Keep on the Borderland and no healing...?

I've basically been running B/X KotBorderlands and how is the group supposed to heal?

Like the Keep doesn't sale potions or scrolls.

Today they went and had a big fight. Went back to the keep. Healed. Went back and had another fight. Went back and healed. They lost 2 party members. Though to be fair one got crit and died the other went toe to toe with a Hobgoblin Chief alone.

Even with a Cleric that can cast 1 heal a day is nice but not enough.

I've relented and said the local priests have scrolls and potions for sale but cost about 35-50 GP a piece and only have a couple each day. Though i need to research this cost.

Like I get level 1 is rough but 1 fight then back to the keep rinse and repeat is kind of lame. But I also don't want to make healing to easy.

Any advice? Just stick to 50gp healing potions?

Use your best judgment on healing potions and scrolls.
Quick check -- are you using morale rules and reaction checks? IMO, the module is purposely designed to be a real slog if the PCs just go out and resolve all problems by violence to extinction. Instead, they are supposed to make (short lived) alliances with humanoid group A to go out and mutually beat into submission/drive off group B, and so forth.

Willie the Duck said:

Use your best judgment on healing potions and scrolls.
Quick check -- are you using morale rules and reaction checks? IMO, the module is purposely designed to be a real slog if the PCs just go out and resolve all problems by violence to extinction. Instead, they are supposed to make (short lived) alliances with humanoid group A to go out and mutually beat into submission/drive off group B, and so forth.

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Diplomacy isn't their strong suit. Plus it doesn't help that they can be randomly attacked by goblins or hobgoblins assault anyone who comes through a door etc.

DarkCrisis said:

I've basically been running B/X KotBorderlands and how is the group supposed to heal?

Like the Keep doesn't sale potions or scrolls.

Today they went and had a big fight. Went back to the keep. Healed. Went back and had another fight. Went back and healed. They lost 2 party members. Though to be fair one got crit and died the other went toe to toe with a Hobgoblin Chief alone.

Even with a Cleric that can cast 1 heal a day is nice but not enough.

I've relented and said the local priests have scrolls and potions for sale but cost about 35-50 GP a piece and only have a couple each day. Though i need to research this cost.

Like I get level 1 is rough but 1 fight then back to the keep rinse and repeat is kind of lame. But I also don't want to make healing to easy.

Any advice? Just stick to 50gp healing potions?

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Get used to high loses.

IIRC, we started each player with two PC's and finished with like 5 survivors. There may have been more than seven deaths but its been a long time.

Scrolls and potions for that price are steals. You are being overly generous. Charge that much for the local clerics to cast healing spells. A scroll of healing is worth about 300 gp. A potion of healing worth about 400 gp.

1e D&D is supposed to play like a military campaign with a lot of planning and preparation. That said, you are playing one of my least favorite modules because it really is just its a lot of rinse and repeat and one big set piece battle after the other.

Looks like you are playing basic or even 1e. The cleric only has one healing spell and then pull back to heal 1hp/day. Another thing was to hire henchmen to heal you as well and some fighters to die fighting for you.

There's nothing saying that the Keep doesn't have potions and scrolls for sale. The first session of my most recent run of that adventure had the PCs going into crypts below the Keep to find a fungus that only grew on corpses so Keep clerics could make healing potions with it.

Celebrim said:

1e D&D is supposed to play like a military campaign with a lot of planning and preparation.

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• This - KotB is a military campaign; afterall youre based in a Military Fortress and the Caves are occupied by bands of squabbling monsters (are they mercenaries being gathered into a horde?)
• Remember the very first page has DM advice about providing the services of several men-at-arms, NPC advisers and giving the party at least one potion of healing - these are important!
• also clearing out every monster from every cave* is NOT the point of the module
• and dont forget the side quests (no reason why the other caves cant have lots of healing potions). *Theres also no reason why you cant move lairs to elsewhere on the map, so maybe the Gnolls are lurking around south of the Fens rather than in the caves)
• better to treat the module as a mini setting, use the Tribal Alliances and Warfare advice to generate factions with competing goals that PCs can interact with, then have everything be a bit more dynamic than "visit cave C - kill the monsters - withdraw - rest and repeat"

DarkCrisis said:

Any advice? Just stick to 50gp healing potions?

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I'd let the game play out as written. You're using OSE Advanced, right? They get 1d3 hp per full day of rest. Unless a fighter rolled max hp, that's no more than 8 days (all nat 1s) to fully heal. They can and should use that down time to plan their next assault on the caves. And there's always the time jump. "A week goes by and you're fully healed..."

As mentioned, the earliest editions all play out like proper military campaigns, complete with logistics and planning. It's combat as war. Lots of uses of oil and fire for Molotov cocktails. Hiring retainers. Buying war dogs. Burning plant matter to smoke out the monsters. Interacting with the environment. Using faction play to turn sets of monsters against each other. That's what Charisma and reaction tables are for. Not every encounter is a fight. Literally anything and everything to give themselves as many advantages as possible before rolling any dice. Combat is lethal and healing is slower than frozen molasses.

If they're simply charging in without a plan, without stacking the odds in their favor, then it should be an incredibly harsh and unforgiving experience.

If that's not the style you're going for, it's a fairly easy fix. As you mention, putting in fairly cheap healing scrolls and potions is an option. So is cranking up the natural healing rate. Bumping up the die type healed per day is an option, so is giving bonuses to the healing roll, but so is modern full healing overnight. The great thing about the older editions is they're flexible and easily hacked. As long as it's mostly where you want it, a few tweaks here and there won't throw anything out of whack.

DarkCrisis said:

Today they went and had a big fight. Went back to the keep. Healed. Went back and had another fight. Went back and healed. They lost 2 party members. Though to be fair one got crit and died the other went toe to toe with a Hobgoblin Chief alone.

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Well, crits don't exist for just this reason, and going solo against a boss monster at 1st level is asking to die. Get rid of crits, and don't worry about trying to fix death by stupidity.

Yes, as clerics don't get heals at 1st level, they need to return to the keep to heal slowly over a week or so before returning. That's just how the edition works. There's no fix to the "no healing is lame" issue you have without house rules or switching to another game system. The slow healing isn't really an issue in the module, though, since there's no timeline. A week between forays is no big deal, they could leave for months and the module doesn't penalize them.

Mark Hope said:

There's nothing saying that the Keep doesn't have potions and scrolls for sale. The first session of my most recent run of that adventure had the PCs going into crypts below the Keep to find a fungus that only grew on corpses so Keep clerics could make healing potions with it.

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Exactly. You can expand the scope of the module quite easily here. The PCs want scrolls and potions but the Keep doesn't have any, great. Along with the above, the bandits in the woods might...the hermit in the woods might...the lizardfolk in the swamp might.