Monday, August 10, 2020

Double Ds for Doors and Dungeon Crawling

I love my d6 in a d6. It's so easy to find in my box of weird dice and very handy. I've previously shared a table for d66 things in pockets. Here's how to use a couple d6 for doors and wandering encounter tables. I recommend using the PDF and Print buttons I've added to each post here at KIWF, or better yet, writing these down in your DM notebook of doom and adjusting it to your taste.

2d6 what's up with this door? 2d6 encounters and occurrences
Dice match:
  • ⚀⚀: trapped
  • ⚁⚁: loud or creaky or screamer fungi will be disturbed
  • ⚂⚂: slimy or unpleasant
  • ⚃⚃: rigged to show passage (hair taped to frame) or to make an alarm ring
  • ⚄⚄: locked (33% of keys for locks are items from a previous room [get that statue's arm to shake this knob], 33% are on wandering monster's person or in their cache, and the rest are lost)
  • ⚅⚅: odd; mimic, portal &ct
Dice are one number apart:
     Rusted, Jammed, or Blocked from the other side like in so many video games
Dice add to seven
     Random encounter is hanging out just beyond this door.

Dice are random (not any of the above)
Normal door, no problem. Still, ask about who is in the front or back of the line to keep that tension taut











Dice match:
     Encounter happens with at least rolled number of enemies. Roll a yes/no die; if yes, total the 2d6 together, if no, go with the number they matched on (i.e. two 1s and a no would mean one monster).

Dice are one number apart:
     Spoor (tracks, sounds, &ct of some monster that wanders these environs)

Dice add to seven:
     Something is up, so roll 2d6 again and total them.
  • 2: Wandering Boss!
  • 3: Bodily need: 1 character is struck with either hunger, a need to sit down and rest, or must use the bathroom
  • 4~10: Fuel source is sputtering out and needs to be replaced within a minute (use a 3 result instead if this result seems to be too soon)
  • 11: Wandering neutral party; an austral merchant perhaps
  • 12: Wandering god (I recommend pulling out Judges Guild's Unknown Gods)

Dice are random:
     Nothing, but you should furrow your brow, ask a player their Int score, &ct


Tuesday, July 28, 2020

TRPGs in Japan! Exploring Double Moon TRPG (Part 1 of many)

So, let me share Double Moon with you. I've been fanslating it for a while now (link), and our Sunday group has been using it to explore Stonehell.

 Double Moon was a few play by post games and TRPG systems. I'll talk about the main one that came out in book for here. The Double moon system was published as part of the CompRPG magazine's Comp/Collection series. The series was kicked off with the first iteration of Record of Lodoss's RPG rules. Record of Lodoss's history is an epic in its own right, but we're talking Dub Moon today, which has more in common with D&D than the percentile beast that Lodoss was at that time.
Double Moon is the one on the bottom right


 The production value is great. This could have been a very short book, because the rules aren't that complex and most of the text would have been spell descriptions, but it is chock full of commentary, advice, characters describing how things work, comics, and scads of art by Hotspace, a group that seems to have also designed video-game books like this one (link), a book which has a lot of the hallmarks in DubMoon (these came out the same year), but Hotspace did way better when they worked on Comp/collection series of books. Comp/collection are all video game related. Double Moon started as a game book series of articles, became a Famicom game, then finally this RPG. The other comp/collection books kinda have this graphic design style in common.

One of the super charming things about this book is that the sample adventurers all have well developed personalities, and these characters talk a lot throughout the book, star in comics, &ct. They are also all from the Nintendo game, but preceded it. In the optional classes section, we will meet some new characters.
A very zoomed out view of the world. We have places likeLancaster, the Misty Forest, and the White Desert (the reason why it is white has a lot to do with an ancient basilisk). The world is divided into two continents by the Raidis straight. This map says the Double Moon of the title refers to the forces of swords and magic. The southern continent is the abode of the dark godess Lorefiel. Other places feel the influence of more gods, benign and beneficent.
Title: The Battle with Samoiren the Demonic

Samoiren leads the Five Evil Stars, a group that worships the dark and terrible god Damon. He heads the 13 Black Magicians and schemes to rule the world of Double Moon. However, even terrible evil must pass in its time, and Samoiren found his downfall at the hands of Mueller and the magic sword Wintia. One stroke felled him. "Don't think this is the end," Samoiren's decapitated head warned with a grin. "I have many backup vessels"
Challenging the new foe, Solomon

Solomon the black mage is the head of Lucifion, a dark and mysterious organization. Safis donned the magical armor Black Dome and confronted Solomon with his party. "This is the destruction I desire!" said Solomon. "I will be refined in the fires of hell." Perhaps Solomon intended to resurrect the legendary beast called Dark Dragon. This story will be played out in days to come.


Caption: And endless adventure awaits.

Why were the continents of Double Moon really created?
Yeah, I figure this stuff is all a bit clearer if you play the Nintendo game or have access to the magazines where play by post happened...
The table of contents
Next time we'll tackle chapter 1: What's an RPG?
It'll be good, I promise.


Tuesday, June 2, 2020

d66 things in this unlucky stiff's pockets

(note that this post won't look good on mobile)
 

First, roll a d5 for location where this dude kept their good stuff: 1) Purse, 2) inner vest pocket, 3) Boot, 4) Hat, 5) Britches.

Second, roll a brace of sixers. I have some sub-tables for the items marked with *.
11 1d4 rations                           21 a statuette*                           31 a fan with a gang symbol*
12 twelve copper*                   22 a bonito log                         32 a very small "shower" spell scroll
13 thirteen copper*                23 a lump of purest green      33 someone (known)'s undies
14 ten copper, one silver*     24 a robot's battery                 34 an I.O.U. from "Big Paula"
15 two silver*                          25  a map to a dungeon           35 a deed to Tegel Manor
16 five gold*                            26  a tijuana bible                     36 scrip: a demon's secret name

41 an ear and a lizard            51 faerie in a jar                  61 letter from this dude's love
42 a wand (might backfire) 52 oil lamp (empty)           62 intercepted scandalous missive
43 a hymnal                            53 jewelry*                          63 note on where a cult is meeting next
44 a kung-fu manual            54 a key                                64 a monogrammed handkerchief
45 a prophylactic                   55 a court summons          65 letter written in PCs own hand?!
46 Matyroshka dolls             56 spool of thread              66 last will & testament of "Bad Bob"

Coinage sub-table (1d7): 1) shmeckles, 2) CHUD currency, 3) devil lucre (sabbat franca), 4) obols (good for deals with Charon, so maybe leave a couple for this poor stiff?), 5) coin of the next realm over, 6) coins from the future, where one of the PC's royal visage has been minted, 7) 1990s USA currency

Statuettes sub-table (1d8): 1) cat god; 2) unknown woman; 3) eldritch entity (sanity check!); 4) a member amongst the PCs!; 5) an unknown gods god, preferably a known one; 6) a pontif; 7) a king, 8) duck on top, key on bottom

Statuettes sub-sub-table of materials (d10): 1) dolomite, 2) gold, 3) pewter, 4) lead, 5) wood, 6) crudely carved wood, 7) wax, 8) copper, 9) brass, 10) melted coins

Jewelry sub-table (1d12)(roll a d6×10×[danger of acquisition to find] monetary value): 1) earring, 2) earrings, 3) eye-patch, 4) nose-ring, 5) necklace, 6) torque, 7) diadem, 8) sheriff's badge, 9) rapper's grill, 10) blinged knuckle-dusters, 11) codpiece, 12) a band (a ring).

Hey, maybe the players discover something before they even get to that pocket.

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Thursday, May 28, 2020

I give this RPG a B+ (1½ page rpg)

The one with all the Bs.

"Yarrr!
I have nothing to do with this RPG actually!
Isn't that scary?"

Elevator pitch: Only ability scores, no separate modifiers (beginner friendly).

Very simple. Lots of fun surprises in character gen.

Your stats are your health, but there is hardly a death spiral. It is a resource that you can manage with cleverness and wisdom.

We have failure=XP like like in Dungeon World to help make bad rolls fun.

 Check it out on Google Docs (where you are honor-bound to point out typos). Or embedded in this post, down below.



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Saturday, May 16, 2020

Transplantable cannon

I run a lot of games. Every Saturday the lads and lasses gather and I usually run a one shot with one of my one page RPGs. But some things are usually the same for whatever elfgame setting I am laying out. Here are a few things I have as my default mythos.

Robots and god-computers are supposed to be everywhere. I am way behind on my robot quota. In general, the world is supposed to have clues that great civilizations have come and gone, and are out there in the cosmos.

I want to seed more slow mutants too. In general, a lot of The Dark Tower octalogy exists in my world, such as "he Jesus Man" being a god and gunslingers wandering the land.

Amazons are a buff, seemingly human but definitely not human race that has nothing to do with real world Greek legends. They look like us, the bad tribes steal human men and have no interest in human women. They do have use for men in terms of baby-making, but they only have more amazon (female) children.

Lately, the amazon cannon has expanded to include hags. Hags are what evil amazons evolve into, and they steal men to make more babies, but hags give birth only to monsters. Most amazons encountered are the PCs themselves, so the evil potential of amazons has been unexplored. Good players.

Manazons also exist, but we don't know how they reproduce. Only that they seem to look like human men, but that they are not. Maybe I should look into Gargareans?

Alignment languages are not cants or code-phrases. They are writings and vocalizations that only someone of the proper alignment can parse and comprehend. If you lose your alignment, you forget the language. It can be written down, but it just doesn't make sense to those not of the way. Only beings of other worlds naturally make these vocalizations, so the PCs can't spout Lawful to an angel and hope to be understood. There is just a certain quality to it that can't be imitated by mortals. It's like that Yiddish-speaking grandma you have that you understand yet can't speak back to in Yiddish.

Orcs don't exist. Oh, a few have slipped in over the years, but I've always regretted letting it happen. Orcs are boring. The kids on twitter will call you racist. Just say no to orcs. Evil humanoids that bubble up out of the underworld's toxic plasms? Okay, that's better.

The underworld is mythic, filled with dungeon-logic. You dig deep enough, and reality starts to change on you. Here's a good source on that sort of thing.

Gnomes are a foot tall. They are David. They are not PC race material.

Elves don't age. They live forever. They have lived forever too, as far as they can remember, but they can only remember a couple hundred years. Everything feels like it happens in the blink of an eye.

Dwarves reproduce through sculpture, not something as dainty as sex. They don't make women themselves, but occasionally have been commissioned to do so ala Pygmalion. Dwarves also do not cast spells, but they can make magical rings, swords, and other artifacts. Dwarves love gold and can smell it. They turn into dragons if they amass too much wealth and don't share it with their clan.

BTW elves and dwarves, not elfs and dwarfs.

Just as every monster is best if it is unique, so too for magical items. No +1 swords in these games.

More on the cosmology is contained here. The players have only uncovered a small bit of the information in that post or this one. I like to let them discover what they like, as if they are amateur archeologists. There is probably some fancy word for this kind of world-revealing. Diagetic? Whatever the word for the opposite of a blog post is.


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Tuesday, May 5, 2020

And now for something completely nihongo

I translated a short game because it looked easy. I did not make the game in this case, even though I make an average of one RPG in my folder per week, but I did kinda alter it a bit and added a missing 8th spell. But this will be pretty useless info if you are not a Japanese reader. If only there was some way to find the original English version. If you are a nippongo-lover, here is the current version of it!



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Wednesday, April 29, 2020

Son of New Elfgame Rules


It had a baby!
I've refined my DCCish old school elf game rules since the last go around. Here's what we got now. If you want to see the old post, it is still full of 90s 'tude. DCC Lankhmar rules are mentioned a lot, because I am currently running a campaign on Nehwon.




Action Dice: When you roll, you do not add bonuses (+1 &c); we only make action dice bigger. If you have an ability score of 14-15, you roll a d22 to do actions with that score. 16-17 gives you a d24. 18 gives you a d30. We do not usually have a die smaller than a d20 (use a d16 only when dual-wielding). Saves don't exist per say; just make an ability check roll with an action die.

The hit/to-hit/class die: If you are rolling to attack or do something that fits the idiom of your class/race/background, you may add your hit die onto that roll. Roll to meet or beat an AC or DC. The DCs are 5, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30, and so on (don't use DCC thief DCs).

Armor: Armor Class is your Agility score. Armor itself is ablative; for each plus it has, it can take one hit instead of you, negating one instance of damage. This damages the armor and it has to be mended. Shields usually give +1 armor. 

Damage: Arms* are flavor, for the most part, and don't affect damage. Maybe your implement of choice is important in some situations. Your HD from the to-hit roll is also counted--provided you hit-- as your damage roll.

Example: Thogar rolls to hit. His STR is 8 and his class is thief, so he rolls 1d20+1d6. He gets a 19 and a 2, for a total of 21 to hit. The 2 becomes 2 damage. The player shakes the Judge's hand for running such a fast system, but then they both get Coronavirus. 

Luck: You can burn Luck or Fleeting Luck to modify rolls up or down in your favor (you can spend Luck on someone else's roll to avoid being hit). Fleeting Luck follows the DCC L rules.

Spell-burning: Wizards can grow their hit die for one instance of casting. It grows one size for each point of ability score damage you take. Spell-burning is ritualistic, so it slows you down and your friends will have to be meat shields while you get it ready. If you know Lankhmareese black or white magic, the first point of spell-burn on those spells is free, but you have to burn more than one.

Magic: You have to roll to learn a spell (fail and you can try again next level). Lvl 1 spells are DC 10, lvl 2 are DC 15, and so on. So you might want to quest for a specific way to learn a specific spell at a lower DC (Lankhmar agent dice might work out too). When you first learn a spell, you have to roll on this table of quirks (no mercurial magic).

Initiative: If you roll higher to hit, you hit first. Most monsters are zaku (small fries). If you hit, you kill them and hit first and they don't get a counter hit. You're no hero, but you might be fit for a pulpy tale.

Deeds: Unlike in DCC where they have to wait for a precious 3+, Warriors in this house may declare a mighty deed each time they hit (don't declare, then roll; roll first) except when they roll a crit, in which case the crit becomes the deed. Tough monsters may get a save to resist the effects of a deed, in which case their DC is 10+the Warrior's level.

Get Gud: Every PC stops gaining HD after level 3, instead re-rolling all previous hit dice and taking the new score if it is higher. Thank you, Dave "Arduin" Hargrave. Another benefit of leveling is that you get to choose one ability score and raise it by 1.

Orizons, not spells: If we had clerics in DCC L, they would not have set spells, but would just beg their gods for help with a prayer roll. What a pointless bullet point this was though.

Star signs: On worlds that use them, we look at what the sign usually affects and give +1d to action dice involving that. No negative star signs, and Luck doesn't make it better or worse to have.

*: I might find a way to integrate arms into the crit tables in the future.
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