[Adventures in Fantasy] Book of Adventure Pt. 4

After a short break from posting about AiF, the madness continues..

My AiF posts have covered only half of the Book of Adventure so far.  This post will cover the remaining chapters of the book.

Underworld Encounters "Beyond the Dragon's Lair"
The title refers to the Dragon's Lair in the Setting up the Campaign chapter covered in my last post.  The Dragon's Lair is used as an example of how to set up an adventure.  This chapter explains how the GM designs additional underground areas for the players to explore after the Dragon's Lair.  There is a chart that will aid the GM by listing some of the more common underground creatures and the chance of the characters encountering them depending on the level of the underground they are typically located on.

Outdoor Encounters
This chapter is basically the outdoor equivalent to the previous chapter.  There are also various charts included in this chapter for the GM to reference.  Some of the charts included are outdoor encounter chance, outdoor evasion, terrain effects of types of soldiers (mounted, foot, mixed), and also a creature by terrain type chart for easy reference.  Some of the rules covered in this chapter include determining hostility of encountered groups, the procedure for asking for assistance or information, searching and foraging, and tactical or strategic movement in the game among others.

Bleakwood
This chapter shows a sample village with nearby possibilities for adventure.  There is some good advice about the rationale of encounters for the GM.  This is one area where I wish the player and GM information was separated into completely separate books but most people can separate player knowledge from character knowledge so it isn't a major deal.

The Combat Matrix in the Basic Game
This chapter explains the combat procedure used in AiF; there is a promise of further details in later supplements that will expand the combat options in the game.  A few points of interest for the combat procedure include comparing body types of combatants (human, snake, lion, bird, reptile, scales), an absolute minimum chance to hit of 2% (regardless of bonuses or penalties), and an absolute maximum chance to hit of 98%.  Optional rules in this section include hit locations, armor saving throw, and hit modifiers due to terrain areas.

How to Gain Experience
This final chapter of the Book of Adventure covers experience gain and how to improve your character.  If  it wasn't clear before, it becomes apparent when reading this chapter that there are only 2 character types or classes in AiF: Warrior and Magic-User.  This is made clear when the method for experience is shown to be different for both of the classes.  A warrior gains experience by defeating opponents in battle and a magic-user gains experience by using spells and defeating other magicians.  Character Levels are part of the game but not in the traditional D&D sense.  Other rules in this area include gaining a reputation, increasing social rank, and hirelings.

That completes my examination of the Book of Adventure and I will continue on my tour of AiF in my next post....