky here and sandy. Stupid fish flit above. We find nothing but something find us. Great snail with vibrant shell comes. Creel Crusher knows its strength. Stomatopod eyes see much. Amby swims to it and dances Querying Greeting in the Third Way2. Snail rear up to fearsome size, even hermit crabs wanting fine shells flee before it. Snail is slow, we are safe and rest.
North-east lies sand. North-west goes deeper. South-west is green with kelp. We go to kelp and search. More stupid fish, but great treasure! Strange silver thing wrapped in kelp. Very smooth and straight lines - shines like motes in axolotl skin. Crabs cut at kelp. Very slow. Jellyfish above, coming lower. Their touch is death. I gather ancestral silver into tail. It pulls shiny thing free and we swim away. Treasure melds with flesh and flows within. New knowledge, new gift of silver. I know how to make jets of water. A great prize!
We wrap in kelp and rest. In darkness evil crabs come and threaten. Crabraham and Magnifico warn them, brave crabs tell them we pass through. Evil crabs want help with great shell - food inside but no crab returns. Agree, but evil crabs must fight with us. They return with sun and we go south-east to great shell in more kelp.
Shell very great. Shiny thing inside and much meat. Crabraham and Magnifico lift rock to stop shell closing. Rock falls away, shell closes. Crabs brave but clumsy. Evil crabs angry. I dig under great shell and find meat fixed to rock. Evil crabs very hungry and take meat with violence. Great shell falls over. I and Amby jet away, Creel Crusher and Magnifico escape quickly. Many evil crabs crushed by shell, Crabraham too3. Shell opens wide and evil crabs enter with violence and hunger. Magnifico and Creel Crusher join them and take shiny pearl. Great shell is slain and we gather meat. Octopod from Reef - Blubbub - devours Crabraham remains and joins us. All food important but I mourn Crabraham. My fault? Helical Circulation of Grief.
We leave evil crabs and go north-west - back to Reef. Sand flats ahead with spiky starfish. We avoid and arrive home. Great feast for all! Dragonets and nudibranchs eat well to be strong. We admire all beauty, but theirs most. Great shiny pearl reminds us of beauty beyond Reef.
We rest and go north-west to sand flats. Evil cuttlefish attack to eat crab and shrimp. Strange patterns - powers not from silver? Amby and Creel Crusher do not move. Magnifico takes Creel Crusher and scuttles. Blubbub makes ink and takes I and Amby. Octopod arms strange but strong. Comforting. I jet water to bring us to friends. Cuttlefish pursue us. Creel Crusher strikes one with mighty claw. So loud! Such violence! Cuttlefish floats still. Magnifico and Blubbub kill other cuttlefish. We kill floating cuttlefish and take both back to Reef. Dragonets and nudibranchs must feed. Offer one cuttlefish to Great Moray. Guardian must be appeased.
Creel Crusher grows stronger. I feel stronger but not so much as Creel Crusher. Reef is well. All is good.
Thoughts
This was a great session! The other players were excellent and spuk's Refereeing kept things going at a good pace - we ended up travelling through around 7 hexes and explored 2 of them fully in roughly 90 minutes of play. For a work in progress I didn't notice any obvious holes in the rules - the benefit of a simple OD&D chassis.
spuk's enthusiasm for the setting was infectious - every sea creature was introduced with a picture in the chat sidebar and his descriptions painted beautiful and vivid scenes. I'd almost have preferred the descriptions without images - we were drifting through a dreamlike place of pressure, sound, and attenuated light and I think having the images imparted too many 'straight lines' to my thinking. Going off description alone is fuzzier and plays into seeing the world through another creature's senses - it would fit the overall vibe a bit better, I think.
I've not played in a game where three-dimensional space mattered so much - most characters being able to effectively 'fly' some distance opened up some interesting interactions from the off. Similarly, the almost total lack of equipment and the fact that pretty much everything we encountered was at least twice our size really calcified the difference between classes - the axolotls were almost pure utility characters, the crabs and stomatopod were cemented in the front-line, and the octopod was unique in being literally super-flexible (turns out having 8 semi-autonomous arms is a power in and of itself). Initially I felt a bit useless in combat as axolotls have no innate way to fight, but leaving things to the harder-shelled party members and dipping in and out with nanite powers was really fun. It definitely nailed the aspect of wild creatures only fighting each other either when the stakes are super high or when they have a huge advantage.
Inventory management was distilled down to the bones: hermit crabs could store a few things in their shells but the other creatures had their hands/claws to carry things and that was it. If you wanted to carry something, it had better matter. It was quite freeing and I think fit the theme of the Reef being a proto-society without any focus on commodities - fuck silver, we need food and useful things to help us build this place up. Pearls are an exception because everyone loves looking at a shiny pearl.
I'm really intrigued to see where this goes. This was my first game on the server and it was nice to put some faces to names. I'm looking forward to playing more!