SoogaGames

Dungeon Design by Hangout

2011-12-14T21:37:00.006Z

Tonight me and a few others attempted a world first (as far as I'm aware). We used Google Hangouts to build a dungeon.

Seven of us contributed at various points throughout the 90 minutes. The product of which can be seen in this map and the accompanying document.

Big thanks to Jez Gordon for suggesting we use his DungeonFu template. It proved incredibly useful.

My personal highlights that I saw other people add are:

A Pterodactyl cave.
The scene of a theological debate between pixies, frogs and clams.
A HUGE table of random smells, sounds and other weird stuff.
Acid traps and humming mushrooms, just to remind you that this is probably for D&D.

Some observations of this method of dungeon design:

People seemed very happy to get imaginative! We didn't end up with orcs guarding chests.
There was less messing with other people's ideas than I expected. It's good because people got to flesh out rooms by themselves but I'd have loved to see a bit more collaboration.
We made a deadly dungeon.

Thanks to Nadav Ben Dov, Kyrinn S. Eiss, Barry Blatt, Joshua Macy, James Paese and David Reichgeld for contributing (let me know if I missed you off!).

For the rest of you, let me know if you decide to do anything with this dungeon. It's so fresh I haven't even had a chance to look at the whole thing myself yet!

The Covenant of the Terror Lizards

2011-12-11T15:29:00.012Z

The Red Scaled Man

STR 10 (+0), DEX 13 (+3), INT 8 (-2), WIL 13 (+3), 7HP, Armour 1 (scales).
Roams with his warrior cultists, using his Horned One spell on his followers in times of danger. If an opponent is weakened he will try to use Banish to appease the terror lizards from beyond.

Ceremonial Dagger causes 1d6 damage and is an Arcanum containing Banish and Horned One.
Banish (Power 8): Make a melee attack. If you damage the target they must pass a WIL Save vs your WIL or be banished to an extra-dimensional jungle filled with terror lizards. This leaves a glowing portal that anyone can follow through for the next few minutes.

Horned One (Power 4): One willing ally writhes and twists, taking the form of a Great Horned Lizard. They fight loyally for 1d6+1 rounds before twisting back to their original form, now dead.

Great Horned Lizard

STR 22 (+12), DEX 8 (-2), INT 7 (-3), WIL 4 (-6), 20HP, Armour 1 (scales).

Gores for 1d6+2 damage.

10 Harmless Cultists

STR 8 (-2), DEX 9 (-1), INT 10 (0), WIL 9 (-1), 2HP.

Will not fight, but are willing targets for the scaled man's Horned One spell.

6 Warrior Cultists
STR 12 (+2), DEX 13 (+3), INT 10 (+0), WIL 10 (+0), 5HP, Armour 2.
Heavy Polearms (1d6+1 Damage, hit anyone that misses you with a melee attack), Heavy Armour.

Dressed in exotic armour, their helms can never be removed. Will fight to the death as long as the red scaled man is alive.

Making a Better Mummy

2011-12-01T21:06:00.006Z

When did Mummies become the hard-hitting tanks of the undead? They're presented as slow but super-strong in both D&D and Warhammer.

Seems to me they should be the frail but magically powerful leaders of vast ancient armies. A very specific flavour of lich, really, perhaps awakening after a set number of millennia. Possible future spoilers for anyone playing in my Into the Odd game.

Mummy of Emperor Kthataktha the Giver STR 5 (-5), DEX 1 (-9), INT 10 (0), WIL 22 (+12), 5HP, Armour 3.

Dressed in full ceremonial armour and wielding an ornate spear, the mummified remains of the once great emperor cannot move without help. Indeed, he is never seen off his jade throne, which is carried by twelve brass skeletons, who serve only as an elaborate means of transport.

He speaks in a raspy groan, needing to be translated by one of the few living speakers of his empire's dead tongue. His thoughts are entirely set on regaining his stolen treasures and establishing a new empire.

The emperor can use any Arcana, even those wielded by his enemies, within 30ft as if he were wielding them himself. He is bedecked with jewellery and a foot-high crown. Together these jewels function as an Arcana containing the spells listed below. Only one of the Emperor's bloodline can wield these items. Anyone else that tried is blasted with lightning for 2d6 damage.

Eternal Hunger (Power 10): One target within 20ft must pass a WIL Save vs your WIL. If they fail they lose 2d6 STR and you gain that many HP, even if it takes you above your maximum. These extra HP are lost when you have a full rest.

Death Knell (Power 14): All living creatures within 40ft must pass a STR Save vs your WIL or take 4d6 damage. Even those that pass this spell are deafened until they next have a full rest.

Eyes of the Stars (Power 16): You know the exact location of one object or being you have touched before.

Making a Better Skeleton

2011-11-27T17:15:00.004Z

This should be easy. To me the skeleton has gone from a potentially terrifying concept to the disposable mook of the undead.

It's a magically animated skeleton! By its very nature it's got a degree of supernatural power about it. A zombie still has muscles and sensory organs, but this thing's walking around through some other means. Let that dark magic have a bit more credit than something so easily dispelled by a sword swing.

That's right, skeletons should be a nightmare for fighters to deal with.

As always, this is written with Into the Odd in mind.

Skeletal Minion

The obedient servants of some wielder of dark magic. They shuffle about carrying out the will of their master as if part of his own soul exists within them.

STR 6 (-4), DEX 12 (+3), INT 8 (-2), WIL 12 (+2). Armour 2 (see below), 6HP.

Attacks with a sword for 1d6 damage.

Counts as having Armour 2 only against piercing attacks such as arrows and spears. Swords, axes and hammers ignore this.

When a skeleton would be killed by physical attacks it is smashed into at least two separate pieces. Unless they are kept apart these will reform on the skeleton's next turn, restoring it to full health. Each half will continue to fight but the half without a sword only causes 1d6-1 damage and both halves subtract 4 from their DEX and WIL until they are reformed.

The skeleton ignores any effects that would reduce its STR or INT. If its DEX or WIL are reduced to 0 the magic animating the skeleton is banished and it falls into a pile of bones.

Into the Odd - Example of Play

2011-11-23T19:57:00.002Z

I always struggle with these, so feedback is much appreciated.

Referee: The base of the long staircase leads into a spectacular room, some 30ft high and equally wide. Its walls look like an intricate mosaic but the tiles are constantly shifting in colour. Waves of differing hues wash across the walls and the center of the room is dominated by a six-foot-wide circular shaft leading down.
Ezekiel: (Sketching down the room on his rough map) Are there any exits other than the way we came?
Referee: No, unless you feel like jumping down the shaft.
Toku: Well, this is a dead end. My hunter's instincts were right!
Ezekiel: The walls look strange... I'm being very careful not to touch them.
Toku: Uthred, you should try touching them.
Uthred: Sure, I'm not scared of a wall. I place my hand boldly against the tiles.
Referee: As soon as Uthred's hand touches the wall the shifting colours stop and a pulsing blue pattern starts to radiate from around Uthred's hand.
Ezekiel: Stand by for his head exploding...
Uthred: You worry too much! How do the tiles feel?
Referee: They feel much like you'd expect a smooth mosaic too, but they are giving off a faint warmth.
Uthred: Huh, weird. Well I'll take my hand off the wall and go to check out the shaft.
Referee: As soon as you remove your hand from the wall it starts to shift colours again and you now see the tiled shape of a person, looking almost like your own reflection. Barely a second later the room is filled with a crackling noise and the tiled visage of Uthred somehow steps out of the wall, hefting the axe from its back and taking up a combat stance.
Toku: Right, I'm not giving this thing a chance to pull us into the wall or whatever it's going to try. I leap at it with my daggers.
Referee: Okay, you get two attacks so give me a damage roll of 1d6 for each.
Toku: I rolled a 2 and a 3.
Referee: (Making a DEX Save for each attack against the opponent) the tiled copy of Uthred manages to parry away your first blow but your second dagger finds home. Do you want to Power Attack or take the 3 damage?
Toku: We need to get this thing killed quick, I'll risk the Power Attack!
Referee: (Makes a DEX Save for the opponent against Toku's STR, failing) You're able to pull off the Power Attack, twisting your dagger deep into the strange being's side for 6 damage. Instead of a scream the copy of Uthred roars out in crackling static-noise.
Ezekiel: I'm going to use the Wither spell from that weird glove-arcanum thing we found earlier.
Referee: Right, make a WIL Save against the Spell's Power, which is 10.
Ezekiel: (Rolls his WIL Save and passes) Made it! Next turn that thing's going down. Just don't let it interrupt me!
Referee: Uthred, what do you want to do?
Uthred: I'll grip my axe and do everything I can to keep the thing from interrupting Ezekiel's casting.
Ezekiel: Nice!
Referee: Right. The copy of Uthred drops its axe on the ground and reaches forward to try and grab Toku. Give me a DEX Save to avoid him.
Toku: (Rolls a DEX Save) Erm... I got a 1.
Referee: (Over the groans of the table) The creature grabs Toku and tries to push him against one of the walls. You'll need a STR Save to resist.
Toku: Uh oh, I don't like this. (Rolls a STR Save) Got a total of 12.
Referee: Unfortunately that isn't enough to resist this creature, who seems to match Uthred in physical power. As you slam against the wall you see a blue pulsing pattern form on its surface. A moment later the colours shift into your shape and the copy steps forward from the wall. Over to you guys. Ezekiel, remember you have Wither ready to use at the start of your turn.
Ezekiel: I never thought I'd have to choose between killing Toku and Uthred... I'll stick to the plan and try to touch Uthred's copy with the glove.
Referee: It gets a DEX Save to avoid the touch (Rolls a DEX Save), but it fails! Roll to see how much STR and DEX Uthred's copy will lose.
Ezekiel: (Rolls 4d6 for STR and DEX loss, as dictated by the spell) Seventeen!
Referee: (Checks his notes and sees that this will reduce the creature's STR and DEX well below zero) It's more than enough to drain the life from this thing. The touch of your glove causes the colour to fade from the being before it simply winks out of existence.
Uthred: There’s only room for one Uthred!
Referee: Before you get too excited you should be aware that you’ve really been making quite a lot of noise in this room. (Secretly makes a Luck Roll to see if any nearby monsters have noticed the noise. A roll of 1 indicates something bad should happen, so he rolls on the hostile encounter table he has prepared for this area). Everyone give me INT Saves and see if any of you score 10 or more.
Ezekiel: I don’t like the sound of this.
(Everyone rolls and Toku and Ezekiel pass their saves).
Referee: Toku and Ezekiel notice the sound of something descending the staircase. Remember that weird horse-like creature with skin like super-hard tree bark you were ambushed by last session?
Uthred: Sure, we knocked it down that pit and fled like heroes.
Referee: Well this thing looks almost identical, but rather than being horse-sized it’s large enough to barely be able to squeeze into the staircase. Its jaws look large enough to be able to swallow you whole and its forelegs end in grasping claws spanning some six feet. Needless to say it’s squeezing down the staircase with you in its sights and it doesn’t seem friendly.
Ezekiel: What are our chances of running through its legs?
Referee: It’s pretty tightly packed into the stairway. If you want to try it would certainly require a tough DEX Save.
Toku: Running past it is a stupid plan, we have a perfectly good exit right here!
Uthred: The shaft? Does it look like the creature could fit down there?
Referee: Unlikely, it’s certainly too big to be able to do so easily.
Ezekiel: As suicidal as it sounds it might be our best hope. Can I throw a coin or something into the shaft?
Referee: As you flick a coin down the shaft you head a distant splash a few seconds later.
Toku: Water!
Ezekiel: That’s optimistic... how do we know it isn’t acid or something? I figure we can probably distract this thing long enough to let us flee back up the stairs. Maybe we can work out a way to distract it with Toku's tile-copy.
Referee: While you’re formulating this plan the creature has managed to force itself into the room, brushing against the tiled wall, which sends out blue ripples.
Uthred: Oh crap, this isn’t going to end well.
Ezekiel: Fine! Into the hole!
Toku: Trust me! I’ll even leap it first.
Referee: You’re all leaping down now?
(The group all nod reluctantly)
Referee: You leap into the darkness of the shaft, falling for a few seconds before splashing into what feels like ice cold water, deep enough for you to fall into safely. You’re barely able to get your bearings in the pitch-black pit before you feel a tingling sensation over your bodies. WIL Saves all round!
(Groans fill the table)

Odd Monster for the Day - Darkthing

2011-11-21T22:10:00.004Z

Intended for use with Into the Odd, I present the Darkthing.

Art courtesy of ox3art

Darkthing

STR 14, DEX 10, INT 10, WIL 6, 14HP.

Bear-sized floating creature, cloaked in unnatural black smoke. No visible detail other than fleshy bubbles and lashing tendrils. Wounding it will give a flash of its true form, a pale creature with large eyes resembling a deep-sea fish. They attack without provocation but flee back into the ocean if badly hurt.

Its stinging tendrils cause an intense pain, attacking for 1d6 damage. Anyone that takes damage from them subtracts 5 from all rolls on their next turn as pain spasms strike their body.

The smoke around them fades when they are killed. Their corpses will also contain a thick chain each wears around their body. Trying to pick this up is painful, as they are intensely cold. May be safely picked up with leather or other thick material but over time will cause the material to stiffen and crack. Causes 1d6 damage per ten seconds of exposure to skin. Anyone who is knocked unconscious from this damage becomes a Darkthing themselves.

Tentpole Monsters - Hoarding Vilsna

2011-11-18T17:05:00.006Z

A Tentpole Dungeon can be considered the central location of a campaign, by which all other locations are considered secondary. As such a campaign will contain a many locations, one of which is the tentpole.

These locations will contain many monsters and NPCs, but will often contain one that is intended to be the focal point. Their influence can be seen everywhere from the workings of creatures and factions to the architecture and treasures found within the location.

Over the next few posts I want to create some monsters and NPCs that could act as a tentpole for a location, "propping up" the whole place.

These will be written for Into the Odd but could be easily modified for your flavour of fantasy RPG.

Vilsna the All-Owner

Artwork courtesy of http://cerebusart.blogspot.com/

STR 20 (+10), DEX 14 (+4), INT 16 (+6), WIL 19 (+9), 20HP, Armour 1.

A huge intelligent, blue snake with a human-like face. A collector of all things arcane and artistic. Will happily show off his collection to those he trusts but fights vengefully against anyone attempting to steal from him.

Bites cause 1d6-1 Damage but ranged spit attacks cause no damage. However, a spit attack or damaging bite causes 1d6 STR and DEX loss from poison.

Will always have at least one Arcanum to use with his dextrous tongue. Will have a hidden stash of valuables, including many decoys and traps, totalling 2d6x1000 gold pieces in value and a notable gem worth 1d20x1000 gold pieces.

Typical Arcana

Pharal Ka

Clear, floating crystal. Talks to the wielder telepathically and is generally helpful. Very eager to see new things.

Contains the following spells:

Invisible Grasp (Power 4): Hold one person still, unable to defend themselves, until they pass a WIL Save vs your WIL.

Madness (Power 8): All within 15ft of a point must pass a WIL Save vs 16 or become confused for 8 rounds. Roll 1d6 at the start of each confused turn. 1: Attack the caster, 2: Act normally, 3: Do nothing, 4: Flee, 5: Attack nearest creature, 6: Attack nearest of their allies.

The Spite Heart

Rough chunk of hard, green wood with a chain attached for carrying. When you use its Spell you must try and use it again on the same target on your next turn or else take 1d6 damage.

Nerve Lash (Power 6): Automatically causes 1d6 damage and intense pain to a target. They must pass a WIL Save vs WIL or take another 1d6 damage and lose the same amount of WIL.

Six Adventurers that are Better Than You

2011-11-02T18:08:00.003Z

1: Farjal the Red Death will fight for whoever pays him. Hope he hasn't been hired to kill you. He never works with anyone else.
STR 12 (+2), DEX 14 (+4), INT 10 (+0), WIL 12 (+2), 12HP, Armour 2.
Longsword, Light Armour, Shield.
Flaming Ring Arcanum: Heat Ray (Power 4), Inferno (Power 6), The Beast Within (Power 8).
Heat Ray: Target must pass a DEX Save vs your INT or take 4d6 damage.
Inferno: Cause a source of fire to explode, causing 5d6 damage to all within 20ft. Targets may pass an INT Save vs your 10 to only take 1d6 damage instead.
The Beast Within: Add 2d6-1 to STR and DEX but also subtract this number from INT and WIL (to a minimum of 1) and lose the ability to speak. This lasts for 8 rounds.

2: Dargaz the Huntmaster only seeks new trophies. He has made lots of enemies in this area in the past.
STR 10 (+0), DEX 11 (+1), INT 15 (+5), WIL 13 (+3), 10HP.
Heavy Polearm (Wildstaff), Longbow, pack of ten faithful hounds.
Wildstaff Arcanum: Dire Beasts (Power 10).
Dire Beasts: Up to five animals double in size for 10 minutes, doubling HP and gaining 8 STR. They also grow much more violent.

3: Arnet the Cloak will steal anything you have that he wants and may kill you to keep things simple. Will never kill women or children.
STR 9 (-1), DEX 16 (+6), INT 13 (+3), WIL 8 (-2), 9HP, Armour 1.
Light Armour, Two Daggers, Crossbow, Various types of poison, Thief's tools.
The Jet Dog Arcanum: Veil Senses (Power 4).
Veil Senses:: Target makes a WIL Save vs your WIL or is Blinded or Deafened until the curse is lifted. Blind opponents subtract 10 from DEX and INT.

4: Rock Varga will pick a fight with nearly anyone just to show off. Considers himself a drink connoisseur, which seems at odds with his personality.
STR 16 (+6), DEX 13 (+3), INT 11 (+1), WIL 10 (+0), 16HP, Armour 3.
Heavy Mace, Heavy Armour, Shield.

5: Castellan Haumar wants to know what you're doing in his domain and when you're leaving. He's terrified of a neighbouring domain attacking, so has little time to waste with you.
STR 11 (+1), DEX 12 (+2), INT 11 (+1), WIL 15 (+5), 11HP, Armour 2.
Halberd, Heavy Armour, SIZ 4 Domain. Always accompanied by his personal guard of ten heavily armoured knights.

6: Omal, Bearer of the Eye will provide excellent healing services for a cost. He will also try to recruit you into his creepy cult.
STR 14 (+4), DEX 9 (-1), INT 10 (+0), WIL 15 (+5), 14HP, Armour 1.
Sword, Light Armour.
Glass Eye Arcanum: Madness (Power 8), Beast from Beyond (Power 8), Breath of Recovery (Power 4).
Madness: All within 15ft of a point must pass a WIL Save vs 16 or become confused for 8 rounds. Roll 1d6 at the start of each confused turn. 1: Attack the caster, 2: Act normally, 3: Do nothing, 4: Flee, 5: Attack nearest creature, 6: Attack nearest of their allies.
Beast from Beyond: Summon a horrific flying beast (STR 20, DEX 15, INT 10, WIL 4, Armour 2, 20HP, hits cause 1d6+1 Damage) to fight for you for 3d6 rounds. After this time it has free will.
Breath of Recovery: Touch a creature and restore 3d6 of their HP or 1d6 points in any one Ability Score. Take 1d6 Damage in return.

Six random jerks you annoy in town.

2011-09-15T21:41:00.004+01:00

The PCs roll into town and somehow annoy someone with minutes. Roll to see who.

Written with Into the Odd in mind.

1d6 Roll

1: Yurg the Large (STR 16, DEX 7, INT 6, WIL 11, 15gp, Punches for 1d6 damage): This guy just wants to punch you in front of everyone. Even the guards won't step in to stop him once he's pounding.

2: Furnum the Flash (STR 8, DEX 13, INT 14, WIL 8, heavy mace, light armour, 30gp): This guy would rather embarrass you with some sharp put downs. He's needy enough that he'll make it his business to be wherever you go, ready to put you down.

3: Hurlett the Vague (STR 7, DEX 10, INT 8, WIL 7, dagger, 1gp): Seems to be a completely mad woman. Takes issue with one of the party and shouts at them, throws rocks and generally causes a scene.

4: Rela the Cat (STR 10, DEX 14, INT 12, WIL 10, club, 18gp): Her and her two fellow footpads have targeted one of the group. As soon as the target is alone they'll strike.

5: Old Marl (STR 11, DEX 9, INT 9, WIL 14, crossbow, 5gp): He doesn't like wandering adventurers, even though he used to be one! He'll try to turn everyone against the party rather than directly confronting them.

6: Nyal the White (STR 14, DEX 13, INT 7, WIL 13, heavy armour, heavy axe, shield, 40gp): Far too eager to jump to the defence of someone you've mildly inconvenienced. Will immediately try to fight you out of town. Everyone else tries to ignore him.

Character Rise and Fall

2011-09-15T17:04:00.004+01:00

I've never really liked experience points.

I get that they can encourage a certain type of play and I understand the difference in play that results when you switch between treasure as XP, kills as XP and completed objectives as XP. I just don't really like using them. No real logic to it.

So how do I want character advancement to work in Into the Odd? As I've described before, the zero to hero to superhero progression isn't really something I like in my fantasy. Wouldn't it be more appropriate for characters to rise to a peak, where they've rounded out their flaws and maybe even improved their strongest abilities, before slowly declining in their elder years, perhaps deciding to retire and hand the torch to a new generation of adventurers.

How about this?

-----------------------------------------

Experience

Characters may take time to reflect upon their experience between adventures. Doing this takes at least a month of game time. The player describes what their character has been doing in this time and may spend their wealth in ways humble or grand. Any gold they do not spend in this time is halved. Hazards may arise over this time that the players decide how to deal with, though nothing as long as a full adventure.

When this time is complete roll 1d20 for each of the character’s Ability Scores. If the roll is equal or higher than the score it is increased by 1, unless it has already reached the human maximum of 18. However, if the roll is a 1 the character suffers a setback and subtracts 1 from this Ability Score.

If none of their Ability Scores change the GM will provide the character with some sort of fruit of their labours. This could be an Arcanum found in this time or one or more followers rallied to their cause.

The first time the characters go through this process they also assign themselves a job title. This could be thief, mercenary, adventurer, wizard, or any other term that can be agreed on. This may change over time. Upon gaining this title they add the descriptor of “Aspiring” before it. Each time they reflect on their experience they move to the next level, rising to the peak of their abilities at “Paragon”.

Rise Levels
Aspiring - Developing - Journeyman - Hardened - Paragon

Whenever the characters reflect on their experience after Paragon level they move to the Decline scale. Although they will likely have more fame, possessions and war-stories than an inexperienced character they will inevitably start to fade in terms of raw physical ability, perhaps handing off more adventurous tasks to their followers or allies.

Whenever a character moves to a Decline Level they do not roll to improve their Ability Scores as they did on their rise to Paragon level. Instead they roll 1d20 for each Ability Score. If the roll is equal or lower than the score it is decreased by 1, unless it has already reached the human minimum of 3. However, if the roll is a 20 the character has new life breathed into them and increases the Ability Score by 1.

Decline Levels
Veteran - Seasoned - Senior - Venerable - Elder

Example

Let's take our sample character Kinru the Swift through the process. No fudging of rolls here, this is a live test!

Kinru the Swift
STR 8 (-2), DEX 13 (+3), INT 11 (+1)

Kinru the Aspiring Thief
STR 8 (-2), DEX 12 (+2), INT 11 (+1)
(Rolled 6, 1 and 2, actually getting worse! This is a risk of the system and one I'm unsure of so far...)

Kinru the Developing Thief
STR 8 (-2), DEX 12 (+2), INT 11 (+1)
(Rolled 5, 5 and 6. Some awful rolling here and Kinru still doesn't improve her stats)

Kinru the Journeyman Thief
STR 9 (-1), DEX 12 (+2), INT 11 (+1)
(Rolled 9, 11, 10. What's with these rolls? At least she gets a little stronger here.)

Kinru the Hardened Assassin
STR 9 (-1), DEX 12 (+2), INT 12 (+2)
(Rolled 8, 5, 14. INT improved. Still not good rolling! Figure she's due a change of career title by this point)

Kinru the Paragon Assassin
STR 10 (+0), DEX 13 (+3), INT 12 (+2)
(Rolled 19, 15, 8, much better! This is most likely the peak of her Ability Scores and she'll move into the decline levels next)

Kinru the Veteran Assassin
STR 9 (-1), DEX 12 (+2), INT 11 (+1)
(Rolled 6, 9, 12. Ouch! Almost back to her starting condition already. Early retirement time before it gets any worse?)

Kinru the Seasoned Wanderer
STR 8 (-2), DEX 11 (+1), INT 10 (+0)
(Rolled 3, 10, 9, another triple whammy. I'm starting to regret a live-fire example... Kinru has really let herself go. I figure a title change is in order, time for her to find a place to settle)

Kinru the Senior Wanderer
STR 7 (-3), DEX 11 (+1), INT 9 (-1)
(Rolled 6, 8, 13. Low rolls are killer here.)

Kinru the Venerable Wanderer
STR 7 (-3), DEX 11 (+1), INT 8 (-2)
(11, 18, 9. More INT loss, I figure due to blindness and/or deafness)

Kinru the Elder Wanderer
STR 7 (-3), DEX 12 (+2), INT 8 (-2)
(Rolled 17, 20, 9. A resurgence of life in her elder years! I figure she'll head down into a dungeon for one last adventure, probably failing to notice a horrible creature descending from the ceiling to eat her)

How do I feel about this example? Mixed... I still think the system has potential but I wonder how much it'll hurt players that get a streak of bad rolls.

What beats twenty scorpions?

2011-09-13T18:01:00.004+01:00

I see your twenty scorpions and raise you TWENTY ONE CENTIPEDES. Written with Into the Odd in mind.

1d21 roll:

1: Black Arrow Centipede (STR 2, DEX 8, INT 2, Defence 10, 1HP)
About the length of an arrow. Launches itself from cave walls, burying its head into anything it hits for 1d6+1 damage. Must be removed slowly and carefully to avoid another 1d6 damage.

2: Endel's Dasher (STR 2, DEX 10, INT 4, Defence 12, 1HP)
A foot long, deep green in colour. Bites for 1 point of damage and flees, letting poison bring down their prey. Those bitten loose 1d6 STR and DEX every round until they pass a STR Save vs 15.

3: White Lady Centipede (STR 4, DEX 8, INT 4, Defence 10, 2HP)
Chunky, a foot long with a soft white shell. Extremely tasty when cooked. Bites for 1 Damage.

4: Bristly Boar-Eating Centipede (STR 10, DEX 8, INT 3, Defence 14, 5HP)
Deep brown, three feet long, able to rear back to reveal a second pair of biting mandibles. Bites for 1d6 Damage and grapples anyone it causes damage to. Picks off young boar in its jungle home.

5: Silver Ghost Finger (STR 4, DEX 8, INT 5, Defence 10, 2HP)
Able to float slowly through the air by moving its silver hairs in a wavelike motion, which no one can explain. Bites for 1 damage.

6: Gnomeshield (STR 6, DEX 5, INT 2, Defence 11, 3HP)
A flat, two feet long, beetle-like centipede with a dull copper, chitinous back resembling a shield. Bites for 2 Damage.

7: Manxtail Centipede (STR 4, DEX 6, INT 2, Defence 8, 2HP)
A foot long, bristly and bites for 1 Damage. Anyone bitten or touching with bare-skin subtracts 10 from all rolls on their next round and suffers unbearable itchiness.

8: Red Cryer (STR 2, DEX 6, INT 2, Defence 8, 1HP)
This centipede's bite would do no harm to anything bigger than the insects it feeds on, but when scared it cries out with an ear-splitting noise. Those hearing it nearby must pass a STR Save vs 10 or subtract 2 from any rolls that are not aiming to silence the racket.

9: Drolonid (STR 4, DEX 10, INT 8, Defence 12, 2HP)
Three feet long, faintly orange and has an unusual fly-like proboscis in place of mandibles, so cannot bite. Will drip corrosive onto anyone passing below. INT Save vs 18 to avoid being corroded for 2d6 damage. Anyone killed will be slurped up by the Drolonid when the coast is clear.

10: Juanan Pitpede (STR 13, DEX 8, INT 3, Defence 14, 13HP)
Bred for competitive fighting, can grow up to five feet in length and extremely bulky. Bites for 1d6 damage.

11: Ulmer's Stinkbug (STR 5, DEX 4, INT 2, Defence 6, 2HP.
Six inches long. Releases stench when in danger. STR Save vs 20 to avoid choking loudly and vomiting. Bite is harmless.

12: Gulleater (STR 6, DEX 8, INT 4, Defence 10, 3HP)
Bite causes 1 damage and poison. STR Save vs 12 or lose 1d6 DEX. Repeat each round until saved.

13: Farfan's Cleaner Centipede (STR 2, DEX 4, INT 2, Defence 6, 1HP)
Six inches long, silver and red in colour. Harmless but will head for metal items and eat any rusted parts, somehow repairing the metal as it moves by.

14: Houndbane Centipede (STR 6, DEX 10, INT 6, Defence 12, 3HP)
Smooth, black shell and two feet long. Bites for 2 damage and poison. STR Save vs 15 or lose 1d6 STR. Repeat until saved.

15: Greater Frilled Longbug (STR 4, DEX 8, INT 6, Defence 10, 2HP.
An unusually brightly coloured two-foot centipede. Bites for 1 damage and poison. STR Save vs 10 or lose 1d6 STR. Very cowardly when not fighting its own kind.

16: Nostril Centipede (STR 2, DEX 8, INT 2, Defence 10, 1HP)
A few inches long. Seeks the nostrils of sleeping passers-by and enters without waking (unless the sleeper passes an INT Save vs 25) to lay its eggs. A month later the victim permanently loses 1 INT and baby centipedes fall out of his nostril throughout the day.

17: Sandtrap Biter (STR 8, DEX 6, INT 4, Defence 8, 4HP)
Three feet long. Lies in wait under the sand of beaches to snatch prey. Anyone bitten must pass a STR Save vs 8 to avoid being pulled down into the centipede's pit, where others may wait.

18: Iplenx (STR 20, DEX 6, INT 12, Defence 10, 20HP)
Purely mythological. Some ten feet long and taller than a man. Can open its eyes to release a beam of light on a target. DEX Save vs 12 to avoid 2d6 damage.

19: Carverbug (STR 2, DEX 4, INT 8, Defence 6, 1HP)
A few inches long, thought to be transformed victims of a sorcerer. They are able to leave a trail of an ink-like substance and have known to communicate intelligently this way, particularly in giving directions underground.

20: Spinerester Centipede (STR 5, DEX 8, INT 8, Defence 10, 2HP)
One foot long and sickly yellow. Will crawl onto a sleeping victim's back and bite the back of their neck (unless the sleeper passes an INT Save vs 25). From here they cannot be removed without injecting a long needle-like protrusion into the victim for 2d6 damage, also doing this if they are damaged. They will feed off the victim's blood, causing them to regain lost HP at half the normal rate.

21: Scorpion-eating Centipede (STR 6, DEX 8, INT 4, Defence 10, 3HP)
Two feet long, red and slightly velvety to the touch. Bites for 1 Damage, or 1d6 against Scorpions.

Into the Odd: Changes? What changes?

2011-09-01T21:58:00.005+01:00

Well, it was inevitable.

Barely hours after I post the changes I'd made to Into the Odd after the first playtest I notice a whole bunch of issues with said changes. Pulling at this thread has the whole knitted jumper unravel and I'm left with a question.

What's a character's Will score for again?

Turns out... not a whole lot. It was a very passive Ability that provided saves quite frequently but having a high Will didn't really let you do anything.

High STR? Grab a Great Weapon and get to power attacking and grappling your opponents to the ground. Throw some rocks around and smash up some doors. Good times.

High DEX? Grab your bow, gun, sword, axe, whatever you like, and get stuck into combat. Disarm that bandit, do a called shot to the mindslug's air-sac. If it all goes wrong then run away or find a good place to hide.

High INT? Be the first to know what's happening and blast away with your Arcanum.

High WIL? Erm... be good at passing some saves? Influence people you talk to? Eh.

So it's gone. Passive fortitude against arcane effects like petrification and psychic shock goes to STR and more active shaking-off of charm effects and illusions goes to INT as well as some of the social stuff.

Is this the last big change to ITO? I'm not even sure if I like the name yet, so no. Maybe something's changed since this post. Looks like the only thing for it is for me to put the info that I want public out there.

Go and see for yourself, journey Into the Odd and enjoy the game before it changes again.

Project Odd: First Playtest and Changes

2011-09-01T13:04:00.002+01:00

Last night I ran a group of playtesters through the first game of what I'm tentatively calling Into the Odd. I used the dungeon I hope to include with the final game and use again beforehand, so I'll avoid too any spoilers. Needless to say the result was a total party kill after a good amount of time exploring. Reactions were mixed, but I think it was mostly successful.

I might write a more thorough play report another time, but for now I'd like to talk about the changes I've made in the wake of the playtest.

Arcana - No longer fire-or-die.
Previously, tanking your INT Save when you casted a spell from your Arcanum meant the spell would backfire on you or cause damage, which could be quite lethal. While I liked the idea of this deadliness it seemed a little too binary. Either the spell would be too risky and wasn't worth attempting or it was safe enough to try, holding the lingering risk of an anticlimactic death.

I've moved back to something with more in common with D&D's traditional Vancian casting. When you fail your INT Save the spell isn't cast and cannot be used again until the Arcanum has "rested" for a number of hours equal to its highest currenty disabled spell. This means if you blow it on a Power 14 (D&DLevel 7) Spell you're going to have to shoulder your Arcanum for some time if you want to get it back. Nothing stopping you from continuing to use the other spells, but even if you fizzle on a lower powered spell you've got that big wait from the high powered spell before any of them are restored.

Starting Arcanum - Now a Win/Win Situation
Previously you rolled 3d6 to see if you got an Arcanum at chargen. If it was equal or under your INT score then you got one with that Power Total, otherwise you got nothing. Really this was just punishing players that had already had a bad roll on their INT score, giving lucky rollers yet another bonus. In addition, as much as I enjoy fully random chargen, players seem to at least want to choose between being a caster or non-caster. Now this is a choice you can make at chargen regardless of your Ability Scores.

After rolling their Abilities the player rolls another 3d6. They either take an Arcanum with this Power Total or they replace one of their Ability Scores with this number. Keeps the random element with a simple choice that isn't too daunting for new players. If in doubt just stick it in your lowest Ability Score.

Expertise - Gone!
Gone entirely. While I liked the idea I didn't think it was implemented well and was a little daunting in chargen. I might add in a new system for this but for now it's out. I'm happy to look at a character's fluff to consider what clues they might be able to get particular insight from.

Transfering Spells - Upgrading your Arcanum
Upgrading is an ugly word, but I like the idea of being able to move spells from an Arcanum you've found onto your own. It particularly suits a character using a Spellbook for their Arcanum. For now I'm using the mechanic below.

Transferring Spells: Most Arcana can have spells moved to and from it. Do to this the character must be bonded to the Arcanum a spell is being transferred to. They cast a spell with another Arcanum, targetting their bonded Arcanum, and if cast successfully the Spell will move over to the bonded Arcanum, leaving the other one. However, if the character cannot pass an INT Save vs the bonded Arcanum’s new Power Total (including the spell being transfered) then the spell is lost in transfer and they take 1d6 damage.

May change this in future but I particularly like that as an Arcanum becomes "full" it's more risky to try to add new spells to it. I envisage most high powered spells being bound to large, immobile Arcana like altars and statues, with noone daring to try and move them elsewhere.

Project Odd: Arcana

2011-08-31T14:01:00.004+01:00

This will probable be the last big chunk of game content I'm going to post for Project Odd, so would very much appreciate any thoughts and feedback, especially on this last section.

Arcana is my attempt to give magic an unusual twist from the usual while still allowing use of familiar D&D spells.

Arcana - Powers you do not understand.
Anything that can store and release magical power including staffs, rings, tomes, tablets and orbs is an Arcanum. An Arcanum will contain one or more spells that its wielder can use.

Spell Power: A Spell’s Power is a measure of its difficulty to cast. If using spells from a Classic RPG double their Spell Level to find their Power. Cantrips have a Spell Power of 1.
Arcane Burden: Each Arcanum a character is carrying with a Power higher than their INT Score subtracts 1 from all rolls that character makes.
Using a Spell: An Arcanum requires at least one hand to use. The user chooses one of the Spells stored in the Arcanum and casts it, using entire round. The spell may also require material components, words of activation or special movement. Before the Spell is complete the wielder must pass an INT Save vs the Spell Power. If they fail this the spell backfires on them, targeting them instead. If the spell was already targeting the wielder they take 2d6 damage instead.

A Starting Character’s Arcanum
New characters roll 3d6. If this roll is equal or lower than their INT score they begin the game with an Arcana with this Power Score. This is the total Spell Power contained within Arcanum. The GM will provide a list of spells for characters to choose from.
For example, a character starting with a Power 12 Arcanum will select spells totalling up to Power 12. This may be a single Power 12 Spell or four Power 1 Spells, two Power 2 Spells and a Power 4 Spell.

Advanced Arcana Use
Creating and Altering Arcana: There doesn’t seem to be a reliable method to alter an Arcanum and nobody who claims to have created their own seems eager to share their secret.
Security: Owners will often trap their Arcana with a curse to anyone other than them who tries to use them.
Bonding: Owners can bond themselves to a single Arcanum in a day-long ritual. If they do this anyone else using the Arcanum must pass an INT Save vs your INT or take 1d6 + your INT modifier in damage. If they pass this save the bond is broken. A bonded owner can always sense the direction of their Arcanum and may sometimes have access to a greater Spell stored within.
Dangers of Bonding: Arcana, once bonded, can have an addictive sense of power, often being impossible to remove from the owner while active. If they drop the Arcanum they must pass a WIL Save vs 20 or take 2d6 damage. If they pass this Save the bond is broken.
Intelligent Arcana: Many arcana have an intelligence of their own and will communicate mentally or verbally. They may have a more simple form of intelligence, like a plant or animal, responding to a certain stimulus by activating a spell. This is the most common way Arcana are used as traps.
Static Arcana: Not every Arcanum is as portable as a wand or scroll. Many more closely resemble furnishings or even structures. Remember, no one fully understands Arcana, so prepare to be surprised.

A Note on Ability Scores and Arcana
INT is a measure of how well a character can actively use own Arcana and harness its power.
WIL is used to passively resist magical effects coming from another.

Project Odd: Running, Fighting and Dying.

2011-08-31T00:46:00.002+01:00

Some of the rules that the player might wish to know in Project Odd.

Running Away: Escaping a pursuer requires a DEX Save against the DEX score of your fastest pursuer. If you fail they can continue to attack you.
Sneaking Unseen: Make a DEX Save against the INT of whoever you’re sneaking past. Failing this alerts them.
Initiative: Normally the characters act first in combat, with the enemies taking the second round. If the characters are ambushed one of them must pass an INT save against the enemy’s lowest DEX or else the enemy take the first turn.
Attacking: Roll 1d20 and add DEX Bonus and any bonus from weapons, matching or beating the target's Defence to score a hit. The GM may provide bonuses or penalties to this roll depending on the combat situation.
Damage: Roll 1d6 to see how much damage a hit causes. A character with no weapons subtracts 1 from this roll.
Power Attacks: Upon seeing the result of a melee damage roll you can choose to turn it into a Power Attack. The damage is doubled unless the target passes a DEX Save against your STR, in which case the attack misses completely.
Called Shots/Disarming: When you cause a hit in combat you may forgo damage to try to strike a particular area of an enemy or disarm them. If the target can pass a STR (for disarming) or DEX (for called shots) Save against your DEX the attempt fails and the attack wasted.
Grappling: When you cause a melee hit you may grapple instead of causing damage as long as you have a free hand. The grappled opponent must make a STR Save vs your STR to act on their next turn, or else they take 1d6 damage. If you move or attack the grapple is broken.
Dying: Characters reduced to 0 Hitpoints must pass a WIL save against 10 or die. If they pass the save they are knocked out. When knocked out a character is defenceless to a killing blow. When your character is dead you may roll up a new one to join the group as soon as possible.

And equipment!

Equipment - As well as their Arcanum, characters begin with 1d6x10gp to spend on equipment. When wielding two weapons any bonuses gained will stack and the wielder gains +1 to their defence in melee.
Light Weapon (10gp): +1 to attacks against targets with no armour.
Heavy Weapon (10gp): +1 to attacks against targets with armour. Can only be wielded in main hand.
Reach Weapon (10gp): +1 to defense in melee. Cannot be wielded with another weapon.
Great Weapon (20gp): +1 to attacks and damage. Uses both hands.
Shortbow (10gp): +1 to attacks against targets with no armour.
Longbow/Crossbow (20gp): +1 to attacks against targets with armour.
Thrown Weapon (10gp set): May make Power Attacks like a melee weapon.
Firearm (30gp): +1 to attacks and damage. Takes a whole round to load.
Shield (10gp): +2 to defense. May be combined with Armour.
Helm (10gp): Armour 1. May be combined with other Armour.
Padded Armour (10gp): Armour 2
Light Armour (20gp): Armour 4
Heavy Armour (40gp): Armour 6
Mystic Paraphernalia (10gp): Includes wizards robes, hat, ceremonial beads etc. Add 2 to WIL and INT Saves related to Arcana as long as the character is not also wearing armour.
Adventurer’s Kit (10gp): Includes rope, spikes, torches, pole, chalk and parchment. A partially used kit may be restocked for 5gp.
Thief’s Kit (10gp): Includes lockpick, crowbar and other mechanical equipment. A partially used kit may be restocked for 5gp.

Next time... Arcana! Finally.

Project Odd: Abilities and Saves

2011-08-30T19:30:00.012+01:00

The main way I will make Project Odd unique is placing Ability Scores and Saving Throws firmly at the the core of the game. First we look at what makes up a character.

Rolling a Character
Characters are created by rolling their Ability Scores. Roll 3d6 for each Ability Score. Characters that have no scores above 10 may be rerolled.

Strength - Overpowering others, surviving injury and striking powerful blows.
Dexterity - Running away, attacking and avoiding physical attacks.
Intelligence - Using Arcana, cunning, knowledge and reflexes.
Will - Innate magical resilience, leading others and determination.

Humans cannot have natural Ability Scores above 18, though magic may raise them above this.

Subtract 10 from your Ability Score to find the Ability Bonus. Both the Ability Score and Bonus should be noted on a character’s sheet.

A character’s Hitpoints are equal to their STR score and their Defence is equal to their DEX score plus their Armour Score.

Saves: Roll 1d20 and add the Ability Bonus being used. You must equal beat the Ability Score of whatever you are saving yourself from or the number provided by the GM. A 20 is always a success and a 1 always a failure. If in doubt a roll of 10 or more is a successful save.

Understanding Saves
Usually a dangerous situation will call for one type of save to avoid the consequences, which may be damage, a particular ailment or death. Some may offer multiple saves to avoid each part of the hazard. A save will always be made against a number (default 10) or an opponent’s Ability Score.

STR Save: Feats of toughness, fortitude and brute force.
DEX Save: Avoiding danger through skillful action and acrobatics.
INT Save: Noticing danger, reacting quickly, harnessing your Arcana and understanding your environment.
WIL Save: Determination to fight on, resilience against magical effects and influence over people.

Save vs STR: Escaping a grapple or breaking free of a prison.
Save vs DEX: Avoiding something seeking you.
Save vs INT: Bypassing the plans or magic of another.
Save vs WIL: Resisting the influence of another.

Next time I'll show how magic will work in this game, being innately tied to items rather than characters. Here's a sample character to give a hint or two.

Kinkru the Swift

STR 7 (-3), DEX 15 (+5), INT 11 (+1), WIL 9 (-1)
Defence 17 (Armour 2), 7HP
Expertise: Lockpicking.
Equipment: Longsword, Shield, Adventurer’s Kit.
Arcanum: (Silver Gauntlet, Power 13): Arrow Protection (P4), Darkness (P4), Disguise Self (P2), Reduce Person (P2), Message (P1).

Project Odd: Player Primer

2011-08-30T15:06:00.006+01:00

The first information on Rules will come in my next post. For now, here's what I would give to a player before starting a game with Project Odd.

Player Primer

You are not a Superhero. You may be great at some things, you may have access to spells of great power, but you're not going to survive getting stepped on by a gigantic boot or falling down a hundred-foot pit. As such, you should be careful.

Consider what Fantasy could mean outside of its most popular settings. There's always something new around the corner, be it shocking, confusing, intriguing or just odd. Magic is something you can use to your advantage, but never becomes innate or natural to you. The world is full of Arcana, objects of a magical nature, that could save your life or cause you a horrible death. Show them some respect.

Make sure you avoid deathtraps and know the risks of mortal combat. Monsters aren't target practice, they're monsters. Run, sneak, surrender, or bribe. Whatever it takes to survive your encounter with them is just as good as fighting.

This game is about exploring and problem solving, fighting is just one of the options at your disposal. If you do insist on killing the huge creature that's trying to eat you I suggest you find a way to do it without going toe to toe with the thing. Honour is for the dead.

Project Odd: Core Ideals

2011-08-29T09:59:00.001+01:00

Another month, another rpg project. This one is purely for personal use as much for enjoyment of the process as anything.

These are the core ideals I want the currently unnamed game to embrace:

- An impartial GM. The GM uses the rules provided to challenge the characters and does not alter the situation to aid or hinder them.
- Adventure Module compatibility. The game assumes the GM is using a pre-planned environment and hazards, whether their own or by another writer. Classic rpg modules will be easily adaptable.
- Rolled characters. The core of your character is random and you do not choose a class. You buy equipment but have no input on your character’s innate abilities.
- Focus on Ability Scores. Rather than being secondary to level and class, a character’s rolled Ability Scores are the most important thing about them. The same goes for Monsters. A Dragon is terrifying because it’s huge (Strength 27?), scaly (Armour 6) and breathes fire (INT Save vs STR or 2d6 Damage!), not because it’s a Level 15 opponent.
- Save against Consequences. The player always has a chance to beat the consequences facing them with a saving throw based around Ability Scores.
- Common sense. The rules are written with the assumption that those playing will agree on a rule’s intention without the need for paragraph-long mechanical explanations.
- Limited power growth. Characters get better through improving their ability scores slightly, but more through learning spells, amassing resources and finding magic treasure.
- Embrace the weird. This game will get scifi, horror and humour in your fantasy, as well as any other genres I see fit.

This will be the first game I've written on a base of D&D, something I think is inevitable for takers with any exposure to the classic game. Next time I'll show you the core of the game: Ability Scores and Saving Throws. If you read my dragon example carefully you can already get a sneak preview of what I have planned.

Getting Scifi in your Fantasy

2011-08-27T09:53:00.001+01:00

This coming week I'll be posting about a project I've been working on that is very much 'fantasy with some Scifi spilled on it.

In preparation I'd love to hear what you think about blobs of Scifi in you d&d style fantasy games. Do you like them to be weird exceptions or spread across the setting as an underlying theme? How about full Scifi fusion where ray guns and flying saucers are common to every adventure? Or do you like to keep your Scifi to different games entirely?

Who Rolls When?

2011-08-25T14:54:00.003+01:00

My last series of posts seems to have gone down like a lead balloon, so let's get back to something more familiar.

Consider the situation. The GM has declared that an ogre is attacking Unmer the Glum, a player-character. Assuming the system calls for a roll to see if the attack is successful (let's ignore damage rolls for now), there are a few ways this could be handled. Some more often explored than others.

Attacker rolls against Defender's Stat.
This is the D&D method, which I've also used for shooting in Xenofringe. The attacker is completely active in the exchange and the defender completely passive. In this way it's possible for a player to be killed without having taken any action in the process. Of course, their prior action may have helped this come to pass, but that killing blow was entirely in the hands of their attacker. You can tell from how I'm writing this that I think this may not be the ideal approach.

Attacker rolls against Defender's Roll.
This is what I've used in The Adventurer's Tale and A Wanderer's Romance. Both parties take an active role in the exchange and if the defender rolls badly they're in for a nasty consequence. You might think, as I've used it so often, I favour this technique. While I do like it there's a certain clunkiness I find with opposed rolls like this, especially if you're running a PbP or IRC game where players' attentions are often divided. I consider this a good choice on paper but imperfect in practice.

Attacker compares Stat against Defender's Stat.
I've included this option for a sense of symmetry but removing the random element altogether doesn't work for me. Next.

Defender rolls against Attacker's Stat.
Here's what I wanted to get to. I don't know of any systems that use this method, but I think it poses a few possibilities.

- The Attacker remains active, declaring and describing their action.
- The Defender is engaged and has active input into the process.
- Something about it just makes combat feel more deadly. It's like the attack is assumed to hit unless you can do something about it.
- It's easily convertible, if not perfectly. Try it with 3e onwards D&D today by having the "Attack Score" be 10+ attack bonus and a character's "Save vs Attack" be 1d20+ AC modifiers.

But one possibly crushing downside looms over me. Would players be happy not making attack rolls? Everyone loves rolling a 20 and can the possible advantages of this system outweigh the pleasure in that moment? Would be interested to hear thoughts.

Something More Concrete - Instant RPG

2011-08-21T16:36:00.007+01:00

Well you've put up with one rambling, vague and cryptic post after another. It's about time I put my money where my mouth is. Presenting...

Instant RPG - Alpha Edition

Instant RPG can be played in person or using social technology like Facebook, Google+ or Twitter. All you need is a line of communication between the GM and Players and you can have your own adventure.

Player Information

When you play the Instant RPG a situation will be described by your GM, who may also ask you questions. You answer these questions and describe what you want your character to do in response to the situation at hand. You can try and do anything you can imagine, though the GM will roll dice to see if some actions are successful or if you face consequences for failure.

Think about what your character will be like. What are they good at? How do they act? With this in mind start playing and most of all have fun!

GM Information

Only the Gamemaster needs to read any further. If you're a player then start playing!

To run the game the GM remembers the three rules.

The Two, Four, Six, Rule
A Task will fit into one of the following categories.
Simple: Requiring a 2 or more to succeed.
Challenging: Requiring a 4 or more to succeed.
Formidable: Requiring a 6 or more to succeed.

The High, Mid, Low Rule
Whenever a Task is rolled, three six-sided dice are thrown.
A character that is completely unskilled in the Task uses the lowest die.
A character that has basic understanding of the Task uses the middle die.
A character that is skilled in the Task uses the highest die.

Rule X
When all else fails, if you are unsure what to do in a situation, roll a single die. If this is high the situation goes in favour of the character in question. If it is low if goes against them. This could be used to determine anything from whether or not a character makes a good first impression to whether or not they survive a potentially deadly injury. In the case of the latter a roll of 1 would often mean death.

Glossary of Terms

The GM may need some of these terms clarified.

Abilities: These are things the character can do without it being a speciality. Most settings come with certain assumptions, such as a modern setting assuming characters can drive and operate a computer. This lists exceptions that the characters have been given by the GM such as a wizard being able to cast spells or a dragon being able to fly.

Adventure: The setting and situation that the characters are in. The characters explore and interact with the setting and to act out their adventure.

Equipment: A character's equipment affects how they carry out tasks. For example, some tasks simply require a piece of equipment, or else can't be attempted at all. Others will be made easier by posessing a certain piece of equipment. For example, blasting an opponent away at close range would be a Simple task with a shotgun, but Challenging with a weapon more suited to long range, such as a sniper rifle. The GM decides, with player suggestions, what equipment characters have access to.

GM: The Gamemaster. He describes the situation the characters are in and, after hearing what they want to do, describes what happens next. He may use the three rules to determine this.

Module: A pre-written plan that helps the GM run the Adventure. May include maps, non-player characters and an explanation of the current situation before the characters' involvement.

Skills: A list of things the character can do really well, from natural qualities to knowledge and experience. The GM allocates these Skills by asking the players about their characters, typically choosing around four Skills. These should be quite specific. Think duelling or staff-fighting instead of just "armed combat".
Task: A Task is something the characters cannot carry out with certainty. This could be because of opposition, a time limit or high risk in the event of failure. The GM will assign the Task a difficulty using the Two, Four, Six rule based on the character's abilities, equipment and support from their allies. The GM then rolls the Task, using the High, Mid, Low Rule to decide which die to use, describing the result to the players. Tasks could be interrogating a suspect, casting a spell or avoiding incoming bullet fire.

Character Information

The GM will note down a character's Skills and Abilities as well as any Equipment of importance they are carrying. An example might look like this.

Hol Varnoo - Space Knight

Skills: Starfighter Piloting, Intimidation, Leading a Crowd, Beamsword Duels.

Abilities: Use of Spaceknight Technology, Speaks Yarnese.

Equipment: Hyper Armour, Beamsword, Rapiblaster.

The Player will influence this information but does not need to track it themselves.

Example of Play

Mike: I could try and shoot the chain but I think Red will stand a better chance.

GM: Red is in a good position to use his sniper rifle.
Red: Ok, I'll take the shot.
[The GM rolls a Challenging task, which Red is skilled in thanks to his "Sniping" Skill, resulting in a success. Had Mike attempted the shot with their Handgun it would have been Formidable instead]
GM: The chain is shot with a clean break, sending Hannah dropping to the ground, collapsing in a heap but not badly hurt. Murca's henchmen return fire on Red, having given up his position.
Red: I'm out of here. Make a break for the exit.
[The GM rolls a Challenging task for Red to avoid being shot as he flees, which he fails. To see how bad the wound is the GM uses Rule X, rolling a 5. Surely just a flesh wound.]
Mike: I'll follow!
GM: Red is hurt by a glancing shot from Murca's henchmen, but Mike manages to help him to safety. Now that you're out of the base you're faced with countless bloodthirsty henchmen in one direction and a frozen wilderness in the other.
Mike: Can't we call in for the Colonel to come and pick us up? I have that radio.
[The GM rolls a Simple task to call for help, assuming that Mike has an Average skill in using his radio, resulting in a success. He uses Rule X to see how long before support arrives, rolling a 1. Not good for our players.]
GM: You get through to the Colonel, who's already airborn with his helicopter. "I'd pick you up right now, boys, but there's still a SAM site that's making the run less appealling. Take care of that and I'll be right there".
Red: Great, well how do we knock out that SAM site?
GM: Red is bleeding pretty badly. Not life-threatening at the moment but you're not in top shape for much physical activity.
Mike: Listen up, I've got a plan...

Social Assumptions

As well as the three play-rules used in gameplay there are some guidelines that all players and the GM should follow.

1: The players do not need to know any of the rules or how the GM is implementing them.
2: The GM will roll all dice and has the final decision over tasks, their difficulty and the Skills and abilities of each players' character.
3: The GM will choose each character's Skills and Abilities based on the player's description of their character and their background.
4: If a player's character is killed or otherwise removed from a game the GM will soon present an opportunity for that player to rejoin the game as another character.
5: A player can leave the game without any ill feeling. Similarly, new players should always be welcome within limits. The GM will find ways to bring in new players' characters as soon as possible.

Now, imagine an adventure your players would enjoy, using a module if you wish, and start playing!

Some Difficult Truths Pt 3

2011-08-21T11:08:00.005+01:00

Concluding from here.

As soon as a game starts to interfere with other areas of life the game is in trouble.
We've all done it. Quitting a game because of another commitment in your life always feels bad. Whether you're comitting to playing every tuesday night or posting in a PbP at least every 48 hours RPGs tend to come with a commitment to bear. Let's remove that. If I'm playing with five friends and one of them only chips in with a contribution once a week he shouldn't feel bad and the rest of us shouldn't miss out. This is a tough one, I know, and believe me I see the problems too. There are solutions, which I'll flesh out at a later date. In my head I'm seeing a few in action. The GM might post that unless someone states otherwise the characters will carry out a certain action. If noone protests the game moves on. If someone pops up a few days later and protests that they wouldn't have wanted to do that, well, we have a situation. The idealist in me sees the players just deciding to see it as a missed opportunity and move on with things but it might not be so simple.

Maybe I've missed something obvious. We're looking at social technology in an optimistic way here and when was the last time you couldn't get a response from one of your friends for days at a time, whether through a phonecall, text message, facebook, twitter etc. Oh sure, we all have that friend who's a nightmare to get a reply from, but I think we can expect prompt replies from most people when they're interested in what's going on. Replying to a facebook post to say "I'll try and bribe the giant with my gold" is a world away from logging into a forum, checking the PbP thread and crafting your next post.

Non-gamers don't want to identify as gamers.
Everywhere I look I'm told that it's cool to be a geek now. Yes, we have our model spokespeople on the edges of the mainstream media but the fact that they're gamers is always secondary to something else. They might be an actor who plays RPGs or a musician who plays RPGs. Gamer isn't their primary badge of honour. They're the more socially acceptable form of geek that I think can be distracting from this topic. The part I want to focus on is that enjoying RPGs doesn't need to be a person's primary trait, worn as a badge of honour or shame. It's just something to do for fun.

Let's look at video games. Their expansion from the nerd's bedroom to the phone in your aunt's pocket is complete. Smartphone and facebook games are perhaps the two clearest examples that our niche hobby can use social technology to spread into the most unlikely places. The mechanics of the games are unimportant. We don't need to take farmville's hyper-addictive reward system or mafia wars' built-in recruitment plan (although that one does warrant some consideration). What's most important is how people play these games. That guy you know who plays Call of Duty online a whole lot. Would you call him a videogamer?

A former work colleague of mine is a woman in her 50s with grown-up children and basic computer literacy. She would spend about an hour or so a night playing on facebook games, chatting to friends on the side, and she loved the Twilight and Harry Potter franchises. She is almost entirely unaware of RPGs. Do you see the untapped resource of players within our reach yet?

GM and Player are completely different roles and many people will settle into just one.
I pondered on this one for a while, but let's face it. Being a GM is often tough work. In this game I'm imagining you're the one that has to know the rules, the setting and how to drive the game in this strange new way.

I think the role of GM in this game is going to warrant a whole post of it's own, but remember one of my goals was to have a newly initiated player be able to run their own game as soon as the hooks are in. Making the game very light on rules is one way to help, but what about learning to guide your players through the world? Learning from the example of a good GM is a good start, but am I really going to make prospective GMs read through a Dungeonmaster's Guide to be able to run things effectively? I want the GM role to be accessible, not a huge burden that one of the players has to bear for the benefit of the rest.

Sharing the burden is something that's been used in other games. The GM doesn't have to write their own material. Remember adventure modules? People really used to use those things, right? But I don't want the GM to have to read through pages of material to be able to run a game. I'm going to make a bold and optimistic statement.

All the information the GM will need to run a game will fit on one page of A4 paper, including rules, character information and the adventure itself.

Too far? I like to aim high. The reality is that I don't envision many of these A4 pages being physical printouts. Think of it more as a guide for the amount of info I want the GM of this game to have to keep on record at any given time, however they choose to do so.

This game will be many players' first experience of an RPG.
In recruiting new players to play RPGs I do hope to deliver a different experience to traditional games. But once that experience has finished, where do I see the players going? Indeed, I can see many wanting to explore the world of more traditional RPGs. Some may wish to stick with this game, but others will want to delve into their desire for in-depth mechanics and use of miniatures. I'm not going to fight that and if I could convert one player from having no interest in RPGs to being a hardcore D&D enthusiast I'd consider the project a success.

Introducing new players to something I see as having a good amount GM rulings alongside some firm mechanics could be problematic if I want to encourage something of a competitive element. Not with each other, but against the challenges of the game. I said before, I want the players to be able to win somehow, and if you feel this falls mostly on the whim of the GM your victory is less rewarding and your loss more personal. Luckily, I've already proposed an idea that I think could help here. The adventure module will be key to this sort of play experience. Here the GM has some pretty clear guidelines for how to run a particular game. When you get killed in the Tomb of Horrors you curse Gygax before you curse your GM.

Phew!

That was a lot of text to spread over three posts. I hope I've made some of my points clear but after working through these issues out loud I feel much more confident in providing something concrete in my next post. You've put up with the rambling, next I'm going to give you everything you need to try and run this game yourself.

Some Difficult Truths Pt 2

2011-08-21T11:03:00.003+01:00

Continuing from here.

People don't want to play pretend.
Roleplaying is still seen by many as the domain of children. Many would feel embarrassed about posting something like "I try to sneak past the dragon and snatch the magic lamp", and understandably so. It's just the nature of our culture that this sort of play is seen as childish. So how can we ease people into taking part in such games?

Limiting choices is one option. If the player is simply choosing from a set of existing options they won't feel as exposed as if they came up with the idea themselves. Of course, this goes against the Unique Selling Point of RPGs, their complete freedom, but the two ideas are not mutually exclusive. Why not provide two options to the player and a third option of "or anything else you can think of". This will ease players into suggesting their own solutions to problems while still giving them the fallback of some GM-provided options.

Part of the problem lies in the perceived pointlessness of playing pretend. Of course, fun is its own reward, but when you're easing in someone new they might like to feel they've achieved something by the end. This is where we can draw on our knowledge of video games. Have a way for the players to win. Get to the end of the dungeon and kill the dragon, it's the classic example, and one that fits perfectly here. The game should be able to end so that your players can decide to play again, try a more traditional RPG or run their own game. If you want to be really fancy you can provide multiple goals in the way of achievements. That alone is a topic for another post.

Social networks do not normally have built-in dice rollers.
Yes, you can probably get them through an add-on or use a website like invisible castle, but why? Remember, if this idea works you aren't going to be stuck playing with some guy you know loosely through a forum and think may be a jerk. You're playing with whoever you want, so choose people you know and trust. The GM will have sole charge of the dice.

Everyone's here to have fun and if the GM wants you dead there are easier ways to do it than fixing some rolls. If you don't trust each other why are you friends again?

The smallest obstacle will put people off.
I have to register with this forum? Screw that. Download an applet? Tab closed. Visit this url? I'll do it later.

This play experience will have zero obstacles to entry. You ask a friend (through whatever medium you like) if they want to play, or they see the game happening and ask you to join, and they're in. The GM starts asking them questions and their answers are the start of the game.

People don't want to play a PbP.
So far you may be thinking of PbP games you've played in before that sound like this. I've GMed and played in a fair number of PbP games myself and I could write at length about my issues with the format. The bottom line is that they've always felt like a big commitment to me. Even if a post only takes me five minutes to hammer out at times it feels like work. I feel obliged to fill posts out with poetic description and consider whether or not I'm making the right mechanical choices. This game isn't going to require either of these. You can be plain in stating what you'd like to do and the GM and other players are sure to appreciate it. The GM, on the other hand, may be more tempted to get flowery with their writing.

Don't do this.

Writing a long post is one thing, but reading a wall of text will daunt even the most literary of us. I've talked about what I think an RPG is and is not. I do not believe an RPG is creating a work of collaborative fiction. Sure, when the dust has settled you'll have a cool story to remember and one that you might even want to write into a piece of fiction yourself. During the game is not the avenue for this. Sure, throw in a nice detail or two when you're describing the environment, but keep it bite-sized. You're not writing a story, you're playing a game. The story is a product of play, not the play itself.

People are more interested in videogames than a paper-based approximation of one.
RPGs are not going to be the best at the type of gameplay videogames excel at. Let them have it. If I want a racing simulator, action-packed gunplay or bone-shaking martial arts combat my console will provide. With even the best system and GM rolling a d20 to see if my car skids off the track is going to be a weaker representation of what I could be doing with a videogame. It's a good job that RPGs have an entirely different type of gameplay that videogames are completely unable to emulate.

I've mentioned before that the unique selling point in RPGs is the total freedom the GM and players have in their actions. A video game is completely opposite to this, even when it might appear otherwise. I'm confident that what I'm proposing will be entirely different to a videogame experience, enough so to differentiate itself in videogamer's minds. The RPG they're playing might be something they just dip into on facebook. It doesn't stop them playing their xbox all night or grinding away at an MMO. It offers something different and both can be consumed without interfering with each other. When you sit and play a videogame for the first time you think "what can I do?". When you play an RPG it's "what will I do?".

Most non-gamers would rather try this out online than commit to an evening of play.
Completely understandable. Draw them in with some online play throughout the week and then when you're all in the same room together why not play for another half-hour before you go out? If everyone's on Google+ why not play in a hangout? The game should be able to occur online and offline, with no obstacles between the two.

To be concluded next time in Part 3.

Some Difficult Truths Pt 1

2011-08-21T02:09:00.003+01:00

Continuing from this post.

The Difficult and Questionable Truths of this project.
In my planning I made a list of the things my brain shouts at me when I consider this topic. I'm by no means saying these statements are completely true, but they're things that come to my mind. Some of them aren't pleasant to hear, but they'll all need to be addressed to do what I want to do with this project.

People don't want to play RPGs now.
Perhaps the hardest truth of all. Sure, you can draw in new initiates to the hobby with traditional RPGs, but this is mostly through hard work on the part of the GM. The fact is that most of the masses that played D&D at its peak don't want to play it anymore. Most other people are aware that gamers sit around a table and play an RPG with character sheets, funny dice and rulebooks, and generally they don't want to get involved. This is the reason I want to build a play experience from the ground up. Something isn't working.

People don't want to learn rules.
This is very simple. The players will not learn any rules. They will consider the situation they are currently in, say what they want to do and let the GM do the rest. The GM is solely in charge of the rules.

People don't enjoy number crunching.
As mentioned above, there is no number crunching for players in-game, but what about character creation? Everyone loves rolling some stats, right? Sure, but here I think it might be best done another way.

The player states interest in playing and the GM asks them some questions about their character. These questions are subject to limitations the GM has randomised and require no knowledge of the setting or rules. These limitations will either make the question multiple choice or else suggest a few clear choices immediately. Think "As a child were you more brainy or brawny?" or "Your character was conscripted to join the army to fight in a way they thought was unjust. What did they do?". Certain assumptions about a character's background will be implicit to the launch of the game. In D&D terms think "you will play a group of miners trapped underground" or "you are the employees of a wealthy noble".

Luckily, RPGs are not about rules or number crunching.
Picture some people playing D&D around a table. Just like in the good old days. The GM describes a situation to them and the players say what they want to do. There's some die rolling and the GM looks at some stuff behind his screen before explaining what happens. Hopefully this is fun!

This is what an RPG is, at it's core. This is what I want to do with my non-gamer friends. Painstakingly creating a character by choosing from a thousand options, moving miniatures around a grid to carry out tactical combat and flipping through rulebooks to check if the GM's using the vehicle rules correctly are not part of this experience. These are parts of some RPGs and will remain long into the future, but these are not the parts that are going to draw in new people on the scale that we should be doing.

The unique selling point of RPGs is that moment when the GM says "what do you want to do?" and you consider your options. This isn't multiple choice. This is infinite choice. Forget about using one of the powers on your character sheet. Forget about working out the quickest way the four of you can kill the dragon. This isn't "what rule are you invoking to do what you want to do?". Strip it back. "What do you want to do?".

Fantasy and SciFi are only popular with nerds and goths.
Some of the most popular films of the last few years have been Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, Avatar, Iron Man. Tell me these don't fit into fantasy and scifi. If we look at 2010s highest grossing films we see Toy Story, Alice in Wonderland, Inception and How to Train your Dragon. 2009 has 2012, Transformers 2, Twilight, Sherlock Holmes, Angels and Demons and The Hangover. 2008 has The Dark Knight, Wall-E, Quantum of Solace and Indiana Jones. For the releases aimed at children I'm assuming they must have also appealed to adults in some part.

For a moment put aside the quality of these films. I've listed a few obvious scifi and fantasy settings, but what about Inception, The Hangover and Wall-E? All these films had clear mass appeal amongst non-gamers. Can you imagine playing an RPG based around each of these settings? If you can't, try harder!

If RPGs are going to grab your friends then you've got to strongly consider whether you use a setting that feels like something that came out of 2011 or one that came from the 1970s. This may be tough to hear, but maybe save Greyhawk for the second game. It doesn't have to be as radical as modern-day Las Vegas, just consider your choice carefully. Is your player going to have to read a setting wiki or look at a hexmap to understand your setting? If so, you've just lost a player.

I love reading a hardback book of setting info, but your friends are going to need to be eased into that. A few sessions down the line they should be asking you for a map or more info on the world they're playing in. Let it grow, don't force it.

Mass Appeal in 2011

2011-08-20T13:28:00.007+01:00

Tavis Allison over on The Mule Abides has written a post that sends sparks flying through my brain. I'm incredibly excited to see if this question could be answered, or at least if attempts at answering it would create a new avenue for the hobby.

Zak Smith has already kindly informed us that, thanks to Google+, we no longer have to worry about not having a game to play in. Twitter has also been explored as a home for RPGs, with apparent success. I believe these two examples go further to answer Tavis' challenge than the most well planned induction game of D&D could.

In the comments of Tavis' post, zhai2nan2 points out that the world of the 1970s was ready for D&D. A bunch of teenagers or adults could gather together without the distractions of smartphones, internet, a console in every home and practically any form of media on-demand. There's an argument for the worlds of elves and dragons having more appeal back then, too, but I think this is a secondary concern. The larger issue is how we socialise with our friends in 2011.

When I look at how I socialise with my non-gamer friends I see that social networks and technology are inescapable. If we're gathering to watch a film I'll get the invite through a message on my phone or Facebook. After a social event the photos are uploaded for all to comment and reminisce. When I want to play a new console game with friends there's as much chance we'll do it online as in the same room. I could go on, but you all know the end result. Socialising through technology has firmly rooted itself into the masses.

Can understanding how the people of 2011 socialise make RPGs appealing to our non-gamer friends?

I think so.

Over the next week or so I hope to hammer out a plan we can all put into action. A way we can use the social technology of 2011 to drag RPGs kicking and screaming from the 70s. Do I want to lay waste to all the traditions of our hobby that so many of us hold dear? Absolutely not. I want to play RPGs with people, not some chimera of collaborative fiction and Farmville. I want an experience comparable to what I think of as a traditional RPG. We already have play by post, by irc, by voice and even by video chat, but, as much as I love these forms, they exist as a round-the-table game lifted onto another social platform. If we're making this move to playing our RPGs online we should have a game that reflects this and understands the link between our online and offline socialising. That link is there, let's use it.

A point I can't stress enough is that I don't want to replace the traditional RPG. I want you to be able to "play D&D" with whatever comes out of this project. I want you to be able to do that with some work colleagues, old friends or even your family that never showed more than a passing interest before. As heretical as my idea might sound to traditionalists I want you to be able to run the Tomb of Horrors with this thing. The method may vary but I want that RPG feeling to remain.

I'll leave you hanging with lists of what I want from the end result of this project.

Primary Goals

To be able to launch a group of my non-gamer friends into an RPG without them having to read a single rulebook or gather in the same room.
To have the game feel like a traditional RPG without the biggest obstacles to entry that non-gamers face. It's not a computer game, it's not a forum game, it's not a boardgame, it's an RPG that understands its roots but is thoroughly modern.
To extend the "play time" of the RPG beyond the traditional all-nighter session around a table without removing that experience. I socialise with my friends 24/7 and the game should take advantage of that.
Break down the separation between our online and offline gaming.

Secondary Goals

To make a first-time gamer want to, and be able to, run their own game after one session as a player.
To understand the traditional fantasy and scifi origins of RPGs while exploring the possibilities that are likely to hold more appeal in 2011. This does not necessitate moving away from fantasy and scifi, but will look at what those words mean today.

The Grey One's View of the Elements

2011-07-04T22:23:00.002+01:00

It was there, but also not there. Sumaj had never seen an Origin in the flesh before, and he could not be sure he was seeing one right now. The smoke around its loosely humanoid form shifted and lightened. As it spoke, Sumaj knew it was addressing him.

"The Elements are all. All comes from these four. The night sky and the endless ocean are from the same seed as the tiger and the man. It is how these intertwine that we have created infinite variety."

The smoky form started to twist and tighten in a funnel before seeming to exhale, somehow still having the hint of a human form.

"That which is only Earth is the stone. It exists in the physical, it is absolute and easily understood, but forms the basis for the greatest mountains and finest wonders of architecture."

"That which is only Earth and Water is the tree. It leans to the sun, draws upon water and blossoms every spring, but will never strive for more."

"That which is only Earth, Water and Fire is the beast. It cries out in anger and whimpers in pain. It beats down its rivals and surveys its territory with pride."

"That which is Earth, Water, Fire and Air is now above the stone, the tree and the beast. When all four near a balance we have Man, and it is to each of the Elements that you owe a part of yourselves."

A Wanderer's Romance is available for free on RPGNow with Stargazer Games.

A Wanderer's Romance now on RPGNow

2011-06-30T09:11:00.003+01:00

With help from Mike at Stargazer Games I've finally managed to get a pdf of A Wanderer's Romance onto rpgnow.

I'm really happy with how the pdf looks, and I'd like to credit Pavel Elagin for his beautiful artwork.

Best of all it's still free! Go and grab your copy now. If you're still not sold here's the freshly written blurb.

A Wanderer's Romance

A Wanderer's Romance is a game of martial art duels and tea-making contests set in a world of unnatural islands on an endless sea. It draws on its Wuxia influences but focuses on a character driven game with scope for incredible environments and a true sense of exploration.

Features of the game include:

A fast, simple and easy to learn system for task resolution that spreads consistently across duels, contests, activities and group tests.
Dozens of combat styles for characters to learn as well as countless other types of contest they can specialise in.
A setting outline designed for maximum creative freedom. Every group's world will be different but will share in similar themes.
Multiple ways to support your allies from teaching them lessons in defeat and envigorating them through activities to training them in combat styles and preparing tea and food that will balance their elemental forces.

The Big Bug Hunt

2011-04-14T14:49:00.007+01:00

The Big Bug Hunt
A Big Action Heroes Scenario

Want to try out Big Action Heroes but running low on planning time? Just show up to the table with this and let random tables plan out a bug hunt for your space-victims!

The Group may be hardened marines, tough survivors or greedy mercenaries, but either way they're on an alien-infested ship and have an objective to fulfil. What objective you say? Roll.

Objective
1: Find and kill the Queen. She will be in the [3d6]th room the group enters and has the stats of a Hulk, but her Scream is upgraded to a 1d6+1 attack and she will be protected by 4 Clawbugs. When this is done return to your point of entry without getting killed.
2: Incinerate the Nest. The first batch of Alien Eggs you find will in fact be a huge nest. One of the players gets a Flamethrower for free (see the gear index) and must use it to torch the eggs. When this has happened return to the point of entry without dying, but any groups of aliens you meet on the way will have an extra 1d6 Clawbugs.
3: Survive. If the group can survive encounters with 2d6 groups of aliens help will arrive to rescue them.
4: Escape. Get to the exit. This will be in the [3d6]th room the group enter.
5: Clean Out. When the group has killed 6d6 Aliens the ship infestation has been cleared.
6: Self Destruct. When the group finds a Control Room they may trigger the ship's self-destruct sequence. As long as they can get back to their point of entry in time they will escape the ship, leaving the aliens to a fiery death.

Want to give the group a better chance? Give them some Mechanised Armour (see Gear Index) for an added level of power. To compensate for this have every alien encounter contain an extra 1d6 Clawbugs.

Every time the group passes through a door roll to see what the room is, its description and how many exits it has. When entering a room roll 1d6. If this is a 1 roll up a bug encounter, if it is a 6 roll up a non-hostile encounter.

Aliens are sneaky and won't be just waiting around for the group to find them. Roll a die occasionally when the group are exploring. On a 1 roll up a Bug encounter immediately to pounce upon them.

Room
1: Junction.
2: Vehicle Bay.
3: Lab.
4: Living Quarters.
5: Control Room.
6: Corridor.

Description
1: Pitch Black
2: Slimed
3: Functional
4: Ravaged
5: Smoking
6: Untouched

Exits
1: Dead End.
2: 1 Blocked.
3: 1 Free.
4: 1 Free, 1 Blocked.
5: 2 Free.
6: 2 Free, 1 Blocked.

Non-Hostiles
1: Crippled Survivor.
2: Sane and Armed Survivor.
3: Alien Eggs.
4: Corpse Pile.
5: Mad Survivor.
6: Dead Spitter.

Hostile
1: 6 Clawbugs
2: 1 Stalker
3: 3 Clawbugs, 1 Spitter
4: 3 Spitters
5: 1 Wounded Clawbug
6: 1 Hulk

Alien Clawbug
Stress Limit: 2
Feat Dice: Athletics 4, Other 2
Class Actions
Scurry: Move a short distance. You have 1 defence.
Pounce: Move a short distance and make a 1d6 melee attack.
Shred: Make three 1d6 melee attacks.
Bonus Powers
Death Splat: If you are killed in melee your killer takes 1 Stress.

Alien Spitter
Stress Limit: 5
Feat Dice: Athletics 3, Bulk 3, Other 1
Class Actions
Scurry: Move a short distance. You have 1 defence.
Spit: Make two 1d6 short ranged attacks against a single target. Alternatively, one of these attacks can be used to dissolve a piece of cover.
Spray: Make three 1d6 ranged attacks at one target within close range. Alternatively, one of these attacks can be used to dissolve a piece of cover.
Bonus Powers
Death Splat: If you are killed in melee your killer takes 2 Stress.

Alien Stalker
Stress Limit: 10
Feat Dice: Stealth 8, Athletics 6, Other 1
Class Actions
Stalk: Move a short distance. You have 3 defence.
Hunt: Move a short distance and make a 2d6 melee attack. Make this a 3d6 melee attack if you Stalked on your last round.
Bonus Powers
Death Splat: If you are killed in melee your killer takes 1 Stress.

Alien Hulk
Stress Limit: 20
Gear: Armour Plating
Feat Dice: Brawn 8, Athletics 4, Other 1
Class Actions
Slam: Move a short distance and make a 2d6 melee attack.
Scythe: Make three 2d6 melee attacks.
Scream: Make 1d6-1 Ranged attacks against all enemies in Short Range, ignoring Defence.
Bonus Powers
Death Splat: If you are killed in melee your killer takes 1d6 Stress.

Armour Plating (Armour)Add a bonus of 2 to your defence against all attacks and ignore any attacks that would cause less than 2 Stress.

Hexmapping...

2011-03-04T18:50:00.004Z

...feels good.

Click for big.

Playing Outside the Rules

2011-02-24T19:53:00.005Z

The following is an excerpt from the GM's section of my work in progress, big-scale, spear-em-up RPG, Thousand Spears. Although it's part of this game I can see it applying to most systems.

Playing Outside the Rules

The most important thing to remember about Thousand Spears is that it is an RPG and not a wargame. You could play it as a wargame, but if you do you’ll be missing out on what makes RPGs so special. In an RPG the GM and players are able to step out of the rules of the game to do, quite literally, anything.

As the GM it's up to you to maintain a balance of playing within the rules and playing outside the rules. This doesn't mean breaking the rules, but is everything the players do that isn't directly linked to a rule. For example, using an individual's Ability to raise some attack dice is playing firmly within the rules, but describing how the archers are pouring arrows onto the enemy is playing outside the rules.

In the majority of games more time will be spent outside the rules than inside them. There are no rules for your Inheritor giving a rousing speech to his men, deciding how to persuade the dock-master to loan him a ship or deciding whether the mysterious Ysorn can be trusted to keep a promise. The temptation may be to play out these situations as Trials or Challenges, but it's important to remember you're not bound to using a rule for everything.

The rules are there for a reason, and there is great fun to be had using them to act out huge battles, dramatic one-on-one duels and life or death journeys across hostile landscapes. Just stop each time you're about to step back into the rules to consider whether you really need to.

Quick Update

2011-02-21T18:59:00.002Z

Two more games have been added to my Games list.

Big Action Heroes is a class-based modern action game where archetypal heroes blow up their enemies in light tactical combat.

Thousand Spears is a scaled-up RPG that follows classical heroes around an original setting leaving a trail of dead followers in their wake.

Both are currently in massive need of playtesting, but take a look all the same.

Enjoy!

Want to be a Fringer?

2010-08-02T21:32:00.004+01:00

You are a Fringer. You may not be a bad person but you've most likely seen bad things or done worse to survive. As is often the case you've banded together with a group of like-minded individuals. Perhaps you've worked together on jobs before or feel like you can trust each other after a friendship. You may have an area of expertise but on the Fringe there are few steady jobs, so you will have had something of a patchwork career history.

There is no Universal Empire or Omni-Planetary Federation here. Core Space is far away and they're happy about it. Here anyone can stake their claim, as long as they have the means to back it up.

Your character's personal kingdom is the shared ownership of a banged up planetary shuttle. This will fly you between nearby planets and can be transported further distances by larger craft for a cost.

Between yourselves you will decide to pursue one of the job opportunities available on the local bulletin service in the hope of making enough credits to stay fed and keep the shuttle running.

I'm finally getting around to running a playtest of Xenofringe, my Sci Fi RPG. As a change of pace I'll be running it play by post on the Penny Arcade forums.

Want to sign up and try it out? Check out the game thread here and post to show your interest.

Monsters: The Big Three.

2010-06-30T20:31:00.007+01:00

Following my post on Elves and Dwarfs in my Adventurer's Tale game. I figured I might as well look at the other side of the coin. While I mostly wanted my monsters to be monsters rather than anything too fleshed out there are three monsters I see as particularly core to a game like this.

The three monster races I consider most analogous to Humans, Elves and Dwarfs are Orcs, Goblins and Trolls respectively and I wanted to present a mostly vanilla version of each while focusing in on what I really think makes each type of monster tick. I didn't want the three races to be opponents of varying toughness. I wanted each to have a unique feel. There are mechanics to back this up but mostly I focused on Goblins as otherworldly vermin, Orcs as an amoral mob and Trolls as stupid creatures with power in their very blood.

Goblin

All varieties of goblin make their homes anywhere there is a safe hiding place, often in Otherworlds that they know are secret. Although they rarely attack their neighbours outright they are known to enjoy the thrill of stealing, playing cruel jokes and generally tormenting other species. They have an unusual affection for trolls, ogres and giants, though this attention is often an annoyance for the big, dumb creatures. Their love of big folk is equalled by their hatred for other small beings such as dwarfs, kobolds and even cats and dogs, all of which they try to harm as much as possible. They are notorious survivors and can be found in environments all across the world, and even in Otherworlds. Typically the lone goblin is much more concerned about itself than the good of its peers, so they make poor guards or soldiers. Visually they vary greatly but are generally up to three feet tall with grotesque features and skin that can be any sickly colour from orange to yellow or green, often with tufts of different coloured fur, some being completely covered in the stuff.

Orc

Rowdy mobs of orcs often raid unprotected villages with packs of warhounds. Sometimes they even form huge armies with archers and war machines but this is usually under the guidance of an evil human, devil or exceptional Orc chief. They are driven by a love of the simple pleasures of eating, stealing and fighting as well as a total lack of morals or care for other beings. Those that live underground sometimes use Goblins or Dwarfs as slaves. Some scholars claim Orcs were once good creatures, but their blood has been tainted with that of demons, or that they were bred into their current form for use as soldiers. Orcs are easily caught up in mob mentality, meaning an army of rowdy orcs are near unshakable in their confidence. Their appearance and colouration varies wildly, some groups having extended lower tusks, pig-like snouts or a more apish appearance. The only things they all have in common are their ugly appearance, amoral behaviour and love of an angry crowd of orcs beside them.

Troll

Strong but slow-minded, Trolls live solitary lives wandering their swamp or cave. They are often captured and used as dungeon guards because of their survivability, but they are never truly committed to such a cause. The blood of a troll can be sold to a wizard or alchemist for 10gp or turned into a Healing Potion by succeeding at both a DN10 Craft roll and DN10 Wisdom roll. Troll blood is commonly mixed with the stock of other species by Dark Wizards, usually Orcs or Humans, to create servants. These troll-blooded creatures combine the toughness of a troll with the more alert mind of another species, making much better soldiers.

Elven and Dwarfish Adventurers

2010-06-21T17:19:00.004+01:00

I've recently added a small section of player advice to The Adventurer's Tale for those who want to play as a Dwarf or Elf. I did this in preparation for my summer break from work, where I should have time to at least run a mini-campaign and would happily welcome a character or two from the nonhuman races.

I've already talked about the basics of the setting and its hidden depths so I think fleshing out the types of characters I expect to see is long overdue.

Even if you have no interest in The Adventurer's Tale I hope someone will draw some use from my take on Dwarfs and Elves.

Elves

From their monster entry:

The otherworldly Elves stand slightly shorter than humans on average and are much slighter, but deceptively strong. They have angular features, pointed ears and never die from old age, reproducing incredibly rarely. Outside of their hidden settlements they usually wander alone or in a small band (1d6), sometimes accompanied by Sprites. Some might even integrate into a human society, as part of their innate curiosity and desire for new experiences. They are fond of animals and often ride a horse or have a small pack of dogs.

Due to their potentially infinite lifespans Elves are always looking at the big picture, considering every action's effect on the future. Elves claim they feel emotions on a much stronger level than humans, and so must control their feelings through worship and meditative craft. Those that let their feelings control them are prone to fits of rage, extended periods of depression or total arrogance. The most selfish Elves are particularly cruel and see other races as little more than cattle and potential slaves.

Playing an Elf Adventurer:
* A potentially endless lifespan means elves are rarely in a rush. They spend great deals of time pondering decisions and are always looking at the long-term effects of their actions.
* Elves value their own lives and those of other elves much more highly than those of other species, so sometimes consider humans as expendable.
* As they have many years to experience life elves are eager to experience everything at least once. Most would rather learn something new than perfect an existing skill so specialists are rare.
* Coming from small communities, elves dislike crowds and are used to having their own privacy.
* Although they form families elves rarely stay together as a family for long. Because of this they share a much looser family bond than other races.

Dwarfs

From their monster entry:

These short humanoids can be found all over the world, living in family clans. While many are peaceful folk, focused on mastering their craft, there are some that turn to madness, usually linked to a particular obsession. If Elves are thought to always be thinking of the big picture, Dwarfs are always focusing on often petty details.

Physically they differ little from humans besides their squat build, hairiness and lifespans of around a hundred years, with many doubling this. Little is known by other races about their concepts of gender or reproduction, with all dwarfs looking male to non-dwarfs. In fact, dwarfs do not reproduce in pairs, but a single dwarf will spend years or even decades carving a child out of specially selected stone or clay. When the child has been carved with enough skill and dedication it will slowly soften to flesh and become a living, adolescent dwarf, complete with beard. The awoken dwarf already has basic knowledge of dwarfish history and language, which the dwarfs claim comes from inheriting part of the carver and their ancestors.

Playing a Dwarf Adventurer:
* Detail is everything to a dwarf, to the point where they nearly all have a specialist area of knowledge or craft that they refine every day.
* Despite not having traditional families dwarfs share very close bonds with those closest to them. They are quick to form similarly tight bonds with those that they trust.
* Dwarfs like to account for every eventuality and greatly enjoy plotting and planning, listing every piece of information they have on the matter, however trivial.
* Change generally goes against what a dwarf finds comfortable, so they usually react negatively to it. Instead they like to stick to routine and tradition, easing into new situations gradually.
* Perhaps due to the fact they do not form couples dwarfs love to indulge in the simple pleasures of food, drink, games and storytelling in the company of friends.

The fans demanded it...

2010-06-01T23:51:00.003+01:00

Remember Skullados?

No?

Well I guess this won't be much use to you then.

Xenofringe Free Preview

2010-02-27T00:53:00.004Z

THE XENOFRINGE is the loose border that divides the established systems of CORE SPACE from the unknown contents of DARKSPACE. Life on the Fringe is a hazardous affair, where the frontiers of civilization meet vast, mysterious space.

As I mentioned in my last post I've been working on a generic sci-fi RPG loosely based on the core of The Adventurer's Tale. Although it's still in a very work-in-progress state I'm happy to put it out there as a preview.

Presenting Xenofringe.

There are a few parts of the game I'm very happy with and it's a slightly more crunchy affair than I'm used to. Although it's rough around the edges the core is playable, so let me know if you give it a try.

Stone Age to Space Age

2010-02-22T11:33:00.005Z

In stark contrast to my work on a Stone Age game earlier this week I've spent the last few days taking another shot at an idea I've never quite been able to make work. A Rules-Lite Science Fiction RPG.

Until now, that is.

I feel like I've made some real progress with a game I haven't got a name for yet. For now it has the project name Futureworlds, and I hope to post more about it when it's further refined.

So here's an imagedump of sci-fi settings that have been on my mind while writing the game.

The contrast of serious and more comedic strands of sci-fi in there is quite deliberate and something I'll go into more detail on at another point.

Stone Age Adventures.

2010-02-17T21:22:00.007Z

Last night I made a light-hearted comment to someone that my next game project should involve dinosaurs. That got me thinking. I knew I was doomed to take this joke-project seriously. We've all seen the anachronistic images of primitive humans fighting dinosaurs, but could this idea have meat for an actual game? I'm familiar with Og and GURPS Ice-Age but neither is quite what I'm seeing in my head. Before I get too caught up in mechanics I want to nail down my overal concept.

The Stone-Age, particularly the Paleolithic, ends over 10,000 years before the medieval era that inspires more fantasy settings begins. This has impact on everything from technology and society through to even more core concepts such as language and religion. To avoid things being too mind-shattering I'm using a wonderful term wikipedia taught me today as a benchmark. Behavioral Modernity. The short of this is that my societies will follow the nine tweaked guidelines below when considering how primitive they are.

- Some permanent buildings, some temporary.
- Purpose-made stone and bone tools.
- Fishing, group hunting and fruit gathering.
- Long-distance exchange or barter among groups.
- Use of pigment and jewellery for decoration and self-ornamentation.
- Figurative art.
- Game playing and music.
- Burial of dead and basic ritual.
- Some animal domestication.

However, notably I want to keep the tech level below:
- Bows and arrows.
- Pottery.
- Agriculture and Animal Husbandry.

I'm imagining the key points of a typical story will feel quite different to fantasy, too. I'm imagining:

- No magic or real focus on earning treasure.
- Significantly tighter focus on a small group and small societies. No wars or huge cities.
- Character advancement through new knowledge and tools rather than strength and skill.
- More focus on survival and acquiring materials and tools.
- Large cultural differences and a sizeable language barrier.

There's been recent talk on the RPGBN concerning historical settings and while I'm not trying to simulate paleolithic life exactly I'm imagining this project as much more of an alternate history than fantasy. The original idea was primitive man fighting dinosaurs, but I think I can do one better than that. I love creating new animals and plants so why not set down my primitive people in a fictional region and fill it with my own creations?

The new creatures and plants will have a grounding in reality, the brilliant Morae River blog being a perfect example of what I'm picturing. A valley would be a good focal point for a region containing a range of societies and creatures but instead I'm thinking a lake. Something about all sorts of life teeming around the coasts of a lake feels right to me. Journeying away from its supply of fish and clean water may be a dangerous undertaking, and perfect subject matter for an RPG. I love the idea of the group of neanderthal-like men climbing over a ridge to come face to face with a creature they've never encountered before.

And so a good starting name for this project has come to me. Stone Lake. Stay tuned for further info.

Understanding the Legendary Styles

2010-02-09T17:28:00.003Z

The Student followed his Master across the green plain, fresh from a filling breakfast of over-night roasted pork. They approached a shallow pond where ducks swam. The Master's spear lightly tapped the cool water.
"The Initiate must be like the pike. Lean. Focused. Hungry for knowledge".
With a splash, the master's spear sent a pair of resting ducks into motion, fleeing into the air before landing and waddling into a calmer pond.
"The Student must be like the duck. Able to leave the comfort of the water to walk or fly, never staying in one pond for too long."
"And what about you, Master?" asked the Student.
"The Master? The Master will become like the pig. Content, humble and..."
The Master paused before lightly tapping his stomach.
"Understanding his role to provide for others." he finished, with a smile.

- Fluff brainstorming for an upcoming game of A Wanderer's Romance

Targets for The Adventurer's Tale

2010-01-25T11:14:00.003Z

Just some thoughts on things I'd like to achieve with The Adventurer's Tale in the next couple of months.

- Complete the currently-unnamed Starter Adventure Module and find GMs to playtest it without me being present.
- Make use of Otherworlds in the first session of a game.
- Test the Mass Combat and Mounted Combat rules in play.
- Update the One-Sheet Quickstart to include a few minor rule changes.

Anyone volunteering as a GM to help me with my first target can get in touch with me, as I'm eager to see how the game plays without having me as a GM or player.

Thoughts on the Otherworld

2010-01-21T19:31:00.004Z

The more I think about it, the more I like the idea of Otherworlds as a focus for a setting. They let you keep the familiar reality of a low-fantasy world, but have your characters encounter magical, high-fantasy elements when need be. I'm hoping that both sides of the coin will benefit from the contrast of the other. But the idea of jumping into new realities is hardly a new one in fantasy. From Planescape to the more accessible 4e Cosmology D&D, the elephant-in-the-room for any fantasy RPG, has covered quite a bit of ground itself.

For my Adventurer's Setting I want something a little less defined. Something more Fairytale than Epic. I'm definitely thinking more akin to Wonderland, Oz, Neverland and Narnia than the Great Wheel. Places where adventures happen and rules of nature are broken, as well as a source for magic to leak into the natural world in small doses.

However, my experience of these sources is a little limited, as may be clear. My examples are exclusively from sources I remember from my childhood. What reminded me of this concept recently was reading about the Celtic Otherworld, and I'm familiar with many of the analogs in other culture's mythology. What I'm calling out for is recommendations for other sources of inspiration for fantastic places existing outside of our world.

Any suggestions for me?

The Adventurer's Setting Musings

2010-01-19T20:08:00.003Z

I've been working on a starter module for The Adventurer's Tale in the form of a small sandbox with a few minidungeons for adventurers to brave. The idea of the game was always to encourage GMs to make their own settings or adapt the game to existing ones. However, I can only resist the lure for so long. I'm going to have a short paragraph of setting info at the top of this starter module.

For this I want to start with some key points that people familiar with fantasy settings will want to know. The idea is to stay generic, but do generic as well as I can. Let's do this off the top of my head.

- The World is a mundane place. Magic is uncommon, most people have boring jobs and the novelty of local monster attacks has long since worn off on the average human. Most people have little reason to know about things that aren't happening in their immediate surroundings.

- The Otherworlds are far from mundane. These hidden, unnatural places exist outside of the natural world and range from the the glittering domain of the forest queen, elusive elf cities, weird underworlds filled with wonder and even Hell itself. Crossing points to Otherworlds are difficult to find and could take any form, but the Adventurers will find a way. These places are where the rules are broken and occasional "leaks" from Otherworlds are the source of most of the Fantasy in the otherwise natural world.

- Elves are elusive, immortal and always thinking of the big picture. Dwarfs are focused, obsessive and enjoy routine. Orcs are ugly, amoral and easily led by smarter creatures. Humans are everywhere.

- Wizards can display supernatural abilities but are rare enough that many people go their lives without witnessing it first hand. Wizards rarely gather together in numbers of more than two, a master and his apprentice. Stories of magic are told, but often assumed to be exaggeration. Likewise, stories of Otherworlds are often thought of as children's bedtime stories.

- Adventurers seek to protect their loved ones, gain riches and fame and explore the legendary Otherworlds. They will be given ample opportunity for all three.

Making the most of your Random Encounters

2010-01-18T21:08:00.006Z

Here's the situation. Your adventurers are roaming through some rough hilly land on the way to their next shot at fame and fortune when suddenly... a random encounter!

As tempting as it is to take the result straight off the table and run through it as quickly as possible, there's no reason random encounters should be unrelated to the matters that are more at the forefront of the players' minds.

Taking some guidance from Treasure Tables the encounter can be sexed up to include a unique element and way for the game to progress if they fail. Throw in a link to an established feature of this area and suddenly your random encounter feels a lot more relevant to the game.

Using an Adventurer's Tale game I ran recently as an example, I'll hit up a random encounter generator for the aforementioned rough hills.

Three Zombie Ogres.

Link to the Game: There's no record of ogres in the area the players were in, but zombie ogres? These unfortunate creatures were servants of the local Dark Wizard, K'Thrax, who the players are very familiar with. They carry metal clubs that observant characters will recognise as being similar to those of K'Thrax's guards, but behind them they drag chains bound around their wrists and necks, in a sort of undead chain-gang. It seems even in their zombie form these ogres weren't keen on serving the Dark Wizard and made a break for it. Could this mean someone is chasing them? Is there enough intelligence left to be able to use them for good? I'd hold off on making them too aggressive and instead play them as more pitiful beasts.
Unique Element: To play up the pity angle I'd have the players encounter the Ogres trapped in a sudden dip in the rough hills, unable to climb back up the steep, jagged slopes. If the adventurers decide to fight the Ogres then play up the chain-gang aspect, perhaps having them attack in unison using their chains.
Way to Progress in case of Fail: These dim creatures will have no interest in eating the adventurers, as a normal ogre might. Instead they're more likely to beat them until they stop fighting back and continue attempting to climb the slope.

Much better.

And as a special treat...

Zombie Ogre
Body 10
Melee 5
Metal Club (Damage 4), 3d6 Treasure.
Relentless: A zombie ignores any non-critical hits that cause less than 4 Damage. Critical hits damage the Zombie as normal.
Clumsy: Opponents may add 2 to their Grace score when rolling against an Ogre.

And what if the adventurers don't save the day?

2009-12-18T17:34:00.004Z

Roll on the following table whenever the adventurers do not save the day.

1: Noone saves the day and the bad thing happens as expected.
2: Someone known by the adventurers tries to save the day instead but fails horribly, dying in the process.
3: Someone known by the adventurers tries to save the day but fails, barely escaping with their lives.
4: Somehow things just work themselves out and nothing bad happens afterall.
5: Some other adventurers save the day and become local heroes.
6: As luck would have it the adventurers are presented with a second chance to save the day!

Creature Collection Preview

2009-11-17T21:28:00.007Z

Today's the day I throw out a sneak preview of my tentatively titled Creature Collection for The Adventurer's Tale. I wanted to keep the monster list in the core game quite pure so this is where I've been able to mess around with some more unusual enemies. Here are a pair of new Undead minions. Put them to use in your Adventurer's Tale game!

Bloodling
These creatures resemble bald, bloated dwarfs, usually found waddling around the lairs of their vampire masters. They serve without question, usually carrying out menial tasks, acting as lookouts and being disposable sources of blood when the need arises. Creating a Bloodling is a process that only a vampire can carry out and involves biting a captured victim in a particular way while casting a Command spell. This causes them to swell with blood and become completely at the command of their master.
Body 5
Melee 3, Shooting 3, Craft 2, Grace 2
Crossbow (Damage 3) and Dagger (Damage 2).
Blood Sacrifice: A Bloodling may fly into a combat rage, adding 2 to their Melee score for a single engagement. In doing so they exert themselves so much that they explode in a splatter of blood as soon as the engagement is complete. Usually they only use this technique when their master is in direct danger.
Variety: The blood splatter of some Bloodlings may carry disease or even burn an opponent's skin for a point of damage. Vampires with military backgrounds often train their Bloodlings in the use of a larger variety of weapons and armour.

Floating Corpse
Dark Wizards may create these horrors without the exertion required in creating a mass of zombies or skeletons. These rotting corpses float upright a few inches off the ground, making no sound as they patrol a set area or head towards a given point. If patrolling they will turn and float towards any intruders they notice, unable to attack, but often serving as a deterrent for inexperienced intruders. When they reach their target they do nothing but helplessly bump against them, hoping to provoke enough of a noise to alert the real guards.
Body 6
Lifeless Hang: Floating corpses cannot cause damage. If they hit an opponent they bump into them lightly, perhaps shedding some rotten flesh on them. Note that engagements with a Floating Corpses still count towards Combat Fatigue.
Variety: Some Floating Corpses are able to pass on curses or diseases with a touch, with others bursting into flames upon contact with living flesh.

And perhaps something larger, if that's to your tastes...

Spider Dragon
These towering horrors would seem to be prime examples of a wizard's experiment gone wrong. They are, in fact, natural creatures predating even Dragons, which they are unrelated to. Forced to the surface from their home deep beneath the ground they have developed a taste for cattle and slowly gained tolerance to sunlight. They resemble pale, gigantic six-legged spiders with a hideous head sporting beady eyes and an unfolding jaw bristling with teeth. No one has ever been known to tame one of these beasts or find a nest of young.
Body 20
Melee 12, Grace 2.
Leg Claws (Damage 4), Chitin (count as Heavy Armour).
Burning Spray: Damage 3 and reduces Body by 1 until healed, Hits 1d6-3 targets at the start of the dragon's turn. Targets can dodge this with a DN10 Grace roll. A spider dragon may do this once every hour.
Web Wrap: A Wild Dragon deals 2 extra points of damage on a Critical Hit, rather than 1. If this would cause their opponent to roll on the Death Table the Spider Dragon will (if they are cow-sized or smaller) wrap them in webbing and later devour them.

One Page? I can do that (sort of)

2009-08-26T13:12:00.009+01:00

A couple of days ago I was linked to Searchers of the Unknown, which is a one-page trimming-down of classic D&D. Despite being dubious about its limitations and holding on to descending AC at first I soon found both of these were good things.

Firstly the limitations meant you had very little to consider, as a player, mechanically. We encountered a pit very early on and rather than rolling athletics to leap over it we went back and unscrewed a door, using it as a makeshift bridge. This is extremely basic D&D stuff, but it felt so much more encouraged with such a minimal ruleset.

Secondly, descending Armour Class actually made sense for the first time. It was a roll-under target for attacks and was used for things like sneaking in a way that made the smaller=better idea actually fit.

Not to be outdone, I remembered that I had my own very-light system, The Adventurer's Tale. Although this game is very simple in itself the document is still pretty large with the optional rules, monsters and spells. Could I trim the core of it down to one sheet? I could. All the rules for creating an adventurer and playing the game are on the front of the sheet, with the back filled with spells and monsters for characters to encounter.

So here's the Adventurer's Tale One-Sheet Quickstart. Grab a few friends and run a pickup game today!

GAME OVER!

2009-07-22T23:37:00.006+01:00

I'll level with you. This game idea is almost entirely inspired by the Street Fighter movie with Jean Claude Van Damme and Raul Julia that everyone hated. I can say without a hint of irony that I thoroughly enjoy this film. Yes, the characters mostly bear no resemblence to their videogame counterparts. Yes, they're mostly awful characters even if you forgive the first point. But something about the film just keeps me entertained from start to finish.

With that in mind I wanted to play around with creating a game where you could take that concept of martial artists fighting off mobs of masked soldiers before going toe to toe with the boss but draw it a little closer to the videogames that inspired it. Yes, in this game I'd like my hero to be able to throw a fireball or two.

All very preliminary. The idea is little more than 30 minutes old but FreeMind has drained the words from my brain and I present them infront of you in a foetal stage.

Stay tuned for what will inevitably turn into another game document. I should clarify I'm aware of a few RPGs out there that tackle this subject matter, but none of them have really grabbed me. Besides, more game design practice is never something I shy away from.

100 Interesting Magic Items: The first half.

2009-07-06T21:06:00.012+01:00

Here's the first half of a nice handy d100 table for what I think to be interesting magic items. I'll describe the effects for each but leave out anything system specific for you to fill in yourself.

Hope you enjoy!

Aardvark Cloak: This cloak may be thrown around the wearer to wrap them in a protective shell. They cannot move or act while inside the shell other than returning the cloak to its normal form, but while protected they are unable to be hurt in any way.
All-Seasons Scabbard: As long as a sword is kept in this scabbard the wearer suffers no ill effects from extreme weather.
Angel Dart: If a target is whispered to the dart it may be thrown into the air, where it will fly to the target and hit it without error, regardless of distance or obstacles. The tiny dart causes no damage itself.
Aqua Grease: This pale grease can be rubbed over any equipment to completely protect it against damage from water exposure.
Amulet of Silence: Nothing within a foot of the holder of this amulet can cause any sound at all.
Broken Dagger: This incredibly ornate dagger is snapped in half partway down the blade and is not able to be repaired by any means at all.
Bell of the Crier: As long as the holder is ringing this hand-bell their voice will carry across great distances and be audible by all within a mile.
Boat of Murder: If a corpse is placed in this small rowboat it will drift out on the water and return an hour later, empty. There will be no trace of the corpse anywhere and no evidence left in the boat.
Bat Sword: If this sword is tapped against something hard it rings out a tone. This allows the wielder to see in the dark or smoke as well as they can in daylight.
Crystal Ship: This miniature ship is beautifuly crafted and valuable, but if it is ever taken on board a ship that ship will sink before its voyage is completed.
Coin Beetle: A normal looking coin. However, at night it comes to life and eats one other coin it can find, before disguising itself as a coin once again.
Chalice of Moods: Anyone drinking from this cup must roll. On 1-3 they remember something sad from their past and their mood drops. On 4-6 they feel a new vigor for life and start to smile.
Candle Beans: If one of these beans is bitten or pinched firmly it will glow for a few seconds before igniting in a low flame, much like a candle. It will burn for around ten seconds before going out and leaving a faint trail of smoke.
Digging Spoon: This tiny spoon can dig through any substance with a forceful push.
Death Drum: Anyone that bangs this drum thirteen times or more will die.
Dogpack Tooth: If this tooth is pressed into someone's gums it will take root and allow the owner to speak with dogs and wolves.
Diving Pearl: If a target is named and the pearl dropped into a body of water it will sink and move towards the target and latch onto it, returning it to the pearl's owner. The pearl cannot move objects larger than a person.
Dustbane Broom: This broom not only brushes away dust, twigs and other leavings, but removes them from existance. This cannot be used to destroy other unwanted items, only things that would normally be swept up.
Elephant Bread: This grey bread tastes faintly meaty and is incredibly filling.
Eternal Chessboard: Anyone playing chess with this set cannot win or lose a match. It simply goes on and on no matter how many moves the players take.
Ether Flute: Playing this flute causes any ghosts or spirits to freeze, mesmerised.
Engraving Quill: This quill can engrave messages onto any substance.
Fisherman's Blanket: This blanket will become dry with a quick shake, regardless of how wet it is, and is always faintly warm.
Frog Box: If this box is left open near to a frog it will be compelled to hop in and sit there happily. The frog will stay in the box without needing food, air or water, until instruted to hop out.
Firey Ring: If a container of food or liquid is held in the hand bearing this ring it will slowly heat up. Within a minute it will be boiling, but the container will still be safe to hold.
Frost Thread: If this thread is dangled into a body of water it will freeze at the rate of around one pint per minute. Once the thread is removed it will start to thaw.
Fingerless Gloves: Anyone that puts on these gloves feels a faint tingling in their fingers. An hour later it will be uncomfortable cramps. A further hour later, intense pain. At this point, if the gloves are removed their fingers will magically disappear.
Grey Paste: This pot of watery paste can be eaten, acting as both food and water, but tastes a little like ash. The pot magically refills with grey paste every night.
Golden Mule: A tiny golden statue of a mule. Anyone carrying this may carry twice as much weight as normal.
Howling Horn: This horn makes a very convincing howling noise, like that of a wolf.
Happiness Beads: Anyone wearing these beads feels a little happier than when they're not wearing them.
Hidden Sword: If this sword is tucked behind a robe or cloak it will not be found by anyone searching for it other than the person that hid it there.
Inspection Lens: Peering through this small lens reveals the true value of any jewels, gems or other art items.
Ice Diamond: This diamond is found sumberged in crushed ice in a specially sealed box. If it is removed from the ice it will gradually change over the next minute until it resembles a grey pebble. If submerged in crushed ice again it will quickly return to its diamond appearance.
Juggler's Balls: If thrown these balls will always make their way back to the thrower's hand before hitting the ground.
Jump Rope: When told to jump, this rope coils like a spring and bounces upwards twenty feet, carrying up to one passenger with it.
Jinxed Axe: This handaxe functions normally in melee but if thrown it will hit an ally if you miss your target.
Kindred Bracelets: When two people are wearing one of these bracelets each they are always aware of when the other is in life-threatening danger.
Karma Vase: Filling this Vase with expensive drink will cause it to drain away, but cure any ailments or damage affecting the pourer. Breaking the vase will kill the breaker.
Kingsblood Weed: Boiling this weed produces tea that will taste delicious to anyone of royal blood but foul to anyone that isn't.
Life Eating Sapphire: Whenever anyone holding this sapphire in one hand kills another being of above animal-level intelligence it glows and swells, increasing its value by 5%.
Leech Dust: Scattering this dust over a wound will clean it and drain any poison from it.
Longstride Breeches: Anyone wearing these red breeches will never become tired from walking.
Lion Gauntlet: This awkward steel gauntlet has a lion's head at the end in place of fingers. When the jaw hinge is moved from inside it makes a convincing lion's roar. The hand inside the gauntlet can't be used for anything else.
Madman's Blanket: Anyone sleeping under this blanket will have horrible, maddening nightmares.
Moon Rock: This rock has a strange feeling and is a weird yellow-grey colour. Any inspection suggests magical properties but infact it's completely mundane.
Marble Man: This statue comes to life when touched, functioning much as a normal servant would. It is only as strong as a normal human and can carry out any basic function it is taught the word for. It cannot speak, run or fight and if struck with a blow will fall to the ground and shatter into pieces.
Master's Ring: This ring causes a faint tingling sensation whenever one of the wearer's employees, servants or hirelings is planning to betray them in some way.
Map of the Head: The holder of this map may look over it when trying to remember something they witnessed while carrying the map. Within a minute of looking at it they will remember, even to the smallest detail.
Money Belt: Any amount of money may be pressed into a small slot on the front of this belt. The money can be retrieved by tapping it three times and announcing how much is required. This will even cause larger coins to be converted into change for specific amounts.

To be continued...

Fantasy Boyscouts and Resurrecting Old Projects

2009-06-17T08:04:00.006+01:00

Been a while since my last post, so time for a quick update on what I've been working on.

Working on Lookouts adaptation of The Adventurer's Tale after being truly inspired by one of Penny Arcade's latest projects.
Being wowed by another awesome map from the Tao of D&D
Scouring my contacts for someone with good pdf layout skills and a little free time they're willing to offer up to help me finally turn A Wanderer's Romance into a nice pdf
Realising more and more that Greywulf speaks a lot of sense
Considering bringing Inheritance back onto a front burner to see if I can improve it significantly and eventually have a completed document for mechanics and fluff

It's the last of these things I want to talk about today.

Back when I spoke about Inheritance in January there were two main areas I felt needed improvement. Firstly the setting needed to be made more accessible and presented alongside the rules in the document rather than seperate in a wiki. I have an idea for how to do this, but it can wait for now while I deal with a more mechanical issue. This second problem was that combat options mostly consisted of "attack" or specialist options like disarm, grapple, charge and so on. I wanted to present more options for character that just wanted to hack away. In addition to this issue there was often a rather high "whiff factor", which I've come to hate in games. Here's how I plan to tackle both of these, without going too far into specific Inheritance mechanics.

Attack Focuses

At the start of a character's turn they may choose an Attack Focus if they wish. This will provide both a bonus and a penalty in combat.

Speed: The character gains a +1PL bonus to their Initiative roll but suffers -1PL to hit on all attacks.

Damage: The character gains a +1PL bonus to Damage rolls but a -1PL penalty to their Initiative roll.

Accuracy: The characters gains a +1PL bonus to hit on all attacks but suffers -1PL to Damage rolls

The desired effect of this is that if a character is whiffing a lot in combat, be it through missing or being unable to hurt a target, they can shift their focus as required. On the other hand, it needn't slow down play as the DM is advised to not use them for NPCs and Monsters and even the players can ignore them if they wish.

Bring on a playtest!

Invisible Eyes made Visible

2009-05-28T17:16:00.006+01:00

Well, I've teased at this for two posts now, so it's finally time to unveil my new game in its first stage. Far from complete and pretty much untested, here's Invisible Eyes.

My target was to hit a couple of design goals I've been mulling over for a while.

Make Exploration and Travel key elements of the game.
Have very little focus on combat and replace rewards for killing with consequences.
Use a real-world modern setting that can be "spiced" to the GM's liking through conspiracy theories and supernatural happenings.
Encourage teamwork in as many areas of gameplay as possible, while not making a small group unplayable.

As it stands it seems like I'm hitting all four. Exploration is the name of the game, as is pushed through the sample character, sample groups and gameplay examples. Investigation goes hand in hand with exploration and the Knowledge and Insight mechanic makes this a focus of the game too, somewhat supported by the Connections all characters have (explained later). Travel is enforced through the parkour-inspired movement mechanics and the fact you're going to doing a lot of sneaking-in and running-away.

There's very little reward for combat. The hostiles you're likely to encounter will be security staff or policemen, if you follow the suggestions in the document. Leaving dead innocents wherever you go is going to make you public enemy number one, not desirable for supposed "invisibles". What's more, combat can be nasty, especially against someone you're outclassed by. It's not a matter of getting killed in one hit, but if a trained security guard catches up with you and he's probably going to pull you to the ground and put on the cuffs. In many ways a breaking and entering charge is scarier than death for a PC. Finally, there's a Shock mechanic that means you don't want to be constantly being shot at unless you have a steady mind and a good psychiatrist.

Teamwork is encouraged most simply through the Helping mechanic, which can literally be a lifesaver. However, a couple of secondary methods enforce it further such as every character having connections. These connections mean that even in a solo game the character will have some friends to call in favours from. In addition, starting characters have a relatively small pool of points to put into Stats and Expertise. This encourages specialisation and means a group are likely to have a variety of personnel that depend on each other in certain area.

As always, the game is free, but remember this document is little over two days old. Changes will be frequent and there are sure to be lots of mistakes riddled through. It's good enough to get across what I want out of the game, though, so check it out.

Invisible Eyes Tease

2009-05-28T00:35:00.004+01:00

I mentioned in my previous post that I've started work on a new project. I recently finished up the opening bite of fluff to set the mood for the game, based on the help of a friendly contributor.

The voice rang. A siren in this silence, a whisper in my ear.
"If we're to get out of this, we need to get up there".
The floor cracking beneath our pursuers forced our plans into action. Up I go, the wooden beams under one foot, my backup's hand under the other.
We're up.
Finding a path in this mess of a dilapidated structure isn't easy, but I'm searching. My nimble feet barely catch the splintered ledges. Then the heavy steps of my counterpart. His heavy boots crush the tiny barbs. The darkness around us disturbed by scanning flashlights.
We ascend higher.
The structure is weak up here. We are surrounded. A look to each other and in a spiralling duet we jump. Explorers, going where even demons fear to tread.

And I'll only answer one question on the game today, fully explaining things in tomorrow's post. Who are the players?

Example Operations

Invisible Eyes: This guerrilla journalist group promote themselves as the necessary eyes of the public, exposing secrets and corruption wherever they find it. Whether the general public believe their paranoia-filled newsletters is another matter.

City University Paranormal Society: Students of a variety of subjects gather to discuss supernatural activity. Their expeditions are most commonly led to the woods and caves outside the city, following the frequent UFO and ghost reports.

The Wet-necks: Adventurous people of all sorts meet on this online community dedicated to exploring the storm sewers beneath the city, also expanding into other underground networks.

Debunkers: This popular TV show involves its three presenters heading into areas rumoured to be haunted or contain cryptids to disprove their existence live on air.

Archo-Mythic Investigations: Retired Cambridge archeology professor Irving Brown has near unparalleled knowledge of historic and mythological artifacts. He and his small team now dedicate their lives to ensuring those that have found their way into the wrong hands end up safely on display in a museum.

Who would you like to be?

Another New Project

2009-05-27T10:11:00.004+01:00

Another new game has taken over my brain. I'll be posting about it in more detail after I've worked on it a little more, but for now I'll summarise it with four pictures.

It's this sort of place...

Being explored by people that can do this...

With the teamwork of...

And the occasional thing that might interest...

It could be fun! More about it soon.

Skullados, a 30 minute MS Paint RPG

2009-05-02T17:13:00.004+01:00

An RPG designed in 30 minutes using only MS Paint. Who'll join in the challenge?

Behold, Skullados.

Addition: This is too addictive.

The Restless Dead of Redway

2009-05-02T15:05:00.008+01:00

I mentioned in a previous post that I'm after groups to test The Adventurer's Tale. As a further treat to lure in testers I'm going to provide all you need for a quickstart adventure in the game, right here in a blogpost. Expect little in the way of plot, but an immediate action-filled starting point for a group wanting to dive in.

The Restless Dead of Redway

Redway is a village of no more than a hundred people. Its exact location is unimportant but it will have Woods to the North and a main road leading in from the plains to the South. The adventurers should all have a reason to be entering the village some time after sunset. They could be returning home or stopping by on their travels.

Upon entering Redway, from the bottom of the map below, the adventurers will not find a living soul. Instead they will face an immediate encounter rolled on the Wandering Zombie table found further below.

Village map, shamelessly taken from elsewhere. Just rub the serial numbers off.

The buildings not labelled are family homes, all others will be suitably outfitted for their purpose listed. Each building will have 1d6 Treasure that can be salvaged from it. Roll each time the adventurers enter or leave a building. On a 1-3 they will roll on the Wandering Zombie table found further below. On 6 they will find a survivor (Body 4, Craft 2) that will provide a little insight into the situation. Roll once on the Survivor Insight table found further below.

Wandering Zombie Table

1: 1 Hulk

2: 1d6 Chargers and 1d6 Hounds

3: 1d6 Shamblers and 1d6 Crows

4: 1 Lurker

5: 1 Tearer and 1d6 Shamblers

6: 2d6 Shamblers

Immediately after any Wandering Zombie encounter is completed make a roll. On a 1 the noise has attracted the Zombie Horde. Roll below immediately and have the Horde rolled emerge.

Zombie Horde Table

1: 2d6 Shamblers, 1d6 Lurkers and 1 Tearer

2: 3d6 Shamblers and 2d6 Crows

3: 3d6 Chargers and 1 Tearer

4: 1d6 Hounds, 1d6 Chargers and 1 Hulk

5: 1d6 Lurkers and 2d6 Crows

6: 5d6 Shamblers and 1 Tearer

The GM should keep track of the number of human zombies that are killed. If this ever exceeds 100 then Redway has been cleaned out completely, now just another abandoned town filled with corpses.

Survivor Insight

1: This survivor can do nothing but babble nonsense.

2: The survivor tells the adventurers how their family were brutally killed, in horrible detail. Other than that, they know nothing.

3: This survivor can only babble about this being the work of "her" and will attempt to flee from the adventurers at every opportunity.

4: This survivor has no immediate insight, but if asked about the Black Hag they will reveal that she is known to live in the woods to the north.

5: The survivor is quite mad, but will babble about the Black Hag of the woods constantly.

6: The survivor reveals that a hag living in the northern forest was seen lurking around the village outskirts recently. They suspect this is the work of her!

Forbidden Knowledge

Any adventurer may attempt a DN7 Wisdom test to recognise the weakness of the Zombies, specifically that they are killed by being beheaded or having their bodies utterly destroyed.

The Zombies

Zombie Shambler
The most pathetic of zombiekind. They seem to have retained no intelligence at all and simple walk slowly towards any survivors in great numbers.
Body 3
Melee 1
Claws and Bite (Damage 2)
Relentless: A zombie ignores any non-critical hits that cause less than 4 Damage. Critical hits damage the Zombie as normal.
Arise: Roll when the zombie is killed without being beheaded or utterly destroyed. On a 6 it immediately rises again, but this time any damage will kill it permanently.

Zombie Charger
Rather than shambling forwards, these zombies hurl themselves forward at great speeds, leaping onto their prey.
Body 3
Melee 2, Grace 2
Claws and Bite (Damage 2)
Relentless: A zombie ignores any non-critical hits that cause less than 4 Damage. Critical hits damage the Zombie as normal.
Arise: Roll when the zombie is killed without being beheaded or utterly destroyed. On a 6 it immediately rises again, but this time any damage will kill it permanently.

Zombie Tearer
Some bodies react violently to becoming a zombie, their muscles swelling and bone claws sprouting from their hands. Other zombies instinctively gather around them due to their knack for finding victims.
Body 6
Melee 4, Awareness 4
Claws and Bite (Damage 3)
Relentless: A zombie ignores any non-critical hits that cause less than 4 Damage. Critical hits damage the Zombie as normal.
Arise: Roll as soon as the Tearer is killed. On a 6 the body twitches and spasms as it grows into a Zombie Hulk, recovering all Damage.

Zombie Lurker
These Zombies have retained some of their human cunning and survival instinct, preferring to strike from the shadows with throwing axes or rocks.
Body 3
Melee 1, Shooting 2. Grace 3
Claws and Bite (Damage 2), Improvised Thrown Weapon (Damage 2, Ranged)
Relentless: A zombie ignores any non-critical hits that cause less than 4 Damage. Critical hits damage the Zombie as normal.
Arise: Roll when the zombie is killed without being beheaded or utterly destroyed. On a 6 it immediately rises again, but this time any damage will kill it permanently.

Zombie Hulk
A Zombie Tearer that survives long enough will go through a second phase as a huge, hulking beast up to twelve feet tall. These will do little more than rampage around the area, smashing walls and any survivors they encounter. Other zombies know to give these horrors some space.
Body 14
Melee 4
Pounding Fists (Damage 4)
Relentless: A zombie ignores any non-critical hits that cause less than 4 Damage. Critical hits damage the Zombie as normal.

Zombie Hound
Not only humans were affected by the zombie curse. These dogs appear at first to be rabid, living beasts, but a look into their red eyes reveals their true nature.
Body 3
Melee 1, Awareness 3, Grace 3.
Bite (Damage 2)
Pack Attack: A hound deals an extra point of Damage when he hits an opponent that has been engaged by one or more Warhounds since their last turn.

Zombie Crows
Picking at the flesh of zombies turns many crows into flying corpses, leaving a trail of feathers as they flap. They follow zombies so that they can scavenge on their kills, sometimes descending on the victims to aid in their death.
Body 1
Grace 5, Awareness 4
Beak and Claws (Damage 1)
Distract: If there are any Zombie Crows next to a character they subtract 1 from any combat rolls.

At the end of any encounter, secretly roll for each adventurer that took damage from a zombie. On a 1 they are unknowingly effected. Roll again after each encounter, or every hour. On a 1 they turn into a Shambler, on a 2 a Charger and on a 3 a Tearer. On a 4-6 they do not turn yet.

A DN8 Wisdom test will identify an infected adventurer, who can be cured by any form of magical healing. Even if they are unaware of the infection, magical healing will remove it.

Anyone killed by a zombie will arise as one within a matter of minutes.

The Black Hag

This curse is, in fact, the work of a Hag living in the forest just to the North of Redway. If the adventurers head into these woods they will soon find her and she will happily boast about the success of her curse on the village. Her motive in doing so is little more than jealousy, after being cast out from the village as a child for her deformation and wicked nature.
If the Black Hag is killed the curse is lifted and all zombies will immediately fall to the ground as corpses. Anyone infected, but not yet turned, will immediately recover.

Hag
A black robe and hood covers the deformed face of the Hag, hunched over a gnarled staff. If attacked she will point her staff at her opponents and attempt her Mind Stab. If the fight turns against her she will attempt to fly away to safety using her magic.
Body 4
Melee 3, Awareness 3, Grace 3, Wisdom 6
Staff (Damage 2, counts as shield in Melee), 3d6 Treasure.
Spells: Tongues, Mind Stab, Flight, Magic Strike

This is a very quick and dirty adventure, so it's ripe for a little expansion or customisation from a GM.
Enjoy and do your best to survive.

A Call to Arms

2009-04-29T21:15:00.003+01:00

A quick post to shamelessly push my recruitment drive for playtest groups for The Adventurer's Tale. I've spoken about it in previous posts and it's now at the point where I'm eager to get it tested out by as many GMs as possible.

Full details are available on two of the forums you're probably familiar with and feedback can be sent by way through either of them.

Give it a try with some friends and let me know!

Brief Thoughts on Monster Design

2009-04-20T20:58:00.009+01:00

Now with more stealth-links.

As I've been tweaking monsters for The Adventurer's Tale I've decided to post the key points I've been keeping in mind for each monster, each of which consists of one paragraph of text followed by the data.

Why would the adventurers be fighting this?
How does this monster behave when the adventurers encounter it?
What are its relationships with some other monsters?
How can the GM easily adjust this monster to make it more or less powerful, or simply different?
Does this monster really need its own entry?

And I'm going to briefly expand on the last point. I mentioned in a previous post about races that I didn't like Gnomes and Hobbits barging in on what I felt should be Dwarfish traits. The same can be said for monsters. Especially when combined with the fourth point about making my monsters tweakable from the ground up, this allows me to have a great selection of classic monsters in a more compact list. Examples below:

Sprites: One monster entry for pixies, brownies, (real) gnomes and even gremlins. Simply make pixies more agile and give them wings, give gnomes a higher Craft stat and give Gremlins the goblin dodge ability that makes them extra slippery and mischievous.
Beastmen: This entry covers your warhammer style goatmen, hyena-like gnolls and even stretches to ratmen and lizardman. The last two being more sneaky (higher Grace and maybe some Rogue perks) and tougher (scales counting as light or heavy armour) respectively.
Chimera: You've got your lion/goat/dragon chimera here as well as Griffons, Hippogriffs and Manticores. Minor differences between them are noted but really one entry covers large, ferocious, winged beasts like these. Tone down its Melee stat and Damage and you could pull off a Pegasus if you need one.
Giants: Here you have a base for your standard hill giant that can easily be altered into an ettin or cyclops. In addition, Ogres are really little more than small cave giants, so they're part of this monster too. Simply knock some Body off your Giant to trim him down to Ogre size.
Ooze Blob: This covers all sorts of ooze. Really, coming up with your own twist on them is so easy!

It's all in aid of stressing that there is no definitive statblock for an Orc. Some of them will be tougher than others, some better at fighting, some might even be smart. If you're the GM use the monster stats given as a guideline and tweak them however you like! That's exactly what this system is designed for. There's a reason there are no levels or challenge ratings provided! (a topic for another day)

Yet somehow I still have three different types of dragon... hypocrisy at its finest.

Use This - A Hero and his Squire

2009-04-20T07:59:00.009+01:00

This encounter could fit into most fantasy systems but is presented here for the recently renamed The Adventurer's Tale (formerly Underworld and Overworld).

Flash Zubnatz - Goblin Hero

The words Goblin and Hero might not be seen next to eachother too often, but even these wicked creatures have folk heroes that would even inspire humans.

Flash has spent his life travelling from one goblin settlement to another, establishing his legacy by slaying threats to goblinkind. He shot the cave-drake at Biterzpeak, drove off the ghouls of Foulnut Forest and protected the goblins of Scummer's Bay from a rampaging sea giant. All with his crossbow and winning smile. Indeed, there has rarely been a goblin as charismatic as Flash. Even orcs have been known to be impressed by his presence.

Flash Zubnatz (Rogue)

Body 4

Shooting 7, Grace 4, Awareness 2, Melee 2

Dodge: A goblin that rolls a 5 or 6 on a combat roll will never be hit. Critical Hit bypasses.

Precision: Adds an extra two points of Damage on Critical Hits when using a weapon with Damage 3 or less.

Crossbow (Damage 3), Two Daggers (Damage 2), Light Armour.

Flash is rarely seen without his squire and travelling partner, Bontukz. Lacking any of the charisma of Flash he mostly spends his life carrying Flash's crossbow, pointing out targets and patching up his wounds. After a few drinks he might mutter about how his spells are the real power behind Flash.

Bontukz (Scholar)

Body 4

Wisdom 5, Craft 4, Awareness 3, Grace 3, Melee2

Dodge: A goblin that rolls a 5 or 6 on a combat roll will never be hit. Critical Hit bypasses.

Spells: Guidance and Hold.

Staff, Dagger and Spyglass.

Upon spotting their target, Bontukz will hand Flash his crossbow and try to hold the enemy in place with Hold. While Flash lines up his shot, usually aiming for a Vital Strike, Bontukz will use Guidance to help him achieve a killing shot.

Flash's reaction to adventurers will depend upon their reputation. If he doesn't know of them he'll greet them cautiously, from a distance. However, if they are known goblin killers he'll see them as potential kills to add to his heroic legacy.

Dwarfs in a Sandbox Update

2009-04-11T19:03:00.012+01:00

I'm getting very excited about the sandbox game I'm starting next week using Underworld and Overworld.

There are some great resources out there for running a sandbox game. I've summarised the three most important considerations for this game below.

Create Situations not Plots

In preparing for the game I've planned out a chunk of a world where the dwarfs can roam. There are some hooks here and there but no "main plot" planned out. Most hooks come in the form of places to explore and looming threats rather than an innkeeper asking you to find his hat some goblins stole. I like the tip I heard somewhere, "plot hooks not plot hammers".
A hook can be ignored or saved for later, a hammer is going to be much more focused on pushing you in a particular direction. I'm hoping the map I've provided is already suggesting a hook or two before we've even started.

I Cannot Control the World Fully

Sure to be a contentious point. I've poured my heart into creating the world and have tried to design it in a way that will give the players a great experience, but once they step into it I'm not going to have complete control of it. It's all laid out, populated with threats and scattered with hooks and treasures. Many of these will appear when the dice decide, rather than I. If the players wander into the Underworld and are finding it too hard or too easy I have no intention of tweaking it on the fly. I also know there are some random encounters noted down that will be dangerous stuff.

By no means will I try and kill the characters but I won't tone them down the hazards when things get tough. I'm hoping I've planned such places in a way that they'll be sufficiently aware of the threat, though. One thing that always bugged me about Oblivion was that monsters would scale their power level to however powerful the player character was at that point. I'm standing on the other extreme of the scale with this game.

A Good Map will provide Hooks

I always love a game with a great map. I want to see interesting looking locations and see some intriguing places named. I remember when I first played Link to the Past I opened up the map and decided I wanted to go and explore the Swamp Ruins. They weren't relevant to the main plot until later in the game but I still headed there and took a look around because what's not to like? Swamps are cool and Ruins are cool.

I'm hoping the map for the starting area of my campaign will do the same.

A larger version can be enjoyed here. Good old Hexmapper.

An All-Dwarf Adventure and Dave's Legacy

2009-04-07T22:29:00.005+01:00

A quick edit here. It seems reports of co-creator of D&D, Dave Arneson, dying weren't true. However, it sounds like he's still in a weak condition, so I'm going to leave the links to blogs posting their tributes here, as it's still a great time to learn about the man. Certainly no need to halt the further spreading of his legacy.

Now onto the game I'm currently preparing for. An all-dwarf sandbox using Underworld and Overworld. Today I want to talk about the decision to make it all-dwarf.

I think the non-human races in fantasy often get a hard deal. It's no secret they tend to be little more than single-culture archetypes and anything differing from that often gets its own race. Look at the short folk of D&D and most generic fantasy. Gnomes, Dwarves and Hobbits/Halflings. You've got your magically-inclined excentric gadgeteer race, the gruff, underground miner-warrior race and the peaceful pipe-smoking but brave race with the odd burglar.

I'm mashing them all into dwarfs for this game and I think the race will be better because of it.

All of the traits mentioned can fit onto a dwarf with no problem at all. Now instead of a race where everyone's an ale-drinking axeman you have a race where a settlement is likely to include all sort of characters. Not to mention a race where different settlements might play more to certain racial tropes than others.

Of course, we still have the usual good-evil seperation that plagues non-humans in fantasy. I don't want dark-dwarves, deep-dwarves, derro or whatever you want to call them. Of course there might be settlements that have a reputation for being greedy but it's not part of their DNA. Perhaps it's just a stereotype or perhaps something about that settlement attracts the greedy type. On the flipside even your peaceful pipe-smoking dwarf hamlet might have one or two dwarfs that... well, are just dicks.

This is a theme I want to carry through to the rest of the races in this game. Orcs, Hobgoblins, Uruk-Hai, Half-Orcs... bleh. An orc that lives underground, an orc that's part of a well trained army and an orc that's trying to fit into civilised society can all be part of the same race. And now they shall be.

Anyone that wants to see more of this upcoming game can find more here. You could even join in if you grab the last slot quick enough. Next time I'll touch on why I've gone for dwarfs in particular.

Teen Island PDF Release

2009-03-25T19:02:00.002Z

Well, it's here. The first pdf version of Teen Island, complete with fantastic artwork from Darren Calvert.

You can grab the pdf from here or here, free of course. Enjoy!

Soogamethod for Rolling Attributes

2009-03-03T16:57:00.005Z

I was reminded of this method for rolling attribute scores by another blog mentioning methods of character generation. For simplicity I'm going to be talking about rolling stats in D&D, but this can easily be tweaked to many other systems that have random attributes.

In the right type of game I like the idea of rolling 3d6 in order for stats, but it's never fun when you have a character that has better scores than another character in five out of six attributes. The benefits, which can be really fun and create interesting characters, just don't outweigh the balance issues to me. In-party balance is the one type of balance I strongly support.

The idea of this method is to capture the unpredictability of straight rolling but keep the party balanced.

One player rolls 3d6. Every player at the table takes turn to note down this score in an attribute of their choice. (Optional: No player may choose an attribute that another player has chosen for this roll)
The next player rolls 3d6 and the players assign this score to an attribute in the same way.
Continue until all attributes are assigned.

Characters will have the same attribute totals but not have complete control over where they put them. Likewise, characters can start off weaker or stronger than average but will still be relatively balanced against eachother. I've never gotten to try this method, so hopefully someone will give it a go in their own game.

I should also note it's only a matter of time until I jump on the top ten monsters bandwagon!

The Game I Thought I'd Never Write

2009-02-16T11:31:00.005Z

Well, it was bound to happen. After working on games with relatively original concepts for so long I've finally given in and designed something where your fighter or wizard kills orcs for treasure, under the temporary name Underworld and Overworld. It took a while for me to decide what exactly I wanted out of this project, but I finally found the answer below.

What is this game?

There is nothing new or shocking in this game. It is intended to be a very simple base system for a GM and group of players wanting a game with deadly monsters, huge armies and characters that gain fame and become Kings. It is perfect for a group wanting to quickly have a fantasy adventure as there are very few rules to learn and the document is free.

From this foundation a GM can create their own monsters to break from the classic examples given, using them to populate a world straight out of his imagination. It could be as simple as a one-off dungeon crawl or it could be a full world with empires and warring gods. With this in mind the rules are intended to be as straightforward and open to modification as possible to aid creation of new content and keep the amount of calculating, memorising and paperwork at the game table down to a minimum.

The game is mostly inspired by my happy, younger memories of Fighting Fantasy books, playing Ultima Underworld and enjoying board games like Heroquest and Dungeon.

You can see the game as it stands here.

Enjoy!

Lessons Learned from Out of the Pit

2009-02-10T11:05:00.005Z

In case you're not familiar, Out of the Pit is the Monster Manual equivalent for Fighting Fantasy. The series was mostly known as choose-your-own-adventure-style gamebooks such as The Warlock of Firetop Mountain and Deathtrap Dungeon, but there was a short series of books branching out into a basic RPG system. I'm yet to get my hands on the other books in that series, but my lust for them is a separate topic.

Out of the Pit was probably the first thing resembling an RPG book I owned. I borrowed it from a friend shortly after getting into Warhammer Fantasy Battles and long before I delved into D&D. Back then, like so many of us at that age, I was mostly interested in reading about monsters and looking at pictures of them. Back then I didn't really give much thought to things like mechanics, random encounter tables or designing locations.

Years of RPG delving later what can this still greatly enjoyable book teach me about gaming?

Limitation Breeds Creativity - Part 1

I love this little mantra and can't recommend it enough. In this case I'm talking about how monsters are largely represented by just two stats, their Skill and Stamina, the majority falling between 5-9 in these scores. Monsters to 2 Damage as standard and those that do 1 or 3 instead will have it noted in their text. There's no talk of movement speeds, specific skills or perception abilities here (although Intelligence does get a mention). Mechanically it doesn't even seem to matter if the orc is carrying an axe, sword or spear. My initial childhood response to all this was bafflement, as surely there must be monsters that are pretty much mechanically identical. So what's the point of making them different?

But they were different. Every monster had at least two paragraphs talking about their behaviour, how they'd fight and often detailing a special rule. This is where a good GM will make the monsters shine. Slykks and Wild Hill men, for example, were almost identical in mechanics, only differing in Intelligence and the Wild Men having a missile attack. The real difference was that the Slykks were described as being unable to unite themselves because of their different colourings (gee, subtle commentary) and always fighting civil wars, as well as being ravaged by local predators such as giant leeches.

Wild Hill Men also had to deal with predators but instead of fighting each other they banded together for protection. Characters could easily find ways to get troublesome Slykks to work against each other or even earn the trust of one colour by presenting heads from another. Their proud leaders are also described as wearing luxuries stolen from humans. Seems like this is an enemy you could really cut a deal with and then get rid of later. Wild Hill Men don't seem like they'd be too easy to sway in this way and are described as being much less open to outsiders.

Look at the mechanically and thematically similar Neanderthal and the text says that they are easily amazed by real magic, something that wouldn't do much to impress Slykks or Wild Hill Men. When we have all these useful nugget do we really need to know the Slykk's Charisma score or their specific skills?

Limitation Breeds Creativity - Part 2

Now for a different point of view. I may have sounded as if I love monsters being mechanically identical, but I don't. I prefer it, in many ways, to D&D 3e style half-page stat blocks and lists of spell-like abilities. What I genuinely like is the concept behind 4e monsters. I'm talking about striving to make fighting Orcs feel very different to fighting Gnolls or Hobgoblins rather than making one of them hit more often, one of them hit harder and one of them take more hits to kill. This is something I can really get behind and is something I feel works really well with my previous point.

Indeed, in my latest design project I've strived to have monsters be limited to the very few stats and skills that they need and then have every one of them possess a special ability that gives them a unique feel. To me this is where the sweet-spot lies in a combat heavy game where you're going to fight lots of different types of opponent. Give me a few important numbers, a special ability and flavour text that tells me where this monster is found, why I'd want to fight it, who the monster will work with and how they behave.

And this very nicely foreshadows an upcoming post about my Fighting Fantasy inspired game. The game I never thought I'd write. Stay tuned.

Lessons Learned from Teaching

2009-02-03T12:52:00.007Z

Alright, quieten down and get in your usual seats. You two stop fighting, you three put your gum in the bin. Put that crossbow away.

After doing over a year of teacher training you start to notice similarities between learning theory and everything else in the world. Mostly this is down to having so much of it crammed into your brain but with game design and GMing there are genuine links!

Flow

I've seen the graph below crop up in both game design and learning theory but it makes a great, simple point. Between anxiety and boredom lies the optimal zone for a satisfying challenge.

Simply put, if your players are bored either increase the challenges you're throwing at them or hinder their own abilities somehow (this one is trickier to pull off well...). If they seem overly stressed either give them an extra boost of power or lower the challenge slightly. Try to keep them in the zone of flow and remember individual failures are perfectly acceptable if they result in a more satisfying overall session.

Starter, Development, Plenary

These are the three ideal components to a lesson's structure and they can be easily ported across to a successful game session.

The starter is a short, usually fun task that has the main aim of engaging every single member of the class. Often they involve getting them to do something physical or loud, it wakes up their brains and reminds them all that they're in a class now and are here to do things.

The development is the meat of the lesson and focuses on progressing the group's understanding of whatever the topic may be.

The plenary is a recap of everything that's been covered in the lesson, cementing it in their minds.

Try using this structure for your next game. Hit them hard with something interesting as soon as they sit down. Combat is a great example for many games but most importantly this scene should engage every single character and give them all something to do.

After this you can progress the plot in the meat of the session, after that big start the players should be in the right mood to get some productive gaming going.

Finally, before you finish you should have the Plenary, where you wrap up everything covered in the development and close off the session, right? Not necessarily. I don't like to wrap everything up at the end of a session and I do love a good cliffhanger. However, the end of the session is a good time to summarise everything that's happened so far. This could happen out of game by quickly taking input from the players as you write bullet points for a session summary.

Cater to Different Types of Learner

A theory tells us that most people sway towards being either Visual, Auditory or Kinesthetic learners that learn best by seeing/reading, hearing or moving/touching respectively (guess which one kids come out as more?). In any lesson plan you should cater to every one of these learning styles as much as possible. Activities can easily cater to two or three of these at once.

Uh oh, am I going to delve into the somewhat questionable GNS theory or threefold model or all that stuff? Thankfully just a very shallow dip. I do think that a good GM will use the ideas present in these theories to cater to players that might favour either plot-heavy sessions or a more "gamey" experience with more tactical choices and rolling of dice. The third group often identified are players that enjoy the simulation aspects of a system. This group can be satisfied either through the realism of the system itself or how the GM presents it. Even with a highly abstract system I believe a good GM can make the players believe they're interacting with a real-feeling world through consistency and quick thinking.

Oh, and I really don't buy into the idea that a game has to focus on being either Gamist, Narrativist or Simulationist. But that's a topic for another day.

Get your class to do as much of your job for you as possible

Ask any teacher, this is a great piece of advice. Rather than having misbehaving pupils wash my car at break-time I'm talking more about the idea that if a lesson is going well the teacher will often look like they're not doing much at all while the pupils will be a buzz of activity. Ideally they'll be asking appropriate questions, answering the questions of other pupils, supporting each other in difficult tasks and challenging themselves with new ideas. If the teacher is talking a lot and asking a thousand questions that are getting one-word answers then it could be going better.

This topic has arisen elsewhere so I'm going to knock out my points quickly.

Encourage your players to ask questions and make suggestions of their own rather than waiting for you to prompt them. Do this with rewards and praise.
During character creation have each player create one or two NPCs concepts for characters that are linked to their character in some way. As well as this have each suggest a key location or two that are important to their character.
Consider giving the players full control of one or more NPCs. This also helps avoid the dreaded GMPC situation.

Take out your homework planners. For next lesson I want you to consider how your own career or studies have given you surprising tips for GMing or game design. Put them in the comments box and the best suggestion will receive a house point.

The Exceptional People's Coalition - Preview

2009-01-31T00:56:00.004Z

Yes, another preview. These will eventually be expanded into coherent future posts, I promise! Today we look at a very early-stage idea I have in my head for a short campaign using my Blowing Stuff Up system. I'll go into how the concept fits the system in another post. Today I focus on the setting.

The Exceptional People's Coalition

The basic idea is similar to that of the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, where Alan Moore did his best to unify a huge chunk of pre-20th Century fiction into one canon. A large part of the appeal was in recognising the characters, even if they were tweaked to fit, and seeing how they related to each other. So what happens when we take that concept into present-day. Do all the novels of the 20th Century suddenly become real? No. Something much better.

Nearly every film or TV series you've seen set in our real post-war world actually happened. Failed theme parks are internationally reported events. A battered Vietnam veteran still wanders the jungles of Asia and people often mistake him for that former boxing champion. Coincidence? Oceanic Flight 815 mysteriously disappeared and conspiracy theorists may have draw the attention of a certain pair of FBI agents to the incident. However, they still have their hands full with the increasing number of cases involving the living dead and that one situation everyone seems so quick to deny.

I'm forcing myself not to expand that into pages and pages of material yet. As you can see there are a wealth of possibilities with this idea, but you have to draw the line somewhere or else you hit a few problems. Here's my official what's in and what's out of the EPC.

What's In?
- Our heroes could be John McClane, Jack Bauer, Jason Bourne, John Rambo
- Modern James Bond, the old one reverted to his birth-name John Mason
- Big Trouble in Little China, Harry Potter, anything where magic is secret
- The events of MIB, Back to the Future, Jurassic Park and The Terminator, undercover to different degrees
- Crank and Shoot'em Up are both common situations
- The A-Team, Starsky and Hutch and Michael Knight could all come out of retirement.
- Video-Game Movies are in, for the most part, if only for Raul Julia's M. Bison.

What's Out? - These films are assumed to have not happened... yet!
- World-Shattering Catastrophes such as Independence Day, Day After Tomorrow, Deep Impact, Cloverfield.
- Any "open" knowledge of aliens and the supernatural.
- Superheroes. They already have enough collective canons of their own.
- Anything before 1939 is identical to our world.

How can you help contribute? Well the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen unites their characters under the said league, each filling a different role. Who would fit each role in the 2009 Exceptional People's Coalition? Fill in the blanks!

Adventurer/Leader -
Scholar -
Engineer/Scientist -
Loner/Rogue -
Muscle/Monster -

Look forward to hearing your suggestions!

Any excuse for a plug...

2009-01-26T12:04:00.004Z

Chinese New Year eh? Seems like a good opportunity for everyone to try out a Wuxia game.

*COUGH*

I guess that means my Chinese New Year's Resolution is to be more shameless in promoting my games.

Robot World - Preview

2009-01-25T23:47:00.006Z

For a while now one of my back-burner projects has been a game and setting called Robot World. It was all inspired by the thought that a robot wearing a cowboy hat and riding a horse is a great image. Think less this...

And more this...

I'm clearly not the only one with a love for clearly mechanical robots in human clothes, so this is a sound basis for any game. I'm going to talk about designing the game in later posts but you can expect the following influences and features to crop up.

Dealing with extremely varied characters from humanoids to self-aware tanks
Avoiding permanent death through backups
How much setting info do you give when the setting is Earth?
Unifying experience, wealth and character points to one resource
Breaking a setting down into smaller settings with tighter focuses (WoD?)
The importance of memorable races (in this case, factions), each with their own appeal and balanced claim to being superior

On the topic of factions I've managed to fit in a few of my favourite robot schticks as individual factions, so hopefully everyone's favourite type of robot is present and playable.

The "Brain in a Jar" equivalent, only the jar is a mechanical body
The previously mentioned human-mimicking clothed robots
Your purpose-built type that might resemble an intelligent bulldozer or roaming security camera on wheels
Robots built by robots. When you remove the need for utility and have robots for robots sake suddenly so many of the Futurama robots make sense
Creepy flesh-growing robots longing to become the next stage of organic life

Specific info and eventually playtest rules to come soon. In the mean time who's going to help me out with some inspirational robots?

Goodies for any System

2009-01-23T23:44:00.004Z

Other blogs have been providing a wealth of system-generic material lately, be it general advice or specific content.

It's time I upped my game. Here are three ideas written with the intention to be useful for any system imaginable. Impossible, I know, but I'd still love to hear the exceptions.

Needle in the Haystack
The villain you've been chasing down slips on his mask, hiding a grin, and scurries into a gang of twelve similarly masked prisoners he has under mind-control. They surround you and draw their weapons. Killing the prisoners is ideally avoided but this villain needs to be stopped! Lay out a thirteen coins to represent the prisoners and the villain, one of which you will mark with a sticker or ink. Force the players to turn over a coin for anyone they try and kill randomly, watching them (hopefully) recoil in guilt as their hand ends the life of a helpless prisoner.

There should be an opportunity for the players to draw the villain out somehow. Perhaps there's a way they can taunt him into showing anger or a way they can recognise his fighting style.

Escape from the Unstoppable
Many players will assume an enemy you throw at them will be a suitable challenge for them. This has to stop. Throw something really dangerous at them but give them a very specific means of escape. It might be a large dragon, beyond their combat abilities, at the end of a dungeon with multiple paths. Can the players remember the quickest way out? Do they know a way out that will prevent the dragon from following them? Another obvious example is being trapped in a pit with some huge beast. You could probably climb out given the time but not while something is trying to eat you. Does one of the characters distract it while the others escape and lower a rope? Does one character have the means to at least stun the creature for long enough to scramble out? In a more contemporary setting the threat could be an armoured vehicle or even a tank division. The PCs might be trapped in a ruined building while the enemy patrol the streets, needing to get safely out of the city. Do you take out one tank and risk being spotted? Carry out extended guerrilla warfare against them? I think I'd just want to get out of there alive.

Just make sure the players are given the hint to flee. Perhaps have the enemy demonstrate its power on someone or something more disposable than the PCs. It would be interesting to know how many players would try and take the threat head on. More interesting than that would be how many were successful!

Brain in a Jar

I mean, seriously. Is there any genre not improved by adding a brain in a jar?

This post is also my first since joining the RPG Bloggers Network, so if this is your first visit I hope you find something you can use!

Swordmountain - Concept Brainstorming

2009-01-19T23:42:00.005Z

Yes that is a terrible placeholder name for any game. But I find that good placeholder names end up staying as final names in my projects! So this one will be replaced gladly as soon as I figure out what exactly the game is.

My initial idea was a game that shifted the scale of a traditional fantasy RPG upwards. Instead of spending an hour of game time travelling through some woods and playing out an encounter with giant spiders I wanted the characters to be able to spend that hour travelling through the woods, killing some spiders, finding a the bandit camp within, training them up to be an effective army and leading a strike against a nearby oppressive kingdom. I wanted one session to feel more like a whole Lord of the Rings book rather than just going through the Mines of Moria. I envisioned mechanics to encourage narrative and character development in this macro-scale world and a focus on travelling and interacting with whole kingdoms rather than barkeepers. A band of heroes that gained and lost members along the way. Raised and defeated armies and altered the world itself.

Then I heard about some game called HeroQuest...

At first it looked like my idea had already been done, unknown to me, many years ago. But should that put me off? Of course not. A game designed by me is likely to be much lighter on mechanics and I'm getting confident enough with design now that I'm sure I can match it in gameplay, with some hard work. I certainly wouldn't be tying the game to a setting like HQ and Glorantha. Most importantly, games have a habit of going into directions you don't always expect. So who knows, after a few more brainstorming sessions there might be very little in common left with HeroQuest. Just in the past few hours as I thought the game over some more I've considered moving into a no-GM direction that would put more of a focus on players collaboratively creating a story and setting as they go. Could some nice old-fashioned random tables fill the gaps left by a GM? I'll let you know as I carry on with this concept, but for now here's a rather hastily written Core Story to describe how I see a typical session of this game going.

A young warrior leaves his home in search of glory. Upon heading into the nearby forest he meets an aging woodsman, who helps him pass through some dangerous man eating vines. Here they find a young noblewoman fighting some flying tree-goblins and help her defeat them.
The three travel together until they reach the city of Kark. This city is at war with the mummies of the Empire of Dust and has been resisting their attacks for decades, becoming weaker each time. Trade routes have been cut off due to this war. The noblewoman gains an audience with the king and he sends the party out to kill the Dust Lord and end the war. They are given horses and a bodyguard of Karkian Heavy Cavalry.
They head out into the desert but are met by Mummy Chariots and their Obsidian Hounds. They battle and many of their guard are slain, but gradually the young warrior's strength forces the enemy back into the desert.
Upon arriving at the Tomb City the party are attacked by Dust Wraiths, which wound the Woodsman almost fatally. The young warrior presses on and into the Dust Lord's Palace, where he meets the Lord himself, cutting his head from his body and remembering the guidance of the king, burning the remains. Howls echo around the Tomb City and the very walls crumble as the Dust Empire's power collapses. The party hurry to find help for the dying woodsman, and a band of travelling nomads offer to help in return for escort to Kark. They heal the Ranger and upon being taken to Kark they reopen trade with the rest of the world and a celebration is held in honour of the heroes.
That evening the noblewoman is declared as heir to the throne of Kark but until her time of glory comes she agrees to continue travelling with the heroes.

I might have overdone it on the fantasy cheese but it gets across the sort of things I want the players to do. Now to go and see if I can hammer any effective mechanics into place for:

Travelling and Exploring
Promoting Character and setting development in-game
Interactions between Characters (Individuals only), Sites (Dungeons, Woods, Cities), Resources (Items, Armies, Monsters) and Factions (Guilds, Kingdoms)

Those four categories of entity were troubling me slightly but I'm happy that any device I can think of fits int one of them. Using the Core Story above we have...

Characters: The Young Warrior, Aging Woodsman and Noblewoman. The King of Kark, the Dust Lord.
Sites: Kark, the Desert, Tomb City, Dangerous Forest.
Resources: Mummy Chariots and Hounds, Dust Wraiths, Karkian Heavy Cavalry, Nomad Trade Caravan.
Factions: The Nomads, Kark, The Empire of Dust.

It's starting to make most sense in my head now. Stay tuned for progress.

Lessons Learned from Kung Fu Hustle

2009-01-18T01:21:00.005Z

I can't recommend this film enough, but I don't want this to turn into a review. Here's what it taught me about running and designing games.

Don't fear the TPK

This film has a neat twist (don't go any further if you want to avoid spoilers) in that it keeps you guessing who the main heroes are going to be. The three masters that become revealed in Pig Sty alley trying to live normal lives seem to be our initial candidates, but soon get themselves killed by the two musicians. In step the landlord and landlady to defeat their killers and go on to fight The Beast, but after they're both defeated the real hero is revealed. I've always been a fan of death being a real possibility in games but there are very few that handle it well. In the case of this film a good supporting cast means new heroes can be drafted in when the first batch fall and it still makes sense for the story. In the Wuxia genre particularly we often see characters dying. Embrace death and look for ways to use it to your advantage in your game!

Have Style

This is one of the main focuses of A Wanderer's Romance. Every character in the film has their own style of fighting which is visually recognisable and comes with a neat sounding name. Even in games that don't feature mechanically distinct combat styles, consider how each person's techniques might appear.

Comedy can Coexist

There's no doubting the film is a comedy, but it features action scenes that are often as impressive as anything in a straight Wuxia film. I'll confess that I was also moved by the emotional plight of the characters. You can add comedic elements to a game without removing the plot, character development and exciting action. In fact there are very few genres that don't benefit from a sprinkling of comedy. This is doubly so when you're creating the story with friends and it's something I fear some GMs worry about. Try embracing a touch of comedy in your next game where you might have tried to play it straight. Your players will thank you and in-character joking around is greatly preferential to out of character joking during a game.

I've enjoyed writing these "lessons learned" posts a lot and would love to hear if anyone else has found gaming tips from more unlikely sources. In a future post I plan to talk about how training as a schoolteacher taught me a lot about GMing and game design. There are really more links than you might think!

Five Star Chef

2009-01-13T17:24:00.004Z

There are all sorts of horrors lurking in my Google Docs. Today I feel like unleashing one of them upon the world.

Five Star Chef is the result of a crazy night where I wanted to try and create a completely non-violent game. I'm not sure if the result qualifies as an RPG, particularly. A single game is unlikely to last longer than 20 minutes. However, maybe someone out there will get a laugh out of it, I know I had fun writing it.

Enjoy, free of charge, Five Star Chef.

Use This - Hunting the Grey Stag

2009-01-11T15:30:00.005Z

This is a test for one or more characters designed with A Wanderer's Romance in mind, but applicable to any game where you might want to have a hunting challenge.

The Grey Stag is reborn every spring in the deepest forest, only ever being sighted for one week during the Winter, by which time he is a mighty and impressive beast.

Local tradition dictates that whoever brings down the Stag with their bow will be guest of honour at the New Year's Banquet, gaining an audience with the king himself.

Your characters may attempt this challenge, which is broken down into smaller tasks. Each may be attempted by a different character if they are working as a group. There is a four hour limit on hunting for the Stag.

Finding the Stag: Tracking down the Stag is a normal-difficulty (Target 10 in AWR) task that could use tracking, survival or a related skill. If this is failed then an hour is wasted but the characters may try again. If they succeed they may move on to...

Approaching the Stag: This is a Stealth test and the difficulty depends on if the group want to get within Long (Normal difficulty, Target 10), Medium (Difficult, Target 12) or Close (Very Difficult, Target 14) range of the Stag. If they fail move on to the next hour and try to find the stag again.

Shooting the Stag: Hitting the Stag is an Archery test and the difficulty depends on whether the group got into Long (Very Difficult, Target 14), Medium (Difficult, Target 12) or Close (Normal, Target 10) range of the Stag. If they miss (which will also represent a non-lethal hit) the Stag flees, but you keep track of its direction and so move back to Approaching the Stag immediately. If they hit the stag is brought down and you may claim your prize.

Regardless of if they pass or fail the group should still attend the New Year's Banquet in order to find out which hunter bettered them on the day.

Identifying Cores in A Wanderer's Romance

2009-01-10T18:19:00.005Z

Here Mike Mearls talks about Core Stories, which are the things that make up a stereotypical game in any given system, writing it as if it was a real session. The idea behind exploring these is that it gives you an insight into the focus of the game and can be a nice easy way to pitch the idea to new players. Elsewhere the idea has been expanded into Core Activities that cover both the characters and the players. I decided to take up the challenge to write a Core Story (what the characters do in a typical game) and Core Activity (what the players do in a typical game) for A Wanderer's Romance.

Core Story: A band of three wanderers, skilled in their particular style of combat and individual talents, arrive to an island on a small boat. They find the ruler of the island has declared a tournament for the following day, with the winner being rewarded with rulership of the island. They find out that the two favourites to win are despicable and cruel characters desiring power for their own gain and decide to enter themselves. They spend the rest of the day preparing by sparring with each other, partaking of some meditative calligraphy and tracking down the master of a legendary style deep in the island's woods. The following day they compete in the tournament, one of them reaching the final and defeating their power-greedy foe in a duel. Upon receiving their reward they do the honourable thing and refuse the power, handing it to the wise master that trained them in their new style, who vows to rule the island in a fair and peaceful way. The next morning they sail into the sunrise in search of their next adventure.

Core Activity: You create your character using the semi-random creation process, fleshing out their concept as you choose their combat style, weapon of choice and specialities. You then seek out duels or contests and prepare for them by considering the location's element modifiers, carrying out activities to boost one element and sparring with your companions to gain a lesson token. Hopefully you can boost the elements that you wish to while keeping your balance score high. In the duel or contest you balance your actions between attacking and focusing, eventually winning or losing to your opponent. In this time you may have learned a new combat style or speciality, slowly increasing your range of abilities.

The purpose of these is something I'll go into in a later post, but at the very least I have a nice clean summary of my game, which is always useful.

Lessons Learned from House of Flying Daggers

2009-01-10T12:45:00.005Z

I've been catching up on some of the more recent Wuxia films I missed, yesterday being the turn of House of Flying Daggers. Of course, there's no way I could watch this film without getting all sorts of ideas for running A Wanderer's Romance. Hopefully they'll stir up some ideas for your game too. There may be slight spoilers, but nothing too detailed.

Say it with Colour

If you've seen this film you'll remember the green scene, the white scene and the yellow scene. There are few visual stimuli that hit an audience as immediately as a bold, highly saturated colour. This could be used to make instantly memorable locations. World of Warcraft is another example of how a strong palette can create memorable, flavourful locations. Whether it's through visual aids or pure description colour is an incredibly useful tool for the GM.

Location is your Off-hand Weapon

We all know that blowing your locations up is fun, but why stop there? The bamboo forest in the "green scene" mentioned above is used for far more than chopping up. Said chopped-bamboo forms a bed of spikes over one area, the stalks themselves provide a limitless supply of spears for the attacking soldiers as well as a vertical dimension to the fight. It's the use of your surroundings as a weapon that really appeals to me. If one of your players wants to cut a rope and send a suspended sandbag onto the head of their enemy why not let them? Roll it as a normal attack with their sword, damage and all, and enjoy the flavour. If your system uses hit points and treats them as an abstraction this fits all the better!

Who needs Badguys?

There really wasn't a single villain in this film. Even the faceless guards doomed to be slaughtered were people you didn't want to see die. The way I felt about the characters meant that when the climactic duel came around I didn't know who I wanted to win. I certainly had no idea how it was going to turn out, either, and I liked it! I like this feeling all the more in RPGs because we really don't know who's going to win. If I'm playing in a game where I'm the hero facing off against a supremely evil villain and I die, it just feels wrong. If my character dies by the hand of someone who was only as flawed as my character instead we have a delicious tragedy. The world doesn't end when I die, which leads onto...

Plot Potential in Success and Failure

As I mentioned, I had no idea how the final duel was going to pan out, besides a hunch that there would be some previously noted tragedy involved. As I was thinking about it I realised that no matter what the outcome there was scope for it to be satisfying. One thing I always try to put into my encounters is potential for the plot to move in an interesting direction no matter what the outcome. With AWR especially there's lots of scope for the player's characters to lose duels or contests and fail tests. This should never be the end of the game and call for disappointed rolling of a new character. Even in death the character should have a purpose in the story, whether a new character is introduced or not. There are a couple of characters I'm playing right now that I'm really looking forward to eventually killing off!

Or maybe I've just been bitten by the tragedy bug and would regret it immediately! I'd love to hear about any experiences you've had with characters living on (not literally) after their death.

Creating Combat Styles

2009-01-07T00:02:00.005Z

It's been a productive year so far, not just with this blog but in actual gaming. Today I'll have my fourth session as a player this year, which matches the number I played in all of last year! I'm not the only one that's glad to be getting out of the GM's chair for a little while. A side-effect is the time spent not worrying about preparing for my next game is spent on making the system itself better. In this case, more combat styles!

One of the key features of A Wanderer's Romance is the use of combat styles, which are either attacking or defensive. I wanted to capture that feel of different martial artists fighting with incredibly evocative styles with poetic names, certain styles countering others and bringing their legacy with them.

This week I've had a little help in coming up with concepts for some new styles to add to the list in AWR, which has recently trickled over 60 in total. Amongst others, my assistant through this idea onto the table for me to clean up into something that would work in the game.

Desert Heat (Spear) - Fire + Water
The sun weighs heaviest when the air is still.
A Style based around holding back and letting your opponent get worn down before making a finishing single blow.

Sounds like it has potential to me! As a general rule a Style would only make the cut if I could picture how it would look in motion. This is where the little line of flavour text comes in. This was largely inspired by Magic: The Gathering cards, which always seemed to get a lot of flavour across from these really short snippets of text. Here it's easy to picture a fighter holding their Spear in a high stance, letting their opponent wear themselves out attacking them, before killing them in a single doward thrust. From this we can determine the Abilities of the Style.

Initiate: May be used as a Defensive Style. Obviously the concept is based around tiring an opponent before finishing them off, so the style will need to be useful both offensively and defensively.

Student: Whenever an opponent misses you they must choose an Element with a score higher than 0. This is reduced to 0 for the duration of the duel. At first your opponent missing you won't be a huge deal to them, as they're likely to have at least one disposable Element. However, after missing four times they're going to look pretty helpless. Ripe for the picking with that final attack!

Master: For every Element your opponent has at zero or below, add one to their Damage rolls. Well, this is where you're in real trouble! You'd better hope you can hit a Desert Heat Master on the first or second attempt or your goose is cooked.

So there we have it, the making of a combat Style for A Wanderer's Romance. Here's the finished product.

Desert Heat (Spear) - Fire + Water
The sun weighs heaviest when the air is still.
Initiate: May be used as a Defensive Style.
Student: Whenever an opponent misses you they must choose an Element with a score higher than zero. This is reduced to zero for the duration of the duel.
Master: For every Element your opponent has at zero or below, add one to their Damage rolls.

Definitely something I'd want for my character!

Lessons Learned from 4e Part 1

2009-01-06T00:01:00.008Z

The title is a little misleading. As part of a series talking about how I designed A Wanderer's Romance I had planned to stick to my own games. Then something like 4e comes along with a strongly focused design that casts its shadow over every gaming forum and blog. Even though I'm yet to play it I guess it was bound to have an effect on my design.

I'm at the risk of repeating what Scott has said over at A Butterfly Dreaming with some of this, but Skill Challenges are an idea that looks fantastic on paper. However, plenty of people have reported problems with the system and it was one of the first to receive an official errata. Not having used the system in play I can't talk too much about it. However, I can talk about Tests in AWR and how Skill Challenges seem to have leaked over into them.

A Test could be a single roll, for jumping from one rooftop to another, using a certain skill. It could also be a series of rolls that are linked together. This could be a group of characters collaborating on a task or a single character going through a series of linked tasks. Examples of how this system can be used are given in the game document, as well as how to determine overall success or failure, but nothing as rigid as 4e's Skill Challenges. The suggested method is that a failure from one person makes the next person's job harder. Overall success could be totalled successes from all or it could come down to the last person to act.

With this in mind I was most impressed to see a first-time GM of this system throw the following Test at me and a group of players in a session for our campaign this week (keeping the numbers behind the screen, of course):

Task: Escape!

Get to port of the isle of Kincade, cannon shots having killing most of the ship's crew. The characters will have to take over positions.

Operating the rudder requires the person to be quick-minded and have a firm control (Air + Water).

Those entwined with the rigging must be graceful of movement but driven to push themselves (Fire + Water).

The gunner must have a practical mind, be good with their hands and determined in causing destruction (Earth + Fire) .

He or she who undertakes the dangerous duty of keeping the ship afloat, sealing leaks, and fixing it under combat conditions must be both cool, logical and creative, intuitive (Fire + Water)

Rigging - TN 14 to swim to shore.
Helm - TN 12 to swim to shore.
Leaks - TN 10 to swim to shore.
Cannon - TN 10 swim to shore. Also, cannon explodes. Will allow a roll to dodge the damage if the player can convince me why.

For multiple failures ramp up the difficulty (TN)!

Needless to say, we sank the ship, but managed to pull ourselves ashore none the less. What I really enjoyed was that it felt like we were all chipping in to one goal but that failure on any part would sting the group as a whole. The more magical member of our group even managed to conjure a blast of wind to help us along, something the GM hadn't accounted for but slotted in without any trouble. If you scrub away the system-specific stuff you've got the same framework as a 4e Skill Challenge.

It's true. Skill Challenge-style Tests can work and are great fun! Just remember what they're not and remember, you don't have to be playing 4e to get in on the action. There's plenty to be learned even from games you don't enjoy, which brings my nicely onto how I intended to finish this post. In these turbulent times the least I can do is spread some cool and calm a little further through this Internet. Treat yourself to a peaceful day.

Lessons Learned from Inheritance

2009-01-05T00:08:00.002Z

Each game I write benefits from the experience gained in writing the previous ones. A Wanderer's Romance is my most recent game so should, in theory, make use of lessons learned from this experience.

Inheritance was the first of my games I really got to a playable level and it's still the longest game I've written to date. While I still like the game there were a lot of mistakes I made with it that I wouldn't make again.

Long Combats with one type of attack are not fun.

For many types of character in Inheritance they had few combat options besides attacking with their weapon. Other options were there such as focusing on evasion and special attacks such as grappling, charging and disarming but they were rarely used and generally unexciting. In learning this lesson I wanted to give a useful alternative to attacking each turn, which became Focusing. This gives you not only a pretty nice bonus to your next attack but triggers special abilities in various styles. This addition, along with the variation within combat styles, has made combat in A Wanderer's Romance much more active for the player than in Inheritance.

In addition combat is much shorter, being between only two opponents in the vast majority of cases. The player is always either acting or reacting to their opponent and a hit tends to end the fight much more often than in Inheritance. This gave us fast, active combat. Much more fun.

Quick NPC generation can be your absolute saviour.

To make a standard human NPC in Inheritance you took the basic human template and chose two "Good Thing" upgrades for them. That's all you need, mechanically, for the merchant your players suddenly need statted up. When running the game this has saved me a great deal of time in comparison to something like D&D or GURPS where I'd be more likely to give in and grab a pre-generated NPC. Pre-gens are great but can't always give you what you need.

For A Wanderer's Romance creating a new character involve dividing six points between their four elements, choosing one or more Specialities and Styles for them and giving them a philosophy. This isn't quite as fast as Inheritance but it's still something I've been able to do on the fly without players noticing. Very handy.

Players aren't as interested in your setting as you are.

I still love the Inheritance setting. I still want to draw up the whole world map and draw trade routes, settlements, map out a full timeline of events. However, I know that this exercise would be completely separate to any useful writing I do, as only the minority of players will ever really delve deeply into your setting. With A Wanderer's Romance I took some notice of 4e's Points of Light setting guidance. I liked the fact that it was a framework for groups to create their own world in. Worlds would be different but still adhere to the feel the designers felt suited the game and, importantly for me, be consistent with the mechanics.

In A Wanderer's Romance there's little the players need to know about the setting before they play. These points are covered in around two paragraphs highlighted in coloured boxes and the rest is down relatively common knowledge of the game's influences and the GM's own contributions.

Goals for 2009

2009-01-04T12:17:00.004Z

This month's RPG Blog Carnival over at that very handy network got me thinking. Resolutions aren't something I normally do but goals? I can be all over goals.

Seal off A Wanderer's Romance and Teen Island as finished games.
Get more people to play my games than last year, which is half of the purpose of this blog.
Play some face to face, at-a-table games. As much as I love playing online I need to see how my games hold up to real-world play.

Realistically I can achieve these in six months, so I should come up with a new batch around July.

Use This - The Emperor's Challenge

2009-01-04T01:38:00.000Z

This small scenario is designed for use with my game, A Wanderer's Romance, but could be easily adapted to suit other systems.

You need someone in a position of power who has something to offer that the characters desire. For our example we have an Emperor looking for someone to fill the position of island champion, a prestigious honour indeed. To succeed the challenger must defeat the current champion in the Emperor's Trial. This is split over three contests.

For the first round the Emperor will choose the contest. If you're short on ideas roll a d6. Listed after each type of contest are the skills that could be used within.

Debating philosophical ideas- Religion/History (quoting others), Deception (bluffing) or Oratory (confidence in presenting ideas).
A race to the top of a mountain - Survival (finding a shortcut), Athletics, Geography (knowing the best path).
A drinking contest - Resist Toxins (not many other options for this one besides cheating!)
Creating a work of art worthy of the Emperor - Poetry, Calligraphy, Cooking (if you can pass off a great dish as art)
Hunting the largest stag in a nearby forest - Tracking, Archery, Storytelling (if you can exaggerate the tale of the catch it might sway things your way)
An arm-wrestling contest - Athletics, Intimidation (with your face that close to your opponent it must come in handy)

The winner of this first contest will choose the nature of the second contest. The third contest will always be a duel to the death, but the location and time of the duel will be chosen by the winner of the second contest. Consider the option of allowing the victor to also choose the weapon to be used in the duel or set additional stipulations.

To save the rest of your group from missing out you could have the island champion instead be a group of champions, with the PCs entering as a team and choosing an entrant for each contest, with no one being allowed to compete twice.

Look forward to a new Use This every Sunday!

Writing a Wanderer's Romance - Concept

2009-01-04T00:51:00.000Z

I've at least partially written more games than I've played. Of the two I'm most happy with A Wanderer's Romance is the one I want to talk about first.

Now that I'm at a point where I'm happy with the game I wanted to look over how I got there. The truth is a lot of things fell into place without much planning, but how does that make me look?

No. For the purposes of this series of posts you should accept this twisted version of the truth where I'm terribly organised and draw charts while sipping coffee. This will be mutually beneficial in making me seem to be a more effective designer and hopefully helping you in designing your own games.

A Wanderer's Romance is a game drawing inspiration from a number of areas, notably the following:

Wuxia novels and films.
Legend of the Five Rings, Chambara films and general western romanticism of Samurai culture.
My own amusement, from afar, of Anime series where the strangest things can become epic battles.

These three combined with my dust-covered brainstorm for a system using Elements as character attributes and basic setting idea based around lots of tiny islands to eventually form the game. Frankly it's a miracle the game doesn't feel like a pile of ideas mashed together, but somehow coherence was formed.