Maybe a mimic that is trying to become a whole room? I found this piece of paper in among all the files and stuff I am sorting out. How many hit dice would a room have? Or hit points for that matter?
How do you kill a room?
Showing posts with label game idea. Show all posts
Showing posts with label game idea. Show all posts
Monday, 18 March 2019
"Room Monster"
Surely someone else has done this better than me...?
Maybe a mimic that is trying to become a whole room? I found this piece of paper in among all the files and stuff I am sorting out. How many hit dice would a room have? Or hit points for that matter?
How do you kill a room?
Maybe a mimic that is trying to become a whole room? I found this piece of paper in among all the files and stuff I am sorting out. How many hit dice would a room have? Or hit points for that matter?
How do you kill a room?
Wednesday, 27 February 2019
Lamentations Of The Dogs In The Vineyard
G+ is on life support, so a few weeks back I trawled through every post I'd made in my 6+ years using it to see if there was anything that I wanted to archive.
I found about a dozen posts that were effectively blog posts I'd misplaced. One was an idea I'd loved but done nothing with. I think over the coming weeks/months/however-long-I-maintain-a-regular-writing-habit I'll expand on this concept and flesh it out as much as I can.
From a November 6th 2014 G+ post:
But while I like the basic stats and skills setup for Dogs, I found it really bothersome to keep on top of the dice pools. The rolls and re-rolls, the escalation. It could be tense sometimes, but at others it was just eight or nine dice on each side clattering and trying to find an exception as no-one backs down.
So why not mix a little Old School goodness in to the blend to simplify some of the mechanics? Why not use D&Dish stats? And since LOTFP has a system that uses equipment and assumptions about a similar background period of history, why not "simply" perform an RPG transplant operation?
Why not write about this in bits and pieces over the coming however-long-I-maintain-this-blog-yadda-yadda-yadda?
Why not.
I found about a dozen posts that were effectively blog posts I'd misplaced. One was an idea I'd loved but done nothing with. I think over the coming weeks/months/however-long-I-maintain-a-regular-writing-habit I'll expand on this concept and flesh it out as much as I can.
From a November 6th 2014 G+ post:
Prequel to Dogs in the Vineyard; early 1800s sandbox campaign in a largely unsettled counter-Utah; party are not-quite-Dogs; sent off by the church to convert isolated communities, make contact with the Mountain Folk and look into those odd reports of weird caves in the Border Hills.I'm a fan of the setting for Dogs In The Vineyard, and in the G+ circles that I used to read and the blogs I currently read I see barely a mention of it. I LOVE what the game is about, I love the idea of the Watchdogs and I think that Dogs is possibly Vincent Baker's best game - at least out of everything of his I've read. The game-setting-making process he leads the reader/GM through is magical. Going from simple prompts it steers your creativity without being prohibitive.
BUT play with LotFP as base system (plus guns). Clerics are true believers, magic-users are the church's investigators into other stuff who are now a bit tainted, fighters and specialists are the useful novices.
And the weird caves are filled with things out of Lovecraft.
But while I like the basic stats and skills setup for Dogs, I found it really bothersome to keep on top of the dice pools. The rolls and re-rolls, the escalation. It could be tense sometimes, but at others it was just eight or nine dice on each side clattering and trying to find an exception as no-one backs down.
So why not mix a little Old School goodness in to the blend to simplify some of the mechanics? Why not use D&Dish stats? And since LOTFP has a system that uses equipment and assumptions about a similar background period of history, why not "simply" perform an RPG transplant operation?
Why not write about this in bits and pieces over the coming however-long-I-maintain-this-blog-yadda-yadda-yadda?
Why not.
Wednesday, 13 April 2016
A Mote In The Oort Cloud
Issue 2 of A Random Encounter is almost ready, but that's not what I want to talk about today!
What do I want to talk about? I suppose the clearest way to put it is words, words and terms. I'm picking up the threads of Into The Oort to take it further, hopefully towards a playtest bundle that people can try in the next month or so. In my day job, one of the workshops I deliver has a bit about the words that people use, how using certain words influences how people think about the topic at hand. The session is about exam preparation, and very often people frame discussion of the exam as "surviving" it - which reinforces negative associations with the event.
One of the last posts that I wrote about Into The Oort was on hexes and distances. When you run the calculations, the region of space that Into The Oort takes place in has around 500 billion hexes, each of which is a vast volume that could comfortably fit the inner solar system in it. Don't worry: Into The Oort is not going to come with a 500 billion hex campaign document! Despite the incredible size of things, these hexes are themselves tiny compared to the total volume of the Oort Cloud...
A word that I've had in mind for a while is the word mote, and as Google helpfully points out this means "a tiny piece of substance; a speck". That's what a hex in the Oort Cloud is, it's a speck, a tiny thing in the vast cosmic perspective.
While I expect that players and GMs will refer to them as hexes, and while I will have hex-shaped divisions on maps in the playtest and in the book, my thought for now is that I will refer to them as motes throughout the book. Because that's what the people living in the Oort Cloud call them, a permanent reminder that they are utterly tiny against the backdrop of the universe.
This isn't the only example I have in mind, but it is the one that I'm closest to a decision on. Aside from posts about A Random Encounter in the near future, I'll try and make some of my thoughts about Into The Oort more concrete by posting them here. If you've got any questions about it then drop me a line and I'll see if I can answer them!
What do I want to talk about? I suppose the clearest way to put it is words, words and terms. I'm picking up the threads of Into The Oort to take it further, hopefully towards a playtest bundle that people can try in the next month or so. In my day job, one of the workshops I deliver has a bit about the words that people use, how using certain words influences how people think about the topic at hand. The session is about exam preparation, and very often people frame discussion of the exam as "surviving" it - which reinforces negative associations with the event.
One of the last posts that I wrote about Into The Oort was on hexes and distances. When you run the calculations, the region of space that Into The Oort takes place in has around 500 billion hexes, each of which is a vast volume that could comfortably fit the inner solar system in it. Don't worry: Into The Oort is not going to come with a 500 billion hex campaign document! Despite the incredible size of things, these hexes are themselves tiny compared to the total volume of the Oort Cloud...
A word that I've had in mind for a while is the word mote, and as Google helpfully points out this means "a tiny piece of substance; a speck". That's what a hex in the Oort Cloud is, it's a speck, a tiny thing in the vast cosmic perspective.
While I expect that players and GMs will refer to them as hexes, and while I will have hex-shaped divisions on maps in the playtest and in the book, my thought for now is that I will refer to them as motes throughout the book. Because that's what the people living in the Oort Cloud call them, a permanent reminder that they are utterly tiny against the backdrop of the universe.
This isn't the only example I have in mind, but it is the one that I'm closest to a decision on. Aside from posts about A Random Encounter in the near future, I'll try and make some of my thoughts about Into The Oort more concrete by posting them here. If you've got any questions about it then drop me a line and I'll see if I can answer them!
Monday, 22 February 2016
Into The Labyrinth
On Saturday afternoon, whilst thinking about publishing and work and other things, my wife was baking a carrot cake and so I was looking after our almost-two-and-a-half year old daughter, CJ. CJ is old enough now, and has been for a while, to watch a movie. After a morning of running around and building Duplo megastructures, it felt OK to sit down for a few hours and watch something.
CJ loves a handful of Disney and Pixar movies, Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs (aka, "The Food Movie") and also Tintin, but we're trying to broaden her movie repertoire. Labyrinth has been on my mind a lot for the last month or so. And it's not that scary for young kids, right?
As it turns out, no, it's not; it's far more scary for thirty-something fathers who have seen it a dozen times or more in their life, and who have read a couple of academic papers about the movie and the symbolism therein. CJ was fine and kept up with her usual movie commentary:
Watching the movie then, thinking about Labyrinth, games and blogposts I've read recently, the following setting started to jumble together...
Into The Labyrinth
How did you get here? You're not quite sure. The walls stretch forever in either direction, and remind you of childhood, of singing and dancing and hair, big hair. But now there is silence. A whisper of wings fluttering nearby, an empty pond and a stone door fallen on the floor. An entrance. And still silence. There seems no way around, and away in the distance, at the centre of the walls and paths is a city, and beyond that a castle. It doesn't look that far...
...but it's further than you think.
Concept: start with a base of Into The Odd, simple mechanics and chargen, maybe a slightly tweaked starter package table. No Arcana. The Labyrinth is procedurally generated as the PCs explore, and strongly flavoured by the movie - but set some time afterwards. Factions of goblins. Features from the movie, but now decayed or time-worn by what seems like millenia. The Labyrinth itself is one giant trap, and can only be escaped at the centre.
Goblin groups, traps, travelling back from a hex to a previously visited location doesn't necessarily lead you back. Have hexes and locations be about features and flavour, people and monsters rather than describing a series of left and right turns. From the outside the Labyrinth is near infinite, inside it takes about thirteen hours, moving at a hex per hour, to get to the centre. But time runs weird in there.
If anyone mentions the late Goblin King in the presence of goblins they will stop whatever they do to shout, "Long live the King!" The goblins are aware of a ruler in the castle beyond the Goblin City but are not sure who it is. Everywhere is trapped but not every trap is dangerous; everyone you meet is dangerous but not everyone wants to hurt you. Paths lead to adjacent hexes, tunnels lead to nearby hexes, underground tunnels lead far, far away within the Labyrinth.
Any player/character who starts a phrase with "I wish the goblins would..." will most likely find that wish fulfilled in an unexpected way. At the centre of the Labyrinth is a fractured Escher-scape and a broken clock that is on the cusp of chiming thirteen. If it can be made to chime then a party of adventurers would find themselves waking up somewhere familiar "as if it were all a dream" except that they would have any treasure and possessions that they had in the Labyrinth.
So yeah, that's what I was thinking about...
Advert! A Random Encounter #1 out soon!
CJ loves a handful of Disney and Pixar movies, Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs (aka, "The Food Movie") and also Tintin, but we're trying to broaden her movie repertoire. Labyrinth has been on my mind a lot for the last month or so. And it's not that scary for young kids, right?
As it turns out, no, it's not; it's far more scary for thirty-something fathers who have seen it a dozen times or more in their life, and who have read a couple of academic papers about the movie and the symbolism therein. CJ was fine and kept up with her usual movie commentary:
- "Who's that?" "Sarah." "Sir-rahh." "Very good, love." "What's Sarah doing?"
- "An owl! ... Where baby gone?" "The goblins...are hiding him..."
- "Who's that?" "(lump in throat) The Goblin King." "What Goblin King doing?"
Watching the movie then, thinking about Labyrinth, games and blogposts I've read recently, the following setting started to jumble together...
Into The Labyrinth
How did you get here? You're not quite sure. The walls stretch forever in either direction, and remind you of childhood, of singing and dancing and hair, big hair. But now there is silence. A whisper of wings fluttering nearby, an empty pond and a stone door fallen on the floor. An entrance. And still silence. There seems no way around, and away in the distance, at the centre of the walls and paths is a city, and beyond that a castle. It doesn't look that far...
...but it's further than you think.
Concept: start with a base of Into The Odd, simple mechanics and chargen, maybe a slightly tweaked starter package table. No Arcana. The Labyrinth is procedurally generated as the PCs explore, and strongly flavoured by the movie - but set some time afterwards. Factions of goblins. Features from the movie, but now decayed or time-worn by what seems like millenia. The Labyrinth itself is one giant trap, and can only be escaped at the centre.
Goblin groups, traps, travelling back from a hex to a previously visited location doesn't necessarily lead you back. Have hexes and locations be about features and flavour, people and monsters rather than describing a series of left and right turns. From the outside the Labyrinth is near infinite, inside it takes about thirteen hours, moving at a hex per hour, to get to the centre. But time runs weird in there.
If anyone mentions the late Goblin King in the presence of goblins they will stop whatever they do to shout, "Long live the King!" The goblins are aware of a ruler in the castle beyond the Goblin City but are not sure who it is. Everywhere is trapped but not every trap is dangerous; everyone you meet is dangerous but not everyone wants to hurt you. Paths lead to adjacent hexes, tunnels lead to nearby hexes, underground tunnels lead far, far away within the Labyrinth.
Any player/character who starts a phrase with "I wish the goblins would..." will most likely find that wish fulfilled in an unexpected way. At the centre of the Labyrinth is a fractured Escher-scape and a broken clock that is on the cusp of chiming thirteen. If it can be made to chime then a party of adventurers would find themselves waking up somewhere familiar "as if it were all a dream" except that they would have any treasure and possessions that they had in the Labyrinth.
Advert! A Random Encounter #1 out soon!
Tuesday, 28 April 2015
Into The Oort: Hexes
Into The Oort is set in a region of space that is 50,000 astronomical units (AUs) from the Sun, way out where the comets that orbit the Solar System move in a vast shell across a huge region of space. What is an AU? An AU is the distance from the Earth to the Sun. Which is vast. To reflect the incredible distances and emptiness of space, each hex is 10AU across. Approximately 1.5 billion kilometres. If you were moving at the speed of light it would take over an hour to cross a hex.
A hex is big.
As with other settings, a hex in the Oort has a quality to it. In another game it might be called the "terrain". Some are basically space, empty; some have dust clouds, some have a high gas concentration, some have cometary debris, some have rogue asteroids in them. With the distances involved, there is a good chance that there is a human settlement of some form somewhere in a hex; if not, there is a good chance that there is an old human settlement - something abandoned or lost or wrecked. And of course there are ships that are travelling here and there; the Oort Cloud is big but the people living there are not static.
Occupied settlements might have huge populaces - tens of thousands of people - or only have a few dozen, or even less. The Hub - the largest human settlement that anyone knows about - has far more people than anywhere else, and no-one knows quite how many people live there.
The region of the Oort Cloud 50,000AU has, from a back of an envelope calculation, on the order of 500 million hexes. If, on average, each hex has a thousand people in it (some have far more, some have far less) then this region of the Solar System might have 500 billion people living in it.
Variety and wonders and opportunities are everywhere...
A note: for the playtest campaign and ultimately a release of Into The Oort I am planning to populate a region of around 50 hexes around the Hub, along with tables for populating hexes with settlements, groups and people. I've shared an in-progress document for generating the basic outline of a human habitat before; if you haven't seen it you can get it here.
A hex is big.
As with other settings, a hex in the Oort has a quality to it. In another game it might be called the "terrain". Some are basically space, empty; some have dust clouds, some have a high gas concentration, some have cometary debris, some have rogue asteroids in them. With the distances involved, there is a good chance that there is a human settlement of some form somewhere in a hex; if not, there is a good chance that there is an old human settlement - something abandoned or lost or wrecked. And of course there are ships that are travelling here and there; the Oort Cloud is big but the people living there are not static.
Occupied settlements might have huge populaces - tens of thousands of people - or only have a few dozen, or even less. The Hub - the largest human settlement that anyone knows about - has far more people than anywhere else, and no-one knows quite how many people live there.
The region of the Oort Cloud 50,000AU has, from a back of an envelope calculation, on the order of 500 million hexes. If, on average, each hex has a thousand people in it (some have far more, some have far less) then this region of the Solar System might have 500 billion people living in it.
Variety and wonders and opportunities are everywhere...
A note: for the playtest campaign and ultimately a release of Into The Oort I am planning to populate a region of around 50 hexes around the Hub, along with tables for populating hexes with settlements, groups and people. I've shared an in-progress document for generating the basic outline of a human habitat before; if you haven't seen it you can get it here.
Thursday, 31 July 2014
By The Numbers
Last night I sat down and realised that the setting I was coming up with wasn't working quite as planned. Basically, travel times between locations (potentially, I've not fleshed them out yet) would just be too short. You jump in your spaceship and even though something is just miles and miles away - you get there fairly quickly. I thought that a smooth 10m/s^2 acceleration (slightly higher than Earth-standard, but makes for easier calculation! Call it "metric gravity" maybe...) as a baseline would mean that it would still take days of travel for adventurers - not because I want things to be boring and tedious, but because I want some semblance of realism.
(I don't want Star Trek style space travel, where the ship moves at the speed of plot)
So what to do? I came to realise that, basically, the local area of space I was considering was just too small. So I scaled up. I started with a square that was about two light minutes across, and have now scaled up to a ten light minute square. For those who don't know: the Earth is approx eight light minutes out from the Sun; the region of space I'm setting this in is approximately 400,000 light minutes out from the Sun.
A ten light minute square might not be big enough, but I have to add the numbers etc to my tables and see what it does to travel times. My basic generation table starts off with a ten-by-ten Grid of single squares; roll two d10s for each square and any 1s indicate that there is a place of interest in the Grid - then refer to tables to generate those. Double 1s mean there is something alien there. Am considering tweaking it very slightly (possibly if any 2s are rolled these indicate something else about the square: a problem? A hazard?)
Enough maths for today! Two good things about progress with prep for all of this: first I have typed up a list of the traits for chargen, along with their effects. Chargen will have the option for three player selected traits or four random ones (should keep things interesting). Second, I've found the notes I had for chargen, so now I can type those up and hopefully streamline the process for players.
Next up, making weapon and armour selection simple!
(if anyone wants to see my maths for any of this, let me know, I'll see what I can do)
(I don't want Star Trek style space travel, where the ship moves at the speed of plot)
So what to do? I came to realise that, basically, the local area of space I was considering was just too small. So I scaled up. I started with a square that was about two light minutes across, and have now scaled up to a ten light minute square. For those who don't know: the Earth is approx eight light minutes out from the Sun; the region of space I'm setting this in is approximately 400,000 light minutes out from the Sun.
A ten light minute square might not be big enough, but I have to add the numbers etc to my tables and see what it does to travel times. My basic generation table starts off with a ten-by-ten Grid of single squares; roll two d10s for each square and any 1s indicate that there is a place of interest in the Grid - then refer to tables to generate those. Double 1s mean there is something alien there. Am considering tweaking it very slightly (possibly if any 2s are rolled these indicate something else about the square: a problem? A hazard?)
Enough maths for today! Two good things about progress with prep for all of this: first I have typed up a list of the traits for chargen, along with their effects. Chargen will have the option for three player selected traits or four random ones (should keep things interesting). Second, I've found the notes I had for chargen, so now I can type those up and hopefully streamline the process for players.
Next up, making weapon and armour selection simple!
(if anyone wants to see my maths for any of this, let me know, I'll see what I can do)
Tuesday, 8 July 2014
Baristas in the Oort Cloud
If you listen to A Gaming Podcast About Nothing, you might know that my current pet project is running a campaign set on the various communities in the Oort Cloud of some future time. Probably using Machinations of the Space Princess, although it started off in my head as a Dogs in the Vineyard hack, I've been making notes, creating tables, even a sample grid of space two light-minutes by two light-minutes across.
At 3:30 this morning while I was waiting with my daughter something just popped into my head: Baristas.
At the edge of the solar system, alcohol isn't so much banned as it is severely frowned on. There's a time and a place for a good time, and you can buy beer if you want it - but it's not the done thing. Coffee on the other hand - well, it's a natural stimulant, keeps you alert, and even in the safest of safe places, there's always a chance of a micro-meteor causing a hull breach, or a cometary ice storm to weather. Coffee is good.
And the Exalted Order serve the best coffee. Some people scoff and say that the machines they use are a sham, that the taste and smell from the resulting coffee is all about perception. Others say that the machines came from Earth, have been lovingly restored or preserved over many generations, and that the Baristas are near-alchemists, turning dials, grinding beans just-so and applying water of the correct temperature to two decimal places without computer aid.
You pay a price for this devotion, but it's often rewarded. The movers and the shakers, the high and the low, they all pay at the temple-cafes of the Exalted Order. There are even stories of the Baristas of the Exalted Order, in their simple black shirt and trousers (forearm sleeve tattoo optional) entering trances, uttering things about patron-worshippers that they couldn't possibly know. Who knows?
At 3:30 this morning while I was waiting with my daughter something just popped into my head: Baristas.
At the edge of the solar system, alcohol isn't so much banned as it is severely frowned on. There's a time and a place for a good time, and you can buy beer if you want it - but it's not the done thing. Coffee on the other hand - well, it's a natural stimulant, keeps you alert, and even in the safest of safe places, there's always a chance of a micro-meteor causing a hull breach, or a cometary ice storm to weather. Coffee is good.
And the Exalted Order serve the best coffee. Some people scoff and say that the machines they use are a sham, that the taste and smell from the resulting coffee is all about perception. Others say that the machines came from Earth, have been lovingly restored or preserved over many generations, and that the Baristas are near-alchemists, turning dials, grinding beans just-so and applying water of the correct temperature to two decimal places without computer aid.
You pay a price for this devotion, but it's often rewarded. The movers and the shakers, the high and the low, they all pay at the temple-cafes of the Exalted Order. There are even stories of the Baristas of the Exalted Order, in their simple black shirt and trousers (forearm sleeve tattoo optional) entering trances, uttering things about patron-worshippers that they couldn't possibly know. Who knows?
Thursday, 3 April 2014
PRISM/AGENT
PRISM/AGENT is a hack of GHOST/ECHO that I am working on which is inspired by Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons. It has been rolling around in my head for a while now to create something "complete" - something that is done and I can play it and move on. Not just to have ideas in my brain all the time with no escape. I think PRISM/AGENT (which is a name-in-progress) is the first way to defuse that creative bomb which, if it explodes, will make me bitter and annoyed and sulky.
I love GHOST/ECHO. I think I've said that before on here. It's just beautiful. Two pages, some inspirations, some simple mechanics that create rich stories. PRISM/AGENT is an ugly little runt, built out of the best bits of other things, but hopefully it will be playable. I see it one way in my head, and others might play it totally differently.
Core ideas are that PCs are agents with colour codenames, as the Captains in Spectrum are; agents have been freed/released/rescued from aliens/others, but as a result have gained Influences (equivalent to Channeling the Ghost Field move in G/E). These Influences are based on the powers that the Mysterons show in Captain Scarlet, but that's it: the agents can use these powers, but if they lose control of them something bad happens. Basic moves are similar/identical to G/E, which of course are based in part on moves in Apocalypse World I think. The Listening For Echoes move is translated to trying to uncover the intention of the Others (Obscurons?) - and if you fail at that then something bad happens (the Others become aware of you, or you face some kind of mental assault).
But here's what occurs and which I am excited about: PRISM/AGENT has the possibility to be really neat in that you can take the basic premise and transplant it to so many different locations and time periods. A retro-future like Captain Scarlet? Check. A 1920s gangster backdrop with Others/Invaders? Check. Straight pulp heroes? Check. This was something that GHOST/ECHO did beautifully - you don't need lots of stuff in order to play it, and to play it in so many different ways.
Anyways! PRISM/AGENT - or something similarly (or not) named. Coming soon. Playtesting over G+ maybe by the end of April, or in person in Liverpool (Liverpool Game Nerds Assemble!). Comments and questions very welcome!
I love GHOST/ECHO. I think I've said that before on here. It's just beautiful. Two pages, some inspirations, some simple mechanics that create rich stories. PRISM/AGENT is an ugly little runt, built out of the best bits of other things, but hopefully it will be playable. I see it one way in my head, and others might play it totally differently.
Core ideas are that PCs are agents with colour codenames, as the Captains in Spectrum are; agents have been freed/released/rescued from aliens/others, but as a result have gained Influences (equivalent to Channeling the Ghost Field move in G/E). These Influences are based on the powers that the Mysterons show in Captain Scarlet, but that's it: the agents can use these powers, but if they lose control of them something bad happens. Basic moves are similar/identical to G/E, which of course are based in part on moves in Apocalypse World I think. The Listening For Echoes move is translated to trying to uncover the intention of the Others (Obscurons?) - and if you fail at that then something bad happens (the Others become aware of you, or you face some kind of mental assault).
But here's what occurs and which I am excited about: PRISM/AGENT has the possibility to be really neat in that you can take the basic premise and transplant it to so many different locations and time periods. A retro-future like Captain Scarlet? Check. A 1920s gangster backdrop with Others/Invaders? Check. Straight pulp heroes? Check. This was something that GHOST/ECHO did beautifully - you don't need lots of stuff in order to play it, and to play it in so many different ways.
Anyways! PRISM/AGENT - or something similarly (or not) named. Coming soon. Playtesting over G+ maybe by the end of April, or in person in Liverpool (Liverpool Game Nerds Assemble!). Comments and questions very welcome!
Monday, 27 January 2014
Monster: Spiky Slugs
In the private workspace of Hirgon the Shapeshifter sits a large stone chest which cannot be moved. It came from Somewhere Else, and is held in our universe by forces beyond anyone's understanding. The contents of the chest hunger, but are thankfully sealed by the stone tablet on top. If it were removed or broken they would be free...
Sunday, 26 January 2014
Wizard Matchbooks
You're a wizard. You're really well-established in the magical arts. You can create life from non-living material, fly and shoot lightning out of your eyes. It gets to be that you think: "Hey, I'd rather spend my headspace remembering spells to shatter the boundaries between reality than how to illuminate stuff or detect an invisible something..." So you make wands or a staff and then one day it hits you. What can you carry in your pocket, with a little one-time shot of magic, easy, handy and convenient. A book of matches. Strike one, and your spell's done.
You start making simple stuff and then realise, "Hey, I could do a lot with this..."
You start making simple stuff and then realise, "Hey, I could do a lot with this..."
Thursday, 4 July 2013
Monster: Spellbook Golems
Some tomes in magical and rare libraries are cursed. The unfortunate reader, if not properly prepared, may go blind from reading the title page. A careless peruser may go mad from touching a hellish travelogue. An unwary thief may find that they are trapped within the pages of a magically charged Who's Who.
None of these fates compare to coming face-to-face with a secret library's secret guardian. No, not a Kamikaze Librarian (thought for later: run a game where people can only choose from extraordinary classes created in that style). A golem made of magical texts...
You run your fingers along the wrong shelf. You open a locked cabinet. You don't pay your fine. Any one of these might trigger a cascade of leather bound books of all shapes and sizes, spilling on to the floor and forming into a humanoid shape - or perhaps into a vaguely houndlike body. If it has been activated it is because you are not supposed to be there, or because you have taken something it is bound to protect. A Spellbook Golem will follow you, attack you, attempt to restrain you - but usually it will not try to kill you. The Librarian who finds you afterwards will do that...
None of these fates compare to coming face-to-face with a secret library's secret guardian. No, not a Kamikaze Librarian (thought for later: run a game where people can only choose from extraordinary classes created in that style). A golem made of magical texts...
You run your fingers along the wrong shelf. You open a locked cabinet. You don't pay your fine. Any one of these might trigger a cascade of leather bound books of all shapes and sizes, spilling on to the floor and forming into a humanoid shape - or perhaps into a vaguely houndlike body. If it has been activated it is because you are not supposed to be there, or because you have taken something it is bound to protect. A Spellbook Golem will follow you, attack you, attempt to restrain you - but usually it will not try to kill you. The Librarian who finds you afterwards will do that...
Thursday, 25 April 2013
Setting Idea: Yippee-ki-yay!
On Sunday I saw Olympus Has Fallen, which was good in a pulpy, ridiculous sort of way. Good actors making the most of an overblown plot. It has been described as "Die Hard in the White House" which is a description that totally fits.
Last night I was watching an episode of Lost (don't worry, if you've never seen it I won't spoil anything) and there came a point where a character was crawling through a ventilation shaft. Something connected back with Olympus Has Fallen and the "Die Hard in the..." summary. Which in turn lead me to write "Game/Setting Idea: Die Hard in an abandoned castle/wizard's tower" over on G+.
So...
Last night I was watching an episode of Lost (don't worry, if you've never seen it I won't spoil anything) and there came a point where a character was crawling through a ventilation shaft. Something connected back with Olympus Has Fallen and the "Die Hard in the..." summary. Which in turn lead me to write "Game/Setting Idea: Die Hard in an abandoned castle/wizard's tower" over on G+.
So...
Friday, 5 April 2013
Creature: Wilizards
Someone from another universe, perhaps a universe like ours, would see a saurian-like creature such as the Wilizard and think "that's a chubby sort of little velociraptor without the sharp claws; a bit fatter like a T-Rex but definitely a smaller dinosaur." As the Wilizard is not native to these parts, and is more readily found in the lands around Wetham, the chances of you seeing one are slim.
And probably just as well.
People who study such things don't know what has happened; a few hundred years ago Wilizards were simple pack predators, hunting, sometimes scavenging. They were nowhere near the top of the food chain, but at around four feet in height, with sharp teeth and a tail to help them balance running on two legs they were at least on the middle rungs of the ladder.
No longer.
Recently Wilizards have been showing greater levels of intelligence than simple pack-hunting animals. They track prey and wait until nightfall before striking. They pretend to play dead so that others investigate. They - somehow - construct crude pit traps and lie in wait for the unwary to fall in. Not all of these tactics are well executed, but more often than not they allow the opportunity for a Wilizard to bring something down, be it a man or beast. Scholars are trying to determine from old museum artifacts whether they have always had opposable claws...
And probably just as well.
People who study such things don't know what has happened; a few hundred years ago Wilizards were simple pack predators, hunting, sometimes scavenging. They were nowhere near the top of the food chain, but at around four feet in height, with sharp teeth and a tail to help them balance running on two legs they were at least on the middle rungs of the ladder.
No longer.
Recently Wilizards have been showing greater levels of intelligence than simple pack-hunting animals. They track prey and wait until nightfall before striking. They pretend to play dead so that others investigate. They - somehow - construct crude pit traps and lie in wait for the unwary to fall in. Not all of these tactics are well executed, but more often than not they allow the opportunity for a Wilizard to bring something down, be it a man or beast. Scholars are trying to determine from old museum artifacts whether they have always had opposable claws...
Thursday, 4 April 2013
Large Chess
The people of Wetham appreciate board games - if they are played on very large boards. While Flaming Chess has been popular for hundreds of years, a variant known as Large Chess has become popular much more recently. Pieces are represented by people, and they move according to the regular chess rules but for one difference: moving on to an opponent's square does not indicate capture, merely combat - a fight to the death or surrender for the two pieces involved.
There are unarmed Large Chess leagues where teams compete regularly: pawns are boxers, rooks are wrestlers, knights fight according to the styles of faraway lands and so on. However, in recent years those with the means to organise such things have taken to invoking Large Chess to settle civil disputes and outstanding debts. Writs are served specifying dates and times for people to pay up or settle by the rules of the game, with both sides bound to abide by the result.
Most choose to pay.
There are unarmed Large Chess leagues where teams compete regularly: pawns are boxers, rooks are wrestlers, knights fight according to the styles of faraway lands and so on. However, in recent years those with the means to organise such things have taken to invoking Large Chess to settle civil disputes and outstanding debts. Writs are served specifying dates and times for people to pay up or settle by the rules of the game, with both sides bound to abide by the result.
Most choose to pay.
Monday, 1 April 2013
Creature: Grimhook Jays
They are not natural, that much is clear. Someone made these - possibly for "a laugh" - "oh, what would happen if..." - and then when they got pecked to death by them they got their answer. Maybe they were made in a wizard's lab, maybe a demon pushed malevolence into a predatory bird - who cares? They're here and they are mean.
Three-feet tall, mostly bird-like, skin-wings that unfold and unfurl and allow gliding. They run on double-jointed emu legs, and have have claws at their wingtips that help them to climb and grasp. Their head has simian and avian qualities, forward-facing eyes, short plumage that covers their torso as well.
And the grimhook. Damn. An eighteen inch razor beak ending in a four-inch downward hook overbite. Nestling between a two-inch double underbite. When it bites it tears flesh, the over- and under-bites scissoring together, the beak edge cutting. It's not just a predator, it's a killer.
When a Grimhook Jay steps out from bushes or glides down from tree-tops, a mocking "HAW HAW!" call echoing, you will flinch, but you will think you can take it. It's not that big. And it's just a bird with a sharp beak really. When a half dozen follow it, you will run. That's the only thing you probably can do.
Three-feet tall, mostly bird-like, skin-wings that unfold and unfurl and allow gliding. They run on double-jointed emu legs, and have have claws at their wingtips that help them to climb and grasp. Their head has simian and avian qualities, forward-facing eyes, short plumage that covers their torso as well.
And the grimhook. Damn. An eighteen inch razor beak ending in a four-inch downward hook overbite. Nestling between a two-inch double underbite. When it bites it tears flesh, the over- and under-bites scissoring together, the beak edge cutting. It's not just a predator, it's a killer.
When a Grimhook Jay steps out from bushes or glides down from tree-tops, a mocking "HAW HAW!" call echoing, you will flinch, but you will think you can take it. It's not that big. And it's just a bird with a sharp beak really. When a half dozen follow it, you will run. That's the only thing you probably can do.
Saturday, 9 February 2013
Somewhere North: Shaggy Pigs
Shaggy Pigs are huge wild boar-like creatures that roam the northern winterlands. An adult can grow to seven feet in length, has great tusks and thick carpets of hair covering it. The most distinctive feature of the Shaggy Pig are the two sets of hind legs that it has, which allow it to run at quick speeds over icy and snowy terrain; it runs with an unusual gait and can keep a pace for many miles.
In the wild they run in packs and are omnivorous, instinctively burrowing for exotic, nourishing tubers and then chasing down wild deer – and whatever else they can find. Shaggy Pigs have been semi-domesticated by Pugs. They use them to pull their sleds, and are known to be used as battle-mounts by pairs of Pugs, who will ride with slings and short swords.
In the wild they run in packs and are omnivorous, instinctively burrowing for exotic, nourishing tubers and then chasing down wild deer – and whatever else they can find. Shaggy Pigs have been semi-domesticated by Pugs. They use them to pull their sleds, and are known to be used as battle-mounts by pairs of Pugs, who will ride with slings and short swords.
Shaggy
Pig
AC as leather armour and shield, 4HD. They attack anything that looks tasty by running in and trying to gore it to death with long tusks (d8 damage). In the wild they run in packs of 4+d6 pigs; young swine are not normally found in the wild, as they are kept in a sty by the pack. Shaggy Pigs are fiercely territorial and belligerent.
AC as leather armour and shield, 4HD. They attack anything that looks tasty by running in and trying to gore it to death with long tusks (d8 damage). In the wild they run in packs of 4+d6 pigs; young swine are not normally found in the wild, as they are kept in a sty by the pack. Shaggy Pigs are fiercely territorial and belligerent.
If
tracked to a regular feeding area, adventurers might be able to find
some of the strange tubers that they dig for. Shaggy Pigs uproot them for sustenance, however they have a strange effect on
non-pigs...
If eating a tuber found by a Shaggy Pig, roll 2d6:
| 2-3: Makes the eater appear two years younger (takes 5 minutes; permanent effect). | 8: Eaten raw, mild poison; cooked CON +1. |
| 4: As Cure Light Wounds. Mild poison if eaten more than three times (CON check or lose 2 CON for 2d8 days; if make check, 1 CON penalty for d4 days). | 9: Nose grows an inch. Improved Bushcraft by 1. |
| 5: Causes ESP effects for 8d6 hours. After a day, save vs magic every hour or collapse until effects wear off. | 10: Skin emits a foul odour for d8 weeks. Soap and perfume won't cover it. |
| 6: Resist Cold for a week. | 11: Gives excellent nightvision. |
| 7: Save vs poison. Fail and canine teeth grow d2 inches. (permanent) | 12: The next time the eater sleeps they age 10 years (permanent effect). |
Thursday, 7 February 2013
Somewhere North: A Guardian
The now-extinct northern Dwarves were not natural magic users, but they were very capable in crafting magical effects from various rare ores. This extended to giving life to various pseudo-mechanical creatures and beings, and even to giving life to assemblies of flesh. An unhealthy competition arose between various lords as to who could create the most dangerous guardian for their palace or home. One of the most feared, by legend, was the Guardian of the Palace of the Perfect Moon.
Friday, 1 February 2013
Somewhere North: The Vaeltaja
The Vaeltaja are nomads on the snowy plains. They wander on the snow and ice, and settle in their groups for the true winter. Where else is there to go? To the city of Zelman? Ha! They care not for the cities, nor for the towns. If pressed and in need they will go to a village or hamlet to trade, but even these are strange places for some of them.
They know where to fish, where to hunt, where to hide - and they know WHEN to do all of these things too. They travel in large groups, deer and ice ponies pulling great covered sleds - caravans of men, women and children - hunters and fishers, makers and leaders, warriors and mystics. Each large group is one great extended family. Groups meet and trade (resources, rumours) from time to time. Some of them are open to travellers stopping with them, especially if they would brave the snow in true winter.
Nomad Family
They know where to fish, where to hunt, where to hide - and they know WHEN to do all of these things too. They travel in large groups, deer and ice ponies pulling great covered sleds - caravans of men, women and children - hunters and fishers, makers and leaders, warriors and mystics. Each large group is one great extended family. Groups meet and trade (resources, rumours) from time to time. Some of them are open to travellers stopping with them, especially if they would brave the snow in true winter.
Nomad Family
There are 10d20
people in a group. Each group will have a patriarch and matriarch and this "first
family" has 2+d6 members.
For
every 10 people rounded up, one will be a hunter (leather armour, dagger, sword,
shield, bow) and will have some responsibility for finding meat. In two-thirds of Vaeltaja families they will have people adept at fishing, and the group will have made camp around a water source. In these cases there will be one fisherman for every 15 people in the family.
There
are 2d4 spiritual/clerical people in a group. They will worship either the spirit of the open plain or a particular family spirit.
Many
others in the family will be craftsmen, makers, food-gatherers, bards, ostlers and
armourers. They share responsibility for the community and while they do have large extended families the "family" is more of a collective than one bonded truly by blood.
Everyone
over the age of 4 will carry a weapon of some kind.
What determines the family's outlook? Roll a d12.
| 1. Family are wary of outsiders. | 7. Family speak a bizarre language. |
| 2. Family worship an ancient spirit. | 8. Family are well-armed and warriors. |
| 3. Family possess a Dwarven treasure. | 9. Family are wealthy. |
| 4. Family rob travellers. | 10. Family are keeping a monster. |
| 5. Family have a rivalry with another group. | 11. Family are poor scavengers. |
| 6. Family recently suffered an attack on them. | 12. Family are at war with a band of pugs. |
How is the favourite son of the family known? Roll a d20.
| 1. Great Axe | 6. Pathfinder | 11. Firstborn | 16. Knifeman |
| 2. Singer | 7. Mead-drinker | 12. The Runt | 17. Spirit-friend |
| 3. Pug-slayer | 8. Bastard sword | 13. Mutant | 18. Monster-slayer |
| 4. One-arm | 9. Farseer | 14. Wolf-slayer | 19. The Fast |
| 5. Fisherman | 10. Future-sight | 15. Goatherd | 20. The Mute |
Example:
There are 111 people in the Hentunen family, a group known for being well-skilled as warriors. Arto and Liisi are the head people in the group, and they have two young daughters. An organised band of twelve hunters keeps the family in wild deer and shaggy pig flesh, and a small but skilled group of fishermen bore holes in the ice over lakes to find prized fish. Half a dozen clerics worship Kalevi, the protector of travellers. Kimi the Mead-drinker is the favourite son of the clan, known for his exploits in drinking contests.
There are 111 people in the Hentunen family, a group known for being well-skilled as warriors. Arto and Liisi are the head people in the group, and they have two young daughters. An organised band of twelve hunters keeps the family in wild deer and shaggy pig flesh, and a small but skilled group of fishermen bore holes in the ice over lakes to find prized fish. Half a dozen clerics worship Kalevi, the protector of travellers. Kimi the Mead-drinker is the favourite son of the clan, known for his exploits in drinking contests.
Wednesday, 23 January 2013
A Chance of Snow
Every day in the frozen north brings a chance for snow. By leaving the relative safety of Rovaniemi and the surrounding villages behind, Külk and Joonas are taking a chance on the weather and the terrain. The wilds are not to be travelled without careful thought...
I had been fast and loose with the environment and weather up until now. I had always assumed that the PCs had some kind of provisions, and that they were wrapping up warm. I kept dropping hints that the weather was going to get worse though, and that heading north would lead to severe snowfall. Precautions must be taken etc.
However, I didn't want to railroad any blizzards or consequences. I wanted the weather to be unpredictable. So before the session on Tuesday I thrashed out a kind of probability-based "Fibonacci-like weather generator". A Fibonacci sequence is dependent on the numbers that came before. So the third number is dependent on the second and first numbers, the fourth number is dependent on the third and second and so on. I decided that a simple way to include this was to say that "today's weather is dependent on the previous two days, with some randomness."
I had been fast and loose with the environment and weather up until now. I had always assumed that the PCs had some kind of provisions, and that they were wrapping up warm. I kept dropping hints that the weather was going to get worse though, and that heading north would lead to severe snowfall. Precautions must be taken etc.
However, I didn't want to railroad any blizzards or consequences. I wanted the weather to be unpredictable. So before the session on Tuesday I thrashed out a kind of probability-based "Fibonacci-like weather generator". A Fibonacci sequence is dependent on the numbers that came before. So the third number is dependent on the second and first numbers, the fourth number is dependent on the third and second and so on. I decided that a simple way to include this was to say that "today's weather is dependent on the previous two days, with some randomness."
Thursday, 3 January 2013
Hate Bear
The Hate Bear is a monstrous white bear that grows to three metres in length. It is the only known species of bear-mutant to not have a typical head. The Hate Bear's fur thins out near the top of the chest, revealing a great muscular maw, surrounded by spiky tentacles that seek to grasp, ensnare and then swallow prey.
The tentacles of the Hate Bear move and seem to track prey without any visible eyes. They respond to sound and can elongate to the length of the Hate Bear. A deep bass growl echoes up from the pit of the stomach. Encountering humans and other sentient species, the Hate Bear tends to only attack if surprised, otherwise it will snarl, growl and posture to intimidate. If weakness is shown too quickly, the Hate Bear will attack. If a bear is encountered with a cub it will fight to the death to protect the little one.
The fur of Hate Bears is extremely flammable; the shoulder blade and chest bones of bears are quite valuable, as they can be fashioned (by a skilled armourer) into a flexible armour that is as tough as chainmail but as light as leather armour.
Hate Bear (originally designed for play in LotFP)
Found "Somewhere North"; icy, snowy conditions. Lives in caves.
AC16 (equivalent to chainmail)
5HD
Can swipe big paws twice (2 attacks) for d8 damage each but at -2 to hit. After a successful swipe and if close can try to grapple with tentacles at +2 to
hit. No damage, but restrains successfully trapped prey; will not attack but will attempt to swallow on next turn. Very difficult to escape. Swallowed victims will take d4 crushing damage and d2 acid damage (damages armour first).
TL;DR - a huge polar bear with the pre-Special-Edition-Sarlacc's maw instead of a head!
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)