Friday, 20 May 2022

There be Cling-ons 'pon the Starboard bow Cap'n

 Inspired by my first game of Pirate Borg, 80s novelty pop and puns, here is a Pirate Borg monster

Cling On

This mollusc resembles a giant limpet but it can extend a feeding umbrella from the peak of its shell. These creatures love nothing more than to cling on to a moving ship and sweep the sea for plankton but there is nothing a Captain dreads more than the call of "There be Cling-ons 'pon the Starboard Bow", especially those called Jim.  Some ingenious pirates have taken to loading them into cannons and firing them at ships they are pursuing.

HP 3 

Morale - 

Shell -d6

Special:  These creatures attach them selves to a ships hull below the water line where they unfurl there feeding umbrella.  This reduces a ships speed by 1" per Cling On.  If attacked they will retract there umbrella for 1d4 rounds.

Naval Combat

HP 1 

Morale - 

Shell -d6

Speed 0  Agility -3

See; Special above



"Pirate Borg: Cling On" is an independent production by Stephen "Long" John Richards (chekmx). It is not affiliated with Limithron LLC. It is published under the PIRATE BORG Third Party License. PIRATE BORG is ©2022 Limithron LLC.

Monday, 25 April 2022

Forbidden lands: Blackpowder Firearms

Weapon Grip Bonus Damage Range Cost Feature
Pistol 1H +1 1 Near 50 SLOW LOAD, BULLET, LIGHT
Dragon 1H +1 1 Near 60 SLOW LOAD, SHOT, LIGHT
Donderbuss 1H +2 1 Near 70 SLOW LOAD, SHOT, 
Carbine 1H +2 2 Near 80 SLOW LOAD, BULLET, 
Musket 1H +2 2 Short 90 SLOW LOAD, BULLET

Features
    Shot: This weapon can fire shot or bullets  if the weapon uses shot then armour is treated normally but upto three near targets can be attacked by a single blast of shot.  Each individual takes weapon damage for a success and the player may then distribute every other success as they wish across those hit.
    Bullet: This weapon fires bullets this ignores chain armour and halves damage(round up) for all other armour.  Cover may also only provide half at the GMs discretion.

    Rifling:  Increases the weapons range by one.  Not possible with weapons with the Shot feature.  Adds a additional multiplier to weapon cost (or potential for limited availability by kin.  i.e. only Dwarves and they will not tolerate ownership by non Dwarves)

Melee:
    In melee all black powder weapons may be used as clubs and use the same Bonus/Damage but if they are loaded have a chance to accidentally misfire if used to attack or parry.    

Actions:
    Load :  All black powder weapons need to loaded and primed as a slow action.  

Talents

    HORSEBACK FIGHTER
        RANK 1: In addition to Shortbow and sling you can fire pistols, dragons and Carbines from a mount

    SHARPSHOOTER
        RANK 1:  As standard but includes black powder weapons
        RANK 2:  Range of black powder weapons with the BULLET feature is extend by one zone
        RANK 3:  As standard but includes black powder weapons

    FASTSHOOTER
        RANK 1: You don’t need to READY WEAPON before you SHOOT with a ranged weapon. Does not apply to crossbows or black powder weapons.

Armour:

Breast Plate & Back Plate AR: 6 Cost:  50  Body Part: Body  Features: Heavy item 
This armour offers half protection against bullets unlike chainmail

Types

    Matchlock

        A matchlock is a historical type of firearm wherein the gunpowder is ignited by a burning piece of rope that is touched to the gunpowder by a mechanism that the musketeer activates by pulling a lever or trigger with his finger.

  • Price multiplier  *1
  • The match of the matchlock weapon must be lit for the weapon to function.  It requires an ammo resource roll every quarter to keep the match lit.  To light a  match requires a stationary person 2 slow actions.
  • The match emits light and smoke which could have an impact on a persons ability to be stealthy.  The mechanics of which are left to the GM.

    Wheelock

    A wheellock, wheel-lock or wheel lock is a friction-wheel mechanism which creates a spark that causes a firearm to fire. It was the next major development in firearms technology after the matchlock and the first self-igniting firearm. Its name is from its rotating steel wheel to provide ignition. 

  • Price multiplier * 1.5    
  • Wheelock weapons require that the weapon is wound before firing this is an additional fast action.  They may be kept out of combat wound but there is a potential for the weapon to fire should the owner be involved in vigorous  action.  The consequences of this are left to the GM

    Flintlock

    The flintlock mechanism is a type of lock used on muskets, rifles, and pistols from the early 17th to the mid-19th century. It is commonly referred to as a "flintlock" (without the word mechanism), though that term is also commonly used for the weapons themselves as a whole, and not just the lock mechanism.

  • Price multiplier * 2
  • Maybe cocked as part of the Load action reducing the chance of accidental discharge.

Pistol


Pistols were used as self-defense weapons and as a military arm. Their effective range was short, and they were frequently used as an adjunct to a sword or cutlass. Pistols were usually smoothbore although some rifled pistols were produced.

Dragon
    

A dragon is a shortened version of blunderbuss, a firearm with a short, large caliber barrel which is flared at the muzzle and frequently throughout the entire bore.[1][2] Dragons were typically issued to Dragoon cavalry, who needed a lightweight, easily handled firearm while mounted

Donderbuss



The Donderbuss/blunderbuss is a firearm with a short, large caliber barrel which is flared at the muzzle and frequently throughout the entire bore, and used with shot and other projectiles of relevant quantity or caliber. The blunderbuss is commonly considered to be an early predecessor of the modern shotgun, with similar military and defensive use. It was effective only at short range, lacking accuracy at long distances

Carbine


The carbine was originally developed for cavalry. The start of early modern warfare about the 16th century had infantry armed with firearms, prompting cavalry to do the same, even though reloading muzzle loading firearms while moving mounted was highly impractical

Musket


    
A musket is a muzzle-loaded long gun that appeared as a smoothbore weapon in the early 16th century, at first as a heavier variant of the arquebus, capable of penetrating heavy armour.


Monday, 24 January 2022

Vasana Farnan's Daughter

Just using FBL talents and the pre-gen sheets out of the starter set I have







I think at least for a one shot as a proof of concept to see how it feels this is pretty close.  Use Will power as Rune Points and mapping spells to talents and spells seems to work ok.  

Things that are mapped

Demoralize = Horror Symbolism spell

Fearless rune spell = Fearless talent

Fast Footwork = Mobility spirit spell

Not mapped

Heal2,  I will probably just use the Healing skill

Lightning,  Might see what Bitter reach spells have to offer but I am not sure

Shield spell - tough I can't be bothered for this one shot

Next up her half sister Yanioth





Sunday, 23 January 2022

Zee to the Hee in Gee ™️

Last year I ran a campaign that was a mashup of 13th Age Glorantha and Heroquest running the Sartar:  Kingdom of Heros campaign.   At the moment it is on the back burner as I got over excited about running forbidden lands and although I feel like the campaign was ok I probably should have stuck with 13th age backgrounds.  I choose to bolt on the hero quest skill mechanic onto 13G for everything but combat because 

    a) I don't think all my players enjoy rules light for longer campaigns.

    b) I wanted there to be some skill progression which isn't a focus of 13th ages class based system

    c) we had previously tried RQiG online(we ran the GamesMaster adventures as a mini campaign) and I found it a bit of a burden and some of my players found the mechanics frustrating.   

If I am honest I think that 13 age is a excellent system for running Heroquest Glorantha material if you want a bit more mechanical heft as the PCs are pretty much superheroes out of the box which fits the epics nature of the Sartar books but on reflection I would stick with 13th age backgrounds.

I am a big fan of Heroquests (now QuestWorlds) character creation using  keywords allowing the player to encompass there charcter concept in a few key words without being constrained to specific Skills but I struggle with setting difficulty and the mastery concept in  Quest world plus I am not keen on almost all rolls being apposed.  As a GM I am happy if I don't have to roll at all and if anyone has any ideas how to do that with the Year Zero engine I am all ears.  

I have a quite a bit of Runequest material that I would like to play through but I can't stomach running it online using RQiG but I feel that a mashup of the Year Zero Engine and more specifically Forbidden Lands would capture the gritty limb losing one hit and your done for combat of RQ with out all the tables hit locations and Strike ranks.

To that end I present to you the rough outline of the concept I have in mind running

Zero to Hero in Glorantha

  • Use Zero Engine Mechanics 
  • Do we use will power or Some narrative pool like Coriolis.  CHAOS POINTS.
  • Replace occupation with the Abilities, Keywords and Break out Abilities.  This would cover such things as Culture (Lunar, Sartar, Praxian),  Community(Specific clan or tribe)  Rune affinity and Occupation. These combined might then point them toward a cult, .  My initial thought is that broader skills would either cost a lot to develop or have a low cap (Maybe 3?)
    • For example
      • Noble 2
        • Read/Write +1
        • Ambitious +2
        • Golden Dagger +1
          Skill rolls would then combine Stats(choosen based on task) + Keyword + Breakout 
          So in the above example our noble would roll Str Based Dice + 2 for Noble + 1 if wielding a                  Golden Dagger, plus any gear dice for said dagger.
        
  • Or keep skills as at the table negotiating over skills can be a pain
    • Might, Endurance, Melee, Crafting, Stealth, Slight of Hand, Move, Marksmanship, scouting lore, survival, insight, Manipulation, Performance, Spirit, Animal Handling
  •         Spirit magic: 
    •  could be reflected by talents.  So Bladesharp would replace Sword Fighter for example.
    • Alternatively perhaps Spirit Magic could Use WITS + EMPATHY = POWER.  This could and Replace Healing with a skill to reflect Spirit Combat and Proficiency is Spirit Spells.  Pushed rolls would damage Empathy.  
    • Might need a cap on Spirit magic spells either POWER or EMPATHY but if POWER Then Power level counts so Heal 2 counts for 2 points.  Start with empathy pints of Spirit magic.  POW recovered by Rest/Sleep.
    • Perhaps 3 power levels. level 1 = fast action, level 2 slow action,  level 3 full turn to cast.
  • Rune Magic based on Empathy + Rune Affinity.  Needs to be more limited at least initially consider giving RP like RQ but a bit like WP.  Perhaps POW can be sacrificed for more Rune points and regained like RQ (How? XP, + Empathy Roll?).  
    • Cast time fast action (Call to the gods)
  • Sorcery would use the Forbidden lands Spell mechanics and your cult would replace occupation providing access to a mixture of reskinned and new Occupation paths with some occupations offering more spell based paths whilst others are more martial talents.  Bitter reach offer the new elemental spells that could easily mirror the common summoning spells uses in RQiG.  One alternative might be to ditch mishaps and make a spell role against your rune skill(Rune magic) or Wits(Sorcery).  If the later then maybe have different crit tables for Empathy and Wits.  Possibly have a skill per spell for sorcery.
  • Use Runes as Pride dice. Each PC has 3 Runes at 3 ,2 ,1 and they map to d12, d 10, d8
  • Culture provides Talent.  With Backgrounds as skills adaptive is semi redundant
  • Kin provides stat limits
  • Strongholds become Communities but have there own stats.
  • Spirits have wits and Empathy only and mostly attack these attributes only.  Spirit combat uses Wits or Empathy as the state used, skill based on background, potentially gear can assist (Mostly shaman). 
Having had a think about it.  I'm tempted  go through some of the Starter set pregens and convert them, then maybe try to convert the adventures from the same for z2hig (as all the cool kids are calling it) and later fill out some of community ideas etc.. with a long term view of restarting my Satar:  Kingdom of Heros or Possibly running the red cow campaign.
Anyway that's what I have so far

What's the point?

 Hi,

      Chekmx here.  What's the point of this blog?   As a place to put my ramblings about TTRPGs because there aren't enough of those right?

    My older brother and his friend introduced me to TTRPG in the early 80s playing Advanced Dungeons and Dragons and Traveller which I continued with a group of friends as a teen-ager.  When Games workshop released a affordable version of  Runequest, stripped of its mighty Gloranthan setting we were immediately captured by its complex simulationist mechanics.   Along the way a variety of games were explored many not much beyond character creation a none exhaust list being Traveller, Paranoia, Gamma world, Traveller 2300AD and Call of Cthulhu.

    Then life happened,  college, work, family and my RPG days slipped to the back of my mind as a fond memory.

    Skip forward 20 years or so and in around 2014 one of my oldest friends mentioned that the 5th edition of Dungeons and Dragons was being released.   Happy memories flashed into my mind but living now living in  Switzerland I doubted that I would find locals to play with (I was very wrong about that).  I can't remember how but at more or less the same time I stumbled across Roll20.  After many false starts, rejected request and campaigns that lasted one session I finally found a group of reliable players that wanted to play the same sort of games as me and we continue to play on a regular basis to this day.

    Since wetting my teeth in this hobby once more with many sessions of 5th edition I began to spread my wings once more try numerous game mechanics both mainstream and indie, crunchy and rules lite.  At the moment my current favourite are the Year Zero Engine games that seem to offer a lite flexible system that still provide enough pleasing mechanical crunch without descending into a 3 hour dice fest. 

    My current games include

    Playing in a semi regular game of Troika game.

    Playing in a bi weekly mini campaign of GURPS set in a post-apocalyptic Tenerife as a psycho feminist nun

     Playing a number of games with my afore mentioned  best friend (Cthulhu (Dark, Hack, Trail of), Dee Sanction, Coriolis ..... The list goes on as he seems to buy every kick starter ever release)

    Running a long term call of Cthulhu Pulp Campaign of the 2 head serpent

    Running the Forbidden lands Campaign books (Raven Purge,  Bitter reach and coming soon Blood March) mashed together with various other sources as an Open Table/West Marches campaign.

    So that's me and I imagine that will influence what I write about.  

    

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