Advanced Dungeons & Dragons using Warhammer 40K rules, part one.

On the plane from Denmark home I had a bunch of ideas, some about Star Trap Dungeon and quests which I’ll talk about another time. One was around using my many fantasy miniatures in wargaming. While I have some old TSR books on D&D wargaming I seem to remember not liking them much. Since I’m most familiar with Warhammer 40K rules, and I know my wargamer friends seem rather down on fantasy Warhammer I thought I’d have a go at converting the D&D universe to 40K. This isn’t meant to be statistically correct by any means, but is more about the flavour of the creatures.

Baseline.

Human guards Average intelligence, Neutral alignment, AC 5, HD 1, D/A 1-6.

Ws Bs S T W I A Ld S

3 3 3 3 1 3 1 6 5+

Close combat weapon, shield, chainmail.

Ok, that’s simple. Dungeons & Dragons is less descriptive about combat than W40K. This means that most creatures combat prowess are defined by their hit dice, and there is no such things as a high strength, low weapon skill combatant. That’s a little problematic has 40K’s scale is all about d6. So you have to split hit dice into weapon skill and strength.

So lets look at weapon skill like this.

2+(lvl/2 : rounded down). That gives HD 1-1 critters Ws 2, orcs Ws 1, ogres Ws 4, trolls Ws 5, medium red dragons Ws 7. Seems good.

Ballistic can be the same, so that’s easy.

Strength is a tough one. Again, it’s a mixture of Hit Dice, but also damage.

2+(lvl/3 : rounded up + 1 for maximum damage over 10 pts). That means any creature that’s total attacks do over 10 points adds one.

Giant rats S 2, orcs S 3, ogres S 4, trolls S 5, red dragon S 6.

Toughness is a mixture of hit points and armour. For armour in the normal range (10-0) should be dealt with using the Sv attribute, but below this it starts adding to Toughness.

2+(lvl/3 : rounded up + every two points below AC 0, rounded up) e.g. AC-1 is +1, AC -3 is +2.

Giant rats T 2, orcs T 3, ogres T3, trolls T 4, red dragon T 6.

Initiative. Dungeons and Dragons has almost no sense of initiative bonus when monsters are concerned. Therefore we’ll have to take what limited information we have. Characters are easier, but I’ll deal with them later. So bugbears surprise on 1-3. Sounds like they are sneaky, so let’s give them a +1. Zombies are slow, so let’s make them I 1. Elves gain a +1 bonus to their Dex, so let’s include that, making them I 4.

Attacks are thankfully simple. Each attack counts as +1. Orcs A 1, trolls A 3.
Wounds are HD / 2 rounded up. Giant rats 1, orcs 1, ogres 2, trolls 3, red dragons 5.

Leadership is complex in Advanced Dungeons and Dragons (it’s easier in B/X D&D) as monster have no morale. Hit dice and intelligence is a good indication, but also alignment. Of course some creatures are fearless, such as undead and slimes.

Ld 6 + (HD / 3 rounded down). -1 for low or below intelligence, +1 for highly or more. -1 for chaotic alignment, +1 for lawful.

Giant rat ld 5, orc ld 7, ogre ld 6, troll ld 6, medium red dragon ld 9

Armour saves. As seen before, very good armour class improves toughness. However normal ranges are converted like so.

AC 0 AC 1-2 AC 3-4 AC 5-7 AC 8-9

2+ 3+ 4+ 5+ 6+

So that rounds off the basics. The fun stuff comes next, spells, characters and special effects to make the game more fun.