I and my friends belong to an excellent Discord server where we all try out different tabletop RPGs. We’re all GMs who have mostly (or only) played 5e, but this year I’ve played 12 different systems!

Most of these games I played in one or two sessions, but I am 18 sessions into running a game of Dolmenwood with a devoted group of players. Most of us agree it is the best game we have ever played. Someone suggested to me I write a blog about the transition from 5e to Dolmenwood. So here it is.

TL;DR the transition for our group was worth it, but difficult. There are some points of friction, and some new rules that I love. I have grown as a GM and my players report the same thing. For me, I’ve learned why 5e doesn’t handle the exploration pillar so well and I definitely have a new way to play 5e as well.

The main points of friction for a 5e group, in my opinion, are resolution mechanics, combat, detailed turn tracking, detailed inventory tracking, the emergent playstyle, the different community and the lack of automation.

The main things that we really like are: the richness of the world (I am unable to really give you a sense of this, but it’s amazing), active player roles, the robust exploration rules, the robust dungeon crawling rules, random encounters that work, the use of retainers and animals as party members, the food and drink and smokable, which contain lots of small “rule-ettes”, the fantastic spells and the wonderful monsters.

Let me say a bit more below on each of these points.

Friction points

• Resolution mechanics:
  • There are no d20 ability or skill rolls, and no DCs. The players either do something by cleverly describing it, or you judge that their plan is not so clever and open to the whims of chance, in which case you pick up a d6 and roll. Bad plan, 1-in-6 chance. OK plan, 3-in-6. Good plan, 4-in-6.
  • Some characters do have skills where untrained people would just fail — like thieves can pickpocket, and bards know about monsters. These you roll on a d6, versus a target that varies by character. (I personally hate that this isn’t a d20 roll, there’s some math explanation but it’s very annoying). Ability checks are D6 as well, versus a target of 4. There are bonuses. I still haven’t got this part down pat.
• The Combat. Is. So. Different.
  • Surprise: 2-in-6 for both sides. Just right off the bat. Every combat.
  • Side initiative: roll each round. Then everyone 1) moves their tokens, 2) casts their spells and takes their shots, and 3) wallops on the enemy. Then it’s the other side’s turn. Fun on a VTT because you can all move at once. Combat is a nice normal D20+bonus and roll over your armour class. Everyone rolls at once! No more waiting a long time for your turn! One action each!
  • Morale: monsters might run away! This is great fun.
  • Combat is freaking dangerous! Clever players avoid it when possible.
• Turn tracking. Didn’t expect that or know what to do with it. Now I make rows of boxes on my prep notes. Adding time to the dungeon crawls is outstanding, and essential.
• The playstyle is emergent. I love it, but it’s really different than what I was used to from 5e. There is no “this happens first, then this” there’s just “here’s this location” and “here’s these random encounters” and “here are some potential objectives or make your own” — go forth!
• The community is really different. I didn’t fully appreciate that I would have to learn many new terms and sources. It’s been a fun voyage of discovery, but… yeah, wasn’t expecting that. Where do you find adventures? has a whole different set of answers than for 5e.
• The automation isn’t there. No D&D Beyond. This is a more manual game. I use Owlbear Rodeo for our VTT (we play online) and we have some shared Google sheets.
• Inventory tracking. Essential in my opinion to the robust mechanics but without automation it is a LOT to get right when you first begin.

Awesome things!

• Player roles! My players take active roles in every session
  • Caller — like my co-DM, organises the combat and makes the party work together
  • Cartographer — draws the maps of our dungeons. You heard me right, I describe and they draw. So much more engaging!
  • Chronicler — takes all the session notes and maintains the archive (or in our case a wildly comprehensive website of awesomeness)
  • Quartermaster — handles all the inventory and all the shopping lists
  • Maestro — handles the session music
• Retainers, mules, dogs — a DW party is assumed to be 6 characters, but they don’t have to be player characters. We are currently a part of five players, two retainers, three dogs and a giant toad devoted to our elf ranger. I love all these extra characters.
• Slot-based inventory. This has lots of positive consequences, and although it’s a pain to set up, it forces the players to make choices and my players like it. These work well with the travel and camping rules. Optimisation happens of the inventory, not of the character sheet, and it’s fun for us all.
• A fantastic range of tiny little “rule-ettes” for the vast array of pipe leaf, wine, herbs, mushrooms, other comestibles, dogs, mules, etc etc etc. Nearly everything has its effect and the effect is to stimulate exploration and interaction with the world. Wonderful.
• THE SPELLS. You will remove the colorful spells over my dead body.
• THE MONSTERS. Are so good. And so easy.
• Random encounters that work! Oh, I am a big, big, convert to random encounters now.

Ordering

Also: to answer your questions, no, the books aren’t out in hardback form yet, but yes, you can preorder them and yes, you can take delivery of the final PDFs now and yes, you can just order PDFs.

Using another system

There’s a big thread on the Shadowdark Discord about converting DW for play in Shadowdark; others have discussed even converting it to 5e! The world is so awesome, goes the thinking, but it seems hard to learn the system.

Of the two, Shadowdark is a better choice in my opinion, and we thought of converting, and even started a conversion, but as we’ve grown more used to the system, our group has decided that we like the Dolmenwood system (a variant of OSE, which is a variant of D&D Basic from 1981), because it is really rich, while Shadowdark focuses on quickness and easy of play. YMMV. Shadowdark contains the lack of skills and dungeon turns but retains a d20 resolution mechanic and individual (though simplified) initiative, and the monsters would work. But it doesn’t have all the little rules and things that kind of make Dolmenwood what it is. And… you have to use the Dolmenwood Player’s Book anyway for all the cool player races and spells and legends of the saints.

ETA: I’ve since written a compressed version of the rules that I call Bixie, and some other resources that you can use like cheat sheets and have put them in this post: Dolmenwood resources for you. Enjoy!