Representing the OSR

Next month, Scott, Rowan and Shane are hosting Busan Con 2026, a two-day (maybe three with the Buddha's birthday being a holiday on that Monday) event. Aside from volunteering to help out with whatever needs doing, I'll be running a Star Wars d6 game for sure (This is the May), and probably a Missions & Mayhem game if I can get something together in time. The deadline to sign up to run games in the 19th. 

A guy named Dave, who I've only interacted with online, wants to run a workshop for new GMs. He asked for any experienced GMs to volunteer to be on his panel. It seems like most folks in and around Busan these days run very story-centric games, whether they're using 5E, PF2E, Daggerheart, or any of a myriad of indie games. And most people who'd sign up to share their GMing wisdom would be in that school of gaming. I signed up to be the OSR guy on the panel. 

Unlike some die hard OSR folks, I don't mind the more story-focused gaming crowd. It's not exactly my thing, as I've blogged about before. But at the same time, I see lots of people having fun with a game that prioritizes the PCs' character growth and playing out a storyline. Honestly, my Star Wars game has been fairly story-oriented, although not so much about a PC living out their "story." Missions & Mayhem is also very mission based, obviously, so each session I'm pretty much dropping the players into an ongoing story. I'm not demanding any particular sort of ending for the missions, though. That's up to the players to determine. 

For the workshop, Dave and I chatted a bit yesterday. He said he'd like each GM on the panel to give a 7-8 minute presentation on their DMing style, then he'll have us field some questions from him, then open it up to the audience. And if there's time, maybe one of the GMs can run a quick impromptu game with the folks to show off their style. 

Being an OSR representative, I'll probably be focused on the notion that sandbox play doesn't need tons of prep like many people think. Random tables and stocking procedures can save you a lot of time. And making an open world with situations, rather than story lines. I'll probably also get in a bit about backstory getting in the way of action, and how Gygax is reputed to have said something like "The first three levels of your PC ARE your backstory." 

I should look up to see what Gygax's actual quote was, or if that's even something he said and not just internet apocrypha.  

It should be fun! 

Decision Points

The current iteration of Missions & Mayhem has much simpler character generation than its parent game, d20 Modern. That was the big impetus for me to create this, actually. Could I create a version of the game that has simple mechanics for the DM (the reason I will play newer WotC games as a player, but not DM anymore), and simple player character mechanics, but keep the flexibility of character concept creation? 

I think I've done it. The iteration I'm working on this week has a revision of the proficiency system (which doubles as both feats/skills for the game), which manages to plug a few holes I had in the system, and reduces the need for so many different mechanics. But I went over that in my previous post. 

What I want to talk about today is how I've come up with suites of proficiencies for each class to streamline character creation a bit more. This also brings it a little closer to old school D&D type games. Jeremy suggested that I still allow the option for carte blanche proficiency selection, but I don't think I need to add that to the rules officially. GMs worth their salt will know that they can house rule that for their game if they like. 

The char-gen guidelines, simplified, has seven steps listed, but one of them is math and not really a decision point. They are: 

To create a Hero, follow these steps: 

1. Roll Six Ability Scores [Place scores as desired. Note modifiers for each.]

2. Select Staring Occupation [Check prerequisites, note talent, proficiencies, starting gear.] p. 6-9

3. Select Character Class [Gain +1 to Ability Score. Select proficiency suite, and a talent.] p. 10-15

4. Modify Combat Values. [Note armor class (AC), hit points (HP), base attack bonus (BAB), massive damage threshold (MAS). Subtract modifiers from saving throws.] p. 10-15

5. If additional languages for high Int or proficiencies for high Wis are gained, select them. p. 24-29

6. Roll Wealth Level and Funds on Hand. Note starting vehicle. Buy additional equipment. p. 16-23

7. Give your Hero a name, description, and a few personality traits.

This gives us seven decision points, with one of them (#5 on the list but actually 6) being situational. 

Decision Point 1: Roll your ability scores, then decide where to place them. This is the same as with d20 Modern. Even if you use a standard array instead of rolling, you need to decide where the numbers go. And it's much faster than point buy. 

Decision Point 2:  There are 19 starting occupations. I didn't modify the list from d20 Modern, just the mechanics for what they do/provide a character. Players will need to consider character concept, how the talent, proficiencies and starting gear provided reinforce or round out a concept when combined with a class, and in a few cases which of two proficiencies or a language to take (decision point 2.5?). Not overly complex, as a lot of players will rule out certain occupations out of hand. And again, the same number as in d20 Modern, so no extra burden. 

Decision Point 3: There are six character classes to choose from. Based on the ability score distribution and starting occupation, most players probably already have this decided. But it is still a choice to make. And it's the same six classes from d20 Modern. 

Decision Point 4: Here is where we finally streamline the process over the original. Each character class has three suites of proficiencies (given convenient labels). Two of the options are based on the standard advanced classes of d20 Modern (not the FX advanced classes, saving those for supplements). The third for each I just thought about what other concepts work well with each ability-score themed class. This replaces both going through a list of 41 skills and 94 feats. Well, not all of those 94 feats can be selected at 1st level, but that's how many are in the game. And experienced players know that you need to think ahead about feat trees and advanced/prestige class requirements, etc. I just counted, and there are 54 feats available to starting characters. That's a lot of comparison and deliberation. 

My version, pick one of three options, and get these four proficiencies (five if you're a Smart Hero). 

The next step is figuring out the combat values (AC, HP, saves, BAB), but that's just a bit of simple math. Take the base numbers and adjust them by the ability score modifiers.  No decisions to make. 

Decision Point 5 (Situational): If you have average or low scores in Int and Wis, there's nothing to decide. If you have high scores in either, you have some choices to make. For high Int, you get one to three extra languages. And granted, it assumes a real world setting so you have thousands of options, from the common UN languages to any world language, including sign language (take your pick), Esperanto, conlangs like Klingon or Sindarin, or even dead languages like Latin and Aramaic. This is part of the decision process for d20 Modern, only it's folded into the skills. So in a way, those 41 skill options become many many more when you factor language. And d20 Modern makes you take Read/Write and Speak as separate skills! I originally had languages as part of the stepped proficiency system (that's what my day job is all about after all), but I realized it's just a game and it's not usually fun to have to roll to see how much of the conversation in a foreign language you can understand. If you pick a language, you're fluent in it.

If you have above average Wisdom, you can pick one to three bonus proficiencies. As I mentioned in the previous post, all of the proficiencies have three levels: Basic, Skilled, Advanced. Everyone now starts with Basic level in all proficiencies. You get two from Occupation, four (or five) from Class, at Skilled level. But if occupation and class give you the same proficiency, it bumps up to Advanced. If you get these bonus proficiency slots, you can take more proficiencies at Skilled, or bump ones you have at Skilled to Advanced to start. There are 19 proficiency areas. Five for combat, fourteen for general. You'll already have up to six (or seven...go for it, Gen Alpha!) at Skilled, but if you have one or two at advanced, they're already maxed out. So it shouldn't be too much mental strain to make these decisions. 

And again, not every character will have decisions to make in this area. 

Decision Point 6: You roll for a Wealth Status level, using a 3d6 roll weighted to Middle Class. That determines what dice you roll with a multiplier for your starting Funds on Hand. Everyone gets a bit of gear from their Starting Occupation and from their Class, and the Wealth Status provides a vehicle (or two if you're Rich). And it's Shopping Time! I have made some modifications to the equipment lists, removing some obsolete or redundant items. I simplified weapons and vehicles to types rather than specific models. I'll probably truncate the lists even more before I'm done as there are still redundancies (day packs, range packs and backpacks are all different items for some reason? [They do have different capacities, but this is probably unnecessary detail.]) I've of course added some items to the list as well, things that hadn't been invented in 2001 when d20 Modern was designed, and things they just didn't include (no WD-40 style spray lubricant? That's useful stuff for an adventurer!). 

So how does this compare to d20 Modern? A bit simpler thanks to the weapon/vehicle simplification. But with hard cash/credit numbers rather than rolling against target numbers, it requires a bit more thought. The fact that you're actually spending a set amount of money, rather than just grabbing everything you like under your "wealth score" probably makes this a bit faster. 

Decision Point 7: Decide on a name, description, and a bit of personality. Standard for almost any RPG. And no, I'm not going to do the NuSR thing of making everyone roll for a random feature or three. Players can stretch their imaginations a bit, and besides the name, it's not so vital at the start of a PC's career. 

 

 

Emergent Characters vs. Bespoke Characters

When people create an RPG character these days, I'd say it's most common for folks to come up with their character concept first, then roll dice & arrange, or assign a standard array, or do point buy to try and 'build' that character. But back in the day, we mostly rolled ability scores first, then figured out what sort of character this one would be. Both have their place, and this post will discuss the merits of both methods.

Last Friday, when I logged on to Discord for our CoC "session 0" (third round), I had a bit of interesting discussion with Richard (the Keeper). Although he's decided CoC is his game that he wants to stick with for most of his gaming, he was reading up on Original D&D, and was curious about some of the methods and the rationale behind the methods in those rules. We will, schedule permitting, get together and just chat about that hopefully some day soon. 

One of the things we did talk about last Friday was relevant to the task at hand. We were generating characters. Richard prefers rolling dice to see what you get, and then crafting a character based on those rolls. I'm partial to that method myself, so we all did that. In the first adventure Richard ran, he just had us use standard array since that speeds up the process and we players were mostly new to the system. My previous Cthulhu experience was under the 3E d20 rules (which didn't really fit the bill). When that adventure was complete, one of the players, Brady, took a turn as Keeper, so we had to make new PCs. Some of the players used the standard array, but Richard and I rolled the dice. This time, Richard is back as Keeper, and everyone tried die rolling. 

Even though we rolled randomly for our abilities, the other three players all had ideas for their character that they modified slightly to the rolls they received. Mostly, though, since CoC is so heavily skill based, the background chosen was more important to their character concept than what abilities they rolled. 

My case was different. I rolled without any real preconception of what the character would be. I had briefly considered trying to remake my old d20 CoC character, a young seminarian convinced that all the eldritch horror was the work of The Devil, but had changed my mind on that before I started rolling. I looked at my scores (pretty poor ones for the most part), and decided that this would be a desk-jockey type analyst for the FBI-like government agency we would be working for on this adventure. He's the stereotypical nerd. Very poor physical stats and appearance (and luck, and power). Lots of 35s. But Education is very good (75 from the roll, bumped up to 84 by lucky die rolls for being in my early 30s), and Dexterity and Intelligence are both around 50. So a weakling, but full of useful skills. I think he'll be fun to play. 

And so, Richard and I spent part of the session discussing the merits of rolling first then crafting the character's class/role and description/personality around those rolls. I'm calling this an Emergent Character. This works best when rolling in order, of course. Any sort of adjustment, including the OD&D through RC version of trading for Prime Requisite, or the BECMI suggestion to swap the highest die roll for the desired PR, move the process closer to the Bespoke Character, where the player comes up with the concept first, then tries to fit the concept around the game rules. 

Honestly, as a veteran gamer, I understand well the allure of the Bespoke PC. Players with experience know what they like, or know what might be a fun new novel challenge for them, and like to come up with concepts first. I often do that myself. Especially in systems where there are point buy abilities, or even point buy skills, this makes sense. If you have to select all of your skills/abilities from a big old list of possibilities (like in WEG d6, GURPS or Palladium games), it speeds things up immensely to have an idea of what you want to play. Yeah, Palladium is technically a class & level system, but with so many sourcebooks and so many skills on top of the copious number of classes to choose from (some with just very minor differences...looking at you, Ninjas & Superspies), it might as well be a carte blanche skill purchase system. 

Class & Level games obviously lend themselves better to a roll-first Emergent Character creation process. And the funny thing is, this method is both better for beginner players who don't really know much about the system, and for experienced veterans who are in for a challenge. The Emergent PC needs to be created on the spot, to reflect the rolls. This makes it easy for a new player. You have them roll, then you can advise them on the best class options for that set of rolls. Granted, sometimes the rolls might be best for a difficult class to play as a newbie, but often jumping into the fire feet first can be a good initiation to the game. And as I mentioned, for the jaded veteran who's tried it all, being able to roll randomly and THEN figure out who this weirdo adventurer is can be both fun and challenging. 

Quite often, when I try to join a new game on RPOL.net, the GM wants players to submit their character concept in advance. This can be hard for me, as I don't always have a concept...or rather, I probably have many potential concepts that I'd like to play. For example, I've been hoping to join a d6 Star Wars game. But if I'm accepted, I'm not sure if I'd like to play a "wandering space cowboy" or a "Jawa scavenger" or a "Guardian of the Whills" type character. All three sound fun to me. Of course, in d6 Star Wars, you don't roll for stats so I could pick any of these that I like. So it makes sense for the GM to vett players by their concept(s) before they're added to the game. Bespoke is the way to go.

In a D&D game, though, most DMs still require potential players to pitch their character before they're allowed to roll the dice. There are a few DMs I play under who will allow a change if the die rolls don't go the way you wanted, but mostly they want you to stick with your concept, even if the rolls don't really allow for that (of course, many want players to use a standard array, or point buy, so you can get your Bespoke PC). Sometimes, the dice fail to cooperate. I pitched an idea for a human paladin Champion of Kord, a consummate athlete turned adventurer. Then the my highest die roll for ability scores was a 14. My other scores were 12, 11, 9, 9, 9. Since this is 5E, I used variant human, and got the 11 up to a 12 and one of the 9s to a 10 so there wouldn't be a penalty, and snagged a feat. So my "amazing athlete" character had a middling Strength (14), just slightly above average Constitution (12), and an average Dexterity (10, because the other 12 went to Charisma), and below average Int and Wis. Not at all the character I'd pitched. 

So I had to rework the idea into a young up-and-coming teen devoted to Kord, hoping to become that amazing athlete some day, rather than having that as the backstory to his adventuring. Honestly, I can't imagine the character giving up adventuring for sports, but that was what the rolls gave me. 

While there is that down-side to Emergent PC creation, Bespoke PCs of course tend to fall prey to either the cookie-cutter effect, or the twinked-out CharOpBoards effect. System mastery tends to suggest certain builds for certain types of characters, and if you have full control (or nearly so) of the character's mechanics, it's easy to just go for the basic builds, and every PC trying to fill a certain niche will look pretty similar to the others in the same niche. And at the extreme end, you get the players trying to find the exploits in the system, designing the "ultimate" PC for whatever purpose, or the game breaking Pun-Pun the Kobold build. 

Both Emergent and Bespoke PCs have their merits and their drawbacks. I tend to prefer the challenge of rolling the dice first and then fitting a character to the rolls. It's annoying to have to come up with all that first, just to have to rework it like my Champion of Kord. But I do also enjoy the dedicated Bespoke PC options in games from time to time. That is also a sort of challenge, trying to create a certain archetype or idea out of the elements allowed for that game.

Getting the Groove Back Over the Weekend

So my last post, I was complaining that I just wasn't feeling it with RPG stuff, and hadn't been for a bit. Part of the reason I wrote that and posted it publicly was to see if it would jump start my motivation to game/work on game stuff. And I think it did. Also, thanks to JB and Dick McGee for sympathizing with me. I think it did what I hoped it would, but not completely. A few things that happened over the weekend got me fired up again. 

My son started Korean high school this month, and hates it. I wasn't surprised. Korean high school is three years of suffering in order to get the highest possible score you can on the Korean version of the SAT test. Lots of stress, lots of late night cramming, lots of competition. So he asked if we could move up or scheduled plan for him to study in the U.S. My parents agreed, so we spent last week making arrangements. At the start of April, he and I will fly to Illinois and I'll get him set up to live with my folks for the next couple of years and finish high school there. Kinda stressful, but kind of exciting, too. 

And I was so busy with those arrangements on Friday that I completely forgot that I was supposed to get on Discord to make a new Call of Cthulhu character with the guys for Richard's new adventure. Luckily, Richard texted me, and after getting Steven ready for bed, and finishing up the translation of Flynn's high school class schedule, I joined up. 

I had no real idea what sort of PC I wanted to make, but everyone else did. I rolled for my abilities instead of using the standard array, and I'm glad I did. I rolled horribly overall, but Education was really good, so while my basic abilities are not good, I've got good skills for my super nerdy 1920s version of an FBI forensics/CIA analyst guy. And discussion with Richard about character generation and OD&D during the session gave me inspiration for my next blog post, about whether to roll and figure out the PC, or figure out the PC then try to build them. 

On Saturday, I finally got to watch Godzilla Minus One, and really liked it. Good film. It makes you actually care about the people in the film, while having some great (if not quite enough) monster smashing Tokyo mayhem. And that's tickling a few ideas that I might also be able to work into some game-able material. And possibly a blog post. 

Oh, and some of you may have heard that NASA put out a D&D (5E-ish) adventure! I downloaded it, read through it briefly, and unfortunately I don't think I'll be using it after all. 

On Sunday, I had my TS&R Jade session coming up, so I got off my ass in the morning and wrote up another location on the map, and have been working on some ideas for another one. I want to do a fairly Jacquaysed map, with lots of verticality and multiple pathways for this second location, so that may take a bit of time to do. But I'm hyped by the possibilities of that map and location. The location I did add is fairly simple, a barbarian encampment that could be attacked (type A treasure, after all!) or could become a resource since they specialize in animal training. If the party makes good relations with them, they could buy trained animals from them, or capture animals to take to them for training. 

And then the session was Flynn's final session before he heads to the U.S. We've got other things planned for the next two Sundays, so no more D&D. Going into the session, he was thinking of trying to go out with a bang, and get his PC killed in a fun and memorable way. But then in the game, he changed his mind and did his best to keep his PC and henchman alive, so that he can keep playing them whenever he comes back to visit. And after the session, we discussed some of the ways he could use the down time to improve his character (martial arts training, spell research, etc.) which we can do via emails or whatever while he's away. 

So, yeah, I've got my gaming groove back. I'm looking forward to getting some content up here on the blog, as well as working on the campaign and my TS&R GM book this week.

What to Roll and Which System to Use

A couple of recent posts by other bloggers got me thinking. Specifically, we're talking today about rolling ability scores, and the modifiers that you get from those scores depending on the system you use. 

It's probably no surprise that the first post that got me thinking about this was one by Alexis over at Tao of D&D: 

As a DM, I see AD&D's combat/survival structure relying on characters possessing at least two stats above 14.  There are no benefits for any stat less than 15 with regards to strength, constitution and dexterity, upon which the combat system depends.  And though spell-use can mitigate the need for these somewhat, a good mage or illusionist really needs a +1 dex bonus at minimum (in my experience), while a cleric whose going to wade in and fight needs at least some bonuses in strength or constitution.  A cleric who won't wade in hasn't a good enough spell arsenal, and is therefore useless; which is part of the reason why clerics who tried to style themselves as "healers" and not "holy fighters" ended up crying for more healing potential, as the original list doesn't allow this specialisation effectively.

Thus, adding that extra die to 3d6 increases the chance of rolling above 14 sufficiently to hit that window of "practical" character.  I know that many, many voices refuse to believe there is such a thing; that the game needs to adjust for the character, and not the reverse.  Of course I could run a softer, more gutted game for those players with mediocre stats, but having experienced the lessened potential and drooling dullness of such a game, I'm not sold on the concept.  If the reader wants me to go into that, I will, drop me an email, but for the present I'll assume most people here are aware that having bonuses makes players happy, and I like happy players.

Too, the 3d6 alternative produces too many "culls," my term for the selective slaughter of players whose stats are too obviously likely to get them killed.  The penalties for stats of 7 and less can be tolerated if they appear with rarity ... but when they're scattered among multiple players in a party, sooner or later the randomness of unfudged die rolls takes its toll.  I see no reason to roll up characters en masse for the purpose of creating an inferior stock.  No, I prefer the alternative.  A nice collection of characters whose stats average around 73 or better makes a party more likely to survive, thus producing a sustainable game.

Up front, yes, I'm one of those DMs that Alexis talks about who thinks that high scores aren't absolutely necessary for an effective character. I like it when my players roll well for their characters. I like for them to have competent characters. But I've also played enough average characters in my life to know that while that extra 5% chance to hit or avoid being hit, or the extra hit point or extra point of damage on each attack can matter, it's perfectly feasible to run a character without them. 

And this is slightly off topic, but I find it funny that a commenter on a previous post thought a 5% or 10% XP boost is really meaningless. Granted, we're talking a vastly different scale between a d20 roll to hit and the thousands of XP needed to gain levels, but a percentage is a percentage. 

Anyway, back to the topic of ability scores and how we roll them. Alexis prefers AD&D's ability modifiers which, at least for combat bonuses, don't start giving bonuses until a 15 or 16. But scores of 15 or higher are really rare on a flat 3d6 roll, so he needs to use 4d6-L to give players a decent shot at getting not just one, but two scores with bonuses, and radically reduce the number of scores that get a penalty. 

I have no problem with this. I use 4d6-L in my game these days, after experimenting with a few other options over the past few years. 

But before I go on, I need to introduce the other blogger that spurred this post, Anders H. of the Mythlands blog, who was writing about not just discrete mechanics for different tasks, but discrete bonuses for different ability scores being a feature not a bug of AD&D design: 

AD&D in general however, revels in lack of homogeneity. There's a ton of derived stats from ability scores and they are all different, with different progressions and determining the math behind the curve of progression is not at all transparent. 

I suspect there is none and that Gygax et al used a more powerful tool than mathematical progression - Deciding on modifiers based on gaming impact. And this one of the great virtues of game design that are lost with streamlined mechanics. 

Modern games, I posit, suffer from a tyranny of number harmonies and easy calculation. Everything must be transparent, easy to calculate and preferably limited to a few basic methods the recur throughout the whole gaming engine.

But does the game actually play better when STR gives the same bonus to hit as it does to damage? Or CON an equivalent bonus to hit points? Does it yield the desired results at the actual game table or simply look pleasing in the rulebook and easy to memorise?  Harmonies do not necessarily equal better game play.

I've gone on record before saying that I'm not a fan of the way AD&D does ability score bonuses. They are inconsistent across the different scores, there is way too big of a doughnut of scores with no adjustment up or down, and then there are things like Fighters getting percentile strength bonus on an 18, or only Fighters getting more than +2 hit points for a high Constitution, or the needlessly fiddly % to Know spells Int modifier for Magic-Users or Chance of Spell Failure for Clerics. 

Exactly the things Anders is praising are the things that annoy me about AD&D ability scores. I do agree with him on most of his other points, though. Clerics and Magic-Users don't need identical spellcasting power. Different rates of advancement for different classes is a good thing. Categorical saving throws are cooler and more interesting than just rolling against your ability scores. And any complex calculation that can be boiled down to a simple hard number on a not overly complex character sheet is a good thing. 

And again, let's get back to ability score adjustments and how to roll those abilities. 

Anders makes the case that the diversity of adjustments in AD&D are due to the different roles that those abilities play in the game. Alexis makes the case that a playable character should have at least two scores with a positive adjustment. 

This made me curious to compare the probabilities of rolling 4d6-L for AD&D adjustment bonuses vs. 3d6 flat for BX/BECMI adjustments. The website AnyDice.com gave me the percentage chances to roll X or higher with each rolling method (yeah, I can do the math myself, but this was faster). And this website has an ability score calculator that can show you the probabilities of getting certain scores or higher on sets of six ability scores, which is handy. 

So to recap: 

In order to get a +1 bonus to any score in Classic D&D, you need a 13 or more in that ability. That's a bonus to hit in either ranged or missile combat, a bonus to damage in melee combat, a bonus to AC, or bonus hit points per level.

In order to get a +1 bonus to any combat relevant score in Advanced D&D, you need a 15 or 16 depending on the score and the variable being adjusted. 

To get a -1 (improvement) to AC, or to get +1 hit point per level, you need a 15 to Dex or Con, respectively.

To get a +1 to damage in melee combat or to hit in ranged combat, you need a 16 in Str or Dex, respectively. 

To get a +1 to hit in melee combat, you need a Str 17. 

According to the die rollers, if you roll flat 3d6, to get a score of X or higher on any particular score, your chances are: 

13+ 25.93% [+1 to any variable in Classic, no adjustment to any variable in Advanced]

15+ 9.26% [+1 to any variable in Classic, +1 to HP or -1 AC in Advanced]

16+ 4.63% [+2 to any variable in Classic, +1 melee damage, +2 HP, +1 ranged attack, -2 AC in Advanced]

17+ 1.85% [+2 to any variable in Classic, +1 melee attack, +1 melee damage, +2(3) HP, +2 ranged attack, -3 AC in Advanced]

18 0.46% [+3 to any variable in Classic, +1 melee attack, +2 melee damage, +2(4) HP, +3 ranged attack, -4 AC in Advanced]

So about one in four rolls will get you a bonus rolling 3d6, on average you can expect one or two scores to be above average. 

If we roll 4d6 and drop the lowest, to get a score of X or higher on any particular score, your chances are: 

13+ 48.77% [+1 to any variable in Classic, no adjustment to any variable in Advanced]

15+ 23.15% [+1 to any variable in Classic, +1 to HP or -1 AC in Advanced]

16+ 13.04% [+2 to any variable in Classic, +1 melee damage, +2 HP, +1 ranged attack, -2 AC in Advanced]

17+ 5.79%  [+2 to any variable in Classic, +1 melee attack, +1 melee damage, +2(3) HP, +2 ranged attack, -3 AC in Advanced]

18 1.62% [+3 to any variable in Classic, +1 melee attack, +2 melee damage, +2(4) HP, +3 ranged attack, -4 AC in Advanced]

The 13+ on 3d6 and 15+ on 4d6-L are highlighted because they have more or less equivalent values. You've got about a one in four chance of getting at least that number on any ability score roll in either system. And while AD&D does grant a few bonuses better than 3 IF you're a Fighter and put that 18 in Con instead of Str or any character with 18 Dex, or you're a Fighter type and put that 18 in Str and roll well on the percentile dice, the Classic system is really more generous. 

If it's imperative to have multiple ability scores with bonuses for characters, you're better off going with the Classic D&D style ability score adjustments, even if that takes away from the bespoke nature of what each score represents, or specialized bonuses for certain classes and not others as in AD&D. 

One more thing. Looking at rolling an entire set of ability scores, according to the Ability Score calculator website linked above, rolling 4d6-L six times gives you a 9.34% chance to roll an 18, so about one in 11 characters should have one. If you need at least two scores of 15 or more, you have a 42.16% chance. To get at least one score of 15+ you have a 79.4% chance. So most AD&D characters rolled this way will be minimally viable, with only one in five not meeting Alexis's minimum threshold, but only 2 in 5 meeting his preferred threshold of two scores qualifying for a bonus. 

And remember, that's looking at the score of 15, which in AD&D only affects hit points and AC, not chances to hit or damage inflicted. 

Rolling 3d6, but needing only a 13+ on a single score, we get an 83.48% chance to get at least one of the six rolls to give a bonus, just slightly better than the chance to get a 15+ on 4d6-L. To get two scores with a bonus, we have a 48.79% chance, that's roughly half of all characters generated. It's not a big difference, but the difference does, I think, matter. One in two suitable characters compared to two out of five. Oh, getting at least one 18 has a 2.75% chance, or one in thirty-six characters. 

Obviously, 4d6-L provides much higher chances of rolling the numbers above the threshold for a bonus, but if you're only concerned with getting at least one or two scores above the threshold, you've got roughly even odds either way, but with a slight edge to rolling 3d6 against the lower threshold of 13. 

The biggest advantage to Classic characters, though, is the regular array of bonuses. Because you need at least a 16 or 17 for certain variables in Advanced, you really NEED to roll 4d6-L (or one of those crazy bucket-o'-dice methods from Unearthed Arcana). And for me, rolling 4d6-L but with Classic bonuses to rolls, most characters are going to turn out fine. 

As an example: Last Sunday, Jeff, who plays in my online West Marches and Star Wars games and is visiting Busan for the month, joined my face-to-face game. His highest score, rolling 4d6-L six times, was a 13. He made a Fighter, and did just fine in the session... although it was one without a lot of combat. But he didn't complain, and he put his usual effort into characterization and had a good time.

Planescape and the Traveling Circus

Call me an old fuddy duddy all you like, but the majority of my D&D characters (when I get a chance to play rather than DM) are humans. I know that's not the norm these days. The big 5E West Marches game I'm in, with dozens of players and over 100 PCs (players are allowed multiple PCs in different parties) has all sorts of oddball races in it. 

Full disclosure: in that game, I have 5 PCs. A Half-Orc, an Elf, a Genasi, and two Humans. When in Rome...

I'm pretty sure that the emphasis on adding new races to the game started with 2nd Edition AD&D. Sure, there were sections talking about allowing monsters as PCs all the way back in OD&D, but no hard codified rules. I think it was 2E, with all the various settings like Planescape and Spelljammer, Ravenloft and Dark Sun, Dragonlance and Forgotten Realms, Greyhawk and Birthright, plus plenty of splat-books with demi-human subclasses and new races (yes, in that era BECMI also had the Creature Crucible series that did this as well, and the GAZ series) that heralded the desire by many players to play an oddball race, rather than stick to the Tolkien cannon. 

Oh, and the Drizzt novels. Lots of friends wanted to play a "good Drow" back in the 90s/early 00s. Many people apparently still do.

Now, there's nothing wrong, in my opinion, about a specific setting having a different selection of standard PC races. Doing that sets the tone for that campaign world. But 5E is just sort of ridiculously overblown. It's not because it has so many options, it's because it seems like many DMs just allow all of them by default, rather than crafting a world with the selection that fits. And so we get a traveling circus as the adventuring party. Dragonborn, goliaths, tabaxi, genasi, drow, warforged, and more! Plus there are usually a few humans, dwarves, elves, halflings...

Now, I am running a Star Wars game, and there are tons more alien races that could be selected...but most of the PCs in my campaign are still human! We have one sentient droid (and the player ran an Umbaran in the fancy ball session where battledroids would not be welcome), a Caamasi (player usually can't join us anymore...Hi Tallifer!), and a Fosh (My younger son is now into eagles, instead of bulldogs, so he changed his Bulldogman Jedi into a Fosh birdman Jedi. Give him a break. He's 9, and possibly on the spectrum [I may be as well]. At least now there's a proper species he can pick to represent what he wants.). One player had a Duros pilot, but now plays a human scout. Oh, and one player made a Togruta Kid, but then she hasn't been able to play. There are seven humans, counting the aforementioned scout, although two of those players haven't joined a game session in quite a while so may be out. 

Getting back to D&D, I don't want my standard D&D tavern to look like the Mos Eisley Cantina. I don't want the city to look like the streets of Coruscant. I want them to look more like Lankhmar or Shadizar. Sure, there may be a few places off the beaten path that look more like a Star Wars background, but the standard of the campaigns I prefer is to be more humanocentric, with a few demi-humans for spice.

Anyway, back to Planescape. If I remember right, Spelljammer came out first, so that's probably what really kicked off the desire to make the adventuring party a circus full of weirdos, but I think Planescape really popularized it. At least that's my conception and memory of the 90s gaming mood. 

And there is a new Planescape for 5E coming soon. WotC put out a video promoting it, but I found it kind of laughable. 

I have already mentioned elsewhere (in the comments of noism's blog) that my take-away of the video was that WotC was really hyping the idea of Sigil being a place where angels and devils live side by side...but doing humdrum jobs. The angel, the servant of the gods of Law and Good, an eternal being whose essence is Alignment made physical reality, is a baker? Really? Why? Does it need to pay rent? 

If WotC wants the new Planescape to be a wild, concept bending, mind-expanding experience like the original 2E version apparently was (I never got into it), then they're gonna have to do better than that. 

The circus is already the default for 5E adventuring parties. We've already got Eladrin, Tieflings, Hobgoblins, and Tortles as a normal part of standard vanilla Forgotten Realms/Greyhawk (5E version). Getting to play an oddball species won't have the same effect anymore. It's just the norm.

And having a setting where the Outer Planes are just some weird capitalist style workplace realm but with medieval fantasy bolted on is just...lame. 

I've always struggled with the Outer Planes. Sure, the Great Wheel is a fine concept. But ever since I was a kid, I've had ideas to make Outer Planes like Avalon from Arthurian legends, or based on lyrics from Led Zeppelin songs, Land of the Lost, or otherworldly scenes from B grade horror and sci-fi movies inspiring what I think outer planes should be like, along with all the mythology that inspired the Great Wheel. It's hard to make my desires about what the Outer Planes should be into a reality in my games, but I have tried on occasion.

To quote Baylan Skoll in Asohka, the Outer Planes should be lands "of dreams and nightmares." But not the nightmare of having to get up at 6am every day because it's "time to make the doughnuts." 

We deserve better.

Treasures, Serpents, & Ruins Ruby Players Rules now available!

I've just uploaded my regular D&D house rules to DriveThruRPG, at my Hidden Treasure Books storefront. 

Treasures, Serpents, & Ruins Jade Players Rules 

It's fully compatible with the TS&R Jade Asian-inspired rules (the Fighter and Thief class are identical in both, just with different suggested examples of each type listed). 

In it, you'll find rules for running a game somewhere between BX/BECMI style and AD&D style games, with mostly the simplicity of the box sets, but with separate race & class, and a few other complexities from AD&D (and a few more modern conventions I like such as ascending AC). 

Ruby has rules for the following races: Humans, Dwarves, Elves, Gnomes, Halflings, Half-Orcs. As with AD&D, demi-humans have class restrictions and level limits, although a bit more generous than old Gary originally suggested.

And the following classes: Bard, Cleric, Druid, Fighter, Illusionist, Magic-User, Paladin, Ranger, Thief. Advancement goes to level 15.

Plus spells up to level 6, full equipment lists, and some handy rules for players to engage in exploration and combat, and some notes for higher level play. 

As with TS&R Jade, this is Pay-What-You-Want so feel free to download it for free, or tip me a few bucks if you enjoy it and can afford it!

Gamma Folio

My friend Denis will soon be starting his Gamma World game. My sons and I, and Denis' daughter, all rolled up our characters for the game. A few more of the regulars still need to roll up theirs, but since Denis normally meets them online, I don't think they've done it yet. 

 Denis had the kids roll ability scores, then arrange them as they liked. Then he let them select mutations, but gave them defects depending on how many mutations they received. 

Anyway, so far, Renee (who played the Fairy Princess Goldie in West Marches) wanted to play a hippogriff (she's a Harry Potter fan*), so we discussed how to make that work. Horse with eagle/hawk mutations? Hawk or eagle with horse mutations? Anyway, somehow she has a hippogriff. I don't remember exactly what mutations she got.

Flynn, my older boy, rolled up another mutant raccoon. Atomic Raccoon (based on Marvel's Rocket of course) is shorter, has speed increase, mental blast, radar/sonar, and time suspension, plus bacterial susceptibility and periodic amnesia. 

Steven, my younger, rolled up a mutant cat (of course). And he named him "Iamashithole" and his mutations include regeneration, speed increase, weather control, and mental control. He has the fear impulse defect keyed to Fen (fish-men mutants). 

I rolled a Pure Strain Human. Since we were rolling and arranging to taste, and PSH are fairly weak, Denis let me roll 4d6 for each stat, not just for the three that normally get a boost. So Lothar has some pretty sweet ability scores (although PS is only 11, and MS is 12, everything else is 17+). With his bonuses to discovering artifact purposes and ability to command robots, I think he'll do alright. 

For fun, though, I later went on my Roll20 and rolled a random character, a mutant owl named Dr. Hoo. I got some decent ability score rolls, and then some mutations that pumped up a couple of them. In the end, he ended up with oversized brain (+4 Int and MS, +1 mental mutation), arterial weakness (defect), taller (3m tall! +2 PS), duality (nice!), teleportation, fear impulse (keyed to some sort of plant, Denis will decide), devolution, and heightened brain talent (+4 MS for defense only) as his oversized brain bonus mutation. Pretty strong. Denis took a look at it, and is wondering how balanced it will be. I have to admit, those random rolls probably gave me a stronger mutant than if I'd picked and chosen! Anyway, Dr. Hoo is my backup. I'll start the campaign with Lothar. 

In addition to Denis' game (2nd edition), I'm again working on ideas for a play by post 4th edition Gamma World game (I posted my barter table a while back). I've got an area map with settlements, ruins, and installations noted, and named, and found maps online or in my collection of old adventures that I can use for them. I've got the basic game set up on the site, but haven't started recruiting players yet. Real world was pretty busy the past few weeks. 

Last night, talking to Denis about Dr. Hoo, he mentioned maybe grabbing some creatures from D&D or other games to use. I told him it was a good idea. And today, I grabbed my Fiend Folio to do the same for my PbP game. There are a few FF creatures that I really like, and have converted to BX/BECMI stats for my games. There are a lot that are just too goofy for D&D. Some of those goofy ones (and some of the not so goofy ones) would make excellent mutants in GW, though. So I think I will spend some of my free time the next week or two converting Fiend Folio critters to Gamma World 4 stats. Should be fun! And will give experienced players a few surprises.

Feeling Confident

Tomorrow, I'm starting up my new TS&R Jade campaign. It's a mixed Asian-inspired fantasy realm. Not faux China like in Flying Swordsmen, not faux Japan like in Chanbara. Just a big old fantasy goulash of Asian history, legends and pop culture tropes. Just like most D&D campaigns mix up all the European (and sometimes Near/Middle-Eastern) historical and legendary tropes. 

Two of the players missed the session 0 two weeks ago. I've been working with them online to roll up their PCs. One of them, Lisa, got the rules document from our Discord channel and was looking over it while we text chatted. We had this exchange: 

Seeing Lisa's reaction, I'm feeling more confident about releasing this rule set (and the TS&R Ruby, which is standard Euro-centric D&D classes that no one really needs if you have any old rules or modern retroclones, but anyway...). 

The TS&R Jade Bestiary and Treasury book is more or less done. Some of the art is placeholder stuff. I cobbled some pictures together with my meager GIMP skills, and they look fairly crappy. Others were low res public domain images, that looked OK on the screen, but when I printed them out looked bad. 

I'd also pared down the monster descriptions in order to fit in art, but now there are plenty of gaps where things just didn't fit the way I expected, so I could go back and expand on some of them to have less white space on the pages. 

Oh, and I've got some space in the magic item description sections for some images, and need to find some good PD sources for items (or again try my GIMP skills to modify them). 

So the Player book is good. I'm happy with it, and at least one person has given me a glowing review. The monster/treasure book is nearly done. I just need to add a few "magic item" images, remove or replace the monster images that make it look amateurish and expand a few monster descriptions that were overly truncated. 

Then I need to totally rewrite the Game Master guidebook. I've got a lot of ideas for how to do it, many based off of recent posts at The Tao of D&D, and some ideas from other blogs or YouTubers (check out an old school YT channel called Bandit's Keep if you haven't yet). 

So for the dozen or so people actually waiting for this, Treasures, Serpents, & Ruins is coming. Soon. Hopefully by the end of the year!

From the Houses of the Holy

For Treasures, Serpents, & Ruins, I have five "holy" classes. Actually, there could be more, depending on the way you characterize them. This isn't counting Bards, Rangers, or Xia, who could all be played as adventuring religious figures if you so choose. But then, you could play any class that way, really. 

Today, I'm focusing on these classes. 

From TS&R Ruby: Cleric, Druid, Paladin

From TS&R Jade: Mudang, Sohei

Clerics are easy. Mine are more or less like the BX or BECMI class, except I use d8 hit dice and give them spells starting at 1st level, as in AD&D. They get blunt weapons, all armors, defensive/utility/healing magic, and can turn undead. Humans of course can be Clerics. I also allow Dwarves up to 8th level (an association from newer editions that I enjoy), and Half-Orcs can be Clerics up to 10th level. A bit higher than their AD&D level limit. What about Half-Elves, you say? Well, in my rules a "half-elf" is just a bit of roleplay you can add on to your Human or Elf character and has no mechanical effects. So "half-elf cleric" is just a Human Cleric with some angsty half-elf flavor.

Druids are a little more complicated, but not too much. I started with the template from the Companion Set, but allow them from 1st level. Also, taking a bit of inspiration from the AD&D class for them. They use a d6 for their hit die. They can only use organic or stone weapons, and wear only organic armor (although I have a few options besides leather, like silk/linothorax, or lacquered wooden lamellar), as in BECMI. They start with spells from level 1, and their spell list is similar but not identical to the Cleric list. I added a few spells from AD&D that aren't on the BECMI lists, and a couple of MU spells that are nature oriented, and replaced a few of the Cleric spells besides those "dealing with good or evil" as in BECMI. 

For special abilities, Druids get Nature Lore: identify plants/animals, detect if food/water are safe to consume, and detect if plants/animals are sick or enchanted, each with a 1-4/d6 chance of success. They can also, like the Ranger, double the amount of food foraged by a party. 

Next, they get their animal shape-change ability. I've been working to balance this for a few years now. Lately no one is playing a Druid in West Marches, but I hope this is the version of the power that works well: The Druid may take on the form of an animal for a total of 6 turns (1 hour) per day. In animal form, they keep their hit points, but all other stats are as the animal. At 1st level, they are limited to small harmless animals (sparrow, frog, mouse, beetle, etc.). Starting at 2nd level, they can transform into larger animals with hit dice equal to their level. So a riding horse, wolf, oil beetle or giant bat at 2nd level, a giant tarantula or black bear at 4th level, a triceratops at 11th level, and so on. 

I think this gets the balance right. They can transform once for an hour, or six times a day for 1 turn each. They can't cast spells while in animal form. They can get access to things like poison bites from 2nd level, which is pretty big, but they still have limited HP and most animals don't have great AC. No where near as powerful as the 5E druid's shapechange which provides extra HP on top of the druid's own, and combat effectiveness from level 1. 

Paladins are basically a Fighter/Cleric, as in AD&D, BECMI, and later editions. They get a d10 hit die, can use all weapons and armor, but have both STR and WIS as prime requisite scores. Their saving throw numbers are as a Cleric, but increasing every 3 levels along with their attack chances. 

Special abilities, are unsurprisingly Lay on Hands, spells, Sweep, Courage, Multiple Attacks, and Dispel. 

Lay on Hands, as in AD&D, grants them healing of 2hp/level each day, but only to other characters. I remember playing a Paladin in Pathfinder and only ever using LoH on myself. Not very knight-in-shinging-armor way of using the ability. At 2nd level, they can start casting Cleric spells, but they have a slower progression and cannot cast higher than 4th level spells. 

Sweep is (as the SSI Gold Box Games told us) the ability to attack 1 creature of 1HD or less per level each round, as a Fighter. 

At 4th level, Courage makes them immune to fear effects, and gives them a +2 bonus against charm effects. 

At 8th level, they get 2 attacks per round when not using Sweep. They never get a 3rd attack, though. 

Finally, at 9th level they can dispel magical effects on their own person 1/day.

Mudang, or shamans, are the TS&R Jade version of the Cleric. There are some important differences, though. They have a d8 HD like Clerics, and are limited to blunt weapons only (I may change this up a bit), but can only wear up to medium armors (chain mail, lamellar). They can use shields, too. They have spells from 1st level, and their spell list is similar but not identical to the Cleric spell list (spells from OA, Dragon Fist/Flying Swordsmen, and Chanbara add to the list). They do NOT turn undead. Instead, they get Resistance (+3 to a save 1/day/level) as in 1E OA (shukenja), but at 4th level I allow them to grant this bonus to an ally within 10' if they choose. 

Next, they get a ritual ability. They spend 1 turn (10 minutes) performing the ritual and get one of these three effects: 

* Trance: gain spirit vision (detect ethereal/astral creatures) for 1d6 hours

* Purify: sanctify an area (shrine, home, etc.) which wards out spirit creatures, undead, and demons.

* Soothe: allow up to 4 creatures affected by poison, disease, or other non-magical maladies to make a new saving throw against that effect. 

Mudang can only perform 1 ritual per day.

Finally, they get 1d6 damage when using martial arts, which again is like the 1E shukenja or 3E shaman.

Sohei are a lot like the Paladin, in that they combine the Fighter and Mudang. They get a d10 hit die, all weapons & armor, but progress in attacks and saves as the Mudang and Cleric (ever 4 levels). 

They get a combat Frenzy ability (bonus to hit, damage, AC, saves) for up to 1 turn.  They can use this 1/day at 1st level, 2/day at 5th level, and 3/day at 10th level, with the bonuses equal to the number of times it can be used per day. 

For spells, like the Paladin they start at 2nd level and can't gain higher than 4th level spells. They use the Mudang list. 

At 2nd level they can Sweep like a Fighter, and at 8th level they get 2 attacks per round when not using Sweep, as the Paladin does.

Finally!

Well, it took 10 years (over 20 if you count since the release of Dragon Fist), but I'm finally getting to be a player in a game of Flying Swordsmen! 

As luck would have it, I had a post on RPOL.net's GMs Wanted board asking if anyone would run a game of d6 Star Wars on there. I'm enjoying running the game for my group (our next session starts in about 40 minutes), but would like to experience it as a player. 

I went to bump that thread and saw someone else had posted asking for a GM to run Flying Swordsmen! I jumped in on the thread saying I'd like to play, too. And since my RPOL ID is Lord Gwydion, it took the OP all of about no time at all to realize I was the writer! Well, we found someone willing to run it (the Star Wars game, too!), so I've now rolled up my first Flying Swordsman player character:

Spitting Tiger Zhao, Outlaw Thief. 

The GM messaged me to sort out a few things, since he is new to the rules. I told him I'm happy to answer questions about my intent when I wrote the game, but it's his game so I'm happy to run with it the way he wants it to go.

Less punishing dual classing?

One thing I think is kinda cool about AD&D is human dual classing. You start out as one class, but switch to another. I like it better in concept than demihuman multiclassing. Of course, Gary was never one to allow cool stuff like that to be easy, so AD&D is full of fiddly limitations about ability scores and how you can't rely on your old class powers if you want to gain XP in the new class, etc. Frank Mentzer's Master Set introduces the idea for one of the paths to immortality (the Polymath) but gives no rules on how to make it work. 

And I'm playing Final Fantasy III (for the first time ever) on my phone NES emulator, which involves switching classes any time it's convenient, so class switching is on my mind.

A while back I made a streamlined multiclass system for TSR, where I just totaled XP from both classes into one progression chart, instead of the division needed by AD&D's system. 

But now I'm thinking of scrapping that idea and going with a modified dual class system for all races in the game. At the moment (I just came up with this idea this morning, so I still need to consider ramifications) I'm thinking it would work like this: 

Start as Class A. 

When you gain enough XP to attain 4th level in that class, you can instead choose to dual class. 

If you dual class, you retain all previous class abilities, but start out in the new class with 0 XP (keep the old XP total noted, though). You immediately gain the abilities of a 1st level PC in the new class, except  you must roll for 1st level hit points (my house rule is max at 1st level).

From now on, you progress as your new class. You can freely use abilities from the old class without XP reductions. You can only dual class once. 

Energy drain attacks reduce your highest level first, so you may lose levels in your original class if drained soon after the switch. If your levels are tied, the original class gets drained first. 

Example: 

Rodrick the Cleric adventures until he's 3rd level. When he finally earns 6000+ XP, he can choose to become a 4th level Cleric, or he could dual class. 

If he dual classes into Fighter, he has 2 1st and 1 2nd level cleric spell and can Turn Undead up to wraiths. He can also now use any weapon and gains 1d10+Con modifier hit points (yeah, I use AD&D hit die types). He uses Cleric saves for all categories but Dragon Breath, which is slightly better as a 1st level Fighter (in BX/BECMI, anyway). He gains the Dodge ability of Fighters (once per day, reduce damage from a melee or ranged weapon attack to 0). From now on, he can only progress as a Fighter.

 

I think this allows for a bit of flavor, won't be overpowering (you can't get 4th level spells then decide to be a fighter, for example, or be starting your new career as a 1st level magic-user with 58 hit points), and a lot less bookkeeping than AD&D dual classing or most rules for multiclassing. Also, at high level, the dual classer won't be so far behind others in their active class.

Fun with the Boys (Down Time 2)

Sorry Lance, still no novel innovations for "down time" in games. Just more quarantine fun. 

The boys and I grabbed my copy of 1st Edition Gamma World and rolled up some characters just for fun. I'm not gonna run it (it's a little too loosey-goosey, especially since I have the 4th edition rules which are not that complex, and 2nd Edition in PDF now which is better organized than 1st and simpler than 4th), but one of my players is considering dipping his toes in the refereeing waters soon with GW, and my 7 year old was itching to roll up a character. 

Well, my 7yo went first. He didn't roll so well for stats, and only got a couple of mutations, but I let him pick since it was just 1 physical and 1 mental, rather than rolling which made him happy. He rolled up: 

Popcat TV

Mutant Cat, MS 8 IN 11 DX 9 CH 7 CN 10 PS 13; HP 31, AC 7 (furs, shield)

Wings (fly speed 12), Mental Control over Physical State (ignore pain, heal x4, double DX, PS, speed for 5d10 rounds 1/week)

Then I rolled up  a humanoid (I rolled high for the two physical mutations, allowing me to reroll and ignore defects for #1, and just to select #2, while the mental mutation was a random roll): 

Del Hartman

Mutant Human, MS 17 IN 12 DX 9 CH 12 CN 8 PS 15; HP 20, AC 7 (furs, shield)

Heightened Strength (add 3 dice damage with physical weapons), Heightened Vision (see clearly up to 3km, infravision w/o drawback, ultravision), Mental Defense Shield (+4 mental defense, sense others with mental mutations within 30')

About the time I got done with that, my 14 year old came in and decided he wanted to roll up one too. He went with a mutant raccoon, and of course the dice loved him, although he did get a defect to balance things out:

Missile

Mutant Raccoon, MS 15 IN 14 DX 13 CH 15 CN 14 PS 10; HP 60, AC 3, Speed 9

Total Carapace (AC 4, reduce damage by 1/2, reduce speed by 1/4), Multiple Body Parts (+9 arms!), Wings (fly speed 12), Shorter (141cm tall, -1 AC bonus), Heightened Intelligence (+4 mental defense, -2 on artifact function discovery rolls), Poor Dual Brain (causes problems randomly)

The good thing about this edition is the simplicity. The character sheets are so simple. Char gen is relatively quick. The down side is that the rules organization isn't the best, and a lot of the mutation descriptions say things like "check with the referee for the effects of this" and just leave it up in the air. Of course, with later editions available to me, I can check to see how it has been done by others, but I think if I do run that GW game I'm thinking about, it will either be with the 4th Edition or a house ruled hybrid of 2nd and 4th (simplify where desired, use the more crunchy details when useful).

Dokkaebi

 Yesterday, Nathan Irving posted that he'd done a bit of simple research on dokkaebi because of my post, and made some interesting suggestions on how to modify the class. 

This morning, I randomly found one of my son's books of Korean folklore about a dokkaebi on the floor (along with a few other books). So, even though my Korean isn't great, I read it to him and he translated a couple of points I didn't understand (Korean is very easy to read, even if you don't know what you're reading). 

The story is about two brothers. The older is lazy, the younger one hard working. The older brother sends the younger to the mountain to collect sticks and bring back some food. Younger brother (no names given) finds some sesame nuts and collects them along with the sticks. But he gets lost, it gets dark, he finds a run-down old house to spend the night. But he hears a ruckus outside, and hides in a cupboard just before a group of dokkaebi enter. They smash their spiked clubs (bangmangi) on the ground and both food and treasure appear. They begin to feast. The brother is hungry, so cracks a sesame nut. The cracking sound is so loud, the dokkaebi think it's the roof cracking and about to fall in, so they run away. Brother takes the treasure and one of the bangmangi that was dropped, and heads home in the morning. 

The dokkaebi feast

Older brother hears this and decides to get off his lazy butt and copy his little brother's good luck. He doesn't collect wood, just sesame nuts, then hides in the shack. The dokkaebi come back, looking for the missing bangmangi. Older brother starts cracking sesame nuts to scare them away, but they realize it's just a human hiding, pull him out, and beat him up for stealing the club. He comes home, having learned his lesson, and the brothers use the treasure to buy a new, bigger home. And older brother becomes hard working. 

It's a fairly typical instructive folktale for children. And the dokkaebi in it are rowdy party dudes, but also perform the function of teaching the lazy older brother his lesson. 

One of the most famous Korean folk tales is that of brothers Heungbu and Nolbu (I mentioned this in my reply to Nathan). Heungbu is kind and hard working, but poor. Nolbu is fat and lazy, but rich. Nolbu is so stingy he won't even share any rice with his younger brother's family. 

Heungbu sees a swallow with a broken leg and nurses it back to health. The swallow may or may not be a spirit creature, but anyway it returns and blesses his house by laying magical eggs. When Heungbu opens the eggs, treasure spills out. 

Nolbu hears about this and decides he wants some free money, too. He dresses like a snake to scare a swallow into falling and breaking its leg. Then throwing off the disguise, he nurses the swallow just like Heungbu did. But the bird is not fooled. It does return and lays eggs. But when Nolbu opens them, dokkaebi appear and start trashing his house. Then another egg breaks and floods the house with shit. Nolbu learns his lesson when Heungbu gives up some of his treasure to help Nolbu rebuild. 

The flood of poop, and dokkaebi

Again, a folk tale meant as instructive for children. And who doesn't love the idea of the rich, greedy, lazy guy getting his stuff ruined by a flood of diarrhea? Anyway, this is where my conception of dokkaebi as dispensers of divine justice comes from. 

I just found a third book (my wife, like many Korean women, buys these sets of books from publishers, and most kids never really read all of them) with another dokkaebi story. I should read it a bit more closely (or with my son so he can fill in the gaps), but it seems like a spirit of a mountain is bothered by a bunch of rowdy dokkaebi, and chases them off. Then at the end of the book he gets taught a lesson by a witch (or group of witches? She seems to duplicate in the pictures). Here's a picture from the beginning of the story. 

I've made a quick revision of my dokkaebi class. Now they're a bit more trickster-ish, although still primarily a Fighter-type class. And they have some small ability to create items (but not treasure, obviously) when needed, a few times per day. Also some stealth (Halfling hide ability transfers nicely to them to mimic the invisibility caps of folklore). And I kept two "clerical" abilities from before. One is the ability to detect evil at will (which they had before), but only on a 1-2/d6 roll. The other is the ability to summon a spirit companion (Nate makes good use of the Channel Spirit spell to have Finn, his Dokkaebi Mudang (shaman) PC, summon Fang, his "brother" to help fight).

Demi-Humans In Race-as-Class TSR East

 I'm still not 100% sure that I want to go back to demi-human classes, at least not for my main West Marches game (I and the players are pretty happy with separate race and class there), but if I ever wrap up West Marches and start East Marches (or start running it as a side campaign), I am leaning toward that, as discussed in my previous post on classes for a pseudo-combined Flying Swordsmen/Chanbara type game. 

The problem I'm having is that I need to pare down the list of demi-humans. Sticking to core rule books, not supplements, BX/BECMI has just three. AD&D has six. AD&D OA has three, but one of them is really a dozen different types, and another has three subtypes. 3E OA has an additional two or three races added on to AD&D's OA races. 5E has the AD&D races plus two more. But AD&D, both versions of OA, and 5E all have separate race and class. So the precedent is for only a few demi-humans in a race-as-class set-up. Sure, I could have more, but then if there are more demi-human classes than human only classes, will it really be a humanocentric campaign? Probably not. 

So, my options, from 1E OA, 3E OA, Chanbara, and my TSR-East rules are: 

Dokkaebi (Korean version of Japanese oni, more or less), big scary looking guys who are sometimes mischievous goblins and sometimes punishers of the wicked. 6-7' tall. Red, blue or yellow skin. Wild hair. Tusks and horns. [TSR-East]

Gumiho (Korean fox fairies, also spelled kumiho, equivalent to Japanese kitsune), tricky creatures with lots of magical powers, who most often are after human souls in the legends, but occasionally are helpful. 4' tall. Red or white fur, but able to transform into human form. Nine tails at full power (more tails = more magic in the legends, and the name is literally "nine tailed fox" as just regular fox is "yeou"). [Chanbara, TSR-East]

Hengeyokai (Japanese for transforming spirit/fairy), animal shapeshifters in OA, but in Japanese legend could be anything from a rock to an animal to a household tool! Gumiho and Tanuki would actually fall under this race if I added them in. OA has the forms they transform into as one of a dozen animal options (mammals, birds, fish), a human form, and a hybrid form. If I add them in, then I'd probably limit the number of forms to animal and hybrid only, and have fewer options for animal type. [1E OA, 3E OA, TSR-East]

Kappa (Japanese water imps), small water creatures resembling a cross between a turtle, frog, and monkey. They like wrestling, cucumbers, and sucking the souls of drowning humans from their buttholes in the legends. 3-4' tall. Green skin. Shells on their backs. The tops of their skulls are concave, and hold magical water that gives them strength in the legends. [Chanbara]

Koropokuru (Ainu fair folk), dwarves. 1E OA has them as gruff barbarians, legends have them as similar to primitive but pastoral gnomes or brownies. 3' tall. Typically tanned skin. Generally good hearted but suspicious. [1E OA, 3E OA, TSR-East]

Naga (Hindu snake-spirits), which are the same name as a monster type, but also pretty much just like yuan-ti. From 3E OA's Rokugan/L5R material, I have no desire to add these guys, but put them on the list for completeness. 10-15' long. Humanoid torso, snake the rest of the way down. [3E OA]

Nezumi (rat-men made up for Rokugan/L5R as far as I can tell), which again I don't feel the need to include these guys, but they appear in one of the sources for this list so here they are. 4' tall. Furry. Stinky. Long tails. Kinda like wererats who can't transform or infect people and not immune to normal weapons. [3E OA]

Shenseng, or Spirit Born (or Spirit Folk in the OA books), which in my estimation should be based on Japanese tales of spirit foundlings like Momotaro, Kaguya-hime, and Kintaro, but are basically half-spirit/half-human "elves" in the OA books. OA has them as bamboo, river, and ocean subtypes. 5-6' tall. Human-like, but prettier. Get benefits from being in the environment of their subtype in OA. Get benefits to interaction/followers in TSR-East.  [1E OA, 3E OA, TSR-East]

Tanuki (Japanese raccoon-dog fairies), are again sometimes tricksters and sometimes protectors/benefactors to humans, depending on the story. Some legends give magical powers to their oversized scrotums, others say they can transform into human form. 3' tall. Raccoon-like fur, dog-like faces (hence the English name). [Chanbara]

Tengu (Japanese crow-men), usually depicted as wild mountain goblins and tricksters in legends, but occasionally legends tell of them training swordsmanship to humans they take a liking to. Kotengu (small tengu) have crow or kite heads and wings, while daitengu (great tengu) have humanoid heads, usually red skinned, with very long noses. 3-4' tall. Feathered bodies with wings and bird heads (or red-skinned and long nosed winged humanoids). [Chanbara, TSR-East]

Vanara (Indian humanoid monkeys), although in myths they are usually described as beast-like, not necessarily monkeys, the most famous mythical vanara is Hanuman, who is always described/depicted as a humanoid monkey. Probably also the inspiration for Son Wukong (Son Goku - yes, this name may be familiar to some of you), the Monkey King of Chinese legendary novel Journey to the West. 4-5' tall. Brown to grayish fur. Prehensile tails. Curious and friendly (at least according to 3E OA). [3E OA, TSR-East]

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So obviously 11 races in addition to humans is too many, especially when there are only 5 human classes (although with subclasses there are really 16). I already mentioned I'll not be considering the Rokugan races of Nezumi and Naga because they just don't thrill me. So that's down to 9 options unless people in the comments really convince me to keep one or both of these. Also, if I use hengeyokai, again as mentioned above, gumiho and tanuki are already included there so that takes it down to 7. If I don't use hengeyokai, 8 options remain. 

TSR-East already has the Dokkaebi, Gumiho, Koropokuru, Spirit Born, Tengu and Vanara with stats for separate race and class, so it wouldn't be hard to manipulate those into classes, but it's still a few too many options. 

At the playground with my son yesterday, I jotted down an idea to cut it down to Dokkaebi, Koropokuru, Shenseng (spirit born), and Vanara. That's easily doable, but while I don't want to overdo the demi-humans, I also feel like I'm leaving out some cool options. 

So, I'd like to ask you readers what you think. Which of the races listed above would you consider the top three "must haves" for an Asian fantasy inspired campaign? Or should I just stick to humans only, as in Flying Swordsmen or Chanbara minus the last page?

Treasures, Serpents, and Ruins (TSR) 2021

 Other than a few edits and tweaks here and there, I think I've got my 2021 version of TSR, or at least the players' rules, done. 

I made a few more changes since my last post on it. 

Races got switched around. Instead of the Asian mythology inspired races being variants of the Tolkien inspired races, I made them all their own thing. Only I got rid of Spirit Born, collapsing the best of their special abilities with the Changeling special abilities to have one race. Really, their fluff and most of the mechanics were identical for them. Might as well get rid of one. I also made a bit more variety among the other Asian races as far as what classes they can take, and the max level for each. 

So there are now 12 races. I listed Human, Dwarf, Elf, and Halfling as the basic options, and all the rest (Changeling, Dokkaebi, Gnome, Half-Orc, Koropokuru, Kumiho, Tengu, Vanara) as optional demi-human races. 

Classes have been set. No big changes, just a few small tweaks to make things interesting or different. 

Basic classes: Cleric, Fighter, Magic-User, Thief. 

Optional Subclasses: 

Cleric -- Darkstalker, Druid, Shaman

Fighter -- Kensei, Knight, Ranger

Magic-User -- Geomancer, Illusionist, Wild Mage

Thief -- Acrobat, Ninja, Outlaw

Advanced Classes: Assassin (F-Th), Bard (Cl-MU), Lark (F-MU), Monk (Cl-Th), Paladin (Cl-F), Warlock (MU-Th). I don't have rules for allowing subclass substitutions for the advanced classes. That might be something to put in the GM's book. 

In addition, I combined the equipment lists for both versions. The only thing I left out were the special ninja gear (basically copy-pasted from Chanbara). I may put them in the GM book, and let each GM decide which items to make available to players.

I also combined the spell descriptions, adding all the Shaman (Mudang) and Geomancer (Wu Jen/Wushi) spells that weren't already Cleric or Magic-User spells. Previously, I had Druids limited to 5th level spells, but now they get up to 6th, so I rearranged their spell list a little bit, too. 

Finally, I had rules for high level characters building castles and getting followers and whatnot at the end of my original document, but I don't think my players ever read it. So I put all that in with each class description instead, and modified versions for the advanced classes. In addition, I had a few notes about magic item creation. I've expanded them a bit, and still may edit them a bit more before I finalize this and show it to my players. 

I plan to let my players switch up their PCs to the new rules if they want, or just continue to play the rules they made them under if they find that a hassle, and when they make a new character use the new rules.

Done with the Half-Elf

 The title says it all. Do we really need half-elves as a playable race in D&D? Actually, what I mean is, do we need a mechanically distinct half-elf race in D&D? This is something I had in my house rules several years ago -- just play an elf or a human and style it as such, but then revised to make half-elves their own thing again. This was part of the fallout of switching a campaign mid-stride from 5E back to Classic. Some players had Half Elf characters, so I figured I'd better write up a version of them to suit my BECMI style house rules. 

At the same time, I added Dragonborn (mostly because at the time my son was enamored of them, he's since moved on to Half Orcs, a race I'm good with keeping around actually) and Changelings which are sort of like 5E's Tieflings but less explicitly goth, and a bit more Grimm/Andersen. 

Since I seem to be gearing up to revise the TSR rules yet again, and collapse both the "regular" and "East" rules into one set, I'm considering the benefits of each typical D&D race. 

Half-Elves don't make the cut. Players can easily style their PC as one if they like. But mechanically, I'll just make them play either a Human with elfy role play, or an Elf with humany role play. That's much more in line with the Tolkienian original idea anyway, where the half-elven could choose to have the fate of the Eldar (elves) or the Edain (humans), and once chosen, that was it. 

As for the other races, I'll probably keep Changelings, especially since they fit well with the Spirit Born in TSR-East. I'll collapse them into one race. Dwarves, Gnomes, and Koropokkuru will also likely just be one race as well. Or more realistically, Gnomes will just be gone. There have been some gnomes in the game, and early on some illusionists, but not much interest in either recently.

Nate is having fun running a Dokkaebi (Korean version of the Japanese oni) Shaman in my West Marches game, but I'll likely drop that race, too. I put it in for the Korean influence to balance a bit of the Japanese and Chinese influence of the game, but I'm not happy with the mechanics I gave them. Or maybe I'll just make them a pallet swap of the Half-Orc? Right now they're a bit more magical. 

So the line-up will probably be something like this (TSR-East races in parentheses): 

Human

Changeling (Spirit Born)

Dwarf (Koropokkuru)

Elf (Kumiho) 

Halfling 

Half-Orc (Dokkaebi)

(Tengu)

(Vanara)

Or who knows, maybe I'll follow through on my threat to go back to race-as-class, and like in BX and BECMI, demi-humans will basically be Fighters or else a unique multiclass combination. Probably not, but it's still a possibility. 

More likely, I'll keep race and class separate, but make "multiclass" classes like the BX/BECMI Elf instead of allowing AD&D style multiclassing. Multiclassing can be a headache anyway.

I think I've got it

The past couple of nights, I've tried to do some tinkering with my Treasures, Serpents and Ruins house rules after the boys were in bed, but I've just been too exhausted to do much. Well, luckily, this afternoon they were playing some computer games then sword-fighting/sumo wrestling in the bedroom. I had some time, so I got on the computer and thought about the various half-formed ideas of the past couple unproductive evenings. And I got something sorted out (I think). 

This is still in the works, and subject to change, but if any of my current players (like Dean or Justin) are reading this, I'd love to hear your thoughts. 

I modified the idea I discussed several months ago and a couple weeks ago, and came up with lists of alternate classes for the Big Four character classes. I'd had some of these ideas already as ideas for backgrounds or alternate classes, but I rearranged them, added some more, added in classes/races from TSR-East (to have an all-in-one game document), and then did some more rearranging. In the end, it's very similar to the ideas in the first link above (from August).

Many of the alternates have both a human and a demi-human version. The big perk I give to humans in my game is "advantage" on hit die rolls, so they're more likely to get higher hit points. If the character chooses the human alternate, they get to keep that. If they don't, they get whatever demi-human perks. Or at least that's my thinking for now. I did consider earlier this evening to only allow the Survival ability (HD advantage) for the four standard options. Like I said, still mulling things over. 

As they stand right now, it works like this. Roll for ability scores. Choose one of the four classes: Cleric, Fighter, Magic-User, Thief. If you meet the prerequisites and want a specific alternate class ability set, you can choose it. Or, if you like, you let fate play a hand and roll for a possible alternate class ability set. The Cleric, MU and Thief each have six alternates (well, technically a few more with human/demi-human options), so roll a 1d12. On a 1-6, you get the standard class abilities. On a 7-12, you get one of the alternate classes. The Fighter has ten alternates, so roll 1d20, with 1-10 being the standard Fighter and 11-20 each a variant option. If a character rolls, they have to take what they get, but they can have the alternate class even if they don't meet the prerequisites.   

I haven't written up all of the alternates yet, but I have ideas for most of them in my head. Here are the lists: 

Alternate Clerics: If the requirements are met, a player may select one of the alternate cleric types. Players may roll randomly to determine the type of cleric, which allows them to ignore the requirements. Roll 1d12:

1-6: Standard Cleric

7: Druid or Half-Elf Cleric

8: Exorcist/Onmyoji or Spirit Born Onmyoji

9: Paladin or Dwarf Cleric-Fighter

10: Shaman or Dokkaebi Shaman

11: Sohei or Tengu Sohei

12: Vampire Hunter or Half-Orc Cleric-Thief

 

Alternate Fighters: If the requirements are met, a player may select one of the alternate fighter types. Players may roll randomly to determine the type of fighter, which allows them to ignore the requirements. Roll 1d20:

1-10: Standard Fighter

11: Archer or Elf Fighter

12: Barbarian or Half-Orc/Koropokkuru Fighter

13: Dwarf Fighter or Gnome Fighter

14: Halfling Fighter-Thief

15: Knight/Hwarang or Dokkaebi Fighter

16: Martial Artist or Vanara Fighter

17: Ranger or Halfling Fighter

18: Samurai/Ronin or Tengu

19: Swashbuckler or Spirit Born Fighter

20: Weapon Master/Kensei

 

 

Alternate Magic-Users: If the requirements are met, a player may select one of the alternate magic-user types. Players may roll randomly to determine the type of magic-user, which allows them to ignore the requirements. Roll 1d12:

1-6: Standard Magic-User

7: Bard or Elf/Half-Elf Fighter-Mage

8: Enchanter or Faerie Mage

9: Geomancer/Wushi or Spirit Born Wushi

10: Illusionist or Gnome Illusionist

11: Witch/Warlock

12: Xia or Vanara Xia

 

Alternate Thieves: If the requirements are met, a player may select one of the alternate thief types. Players may roll randomly to determine the type of thief, which allows them to ignore the requirements. Roll 1d12:

1-6: Standard Thief

7: Acrobat or Elf/Half-Elf Thief

8: Assassin or Half-Orc Assassin

9: Guildsman/Yakuza or Koropokkuru Thief

10: Halfling Thief or Gnome Thief

11: Ninja or Vanara Shinobi

12: Treasure Hunter or Dwarf Thief