Quote from: RunningLaser;928322I'm surprised that no one has whiteboxed or osr'd something like Vampire and called it Trenchcoats & Katanas or something.

Hah! That's a great title.

Quote from: trechriron;928463Yeah. That would be. Ridiculous.

Huh. What d'you know? It exists!

Quote from: RPGPundit;929397I was a big fan of BECMI, but the war-machine mechanics were always way too complicated for my tastes.

I made something a lot closer to my own level of comfort in the mass-combat rules for Dark Albion.

It's not too bad. Mind you there was little choice at the time unless we used something like Seige of Jerusalem which we did one time. I prefer Battlesystem 1e because of how well it integrated with Melee combat.

Quote from: Krimson;929406It's not too bad. Mind you there was little choice at the time unless we used something like Seige of Jerusalem which we did one time. I prefer Battlesystem 1e because of how well it integrated with Melee combat.

True that it was one of the only options at the time.

Quote from: RPGPundit;930368True that it was one of the only options at the time.

Actually I've been thinking of Battlesystem and War Machine recently. Battlesystem in particular because of how it works with things on the character level. I used this to my advantage once in a mass combat that too place in Thyatis, since my friend likes running games there (same guy who did another Thyation battle using Seige of Jerusalem). My character was a Centurion Officer and a level 13 Fighter. As I recall the rules had three melee rounds per mass combat round, so my Centurion spent the battle running around killing snipers and officers. Hell, I used the thing to run fleet vs fleet battles in conjunction with the Buck Rogers XXVc RPG which was based on 2e rules. That was... amazeballs. Yeah that's the word.

I've also had amazing fun playing Battletech/Mechwarrior is a straight RPG, as well as Battletech on it's own. So what I was thinking is that it would be nice to see something like Battlesystem/War Machine for the OSR. I say this before searching to see if someone hasn't already done it. I like mass combat. I like tactical combat games. I've always run RP heavy games knowing that sometimes you need The Big Fight. Seriously, you can get away with all sorts of plot if you give them a big fight and loot every so often. Something mass combat is great because then characters can act like officers and have units under their command that they can direct and without giving them powerful magic, you can give them a force which lets them feel powerful. Of course, if they make stupid decisions you can crush them. Battlesystem also works for naval battles.

Or, sometimes in your gameworld, a major battle occurs that you as the DM want to happen. Sure you can arbitrarily decide the outcome, but I prefer to play it out and see what happens. And if I can get my players to take control of the forces in the battle then they feel like they are part of establishing history, even if their characters are not directly part of it. I just like mass combat.

Battlesystem? pfaw! real old school players use Knights & Magick!

Quote from: TristramEvans;930398Battlesystem? pfaw! real old school players use Knights & Magick!

I found that one years ago:)

There's a reprint of Knights & Magick you can get jfyi.

Knights & Magick is so New School. Old School gamers use Swords & Spells. Hard Core OG use Chainmail.

Quote from: RunningLaser;930427I found that one years ago:)

There's a reprint of Knights & Magick you can get jfyi.

Yeah, I purchased the hardcover from LuLu. Its a fun system.

Quote from: DavetheLost;930431Knights & Magick is so New School. Old School gamers use Swords & Spells. Hard Core OG use Chainmail.

Chainmail doesn't really have the support for fantasy outside of D&D, and D&D's fantasy isn't geared towards large battles. Haven't heard of Swords & Spells though, will have to look that up.

I was of course making an edition wars joke based on release dates.

Swords & Spells was the OD&D mass battles supplement it was a yellow covered booklet the same size as the other OD&D booklets. I remember it used single figure casualties, and iirc D&D mechanics. I lost my copy decades ago and have not been able to find a replacement.

IMHO there are better mass combat fantasy wargames than most of the RPG addenda.  I'll have to check out Knights & Magic, I missed it the first time around.

Quote from: TristramEvans;930398Battlesystem? pfaw! real old school players use Knights & Magick!

Quote from: TristramEvans;930571Yeah, I purchased the hardcover from LuLu. Its a fun system.

Cool I'll have to think about picking up a copy.

Have to say I  have no familiarity with Knights & Magick.

I'd like to go back to the first posts of this thread...

Quote from: Ratman_tf;923853What is it? Is it Dragonlance Done Right?

Quote from: estar;923859Adventure Paths and linked chain of adventures is one of the least developed in regards to the OSR.

Quote from: estar;923867But is the Paizo adventure path or how TSR linked G1 to 3, D 1 to 3, A1 to 4, Dragonlance, etc the ONLY viable ways of doing this? My feeling it isn't. (...)

For example the Boxed set is a possible product format for publishing in the OSR.

I don't think that boxed sets are feasible for a market segment that has to rely on PoD.
Boxes are expensive to produce and ship. They were a marketing (or rather, distribution) tool in the heydays of TSR. Boxes exclaimed, "I am a GAME" on the shelves of toy stores.
Today's OSR customers don't need that.

Tristram's wish for more gamebooks lead to this:

Quote from: RunningLaser;923877You should check out the Fabled Lands gamebooks if you haven't already.  They are supposed to be open ended.

The Fabled Lands model, with its regional gamebooks that have pointers to all other books, and lead-ins from all other books, sounds more like a feasible solution.

Instead of an adventure path make it an adventure net.

Imagine the 12 Dragonlance modules, each describing its location/region, with a timeline of events, triggers ("if character x arrives with item y, then...", "if location/module z was cleared before, then..."), and future developments ("if NPC x survives he will flee to location/module y or z, depending on circumstances", "The blue Highlord will learn of the events after two weeks, the red Highlord after three weeks"), and rewritten to be played in any order.
(Although the publication order would at least suggest one order of events.)

Bonus points if each module worked as a stand alone, location based adventure/problem because that product type is the heart of the OSR.

Quote from: Dirk Remmecke;931766Instead of an adventure path make it an adventure net.

Imagine the 12 Dragonlance modules, each describing its location/region, with a timeline of events, triggers ("if character x arrives with item y, then...", "if location/module z was cleared before, then..."), and future developments ("if NPC x survives he will flee to location/module y or z, depending on circumstances", "The blue Highlord will learn of the events after two weeks, the red Highlord after three weeks"), and rewritten to be played in any order.
(Although the publication order would at least suggest one order of events.)

Sounds good _in theory_. In actuality, it sounds like a monumental pain of bookkeeping. YMMV