Showing posts with label crunchy bits. Show all posts
Showing posts with label crunchy bits. Show all posts

Friday, August 9, 2013

Another Sea Dracula thought: ready-made names

Starting a game of Sea Dracula and hard pressed to come up with a name for your lawyer? Need a witness or three in a pinch? Then look no further than the list of code names for Ubuntu releases! I mean, come on:
  • Breezy Badger
  • Dapper Drake
  • Edgy Eft
  • Feisty Fawn
  • Gutsy Gibbon
  • Hardy Heron
  • Hoary Hedgehog
  • Intrepid Ibex
  • Jaunty Jackalope
  • Karmic Koala
  • Lucid Lynx
  • Maverick Meerkat
  • Natty Narwhal
  • Oneiric Ocelot
  • Precise Pangolin
  • Quantal Quetzal
  • Raring Ringtail
  • Saucy Salamander
  • Warty Warthog
Duchamp would be proud. Pro-tip: these names also work fine as character concepts for Dō: Pilgrims of the Flying Temple. "Pilgrim Lucid Lynx helps people by moving swiftly and stealthily through woodlands, but gets into trouble because she's unable to deceive herself or others into believing comforting lies."

Tuesday, August 6, 2013

Lo giuro su Sea Dracula!

Di Sea Dracula («il miglior gioco mai uscito e che mai uscirà dal movimento indie», o qualcosa del genere, scrisse una volta Vx Baker, avvocato delfino*) si trova in circolazione anche una traduzione in italiano, ma io non lo sapevo o non me lo ricordavo più quando, alcuni mesi fa, mi posi questo importante(**) problema: se per giocare correttamente a Sea Dracula occorre pronunciare, per ogni nuovo personaggio, il Sea Dracula Oath ("Giuramento di Sea Dracula"), allora per giocare a Sea Dracula in italiano occorre una traduzione italiana di tale giuramento (tradurlo ogni volta in maniera estemporanea potrebbe non essere una buona idea***).
Essendomi posto tale importante** problema, mi applicai immediatamente a risolverlo realizzando una traduzione**** italiana del Giuramento! La quale traduzione non ho però mai condiviso con voi, amati lettori, perché mancava di un passaggio importantissimo: il playtesting.
Ma ora finalmente, in occasione di Etruscon Estate 2013, il Giuramento di Sea Dracula secondo Rafu è stato proditoriamente, prodigiosamente e religiosamente playtestato dai magnifici: Alex Isabelle, Ariele Agostini (in arte Plastic Manatee III), Barbara Fini, Coccodrillo Giudice, Enrico Ambrosi, Iacopo Benigni, Matteo Sasso e Valentina Corato. Onore e gloria a voi! Pertanto, ora certo che la mia opera è degna di nota o quantomeno utilizzabile, condivido finalmente con il mondo intero il…


* = potrebbe non essere proprio un delfino, o almeno non un delfino terrestre.
** = potrebbe non essere poi così importante.
*** = potrebbe essere un eufemismo.
**** = potrebbe non essere proprio una traduzione, o almeno non una traduzione letterale.

Giuramento di Sea Dracula secondo Rafu

Io qui presente, [DIRE IL PROPRIO NOME], giuro solennemente di dire tutta la verità nient'altro che la verità mi fa male lo so che i papaveri son alti alti alti e tu e Lapo ed io penso dunque sono stato bravo bravissimo molleggiatissimo e niente e nessuno mi fermerà dal qua-qua-qua: basta aver coraggio da leoni e una fame da lupi di mare, monti e valli a chiamare e digli: qui ci vuole un fisico bestiale e una faccia come il cuore/motore/carburatore per vederti ballare, ballare, come in cielo così in terra, amen. Dica lo giuro!
 Vi prego, fatene buon uso e non lasciate che cada in mani sbagliate.

Wednesday, May 1, 2013

Rafu’s Grievous Wounds – the Pulp Fantasy Edition


This is for OSR-ists, or anybody who’s still playing OD&D or similar games. You’re interested in mitigating lethality (as in, burying fewer dead PCs), but you’re like me and dislike tracking negative hit-points?

Have a standard pack of playing cards (54, with jokers) somewhere on the table. When a PC drops to 0 HP, deal the player a random card from the deck, face down. They can’t look at their own card yet.

The idea is that the character is out of the fight for good, but not necessarily dead. They suffered a Grievous Wound. They can’t be revived on the spot, but should their companions carry them back to home camp, the injured & dying character might recover and survive, depending on the exact sort of Grievous Wound they have suffered.

When the party’s out of the dungeon and recovering, you’re finally allowed to reveal your Grievous Wound card…

Ace of Spades: meet the Angel of Death! You fail to recover from this grievous wound, and die. Or maybe you were actually killed on the spot and hauling your corpse back home was just a futile (if compassionate) effort.

Ace of Hearts: that which doesn’t kill you makes you stronger! After recovering from a near-death experience, you find that – besides suffering no lasting ill-effect – you are now tougher because of it: permanently increase your Constitution score by 1. But you can only benefit from this card once in a lifetime: otherwise, it’s the same as an Ace of Clubs/Diamonds.

Ace of Clubs or Diamonds: you got lucky! The wound wasn’t actually that bad, and in the end you recover fully, with no lasting consequences.

Suit of Spades, 2 through 10: you survive the wound, but have suffered lasting damage to your muscles or bones (lost a limb, perhaps). Permanently reduce your Strength score by half the card value (1-5). Should this reduce your Strength to zero, then you’re as good as dead: you’re forced to retire from adventuring, and might not be able to get back on your feet again.

Suit of Hearts, 2 through 10: you survive the wound, but will never recover fully. Permanently reduce your Constitution score by half the card value (1-5). Should this reduce your Constitution to zero, then your recovery was just apparent, but you’re going to get worse and die before you can adventure again, maybe because you caught an otherwise minor illness which proved fatal in such a weakened state.

Suit of Clubs, 2 through 10: you survive the wound, but have suffered lasting damage to your muscles or nerves, perhaps lost an eye or even a leg. Permanently reduce your Dexterity score by half the card value (1-5). Should this reduce your Dexterity to zero, then you’re as good as dead: you’re forced to retire from adventuring, and might not be able to get back on your feet again.

Suit of Diamonds, 2 through 10: your body heals the wound just fine, and you survive, but… Either it was a blow to the head, or the shock, fear and mental trauma was too much to bear: you’ll never be the same person again. Permanently reduce your Intelligence (if an even-numbered card) or Wisdom (if an odd-numbered card) by half the card value. This may result in forgetting things you used to know, such as languages, how to cast spells, how to read and write – as befits a survivor of severe trauma. Should either Ability score drop to zero, you can never function as a self-sufficient individual again.

Face cards, Black: you eventually recover from the injury, but it leaves gruesome, horrifying scars or a permanent deformity. Your disfigurement is impossible to conceal and repulsive to most intelligent beings: friendly humanoids are disgusted, while hostile monsters believe you weak and vulnerable, less of a threat. Permanently reduce your Charisma score by 1-3 points (for a J, Q and K respectively).

Face cards, Red: you recover from your injury fully, and it doesn’t hamper you anymore, but it left you with some visible, cosmetic scar. Such a scar makes you appear more rugged and experienced, charming and dangerous, more of a badass. Permanently increase your Charisma score by 1-3 points (for a J, Q and K respectively).

The Joker: what was it that near-killed you, exactly? Whatever it was, you now laugh in it’s face! If it was a failed Saving Throw which brought you to the brink of death, you gain a permanent +1 bonus to the appropriate category of Saving Throw, and develop immunity to the specific hazard which befell you this time: if it was a rattlesnake bite, for example, you’re now immune to rattlesnake poison and save at +1 vs. poison from any other source; if it was an Inflict Serious Wounds spell, you’re now immune to that spell and you save at +1 vs. all other spells; etc. If you suffered the Grievous Wound from a mere blade or claw, you instead permanently increase your maximum Hit Points by 1d3, having become inured to pain and more reckless.

Additionally, surviving such a close brush with death is quite the formative experience, and yields significant bonus XPs for the player character. When you survive a Grievous Wound…
  • …for the 1st time, gain 400 × your current level bonus XPs.
  • …for the 2nd time, gain 200 × your current level bonus XPs.
  • …for the 3rd time, gain 100 × your current level bonus XPs.
  • …for the 4th time, gain 50 × your current level bonus XPs.
  • …every subsequent time, gain 25 × your current level bonus XPs.

Notes and variants

  • These rules are better suited to those games where Hit Points are deemed to be an abstract measure of defensive ability, with HP loss not usually representing an actual, bleeding wound (but rather the defender tiring down, losing ground, damage to armor and weapons, pain and disturbance, annoying but nonthreatening scratches and bruises, morale drop, etc.). If you already described, say, a PC having their left arm numbed, or bleeding profusely from the abdomen, after being successfully hit for HP damage, then Grievous Wounds as presented here would be made redundant.
  • Grievous Wound rules don’t apply to careful murder of the defenseless — i.e., a combatant taking special care to ensure that the fallen stay down. If they stop and slaughter you on the field while you’re helpless at 0 HP (a non-combat action to deliver a careful coup-de-grace), you’re just dead.
  • Divination magic or the skills of a healer (here representing diagnosis) could be used to peek at the card in advance; for example, to assess whether a dying comrade is worth hauling back to safety at all or is beyond hope already.
  • Specialized spells could be introduced that allow for changing one’s Grievous Wound card(s) — presumably after peeking at it.
  • It’s on each DM to decide whether to also apply Grievous Wound rules when a character’s slain by poison, insta-death spells, etc., or only for actual HP damage. Personally I’d use it for very fast-acting, save-or-die-instantly poisons, but not for poisons that are slow enough to allow for treatment.
  • If you want to penalize PCs for being defeated too frequently, rather than give out an XP bonus, you can inflict an XP penalty. Or the bonus could only apply to the first five Wounds in a character’s life, while for the 6th and subsequent you start giving out a penalty, reading the table in reverse (-25×level, then -50×level, and so on).
  • As a variant, players could be allowed to gamble with Wound cards (at the meta-game level) in the hope of gaining one of the beneficial wounds. Here’s how I would do it:
    • You must be a 2nd level character or higher to gamble with Wounds.
    • If you choose to gamble (it’s never mandatory), draw additional Grievous Wounds cards equal to your character level.
    • When cards are revealed, choose one (and only one) to discard.
    • All of the remaining cards apply! They can represent separate injuries, or you can combine them into one, but all of their effects are applied separately (if, for example, you drew a Nine of Clubs and a Queen of Hearts, maybe it means you lost an eye but look very cool with an eye-patch).
    • Note that, under these rules, gambling is virtually an insurance against being killed by the Ace of Spades, but tends to erode Ability scores very fast (which can be just as deadly).
  • Notice that out of 54 cards there are only 9 desiderable outcomes (a 1-in-6 chance), vis-a-vis 42 damaging ones and 1 insta-killer.

Commentary

My readers already know that I’m prone to occasional fits of dungeon-nostalgia, in various flavors. These rules came to my mind while musing about a setup for a low-level, high-stakes campaign of mostly randomly-generated dungeon crawling… which occurred to me soon after reading about the somewhat hilarious (mis-)adventures of the Fellowship of the Bling, brought to my attention by Paul T. via Story-Games.com. Most notably, they sprung from an off-hand comment by Eero Tuovinen in that very same thread, something about rolling to confirm death or survival of fallen combatants, campaign-wargame style ("down at 0, with 50% chance of dead") — and from my desire to elaborate profusely on that very simple but quite attractive rule.

Thursday, July 19, 2012

Ability scores: roll #d6, some of them in order


That which follows is a method of Ability scores determination for use – during character creation – with any role-playing game employing six Abilities with scores in the 3-18 range. This includes all iterations of D&D I know about, retro-clones or other immediate derivatives of them, as well as Dungeon World and some others. The method can also be altered for a different number of Abilities or scores in a different range, of course.
My aim with this is to marry the “organic” feel of the roll-3d6-in-order method with some of the most desirable qualities of roll-and-arrange and fixed-set methods (namely, the ability to play the class you desire, to always have a character you can make sense of in your mind’s eye, and less power-disparity within the party).

Rafu’s matrix method

First you need to draw a grid of three columns by six rows. Outside the grid scribble the Abilities used in your game, one per row. It looks like this:

Str:



Int:



Wis:



Con:



Dex:



Cha:




STEP 1: roll 6d6. Write the results in the first column, arranging them as you wish.

STEP 2: in the second column, write the numbers 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6, arranged as you wish.

STEP 3: for the third column, roll 1d6 per row and write down the results in order.

Finally, total up each row to get your Ability scores.

Example: I'm playing OD&D. I roll underwhelming dice in Step #1 (4, 4, 3, 2, 2, 1), but I decide I'm gonna try and make this character a Cleric — a hardy and survivable, no-nonsense knight-templar type. Dice are kinder to me in Step #3.
Str:
3
4
5
 =12
Int:
2
1
2
 = 5
Wis:
4
6
4
 =14
Con:
4
5
4
 =13
Dex:
1
2
3
 = 6
Cha:
2
3
6
 =11

Variants

  • If you like to use formal rules for “unplayable” characters, to establish when a player’s allowed to reroll, try devising some based on Step #1 (only): this saves everybody’s time. Something like: “if you got two or more 1s and/or your best die is a 4, you’re allowed to reroll”.
  • If you want a more uniform power-level, and/or to make any one point of difference very meaningful (a flatter distribution):
    • for Step #1, roll 8d6 then drop highest and lowest die (or even 10d6 drop 2 highest and 2 lowest, etc.);
    • for Step #3, roll 3d6 and keep the median value (drop high and low) instead of 1d6.
  • For a different number of Abilities (five scores, seven scores, etc.) you need to both:
    • roll nd6 in Step #1 where n is the number of Abilities;
    • alter the array of numbers in Step #2 by removing or adding (duplicating) values starting from the middle ones (3s and 4s): thus an array for an 8-Abilites game could be “1,2,3,3,4,4,5,6”, one for a 4-Abilities game is “1,2,5,6”.
  • To generate Ability scores in a 2-12 range (Epées & Sorcellerie, World of Dungeons):
    • skip Step #1;
    • for Step #3, either:
      • use the 3d6-keep-median roll, or
      • repeat Step #3 twice, writing down both sets of results, then choose one (a whole set, not row-by-row).

Notes

I originally devised this method back in my 3E days, out of a desire to introduce some controlled randomness, but never got to put it to any real use. I wouldn’t use it for a 4E game, because it doesn’t fit with the small-squad tactics optimization those rules finally canonized as the “official” style of play, IMO. But in the present era of Old-School Renaissance, widely available OD&D retro-clones and free-licensed, D&D-themed Apocalypse World hacks… I believe there is now room and even demand for little house-rules like this to be circulated.

Thursday, April 26, 2012

From the depths of my hdd: D&D3/d20 Monk Weapons


Foreword: I have recovered some old files while tidying up my hard drives, stuff from the old days when I was into Dungeons & Dragons 3rd Edition. What follows is an article I originally meant to submit to Dragon magazine (when it was still a print magazine!) detailing new weapons for D&D3/d20 System. Ehi, somebody still plays that stuff! I guess this works alright with Pathfinder or with any D&D variant which has “monks” as a class. The statistics given are for “3.5” rules – for “3.0” rules just ignore the “Dmg (S)” column and instead assign each weapon a size. I’m sure you can easily adapt the table to whatever version of D&D you’re using. These weapons were never playtested (but, if you want my opinion, most such material released in magazines wasn’t, either).

New Weapons for Monks


All of the weapons described in this article are exotic weapons, requiring a character to acquire the appropriate Exotic Weapon Proficiency feat or suffer a -4 penalty on attack rolls. Besides, all of these weapons are considered “special monk weapons”, but only in the hands of a proficient character: thus, a monk character wielding any of these weapons and being proficient with it can use it as part of a flurry of blows.

Hollow staff: A 5’ long staff fashioned from bamboo wood, very stout despite being hollow inside and thus lighter in weight compared than a common quarterstaff. Like the quarterstaff, you can wield it as a double weapon. Alternatively, and unlike the quarterstaff, being so light you can grip it very close to its end and brandish it like a long club: in this case it counts as a reach weapon and you can strike at opponents 10 feet away with it, but you can’t use it against adjacent foes. Switching from wielding the hollow staff as a double weapon to wielding it as a reach weapon, or vice-versa, takes a “draw weapon” action for any character but a proficient monk; a monk proficient in the hollow staff can instead make the switch as a free action.
[Note: if you’re using my variant weapons rules from this other article, you could treat the hollow staff as a variant quarterstaff, instead of a separate exotic weapon (the only effective difference being that a nonproficient user could still pick up a hollow staff and use it as it was a standard quarterstaff).]

Hornet knife: A small, triangle-shaped throwing dagger, resembling an oversized shuriken. Since it is not designed for melee, you are always treated as nonproficient with it if you use a hornet knife as a melee weapon. Although they are thrown weapons, hornet knives are treated as ammunition for the purposes of drawing them, crafting masterwork or otherwise special versions of them and what happens to them after they are thrown.

Serpentspire sword: This sword resembles a straight-edged rapier with the long handle and cross-shaped hilt of a bastard sword. Its very flexible blade twists and waves almost like a snake, hence its name. It is a favoured weapon of certain master swordsmen from distant lands who employ an exotic, flamboyant style of swordplay: they juggle the sword from their left to their right as they duel and occasionally they grip it with both hands. You can use the Weapon Finesse feat to apply your Dexterity modifier instead of your Strength modifier to attack rolls with a serpentspire sword sized for you, even though it isn’t a light weapon. In order to attack with a serpentspire sword as part of a flurry of blows, a monk must be wielding only one such weapon and have her other hand free.

Tonfa: These L-shaped, stout wooden sticks are often used in pairs and make for an effective parrying weapon. One wields them by gripping the shorter, thinner bar in the palm and keeping the longer, thicker bar parallel to the forearm: thus one performs parries with the protected forearm in the style of an unarmed fighter, but rotates the weapon forward to strike with it as a club. A proficient character wielding paired tonfas gains a +1 shield bonus to AC when fighting defensively, taking a total defense action or employing the Combat Expertise feat.

Unbalanced axe: There once was a martial artist of unsurpassed mastery, but possessing little muscle strength in his arms, who sought out a weapon which would substitute the former for the latter. He designed an oddly bent axe, no larger than a typical handaxe but considerably heavier, meant to be swinged around in circular motions at high speed, then driving its mass with a skilled flick of the wrist as it drops. So unwieldy is the unbalanced axe that it always imposes a -1 penalty on attack rolls. Besides, a monk can only use unbalanced axe attacks in a flurry of blows if he wields two such weapons and makes all of his attacks with those (mixing no unarmed strikes in the routine). Despite being considered a “light weapon” for most purposes, the unbalanced axe can’t be used in a grapple.

New exotic weapons

Cost

Dmg (S)
Dmg (M)
Critical
Range Increment
Weight
Type
Light Melee Weapons







Tonfa
2 gp
1d4
1d6
x2
2 lb.
Bludgeoning
Unbalanced axe
25 gp
1d6
1d8
x3
5 lb.
Slashing








One-Handed Melee Weapons







Serpentspire sword
40 gp
1d4
1d6
18–20/x2
2 lb.
Piercing or slashing
Two-Handed Melee Weapons







Hollow staff (as a double weapon)
15 gp
1d4/1d4
1d6/1d6
x2
2 lb.
Bludgeoning
or hollow staff (as a reach weapon)

1d4
1d6
x2











Ranged Weapons







Hornet knives (5)
2 gp
1d3
1d4
x2
10 ft.
2 lb.
Piercing


From the depths of my hdd: D&D3/d20 Variant Weapons


Foreword: I have recovered some old files while tidying up my hard drives, stuff from the old days when I was into Dungeons & Dragons 3rd Edition. What follows is an unfinished article I originally meant to submit to Dragon magazine (when it was still a print magazine!) detailing a new rules option for D&D3/d20 System. Ehi, somebody still plays that stuff! I guess this works alright with Pathfinder etc., thus use it if you like it, and maybe build on it. It was never playtested (but, if you want my opinion, most such material released in magazines wasn’t, either).

Variant weapons


Common rules: “variant” weapons, such as those described here, aren’t new exotic weapons – they’re special variations of existing simple or martial weapons. Any character proficient with the “base” weapon can use a variant weapon as it was a normal weapon of that kind, with no penalties to their attack roll (i.e. any character proficient with simple weapons can use a boarhunt spear as it was a normal longspear and a mail-piercing dagger as a common dagger). However, you also have the option to expend an Exotic Weapon Proficiency feat to perfect your use of the weapon, gaining access to a “special ability” unique to each variant weapon.

Boarhunt spear (variant longspear): a spear with a crossbar stoutly affixed one-third down its length, it is designed to stop a rampaging beast’s charge. When a trained user (Exotic Weapon Proficiency: boarhunt spear) makes a successful attack roll against a charging opponent (either as a readied attack or due to an attack of opportunity granted because of reach), she and the opponent also make an opposed strength check: a losing opponent is forced to halt the charge and stop in place.

Mail-piercing dagger (variant dagger): a strong, stoutly built thrusting dagger which only inflicts piercing damage, this weapon is designed with the purpose of punching through armor, chainmail especially. A trained user (Exotic Weapon Proficiency: mail-piercing dagger) gains a +2 circumstance bonus to hit with the mail-piercing dagger against opponents wearing metal armor (including: all heavy armor, all medium armor except hide, and chain shirt).

Afterword: my original file also has headers for two more weapons: the “swordbreaker” (variant greatclub) and the “long-reaching sword” (variant greatsword) – the headers only, but no actual descriptions. The hollow staff from this other article could also be one. If you like the concept, please, make up your own!

Sunday, February 5, 2012

Yes, I like to think I have this Key. So what?

Key of "You think you know me?" 
It happens all the time. Some player sitting 'round the table says to you: "Oh, man, and now you're so going to tag your Key of [Something] again because of this! Easy money!" (or variations). But in fact you…
1 XP = Can't tag your Key of Something, because it doesn't apply.
2 XPs= Don't have the Key of Something at all.
5 XPs= Can and do buy off your Key of Something right now.
Buyoff: They're right, your Key of Something applies and you tag it for 3 XPs or more.