Taking a DMing break my cohort DM 10pin is at bat running the latest.
Its DCC crossed with steam punk and magic plus a bit of monsters and horror. Alternate history durring early civil war some cultists unleashed Cthulu and the elder gods on the world. All of humanity teamed up to fight off the monsters. (us vs them)
The world is as such....
And plays a lot like this below.
Any of you gentle readers should be asking, where is the rant?
Well its short and sweet: DCC funnels are THE WORST. They play like an rpg version of Betrayal at the house on the hill. Which is a fun game but in an rpg? No Bueno.
The funnel breaks immersion, is gratuitous violence and player death only for the reason of a body count. I know the DCC designer believes the body reminds the deadliness of the game, but it doesn't. People know know dungeon crawling is dangerous! killing 1/2 to 3/4 of the starting characters is only fun in a gory macabre orgy of death sort of way.
The role players don't attach to their characters, The power games try to safe guard the guys with good stats and some attempt to kill all of their funnel characters for fun.
It took 2 sessions the run the funnel: 2 sessions where NO ONE played the character they wanted to play. (who enjoys playing a zero level nobody with 1 to 4 hps?) No class, no skills, no abilities, just a herd of meat for the grinder.
The funnel adventures can be quite good, so i tweak them and run them as level 1 adventures.
I have ran 1 funnel and played in 1, i will not be doing another in either capacity. If you want a good game opener look to Lankhmar: the "Meet" is a glorious concept. It starts the adventure with minimal back story and then drops you in "Medias res".
Much more fun, cut to the chase and start strong, work it out as you go.
The funnel, needs to die and stay dead.
