Opinion: Feast of Legends (Fast Food goes Dice)

I saw this, saw everyone lose their shit and thought I'd throw in my 2 cents: prolific fast food chain Wendy's published a complete RPG with campaign, clocking out at 97 pages and is giving it away for free. This just up front, I'm having a blast right now. Genius. Beautiful. And rotten to the core ... I have opinions on that. Let's have at it.

Not a review ...

I've heard people state that this is a complete rule book and functioning. That is, to say the least, bullshit. No DM advice, no play examples and you only need to read the first page of the adventure/campaign to see that this is hollow and bad (also full of advertisement). That said, you could drop this into almost any D&D derivative of your choice (3e/Pathfinder/Basic Fantasy seem great fits) and it should work (no guaranties, though ... nobody says that this had seen testing for balance or what have you).

Might need some work, but could be fun. Maybe. Once. And you have to have experience DMing.

[source]

So it looks nice and crisp. Proper layout, nice illustrations, inspiring maps. It is great at mimicking to be a complete game and yet, it is decidedly not. So, no, I'm not investing time in writing a proper review. This is an artifact and in its understanding on what makes a rpg tick just as deep as you'd expect from someone selling pressed sugar mixed with sad excuses for meat as food. Compared to proper RPG this is what a hamburger is to Beef Wellington.

As I said, it is an artifact, at best. Something that is nice to have. I'd buy this as a book, just to have it in my collection. A RPG it is not, though.

Here's why it's funny

This coincides with another article I've read today, something about why successful subcultures are doomed. It describes how innovation draws consumers and sociopaths until a subculture goes full bloom in mainstream and goes away to die afterwards. I don't necessarily agree with the piece (which should be discussed in another post, I guess), but it gets the basics right and this here is a great example what the process could manifest like. 

I admit, 'funny' is a bit of a stretch. However, it has to be obvious at this point that this is nothing else but a marketing ploy to get some (well deserved, imo) buzz. It's well played and it works. The reactions are as you would expect: people hate it, people embrace it and the more money oriented folks already offer twitch sessions. This draws flies like an old burger in an alley (pardon the bun).

Way more funny, though, is that they treat our hobby like publishers already do for years now. Nice to look at, some variation to well known ideas and a new-game-hype every other week. Just a buck, just a little kickstarter, just something to put into the shelf and forget. We brought this unto us, and we deserve it ... It is how those things tend to play out, and yet, there is an irony to it all.

Here's why it's not funny ...

It's not all fun and giggles, though. We not only have to see this for what it is (a fun promo for unhealthy food), we also have to understand that this is IN NO WAY, SHAPE OR FORM different to what D&D under Wizards of the Coast/Hasbro is: a vehicle to sell product. Sure, you don't have to buy a burger in real life to gain a bonus in the game, but the principles at work are very much the same (and junk food has been a huge part of the gaming experience, so ...).

Splat books, miniatures, editions, merchandise ... the rules are designed with selling additional material in mind. Arguably more so than actually being playable (high level gameplay from D&D 3e onward, if you need an example). D&D's triumphant parade into mainstream shows more and more how they need to divert from the original concepts that spawned our little hobby towards something more .... superficial. It becomes something like a theme park of an adventure compared to the real thing. The difference between reading War and Peace and getting it retold to you by a 3-year old ...

I need to stop. Either way, this is where it's at.

It's not all bad (some will say)

If someone enters the hobby because Wendy's gave it some exposure, it's all for the better. It also does show others that variations to D&D are possible, which is just as well, considering D&D becomes more and more synonymous for RPG in general (while changing and watering down significantly for mainstream appeal ... see above). In all that, the ad is a good (and bright) marker and reminder what mindless consumption will lead to.

That's the morale, if you need one. Big Money will have its way with RPGs, if we want that or not. And while it's certainly good for most people, as it offers new and exciting forms of mindless entertainment, it leaves those behind who took the whole thing a bit more seriously. As with all dying subcultures.

If you need to know what you can do about this, I'd say: built on that to be prepared for the decline. Innovation is what creates new spaces, as they say, and when the whole fad has run its course and D&D is nothing more than a theme park, those looking for more will find plenty. And that's the nice thought I want to close this with.

Guess what I'll have today [source]

A Dungeon Faction Generator - The Immersed DM 01

What is this madness? Another post this month?! Yeah, that kind of happened. It actually wrote itself after those posts the other day about how rpgs are media and how the DM, too, should get a chance to immerse himself in a scenario before he, in turn, generates an immersive experience for his players. This is an example of that. And you can use it without the theory to stock your dungeons, too. Have at it ...

About putting the cart before the horse

The biggest beef I have with Monster Manuals is that they (usually) just create individual entities without a real sense of what their impact is in a gaming world. In other words, I don't care that much about how many attacks a dragon might have or what his breath attack looks like and way more about what a dragon steak would taste like and what a cook would demand for a delicacy like that. Or the cultural impact of having cheap slaves available, with all those weak ass demi-humans. Or how magic is a lot like toxic waste and what impact magic would have on a society in general (the usual suspects: industrialization, & war). The list goes on.

My thinking is that there is the established way of taking a random dungeon and filling it with the monsters you like or want to test or think fitting. Everything else usually comes as an after-thought. This is true to a degree where monsters become staples. There is a widely shared understanding what a goblin could be, in terms of stats, at least, and that understanding, then, (in)forms the playing experience.

I'm not against the meta-gaming part of the game. On the contrary, I think it's crucial for player skill to know the parameters that make a game tick. But if it's the only information the game runs on, it means missing out on the great opportunity to elevate the game from a tactical meta-gaming level to an engaging narrative. In other words: it's the difference between "Hey, it's just a couple of low level goblins, not even worth the xp, but let's get rid of them ..." and "Woah, their colors mean they are of the Stinky Feet clan, they are famous for their mean Blutschnaps, let's see if they know something about the strange orcs we encountered earlier ...".

Not saying it doesn't work, but ... [source]

I'm exaggerating. A bit. Or in as far as both variants are bound to happen in role playing games and a DM can emphasize either to taste. If he has the control, that is. The amount of control, now, is connected to the the information policy at the table. The DM shares information, the players decode it and give feedback with their actions which generates feedback from the DM and so on.

A prepared DM will usually bring some color to encounters. But as soon as we are winging it, like we would with sandbox games or when the players do something unexpected or we actually aren't prepared, well, as soon as we have to improvise and start to construct an encounter going by a monster entry or by a random encounter, we are bound to put the cart before the horse.

Immersion is ...

Immersion is when the brain connects the information it gets in a meaningful way, flow is when that happens over and over again. So it's a succession of events, if you will. You get input, interpret it and produce a result. There are also hierarchies that make it easy to stack information. When used in a role playing game, those hierarchies are connected to what is happening at that specific moment in the game.

Information hierarchy is important ... [source]

I think one of the biggest challenges in encounter and monster design is that it mostly happens without those specific connectors in mind. One of the biggest mistakes is when that connection is ignored, though. Now, in my opinion, good encounters don't start with a monster, but with how it manifests at the table. There isn't a DM with a brain out there who isn't aware of the great tool that is obscurity. Players engage and get immersed when informations are revealed layer by layer (again, hierarchy of information ... piecing something together isn't that different). It's how you produce tension, too.

This being about connectors between a specific scene in some established frame of sorts (campaign area, story arc, established threats, mood at the table and so on), it's worth asking which input will help a DM effectively to produce results in a manner (=hierarchy) that is directly useful in that situation.

In short: the DM needs to be immersed himself to conclude a complete impression of the potential the situation at hand has before he can communicate it to the players in a meaningful way.

Example: Dungeon Factions

The procedure I'm about to present is mainly meant for the preparation of a dungeon setting. But once that is done, it also can be used as described above. And the principles used for that generation process are the same: they are meant to immerse the DM when filling his dungeon. Here is it:

Open in new tab for more detail ...

So the idea is, you take a random empty dungeon you want to stock. With huge dungeon complexes, I'd go from level to level. Make yourself familiar with the area you populate. Now you roll 6d6 (or you change the die-range if you want to put an emphasize on certain results ...) and read the results A to F from left to right.

Example A (4, 6, 1, 5, 4, 6): Some greedy humanoids with an overwhelming attitude that want to expand, are newcomers to the area and are the main theme right now in the dungeon. So this dungeon (or dungeon level) could be hosting an army of Hobgoblins getting ready for war!

You repeat this first step until F turns up to be a 6 (happened here with the first roll). This is your main theme for the dungeon (or dungeon level). You keep generating factions like that until F turns up being a 4 or higher. Your dungeon (or dungeon level) is stocked now.

Example B (2, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1): Some strong magical beasts are in here to protect themselves, they'd rather use scare tactics, have been in this ruin for a long time and live in between spaces ... Maybe some sort of magical experiment that has gone wrong as this place fell to ruin. I'll settle for intelligent displacer rats. Rat infested catacombs with Hobgoblin military camps, so far.

Example C (1, 2, 4, 3, 4, 4): Some cautious natural beasts, also having self-preservation as the main motive and use scare tactics, are also new to the dungeon, but established a small presence in one part of the dungeon (or dungeon level). Giant spider would be the classic here. They'd control an area with their scary webs and catch only what they need (self-preservation).

Your results will tell you a story about the factions, why they are there, what motivates them, how strong they are and how many of them there are. Even if there are conflicts between factions. It'll resonate differently from dungeon to dungeon, even from DM to DM. But that's the point.

Once you have a result, you'll be able to come up with a monster/encounter that fits the description. In the examples above it has always groups of them, but individuals are possible, too. Some weak and weird human, living between spaces, could be anything from a crazy and left behind wizard hiding in the passages of the dungeon to a weird cult processing through the halls, singing and dancing. If it fits the description, it'll find a way into the dungeon.

Using this as a Random Encounter Table?

And here we go full circle. You could use all this as a Random Encounter Table of sorts. As I said above, it's all about how an encounter manifests. Assuming that a DM already has a vague sense of the place the characters are exploring, he should be able to apply the results above in a way that has an immediate value in the situation by answering the questions what the result could be and what kind of signs it would leave behind.

If we now take, for instance, Example A and use it in a totally different context. Say, this comes up while the characters are in a human controlled metropolis. A overwhelming and expanding humanoid faction could mean some sort of humanoid crime-syndicate spreading in the shadows. Encountering something like that could be anything from a robbing, because the characters are in a dark corner of the city at night or maybe some strange signs on the wall or meeting one of the victims ... as you see fit.

All a matter of perspective. [source]

Rather than being specific it lets the specific arise as a narrative from whatever is at hand, while being entirely random at the same time. It's also immersive and that will, hopefully, help a DM getting an understanding of the place, which I deem far more important than knowing how much hp one hobgoblin might have.

That being said ...

Of course you'll have some of the same results with just using your good old and true Random Encounter Table and monster entries. I also think that the ideas and concepts at work here are nothing new but more likely something every DM uses on way or another. Doesn't even matter if they are aware of it or not. It's just something we do when we DM: we take what is there and make it sing.

What I'm trying to show here, though, is that there might be other ways of producing content, be it for preparing the game or when we are winging it at the table. Some of those ways are about how we actually experience books or movies or other kinds of media by generating content from something vague. The specific makes us lazy, while the vague activates us and lets us explore the possibilities.

Alright, I'll leave it at that. I hope you guys find the Dungeon Faction Generator useful and take something away from my ramblings here. We are just scratching the surface of the possibilities our hobby offers and how much there still is to explore regarding module design or rules, to name but two examples. It's part of the fun, right :)

Please feel free to add your thoughts, impressions or comments about this ...

If this somehow resonated with you and you want to see my take on it in something bigger than the Dungeon Factions Generator, you should take a look at the module I published the other day: Monkey Business (and thanks for the support if you've already done so!).

Bonus Picture!

[horse]

Play-testing Lost Songs - Goblin Carnage

There's so much regarding Lost Songs of the Nibelungs I need to write about, it's uncanny. And the heat here doesn't help. It's devastating, to be honest. Anyway, I'll try. Combat is almost complete and works like a charm. But I won't go into detail in this post (much). Just some pictures and commentary on our last session. More as soon as I got the time (and temperature). For now it's just killing goblins for fun and profit (from a DM's perspective) ...

Disclaimer: this post expands on ideas I wrote about in a three part series of posts called "Filling the Void". I'll try and keep it as general as possible and even if you haven't read it you'll be able to read and understand what I wrote below. But if you are interested to go deep into this, you'll find PART 1 about character creation here, PART 2 about combat here and PART 3 about scarring characters (use of ability scores/qualities) here.

Last Weekend the group came together again. Eight people, all in all (seven players, three of them women, for those who care or wonder ...). We took our time with character creation, now using all the rules I had and we opted to go complete Donjon on the group and rewrite the Anthropomorphic Character Generator for the occasion:

After that I threw them directly into the action: on their way to the dungeon they get ambushed by some goblins. As you can see on the picture below, I rolled a couple of sixes for environment and the first attack. They even accused me of cheating (although all the rolls had been made in the open, but that's how players are ...). Anyway, I described it as the perfect ambush:

That's the first attack of the 7 goblins ambushing the heroes. 

Let me explain this a bit. The basic rule is that every rolled six (of the initially rolled dice) generates a new d6. Environment is only rolled at the beginning of an encounter and I used 3 dice (moderate complex forest). Monsters can use environment dice as advantages in a fight as soon as they roll corresponding numbers. So in this case they could trigger with 2, 4 and 6 and add it to their actions to move around, for defense or attacks, just as I needed it and the dice allowed (as a side note, environment just adds the value and doesn't count as double or triple).

As you can see, they were in for a beating. Fate decided which of the 7 level zero characters got attacked first and three had been unlucky enough to not make their rolls. The picture above shows 5 attacks by 7 goblins on 3 characters.

I won't go into detail, but let me just say that this worked very well to make those buggers and their surroundings come to live. They run for cover into the bushes, jumped from trees and rocks, used them as cover and cooperated with each other. As one of the players put it, it's unheard of to let monsters work that tactical with their environment and with each other. They should just attack and die (he had been the designated tank of the group, but failed to be fast enough to intercept those goblins most of the time, so some of that might have been frustration).

All in all it had been a fair fight. The goblins had no chance at all, but fought to the end (as morale indicated) and fought well (one character will remember this fight by the scars she took from a mean spear wound that almost got her killed).

Not a surprising sight for the initiated:
we are playing funny-elf-games (TM)

I think this went really well. The dice tell the way like an oracle. A bad roll might correspond with the environment or might help another goblin move into safety or do more damage, not just because I say so as the DM. There are almost no arbitrary decisions, it's all interpretation. If nothing else, it really supports the way I like to run a game and the players enjoyed it a great deal, too.

Speaking of the players, I had made a few updates on the character sheet and added a few options in combat. Behold:

Newest additions are circled and explained below

So one player asked me how animal companions are handled in the game (since she likes to have those) and it had caught me a bit by surprise at the time. I'm generally not a fan of having a record sheet for everything or the level of detail that goes with it. Do you need all those stats for your character's horse, dog and henchman? I don't think so. They have a few functions in the game and that's where they should count.

Long story short, I decided that they work like environment works for monsters. Before an encounter a character rolls one die for his companion. A 1 is discarded, a 6 generates one new die. The result stays that way for that encounter. If it's a 1, the animal is not responsive, every other result may be used if the dice correspond with the combat dice the character rolled or if a drop die action is spent to issue a command (which is especially useful if  a companion ended up with two dice). Corresponding dice may be used for all actions, but do not produce doubles or triples.

"Style" mostly works just like companions do. It's a combat style a character learned and also a static that is determined before an encounter. Depending on how that fight turns out, a style might be more or less effective that way. Since a style may only be used for combat actions, corresponding dice do count for doubles and triples. If you are able to use a style in combat, it will have an impact.

"Exhaustion" (indicates a character looses a combat die) and "soak" (characters may soak incoming damage instead of doing it) are no new concepts. They just needed a new home on the character sheet.

The last new addition is giving a fixed disadvantage for the different stages a characters qualities could be in. It's nothing special, but necessary to give those changes an immediate impact.

All of this got tested in this little encounter. One character had two companions, another had just one and they turned out to be useful without making a character too powerful. They also made for an interesting change in the flow of the fight and the narrative that resulted from it (first character rolled a 1 for his owl and the bird got disoriented and was no use in the fight, the other character used her falcon to hunt down some goblins who thought themselves clever enough to hide in the bushes, stuff like that). Players liked it, too.

As far as damaging and killing goes, the system responded as it should. One character had a bad save on Good Will and already lost some fate in the process. She was one of the three getting attacked first. She caught two strong hits. The first one almost got her unconscious, but she stomached it (successful save Stomach vs. 20) and pushed on with a -4. That second hit pushed her way too much into permanent damage. She had to decide to either take it or deplete her Fate even further to compensate the damage (risking ill fortune, just like Nibelungs are supposed to).

This proposed an interesting problem, since the player said this might result in a fate far worse than death. Sometimes, she mused, dying needs to be a viable option. I honestly hadn't thought of that and I think it's a minor problem. People will try hard to stay alive as soon as their characters have some levels under their belts. I have to think about this a bit more and testing will help sorting the rest out. For now it's an option a player has: take the hit and be crippled or loose Fate and risk the gods ill will.

She took option number 2, took some scars from that spear and some hate from the gods. We'll see how that turns out for her ...

Conclusions and outlooks

This is more text than I thought I'd manage to come up with (that damn heat!), but anyway, I hope you all got some ideas out of it. So far testing this game is quite satisfying. It does what it's supposed to do and problem are fixed easy enough. Combat turns out to be the main feature so far. It's detailed, but random. Decisions do matter, but there's also luck, interpretation and some bluffing. For the players knowing the potential of what might happen in a round opens up a lot of possibilities and really helps in letting a fight come to live.

We took our time with this and there's still lots of potential to improve the system, the combat sheet and the character sheet. I have an idea how I could streamline and coordinate the DM's work with the monsters a bit more (the combat mandala has a special place in my heart, but there might be a better solution). I also keep forgetting Endurance, so I need to do something about that (since I believe it important, but maybe for the wrong reasons ...).

Well, it is as I wrote in the beginning, there's still a lot to do. I hope I was able to give you all an idea how my private little fantasy heart-breaker is shaping up. I really need to post a complete combat, though. As soon as this stupid heat is going back where it came from ...

Questions and comments are very welcome, of course.

D&D Rules Cyclopedia Combat Strength Evaluation (re-post)

I'm not even sure I posted this or when, but I never made a cleaned up pdf-version of it for all of you to download, so I thought it might be a good idea to release this into the wild ... again. So if you ever wondered how to evaluate the strength of that monster you just came up with, this could help you getting some ideas. Same goes for building very big or very small character classes for the game (if you go with the "damage as HD" routine, mostly).

A quick (re-)introduction

I stumbled across this while doing something else, started cleaning it while thinking and re-reading it and thought, now that I've done this, I might as well post it again. Something that always kind of irked me when reading monster entries, was the fact that there seemed no public reasoning behind the decisions behind the damage those creatures do.

This is especially true with giant or bigger monsters, that should have an immense strength and damage output, crashing trees and buildings as they thrash along. By the way, what is that strength anyway? At some point I thought I should try my hand at finding out if I'm able to produce such a thing for my D&D game. Here it is:

Open in new page or download the pdf to get a closer look.

What else is there to say? Explanation and examples are on the document and I understand this as a rough guideline. You'll see easily enough how it all connects, I think. But as always, questions and comments are very welcome, of course. I'll also give this a new home in the (long neglected) Free Stuff section above ...

State of mind, state of projects (Goblintribe-Simulator, S!A!C!, Lost Songs, Community Projects ...)

Since I'm right now up to my elbows in various projects here on the blog, I thought it's about time to give you all (and myself ...) a short summary of the state of affairs. I'll try and keep it fresh (or at least short).

The Analogue Goblintribe-Simulator:

It's developing slow, which is a shame, since it got quite popular and I fear loosing the wave here. I will dedicate a weekend in May pushing this forward. Here a glimpse of how that sheet is filling up:

A "0" indicates a place for a die, there'll be different forms of storage and you
see the angry/happy scale somewhat improved ... lots of stuff to discover if
you knew the last incarnation of this thing. This is still happening :)  

Soldiers! Aliens! Carnage! - Combat:

The idea to use a deck of cards to build a dungeon got quite some legs. +Eric Nieudan and +John Payne took the ball and came to some great solutions in this regard (check here and here). I love it when those things happen. It's all far better than anything I could come up with.

Anyway, that's not what S!A!C! - Combat is about. Instead it's about cleaning random space stations from alien scum. And how far am I in finishing this baby? Well, I need to test it, that's how. The girlfriend and I are trying to make a test run happen, but no luck so far. We'll find the time this weekend, I'm sure. What I could do until now (it's what needs testing ...) is streamlining the combat as far as possible.

So instead of having armor and health, you have just one stat and loose action points as soon as you drop below 10 (when wounded you get slower). I came up with an idea to make firing a gun a bit more than using a die and bookkeeping ammunition (I think it's a dull exercise to keep track of those things).

What happens now is that each clip is a d6 and if you hit the target (roll d20 above card number, 11 is a true hit), you loose as much ammo as you rolled above the target number but never more than a d6 (this way you just change the die number or just take the clip from the sheet). If you miss, you roll the d6 to see what's left in your clip (keep the number you rolled and a 6 means the clip is emptied). We'll see if it holds in play-testing.

Another little problem I have is with what I call "Card Intelligence" (C.I.). How should cards move and all that. Should they move towards the player or take cover and let them come?. Again, we'll be testing all this the next few days.

Lost Songs of the Nibelungs:

We are still testing this in our Friday group and it's still developing further and further. Combat is getting somewhere but still not at a stage worth writing home about. Magic is a big gap and I need to do something about that soon, but level advancement is more important right now, as the players are already asking for it (not surprising, three sessions in).

I think the most important development so far is how ability scores are handled. Everyone starts more or less the same and the narrative (fate) decides how characters are shaped. Organic character growth, if you will, mixed with a level-based advancement system that allows some freedom in how a character develops in that regard.

Character creation takes 5 minutes and still creates unique snowflakes individuals.

In my head it keeps manifesting more and more. So much even, I'm way behind in writing this stuff down. And it's not just one thread either, but at least three sub categories that need updates. Let's see:

• Reading the Nibelungenlied: Will take time. I might even switch to writing about each chapter in a separate post. The first post was received quite well, as far as I could tell. We'll see if I can keep people interested, but I think it's a great story with some beautiful verse and really very much like a session report of sorts.
• Bare-Knuckle Fighter/Pub Brawl (the mini dice-game series): A bit neglected on the blog, but I test this stuff as often as possible. What needs to be happening is a complete re-evaluation of how the rules are presented. I got some ideas and I talked a good friend of mine into writing a guest post. As soon as this happens (or I know for a fact that it doesn't ...) I'll start with the updates and give this stuff a permanent home somewhere on the blog. I plan to make similar mini games for magic combat and armed duels. All of this should in it's final stage work as a skirmisher and I still plan to use this combat system for lost songs. It will take time, though.
• The Lost Songs Page here on the blog: Needs updating. ASAP, as they say. There are already lots of strays to collect and put there. Also need to do some work on the logo. Ah well, it will happen soon enough.
• Loose ends: Level advancement will be the next thing, but I'll start talking about layout and design of the game very soon. DM procedures will also be a topic in the near future. What I have in mind here is a method using 3d10 to generate a fully developed region for the characters to explore. I have some vague ideas how to make that happen, but all I can say is that it'll happen some time this year. Which is a shame, really, since I think it will be great fun exploring some old ideas further ...

Lost Songs is a big project and will most likely expand in many more directions I didn't think of right now. Being a weekend blogger doesn't help with all that either. I need to have some food and shelter, though :) Anyway, I'm getting there, step by step.

Community Projects

As of this writing I'm participating in two awesome community projects. Both were initiated by +Charles Akins over at Dyvers. The first will be about revenge, murder and mayhem in role playing games. I aim for two entries in this: one will be my first attempt at short fiction here on the blog and the second is a surprise (as in: no idea ...).

The second community project is about writing love letters for role playing games. I really love that idea, as it will collect a huge amount of essays about the games out there and what makes them special. It'll also get a pdf release and I imagine it a great help for introducing new people to the hobby. If we can spread it that far, which I really hope.

But look at the line-up linked to above! It's 5 names short of a Who's Who in the OSR, so it's sure to generate some noise. My entries will be the D&D Rules Cyclopedia and HackMaster 4e. Both are a big deal for me and I'll do my very best to do them justice.

So far it's been a great experience working with all those creative writers. As those things usually take lots of time to come to some sort of conclusion, I wouldn't hold my breath waiting for this to happen very soon. But it will happen eventually :)

Smell what (else) the Ranger is cooking!

Yeah, sorry, there is more. I'm going to take a close look at the blog and check it for loose ends. I need to come to a point where I actually finish the things I've started. Right now I'm thinking of one adventure and a series about clerics that need finishing/reactivating. I'll do this whenever I get the feeling I need some variation in what I'm writing about at the moment.

I also want to start doing interviews around the blogosphere to learn more about the people I read so much on a daily basis. A first shot on this will happen soon, featuring the great +Adam Muszkiewicz, finding out who he is and where he's going (if you for some reason never heard of his fantastic blog Dispatches from Kickassistan, go and check it out - you're in for a treat).

If it works, more of the same is going to happen on a monthly basis (I think).

And there is a vague idea to write about great old school products out there that people already lost out of sight (like this great D&D supplement by Cygnus, for instance). But it's just that for now, a vague idea.

That's it, folks. A lot is happening, it's just not happening fast ...

A picture of an OSR logo by Matthew Adams, because
it's fantastic and for other obvious reasons ...

Combat in LSotN and Compatibility to D&D (Design Post)

I had to ask this question at one point, so here it goes: How far can you go when designing a new combat system if you want to keep it compatible with D&D (and friends)? There are several important factors at work, not the least being to ask what will be accepted by the audience. And there's certainly a line which, when crossed, will result in something new, only related to D&D in a very abstract way. If this line is crossed, it needs to be done deliberately. What follows are my thoughts and observations regarding the problems a writer of a game might encounter.

What is compatibility?

On a very basic level, it's not so much the understanding of what has been changed in a new set of rules, but the access to comparable data that a new system offers. In other words, to see if something is compatible you don't need to know how combat works, you'll just take a look at the relevant stats and see if they correspond with what you know. So if there are still hit dice, hit points, armor class and a base attack (of sorts) and they all work within the parameters you know from some version of D&D, you could just take an adventure or monster written for the new system, use it with your own system and it would work without too much trouble. You needn't even know the new rules and that's exactly the point.

As long as a designer keeps within the information D&D is supposed to produce, he's relatively free to change how he gets there. To answer the question: compatibility is a shared set of information and values between systems, it's not how a system gets to produce that information and values.

But how is it still D&D if you change the procedures that make it D&D?

Yeah, this is a tricky one. What ideas represent D&D and make it the game it is. There's not much arguing about the specifics, as they are a matter of taste. But that, on the other hand, means that within what D&D could be, there's a lot of choice. Some might keep with the original product line, saying it's D&D because it says so on the cover. And even here you got a wide spectrum of choices, from those who claim that the first edition of the game is the only edition that fits the bill and those that say, the newest edition is truest iteration, since it's the end of a long (and still ongoing) process. 

But you could focus on the system instead of the official product line and you would be well in the territory of clones and variants. Not the game by name, but, as you would read on a regular basis on OSR related blogs (but sure not exclusively), it's D&D in every other way. There is a tolerance how far that might go, but mostly it comes down to choosing a variant of D&D over another. The core system is in all cases still recognizable.

Another extreme in this plethora of choices could be those who play Dungeon World, rules-wise a completely different system with almost no connectors to any version of D&D, and claim that that's how D&D is supposed to be played. And they are, to some degree, right in saying so, as Dungeon World manages to emulate what could be called a D&D experience.

The examples above illustrate that it comes down to three major groups: Official D&D, variants of a D&D system (but not D&D by name) and the tropes/clichés/stereotypes originating in D&D but emulated in another system.

This is D&D, for sure! [source]

All those can be D&D or can make a game feel like D&D. But they also need to compliment each other. If you reduce one aspect, you need to emphasize another to stay within this framework. Official D&D would be allowed to introduce radical changes to the system (as they already did several times), but it would still be D&D by name and well within the framework. Variants may change the name and parts of the system, but it needs to be compatible to some version of original D&D to stay within in that framework. And if you get rid of the system, you need to keep the stereotypes associated with D&D emphasized or you might end up playing Apocalypse World instead of Dungeon World.

Change the system, the name and the stereotype and you got something like Runequest (to give but one example of a game that was clearly inspired by D&D but wanted to be it's own thing).

As long as the designer of a game is aware of those possibilities and how they interact, he will be able to say if his game is still D&D or not. Even more so, he can direct his design choices to make a game part of what could be considered D&D. There is that line I talked about above and if it's crossed, it results in a new game with only some of the DNA of D&D (which would be true for almost every other rpg out there, if I may say so). Being aware of that can only help when trying to tell people what the game you're writing is all about or why it is still D&D.

So, will Lost Songs of the Nibelungs still be D&D?

Short answer? I believe it is. Somewhat. My reasoning at least is. And the result will be compatible with other D&D systems, so there is that. But arguing my case would go far back to ideas formed in the very first edition of D&D (mostly the idea that you should make the game your own*) while working with assumptions introduced in the D&D Rules Cyclopedia, sprinkling it with AD&D and some 3e concepts, getting rid of character classes and radically changing combat procedures in the process (so far). So if I tried to make my case, I'd end up using more words than the definition might justify. But it is there. Will you be able to play it just by knowing D&D? Maybe not.

But you will be able to take what you want and use it in D&D or take parts of D&D variants and use it in LSotN (to some extent, at least). So I guess it stays in the family. If I were to describe it, I'd say it's an "OSR fueled D&D Frankenclone". The rest I'll find out when the chips are finally down.

D&D, allowing house-ruling since 1974!

Anyway, it is D&D combat and it is not ...

Now back to the original question: How far can you go when designing a new combat system if you want to keep it compatible? If you agree with my assumptions about compatibility at the beginning, we'll have the room within the rules we can navigate in and that is the procedures that produce and interact with the terms we learned to use when playing D&D (xp, to hit, hd, ac, all that). You'd expect a certain range for armor class and a way to find out if you've hit the target or not and what damage you made, which relates to hit dice and hit points within a range of levels, and so on. D&D normally uses a twenty sided die (results ranging from 1 to 20) as a key element in combat (it connects to-hit with ac and level/HD to regulate hit points) and is supported by dice variants for initiative and damage.

What I'm trying to achieve now in LSotN, is replacing the d20 with a roll of 3d6, fragmenting the d20 (so to say) and ending up with a system that, while still being in the range of the d20, allows a player to get initiative, defense, attack, damage and a selection of other actions with just one roll per round. The Bare-Knuckle Fighter and the Pub Brawl Expansion** showcase that it is possible and not only works, but also supports tactical thinking, planning and bluffing. But it still ends up producing the same results you need in D&D to interact with the stats presented in D&D.

I'm not saying here this is the only way to go or the philosopher's stone or anything like that, but I hope it shows that there is some room for game design between rolling to hit something and finding out if it happened, without changing the original assumptions that work for D&D. And I hope it helps a bit in understanding my thinking behind those dice mini-games I tend to write about so much the last few days.

In the end it's for you to decide if that's still D&D or if I went too far with this.

*I elaborate on this further in a post I wrote last year, but it would too far away from what I'm writing about here. The post can be found here.

**That link leads to a complete and detailed set of rules, a somewhat less detailed version would be The Bare-Knuckle Fighter without the expansion. It can be downloaded here. The game-sheet itself will have all the necessary rules, the introduction can be seen as a strategy guide for the game.

A Complete Set of Rules for the Bare-Knuckle Fighter and the Pub Brawl Expansion, now with Examples

There is a tendency, so far, that people reading the rules of the Bare-Knuckle Fighter sheet get paralyzed by what seems to be too complex to grok. In all the cases I had a chance to talk with those people, they all stated it's just the initial impression and it fades away fast once you actually throw some dice and see what's what. After that, it's business as usual: you encounter a problem, you check the rules, the game goes on.

See? This just got a little crazier ...

Now that the feedback keeps trickling in (and is mainly positive) I'm really relieved to see that the rules, although they work, have room to improve and the game itself does what it's supposed to do. A revision of the rules and some examples can only help that process along, so here we go. While I' at it, I might as well (to keep it interesting) add some rules for pub brawls and group play!

"Man, his eyes looked in all four directions after that punch!"

So Friday night the group assembled and we got a chance to test the Fighter. I had some rules for group combat ready and had altered the original sheet to make room for the three new die drop actions. It got explained, we discussed it a bit (somebody states he just wrote a game and wants to test it and you'll most likely have some skepticism at the table about what's going down) and then we threw the dice for the first round. This went on from half past eight in the evening until half past two in the night! It was, if I may say so, great fun.

And very educational, I might add. I'll now start with a break down of the relevant rules and terms. After that I'll give a few examples how it played out. This is now a clarified, concise and detailed version of the rules (in other words, it's long, but it should explain any questions left for those interested in playing either version). Please use the sheet with the game on it as reference, if needed. And sorry in advance, this might be longest post I've written yet (4425 words and some spare!). But it's all in one place now and with this post you have the revised sheet to play the game on and all the rules you might need to do so without the need to go somewhere else!

The Bare-Knuckle Fighter (introducing The Pub Brawl)

For now a png with both games (pdfs will follow). With this and the (revised)
rules below you will be able to play both games. If you're familiar with the
Bare-Knuckle Fighter (BKF), you'll notice that this version has just a few
drop die options more and new advancement rules.

The Set-Up:

Every player had a sheet, some six sided dice and a twenty sided die. We followed the procedures on the sheet for Base Attack, Base Defense, Health and Endurance, which produced a wide array of different characters. Each character got a name.

The Initial Roll:

The first roll at the beginning of each round is with three six sided dice (3d6). A rolled 1 will discard the die it was rolled with, a rolled six will produce an additional die (only a rolled six with the initial dice will produce a new die).

As soon as all dice are on the table, everyone adds the values of the dice that turned up with a countable result (basically, everything but the 1s, which should be gone by now anyway). This is the INITIATIVE.

The individual dice (with the results they show) are the POOL a player has at his disposal to fight that round. With those he declares his ACTIONS.  

Initiative:

The lowest initiative has to declare his actions first, then the next lowest and so on. Tie results decide who's faster by rolling a twenty sided die (1d20) each (higher result is faster). For the very first round in the Pub Brawl, we decided that the lowest initiative also was the one initiating the fight. We encouraged insulting someone at the table as a feature.

The Pool:

With the initial roll at the beginning of the round a player has all he needs (or all the gets) to play the round in front of him. The dice are not changed or altered beyond what's been done at the beginning. Those are your options and the options the other players have for the round. Now you have to decide what to do with them.

The Actions (Overview):

Basically you have three main groups of dice actions. There are the MAIN ACTIONS (Defense/Attack/Damage), the DELAY ACTIONS (with which you delay a die for one of the main actions to the next round) and the DROP DIE ACTIONS (if anything else needs to be done, like moving around, drinking a beer, regaining your breath and so on, you'll do it with a drop die action).

Main Actions (Defense/Attack/Damage):

A die used for one of those three actions will either be added to Base Attack/Base Defense* (attack or defense action, respectively) or used as damage die (with the value shown on the die as the damage).

If an attack is declared, damage needs to be declared, too. There can't be more than two defense and two attack actions. The number of dice you can use for attack and defense is limited only by the number of dice available (but remember, if you assign an attack, damage needs to be assigned, too). Damage dice are a bit different in that only one damage die is allowed per attack die used (drop die actions may alter that, see below).

You may attack characters with a higher initiative and you may built up a defense without knowing if an attack is actually coming or by whom, but you can't block more than two attacks and you have to declare how many attacks you're preparing to defend.

The main actions are the only actions where DOUBLES and TRIPLES will have a special effect. Those numbers stack, so to say. If you got a double 3, each of them counts as a 6 and if you have a triple 5, each of them counts as a 15 when used in a main action. The complete double/triple needs to be used in the main actions to work. If you decide to use one of them as a die drop action, it's not a double anymore or a triple gets reduced to be a double. It's the same if you delay one of those dice (but a delayed die counts for doubles and triples in the next round, see below).

One more note on doubles and triples. Over the course of the game you will have, at one point or another, more than three dice at your disposal (with delayed dice and drop die actions, see below), so a quadruple is technically possible. To keep the game balanced, though, there are only doubles and triples allowed and a quadruple would actually mean two doubles. In the rare case that you wind up having five dice showing the same number, you'd have a triple and a double (if you use all of them in the main actions). In both cases you'll most likely have a huge impact with such a result. Those are brutal punches!

Delay Actions:

You may delay up to two dice per round for the next round (not longer, you may delay new dice in the next round, but the already delayed dice get back into the game the next round). As indicated on the sheet, you also decide the main action the die is delayed in. The die will keep it's value and is accountable for doubles and triples in the next round, but NOT for initiative. You may delay an attack die without delaying a damage die, too. But you'll still have to assign a damage die to that attack in the next round (even if it fails). Same goes the other way around, you may delay a damage die without delaying an attack die, too. But then you'll have to assign an attack the next round, since you can't do damage without hitting something.

Drop Die Actions:

Those are the actions you might consider to get a benefit in a fight other than punching someone. They are called "drop die actions" because for getting that benefit you'll have to use a die you then can't use for the main actions.Nonetheless, they are an important tool to give a character just the right edge or to bluff the enemy into using his dice another way. The value of the die dropped counts only for some of the drop die actions, for other it's just the act of using the die to get the effect.

What follows is a detailed description of all the drop die actions available in the Bare-Knuckle Fighter (BKF) and the Pub Brawl (PB):

• Counter (BKF/PB) - Can be used against every die drop action, as long as it is already declared that round or still active from previous rounds. You may even counter another counter action, as long as it's already declared. Counters are always resolved first (see below for resolving rounds), in an order from the fastest initiative to the lowest.
• Advantage (BKF/PB) - Gives a character an edge in the fight. Every successful advantage action (that is, not countered in the same round) gives a character a +1 to the Base Attack. The character keeps this advantage until it is countered in a later round. Making another advantage drop die action will give the character another +1 (resulting then in a +2 to Base Attack) and so on, but one counter will get rid of the complete advantage, indifferent how high it is.
• Maneuver (BKF/PB) - Gives a character a better position in the fight. Every successful maneuver action (that is, not countered in the same round) gives a character a +1 to the Base Defense. The character keeps this maneuver until it is countered in a later round. Making another maneuver drop die action will give the character another +1 (resulting then in a +2 to Base Defense) and so on, but one counter will get rid of the complete advantage, indifferent how high it is.
• Regain (BKF/PB) - Regain a number of Endurance points (see below for further instructions on Endurance) equal to the value of the die used, unless it is countered in the same round. This action must be countered in the same round. A character can only regain Endurance as long as he has Health left. If he's already in the Buffer Zone, he may use the regain action to first fill up the zone until at least one point Health is regained. Only then he may regain Endurance again (see below for further information on Endurance, Health and the Buffer Zone).

• Coop (PB) - You can give a die to another character to support him. The die keeps his value and is accountable for doubles and triples the supported might have/get then. If coop is declared before the supported character had his turn, he may use the coop die for all actions except delay actions. If the supported character already had his turn, he may only use it for already declared main actions and for drop die actions, he may not use it to declare a new main action after the fact. It is possible to counter a coop, but it needs to be countered in the same round.
• Move (PB) - A move action is used to get into a fight and change between fighting groups. It may be used as a "charge", allowing one more damage die for an attack (so with one attack die, a character would be allowed to use two damage dice for that attack, instead of just one). It is possible to counter a move, but it needs to be countered in the same round.
• Bind (PB) - A character my bind another character with a lower initiative. It means that the bound character (who, having a lower initiative, has already declared his actions) first has to attack and defend against the binding character instead of against his declared targets. This may of course be countered by yet another character, which would, in turn, render the bind ineffective. But it must be countered in the same round.
• Pick Up (PB) - A character may choose to pick up an item and use it in the fight (a bottle, a glass or a chair). The damage dealt when using such an item goes directly to Health (see Resolving Actions 3) and one point of damage per damage die to endurance (see Resolving Actions 3). The value of the die used for the drop determines the size of the item (1-3: small, glass or bottle; 4-6: big, a chair). Using a big item allows for one more damage die in the attack (so with one attack die, a character would be allowed to use two damage dice for that attack, instead of just one). The item is active until it is used once in a successful attack or until countered. It may be countered as long as it is active and damage needs to be dealt with it to count as used. the value of the die is just important to determine the size of the item, not to determine damage.
• Drink! (PB) - A character may choose to drink an alcoholic beverage to get back some Health (see below for further information on Health). He may regain a maximum of 10 Health this way (please keep track of the Health gained this way in the square for the drop die action on the sheet). The value of the die is not important. If the drink option is not countered in the same round, it is resolved by rolling 1d6 and adding the result to health. If the result is over either the 10 point maximum or the maximum Health a character has, he will be dizzy for the number of rounds he is over the limit (say a character already gained back 7 Health this way, but decides to take the risk and go for another drink, if he comes up with 5 now, he'll be dizzy for two rounds). For the time he is being dizzy, he will loose 1 die in the initial roll (2d6 instead of 3d6). A character can never gain more Health than his initial maximum indicates.

Resolving Actions:

When the character with the fasted initiative has declared his actions, he also starts resolving them directly after (then the next fastest and so on).

1. The first thing to do now, is resolving the drop die actions in the order of initiative. Start with what is countered and remove it, then resolve the remaining die drop actions as explained above. Resolve every step in order of initiative, start with the fastest counter action, stop with the slowest counter action, go on with the fastest drop die action down to the lowest. The fastest initiative is not to do it all at once.
2. The main actions are resolved next. An attack is successful whenever an attack die plus Base Attack* (plus advantage, if active) is higher than the defense of a target (Base Defense* plus defense dice, if used, plus maneuver, if active). Although resolved in order of initiative (fastest to lowest), it all happens at the same time, so even if a successful attack might bring a character down (see below), he'll still be ale to bring his attack home before the lights go out. A double-K.O. is possible. All successful attacks deal DAMAGE now.
3. The value of a damage die reduces Endurance until it's gone, the number of damage dice used reduces Health as long as he has Endurance (using an item changes that, see the pick up drop die action for further information). The moment the damage value of a die reduces Endurance beyond zero, the remaining damage is dealt directly to Health (only under those condition the number of dice used becomes unimportant). Whenever Health drops into the buffer zone (a zone of 10 points below zero), a character has to check if he gets KNOCKED OUT.
4. To find out if a character is knocked out, he needs to roll (1d20 + what's remaining of his buffer zone) versus a difficulty of 15. As long as the result of this roll is above 15, he stays in the fight.
5. As long as a character still has points in his buffer zone, he will be out of the fight for only two rounds. Not being completely unconscious, he may roll 1d6 per round. If he comes up with a 6 he gets one die to roll for initiative, using the result of that generated die in the round (if that second roll comes up with a 1, bad luck, but if it also comes up with a 6, you just earned another die for that round!). After two rounds he is back on his feet, but he needs to spend a move drop die action (see above) to get back into the fight.
6. If the character gets enough damage to reduce even his buffer down to zero, he is out for 3 rounds if he doesn't make his save (in this case roll 1d20 higher 15). If down, he won't be able to do anything in those three rounds but getting his shit back together. After three rounds he is back on his feet, but he needs to spend a move drop die action (see above) to get back into the fight.
7. The next round starts when all actions are resolved.

Endurance, Health and the Buffer Zone:

They mirror the condition of a fighter. When using fists (or heads or feet), the value of a damage die will go to Endurance first and only the number of the damage dice used reduces Health. The moment the value of a damage die would reduce Endurance under zero, the remaining damage goes directly to health and the number of dice isn't factored in anymore.

There is a Buffer Zone of 10 points that is depleted as soon as damage reduces Health below zero. This is where the hurt is. Every time a character gets damage in the zone or beyond, he has to roll (1d20 + what's remaining of his buffer zone) versus a difficulty of 15. As long as the result of this roll is above 15, he stays in the fight. If not, he goes down (see Resolving Actions 5 and 6 above for specifics).

A character has some options to regain Health (only PB) or Endurance (BKF/PB). See drop die actions Regain and Drink! above for further information.

*Cross-Reference with sheet for information on Base Attack and Base Defense (it's basically 3d6/drop lowest/add remaining for each).

Optional Rules (BKF)

Boxing Variant - When gloves are used in a fight, only the value of a damage die counts as damage, but the number of the dice used to do damage won't reduce Health. As long as a Boxer has Health left, he may regain 1d3 (roll 1d6: 1-2 are a 1, 3-4 are a 2 and 5-6 are a 3) endurance back between rounds. There is no limit to the number of rounds. The fight is over when one of the combatants drops.

Same-Level-of-Experience Variant - There is a random element when creating a fighter. For Health and Endurance you start with rolling  1d3 (roll 1d6: 1-2 are a 1, 3-4 are a 2 and 5-6 are a 3) to find out how many d6 a character has to roll for his Endurance and his Health (in other words, how experienced and tough the fighter is). You may decide before character generation how many dice are used instead of using the random method and then use those dice to generate Endurance and Health. You might even ignore the dice completely and just decide how much Endurance and Health both Fighters have and go from there. While you are at it, you might decide the same for Base Attack* and Base Defense*. Have fun experimenting!

Optional Rules (PB)

The-Barkeep-called-the-Police Variant - Limit the duration of the brawl by setting a time when it's over. 10 rounds is a good number, but feel free to randomize this or just set another number.

Team-Play Variant -  Just make teams either way you prefer. It'll make sure the Bind and Coop drop die actions will get some use and it's always good to know who the enemy is when you're playing among friends. There is a bit of an advantage, if one group is bigger than the other, but we tried it (3 vs. 2) and the smaller group managed to knock two guys out before they went down. And it still could have gone the other way.

Examples of Play

For the first game we set no time limit and it was everyone against each other. Character creation had been completely random (as proposed on the sheet) and we had some variety of results. The brawl went on for about three hours without getting boring or redundant, but it took most of the first hour to get all players on the same page (which is not unusual when learning a new game). The Drink! and Regain drop die actions hadn't been as strict and limited as they are now, which resulted after some time in characters taking breaks to power up and that started to work way to good. But it was okay, since I needed to see how the game reacts in the long run.

The second game was a bit shorter. We decided to build two teams (3 vs. 2) and set a time limit (10 rounds). It took seven rounds to the Last Man Standing. Having teams and a time limit, with the players now completely understanding the rules, made the fight much more vicious. It was brutal. For this fight we had coop actions handled as delayed dice, but decided afterwords that it would be better to have it as a drop die action would be better, because than it could be countered.

Observations

Pick Up actions got pretty popular fast, but also got drinking. Once the rules got out of the way, the players started thinking strategy. Once they had a handle on that, they started talking business. And that was lots of fun. I got a coop drop die from a team member to use it as a move and we decided he was throwing me back into the fight.

A player tried to get a drink and got countered by another player, who also took a drink. It was only natural that one player took another players drink away to drink it himself! And when he rolled a 1 for Health, others started joking that he had spilled most of that other guys beer while he took it from him ...

One player really wasn't lucky with the dice. From the very beginning he wound up having only one or two dice to work with. Which resulted in a beating, of course, and he was down in the buffer zone within the first few rounds. But he didn't go down! No Sir, he took at least 4 heavy hits and made his save every time. It was amazing. One of his drop die actions had been picking up a chair and we kept joking that he used it to keep standing.

In the end he went down for three rounds and that was unfortunate. But he took it like a sportsman. And once he was conscious again, he took a drink, made some breathing exercises and was back in the fight. If you've ever seen a Bud Spencer/Terence Hill movie, that's what the fight felt like.

Luck has it's fair share in a fight, but with the ability to delay dice and the drop die actions you have some options to prepare for the next round instead of going all in. Team play made for some nice cooperation and shifted the game from "how to use my own dice" to "how to use my own dice with the dice the others got", which was really nice to see.

Either way, you could never tell how a fight would end. People down and out came back and brought trouble. A well prepared round with a good initiative and some brilliant thinking could turn a fight just like that. Bad rolls are bad rolls, but playing in a team could compensate it somewhat. The result was a bit like what you'd expect from a real fight. Uncertainty, an idea what was coming at you and maybe how to prevent it, add some explosions of violence in between and a fitting narrative at the table to get the pictures you'd might want to have when playing such a game and you get an idea how it played out.

That all the dice and stats were visible all the time was never a problem, but more like a shared advantage. People talked strategy, bluffed all around the table and initiative did the rest to bring some tension. In one round a guy tried to hit me with a bottle, but was slower than me, so I decided to counter his bottle and give him a good one, too, for good measure. But his team mate had been faster even than I had been. So he decided to counter my counter and gave a boost to his friend's defense. You might already guess how that ended, that bastard had grabbed my hand so I couldn't get to that bottle aimed for my guts and the punch I was throwing was blocked in the last second, too! But I couldn't have known when I decided to make my bet with the dice. I knew when the faster player had decided how to use the options he had.

It was all good fun.

What else?

Yeah, such a long text and I'm still writing (or as a friend of mine put it just the other day: "The text was so long, I couldn't even bring myself to scroll down to the comments section and write tl/dr!"). I will update all the rules the next few days. The Pub Brawl sheet is already in this post (png for now, but I will make a pdf of it, too) and I'll have all this nice and finished by next weekend (the latest). That's it for now and if you read all this, I owe you one. Give the game a chance, if you are interested (and why wouldn't you, reading all this?!).

Swordplay will be next.

The Bare-Knuckle Fighter, now as PDF and with an Introduction for your Gaming Pleasure

With this I proudly present the Bare-Knuckle Fighter pdf. For those following the blog, it's what I've talked about here and here, but now it's a 3 pages document, somewhat resembling what one could call a product. And free, at that.

DOWNLOAD

Cover of the Bare-Knuckle Fighter

It is still beta v. 0.4, but it works. I already saw some typos I forgot to correct (three or four, please tell me if you find more) and one box isn't just sitting where it should (okay, it's not even a Millimeter ...). But I felt that it needed to be out there anyway, since the game itself works and at one point a few days distance allow a fresh start, so I'll tackle it again end of next week. And it'll get a new home in the download section above.

Let's talk Expansions

The last few days I tinkered with it, I already got some ideas how to expand on the Bare-Knuckle Fighter. Instead of implementing weapons next, I'd go for some brawling. It's actually quite easy, basically it needs four more drop die options (Pick up Item, Change Opponent and Bind Opponent*, all of which might be countered, of course), an additional Delay rule (Cooperation, instead of delaying a die to the next round, you might cooperate with a friend to create a double, not a triple, though) and some rules for improvised weapons (improvised weapons deal direct Health damage, a glass would deal one damage die, a chair could have two damage dies for one attack, both are items to be used once).

Initiative is rolled the same way, but I need to think about ties. Distribution begins then with the lowest initiative and among the first actions should be a die drop to engage an opponent. This works without a board (you drop a die for movement ...) and should be a hoot with a group of players punching left and right, where opportunity takes them ...

After that it'll be about Duels and finally skirmish rules, expanding on all of that. A martial arts supplement is possible, too. But that'll take some time (at least setting up some documents for it will). I'll keep you posted.

Gallery of unused pictures

The book I got the pictures from is Boxing, and how to train by Sam C. Austen (published 1904**). I found it over at the open library and it's a poor gold mine for the pictures and the advertisements alone. If you feel like it, check it out (that online reader is a real gimmick, too). Here are some pictures from it I didn't use:

Have fun with the Bare-Knuckle Fighter! I'd be glad to answer any questions about the rules and would be very happy to hear from people that actually tested it, of course.

*A fifth option could be drinking some shots to get some temporary Health back. Need to think about that oné ...

** This needs to be in the public domain by now, am I right?