I will be using this as a 'Thoughts and workspace' for my game.

The concept: High fantasy in a late, late fantasy medieval world that missed the industrial revolution.

The world: Roughly based off real-world history and mythology, with some creative spin. Your Noble Knight will have enchanted arms and armor as he goes to Underhill to negociate with the local Fairie Lord over property lines on his new fiefdom.

Characters: Characters range from Ordinary Joe to Epic Joe (Beowulf, Saint George).

What do characters do?: Besides KMATTS , much of the world map is still unexplored and forests cover a lot. So there's fantastic locations (Ruins, hidden cities, cults, strange and exotic flora and fauna). There's sinister plots and dark mysteries in the cities and towns, there's encountering strange and mysterious beings...And plenty of non-human races. Why have one Naga when you can have Naga cities? Also, I'm not ignoring social stuff - There'll be social combat-fu.

At least a few of the non-human races will be playable.

The system: You have Attribute + Skill + Technique/Spell + One item.

Everything is on a chart. Half a page for the chart; four copies to cover from -20 to +20. All abilities in the game (It's worked for all 54 current pages) are measured in 'Shifts'. +5 shifts is double; -5 shifts is half, except for cost, where it's thrice or one-third.

Three resolution methods.
First, take the value indicated by the shift. Used for things like movement. +5 is 60 feet per round.
Second, roll d6-d6 and add the shift. Used for things like damage; on a 0 damage shift, gives a range from 3 to 12. 0 health shift is 24.
Third, roll d6-d6 and add half the shift, rounded down. Used for success checks. There's a chart row for this, too.

Obviously not rules-light.

I'm currently working on fleshing things out and organizing things - I wrote most of this over about four weeks and now it needs refactoring, to use programming terminology.

So - Types of magic. Currently thinking,

Dire Magic: Curses, misfortune, negative transformation (I shall call thee Froggy!), poison and disease and undoing same. A little direct-harm stuff.

Glamour: Illusions, luck (Good and bad), mental effects (These aren't the...Yada).

Elementalism: Fireballs, lightning bolts, choking and dehydrating your enemies, instant mud...

Divine?:

Diabolism: Evil magic only. Summoning demons, sacrificing victims, creating monstrous horrors, raising vile undead, causing people to die in horrific ways.

Thoughts? Do they look complete? Does it look workable? Does it look fun? Ideas? Functional differences between those areas?

Thanks for any and all help.

You might want to try something with White Necromancy, its never really touched on by traditional RPGs due to the presence of clerics and the class balance/niche issue. I really do think that if a magic user spends 5, 10, or 20 years dissecting dead and living things he will probably get to know something about physiology if only by accident and thus be able to manipulate it with magic.

Thanks. Actually, that's been a pet mouse of mine for a while. Why must necromancers be evil?

And, huh - Given that there's some bits in there about raising undead being possible with Fairie spirits and not just demons, looks like I got a starting point.

So - Magic-user undead - Faerie/supernatural spirits. Divine undead - Dead guys. Diabolist undead - Demons.

It should be noted that most of what I have is system. I need more setting stuff...

You could just lump all necromancers into an Anatomist class with individual casters choosing to use Faerie/Demon/magically manipulated medical skills or a combination of all of those depending on how they feel that day.

No classes - Point-buy. To clarify, those are skill sets.

An Anatomist skill set sounds like a good idea for a healer skillset, which I was wondering about.

"Ok, Doctor Marlov. We know you need corpses to continue your research into how to heal people. But you've dug up this one, not paid for it.

No, don't try to wiggle out of this. It's still got dirt on it. And that's a shovel you've tried to hide."

Add in some Frankenstien and there's a fourth undead type. Cool.

Quote from: Narf the Mouse;234731No classes - Point-buy. To clarify, those are skill sets.

That makes things easier. A player could do something like this
(depending on what your skill list looks like and how you work the point system)

Dr Frankenstein
Anatomy: 1 Point
Arcane Knowledge: 1 Point
Faerie Spirit Knowledge: 1 Point
Demon Spirit Knowledge: 1 Point
Herbalism: 1 Point
Magical Construct: 1 Point
Healing Arts: 1 Point
Excavation: 1 Point

Probably something more like this:

Dr. Frankenstien
Skills
Magic: Undead, Animated +5 (80)
Expert: Medical, Anatomy +5 (80)
Expert: Medical, Herbalism +4 (64)
Expert: Medical, Surgery +4 (64)
Expert: Archeology, Excavation, Graveyards +7 (100)

Pacts
Faerie Sworn, Hell Sworn (Both Pacts. Someone with both could make a very[/b] tormented mad scientist. At the least, very tormented)

Spells
Create Frankenstiens' Monster, , ()

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Of course, given that his creation went rogue, either he violated the pact he used to make his monster or didn't make any pacts and failed to successfully negociate.

What's a good, common page size for RPGs?

I'm currently running a game with my brother and dad; we have from a little to some RP experience and I'm still a level 3 GM, at most. (Need to kill more PCs for the XP. )

Anyway, the first session was just my brother. I ran freeform. Characters tend to change between sessions, as the rules constantly update. Unfortunately, I don't remember what the name of his first character was. The write-up is based on memory. Sessions are also short, but hopefully that will improve.

From afar off, we see a lone figure trudging through a hilly country. The hills and dales occur with such frequency that little can be seen of ahead or behind, save the tops of hill. As we approach this figure, we note that he is armored with arcane cloth of blue, with two swords of ice (My brothers' contribution - Short swords and a quick armor write-up)

Ahead is a long valley, in the middle of which stands a lone graveyard, unseen by our hero. Worse yet, as he crests the hill to enter the valley, a thick mist arises until soon, only a short distance is visible. Erie howls begin to sound ahead of him.

Undaunted, our hero presses onward into the thick mist. Soon, however, he discerns a figure in the fog. A lone, ghostly figure becomes visible. Dread pours outward as the figure lifts a hand in a clear gesture - 'Go back!'. The armoured figure seems to consider this, before rejecting the influence.

(Quick-ruled: Charisma versus Insight - My brothers' character figured out the ghost was using magic to influence him and shook it off. No social rules yet)

Rejected, the howls faded and the ghost departed. The mist began to thin, but still remained. Pressing on, some long shape began to be visible in the mist. The lone warrior attempted to discern what it was, but could not make it out. Eagerly, the figure approached, yet the fog seemed to tease him, never quite revealing what it was. Soon, though, he approached close enough that even this unnatural fog could not conceal it.

(This part was easy - Comprehension (Mental agility, intelligence and perception) versus a difficulty based on the distance collumn of the chart. I think there may have been a modifier based on the adjective describing how thick the fog was and/or the size, too. Also, multiple bad rolls on his part)

It was a graveyard. However, our fearless warrior entered unphased. Inside were graves and crypts and shapes in the mist. Approaching a crypt, our hero went inside, whereupon he found a small room with carvings on the walls and a trap door. Examining the carvings, he felt his armor take a blow. Spinning, he confronted a member of the undead - A skeleton!

(The skeleton write-up took about thirty seconds, including adding a special 'Fragile' modifier. I determined it was demonic and we went from there. The graveyard was a map of wrecked buildings I had bought from our FLGS)

Nevertheless, the fragile monster proved no match and a few quick blows put out its glowing eyes for good, leaving a dark, misty form to go screaming downward. The lone hero pressed downward, opening the trap door and descending.

Downward, he found a sprawling crypt, lit by glowing lights. He had little time to admire the scenary, however, as he was immediatly set upon by undead! Skeletons and zombies filtered out of the crypts in a stream! Smashing skulls and slicing chests apart, he advanced to the center of the crypt and killed the last three undead.

(I don't recall this fight in enough detail to write it up, unfortunately. In all, he killed about seven minion-style creatures, for rent armor and some damage. Armor is easy to fix by the current rules; mostly busted straps and stuff you can sew up)

And there endeth the game.

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One question - Does armor having HP or armor resisting damage appeal to you more? Or a different idea?

Thoughts?

Thanks.

Quote from: Narf the Mouse;234749What's a good, common page size for RPGs?

I like the standard 8.5x11 format with 12pt font, and a clean background either white or parchment colored, adding art and designs to the background clutters up the text and makes it hard to read sometimes.

So, what do I do to get more people to post here?

First off, big post about this on my Livejournal.

Second, how much hassle would a 'tick' timing mechanic be? (What I'm using right now is 'researched' from That Other Big Game) That is, each weapon and technique would have a speed shift. Add them together, get the 'tick' on which the action happens. Lowest tick goes first. So a quick jab with a dagger would take more time than a heavy attack with a greatsword.

Er, a lot of you probably already know what I'm talking about; the explanation is for those who don't.

Would also replace initiative and look something like this:

Bob the DaggerManiac: 3 + 4 = 7 + 2 = 9
Bill the Swordsman:   4 + 3 = 7 + 5 = 12
Amber the Axewoman:   5 + 6 = 11 + 4 = 15
So Bob would act on 3, 7 and 9, Bill on 4, 7 and 12 and Amber on 5, 11 and 15, resulting in a chain of actions looking like this:
3: Bob
4: Bill
5: Amber
7: Bob, Bill (In order of Grace or something like that)
9: Bob
11: Amber
12: Bill
15: Amber

Thanks for comments, help, opinions, information, comparisons and contrastations and cookies.

I need a matching chart progression and dice mechanic. Cause the odds on mine are *Not* even...Blarg.

Well, that's sorted out and I'm happy with it again.

Been refactoring the combat stuff - The numbers are good, just implimenting them onto the existing stuff.

Graff the Thug - Comprehensibility check?

Two more iconic NPCs stated up. Also, the NPC format has be cleaned up and, well, formatted.

Let's see what happens if I post one...

...Well, that's not going to work. Too much html.