My First Foray into Labyrinth Lord

Let me just say one thing. I am a huge Dungeons and Dragons fan. I love old school Dungeons and Dragons, Advanced, 3.x, even 4th edition is fun, though it's a very different game. I love being a player and DM. As a player, I'll go under any edition. But as a DM, I have to keep static which edition I use if I have the same players or running a campaign. I can't run 3.x one day, 1e the next session. With 3.x, and even first edition, I have trouble keeping my players interested due to the complicated character sheets and generation. Fourth edition is easier, but it's a different game. Therefore, I decided to traverse back into B/X D&D with Labyrinth Lord. This post is a little retrospect on Sunday's session.

This Sunday there were only two players, both fighters, roleplaying AD&D classes. One player was a barbarian from the south, Warrior Prince Bast of the Icewalker Tribe, seeking military aid for fighting off the invading Bloodfire Berserkers. The other player was Nokura, Bladefighter of Tellamina, a paladin seeking a sacred jewel called the Kokiri Emerald. (Yes, like in Zelda.) They both arrived by boat in the town of Freehold, a port town outside a prosperous city-state, Lidius, on the same day. They met with each other and also with a mercenary, Gunthorian, the character of an absent player. Gunthorian delivers shipments of ale and spider silk from Freehold to Lidius every so many weeks, and works as a mercenary in his offtime. He needed a little extra muscle because of a bandit threat, so Bast and Nokura rode the caravan with him for the path through a forest to Lidius.

During the travel, the PCs took a rest at a lake and were attacked by bandits. Bast rolled a 20 the first roll of the game and decapitated a bandit, causing the others to flee, but not before they had a chance to kidnap Gunthor. Gunthor was injured so the PCs followed a trail of blood through the forest to the bandit cave and managed to rescue Gunthor from a horde of bandits, before the powerful leaders arrived, and escaped with their lives, but not much health.

After arriving at Lidius, the PCs met with a historian, Aran, the town sage. He agreed to tell Nokura the location of the Kokiri Emerald according to legend and get Bast an audience with the king if they investigated the castle of Tyras, a former lord raised as a lich that's a threat to Lidius. The PCs rested for a bit in the town and went to his castle. After arriving, they found out it was taken over by orcs. They snuck into the castle, dressed in orc skin, and the game ended there.

All in all, it was a short but fun game. There were two near-deaths, but both were avoided by luck of the dice. It was a fast game, with twice as much being accomplished during the game as would have been during 3.x. It was much simpler and more reliant on role-playing. We didn't run into any obstacles. I'll update next week after the next session.