Dreams and Dragons

Old School Hack - Playtest Review

2012-01-31T02:20:00.001-06:00

I play tested “Old School Hack” this past week. A few members of the regular Thursday night group had conflicts and so it seemed like a good time for a “one-shot.” I had only 2 players and decided to give “Old School Hack” a try.

The time that I had planned to use working on the game session prior to play got away from me, and I found myself the night of the game with almost nothing in way of preparation. No pre-made characters, no adventure, or even an initial encounter to start the action, nothing … except that I had managed to print a copy of the rules.

Fortunately, OSH seems designed to be easy to pick up and play with minimal (in my case zero) preparation. I pulled the class pages out of the printout I had made and laid them out on the table. I told my players to look them over and pick one that looked interesting.

One player chose the Cleric class sheet and the other the Elf class sheet.

After choosing their Class, each player rolled attributes. This went very quickly and although I was worried at first as the Elf started out with two negative results, the rest of her rolls were much better and soon she had assigned all her rolls to her attributes and was ready to continue.

Although inspired by D&D, the Attributes for OSH are named differently and also used in some cases for different things. The six attributes in OSH are:

Brawn - sheer size, number of heavy things you can carry, physical intimidation factor.

Cunning - trickery, sneakiness, doing stuff that others are trying to prevent.

Daring - courage, facing your fears and attempting dangerous stuff without hesitation.

Commitment - devotion and intensity, catch-all saving throw, shrugging off magic and other wiles.

Charm - social aptitude, ability to inspire or encourage people to see things your way.

Awareness - alertness and perception, reflexes, reading between the lines.

The attributes page does a good job of showing how this particular set of attributes applies to various actions the players may wish to attempt. I like the choices made here over all, it's not how smart you are, but how clever, not how nimble you are, but how bold.

I believe that the goal here was to create a set of attributes that separates itself as much as possible from the combat model, so that the attributes would be chosen based on the sorts of things a player might want their character to do and no so much as simply another way to boost their combat numbers.

If that was the intent it works, and OSH looks to have a versatile attribute based task resolution mechanic that resists the need for a skill system. I like this. Skill heavy systems that micro-manage a character's scope can restrict player creativity. In avoiding this, OSH characters are not only more versatile, they are easier and faster to create.

The attribute assignment was over in a flash and we were on to class talents.

The Class Sheets describe a class' inherent ability and a “limitation” which is really just a guide for role-playing the class. In addition, each sheet has a description of five class specific talents. Each player chooses one talent at character creation with more talents becoming available to the character as they grow in experience.

The talents come in three different flavors. There are “continuous talents” that are either “always on” or usable as much as the player wishes, “arena talents” that are usable once per arena (like once per encounter, but better … more on arenas to come,) and “rested talents” that once used require a rest to recharge.

The Elf chose “Perfect Accuracy” which allowed the elf to add +2 to a “delayed attack” with a ranged weapon once per arena.

The Cleric chose “Prayers of the Hurt” which is a spell that allows the Cleric to heal wounds once per rest.

The nature of the talents and their use reminds me of D&D 4e powers, but they're not as restrictive. It seems to me like everything in 4e tries to define itself as a power. The game designers created a rules formula and then shoe-horned everything to fit that formula. When playing 4e, it felt like a character couldn't blow his nose unless he had a power defined for the action.

Here things don't feel as restrictive, the talents are “extra” a bonus … something you get, not something you're tied to. I am not sure how it is that 4e ends up feeling so restrictive or how OSH ends up avoiding this trap … but, it does. Or at least these are my impressions. Both my players had played 4e for about a year and decided they didn't like it. OSH did not produce immediate reactions of disdain or disinterest, so I felt encouraged as we forged onward.

The next step in character creation was choosing a weapon. This is actually a key part of the system as weapons categories are tied to combat arenas. Arenas are an incredible idea and part of what makes OSH burst ahead of other fantasy themed old school RPG clones and stand head and shoulders above them as something unique, better than the games that it strives to emulate and a true gem in a this overly crowded RPG landscape.

An arena is a simple enough idea. It is any place that characters might do battle that is different from any other place that characters might do battle. In a single combat this could mean, the crowded floor of a busy travelers inn, the stairwell leading up to a balcony overlooking the main floor of that same inn, and the narrow balcony itself.

These areas would then be defined as “arenas” and each arena possesses qualities that makes it different from the arena connected to it.

The crowded floor of the inn is a DENSE arena.

The stairs leading up to the balcony might be a HAZARDOUS arena.

And the narrow balcony might be a TIGHT arena.

The brilliance of arenas is that no longer are the descriptions of special abilities and effects defined as so many inches in range or radius. Now instead of thinking of things as miniatures on a combat grid, players are encouraged to imagine the environment, the actual qualities of the three dimensional space where the combat takes place.

What does this have to do with weapons? Well each weapon type is best suited for a specific arena and using the right weapon for the combat situation provides a bonus.

The weapons categories are further refined as each weapon type provides a different kind of advantage. The player is no longer taxed with simply selecting the weapon that does the most damage, some weapons allow the character to act earlier in the combat round, others add to defense, some are more accurate and finally still others do more base damage.

The balance of weapon types is so brilliant that an arbitrary limitation to a specific weapon type based upon a character's class is not needed and not used. Any class can use any weapon and everything feels just right.

The Elf player chose a Bow which is a ranged weapon and gains a bonus in OPEN arenas.

The Cleric player chose a Poleaxe which is a reach weapon and gains a bonus in HAZARDOUS arenas.

Next, was a choice of armor. Again, no restrictions are arbitrarily applied based on class, but heavier armor is cumbersome and so best left to characters with a higher Brawn, while a character who chooses to fight without any armor at all earns bonus Awesome points at the end of the combat because fighting without armor is awesome!

Awesome points are a special kind of in game currency that players can use to replenish their special abilities. So, although a Wizard could certainly wear armor, one who fought without would find themselves with more awesome points with which to fuel their spells. The mechanism is elegant and functional. Just another fragment of brilliance in a treasure trove of brilliant ideas.

The Elf with a -2 Brawn chooses to wear Leather Armor.

The Cleric opts to go without armor all together relying on his inherent armor class bonus (from his deity for wearing a visible sign of his faith) and the armor class bonus from his poleaxe to offer him the protection he needs.

With this we were ready to go. I came up with a reason for the two characters to be in the same place at the same time and we were off and running. It took about an hour to make characters, maybe a little less. And since neither of my players had ever even heard of OSH before, this seemed pretty good.

As mentioned before, I had nothing prepared so I just started making stuff up. The OSH rules are designed so that I really didn't need to have anything written down.

I made stuff up, and when we needed to make an attribute check we did that. I rolled a die, the player rolled a die, and we compared them. This system of “random difficulty” may not satisfy every DM in every situation, but it worked great for the improvisational nature of the evenings adventure, and the system can be easily modified to suit other styles of play.

During play, the rules document itself proved incredibly functional. Each major game concept and idea is defined and presented on a single page. Need to know about attributes? Everything I need is on the attributes page? Combat? All on the Combat Page. And here was another place where OSH shines. The combat sequence creates a logical flow that provides strategic options without the need for grids or miniatures or attacks of opportunity.

The sequence has a logical flow to it that feels natural and moves quickly and easily. These were some of the best, most interesting combats I can remember running ... ever. They played so quickly, and were incredibly easy to setup and manage.

All I needed to do was imagine what the environment where the combat took place looked like and define it as one of the arenas. Hit point totals were small (minions having only 1 each) and so record keeping was nearly nonexistent. The use of awesome points kept things dynamic and exciting.

Awesome points are awarded by the players to each other for doing something … well, awesome! I love the idea of involving the players in the rewards mechanic, it allows the players to interact on a whole new level and to congratulate one another when they do something cool or funny. I can see this promoting team work among players and eliminating the “so-in-so is being a jerk” factor … Brilliant!

Awesome points can then be spent by the player to replenish a character's talents or even to use class talents that they haven't yet learned. In our story, the final battle saw the characters facing a hoard of undead zombie minions. The Cleric did not possess the “Turn Undead” talent, but by spending 3 awesome points he was able to use it in a surprise move that destroyed all the zombie minions in an instant and earned him one of his Awesome points back on the spot (and a high-five from his fellow player.)

As players spend their awesome points they record this on their character sheet. The use of awesome points is the gauge by which characters advance in the game system. It's another great little innovation that not only works, but relieves the DM of further record keeping. (Have I over used the word, “Brilliant?”)

The “High-five moment” sums up a lot of my feelings about OSH. It's fun! OSH is fun to play. Higher praise I cannot give, and both players have saved their character sheets in anticipation of playing again, and soon.

OSH is a 26 page PDF. Of this only the first 20 pages are actual rules, the rest being play aids. And after character creation, only about 10 pages are really going to be needed to play. It's the kind of concise rules package that I look for when it comes time to bring an RPG to my game table.

This strength of concise presentation might also be the games only weakness. OSH may well be the best candidate for an entry level RPG I've seen, and as such it would be brilliant to see a version written with an eye toward introducing new players to the hobby.

The concise and compact nature of OSH also means that it only contains information for taking characters from 1st to 4th levels. The author promises a forthcoming “Heroic” edition, so maybe that's a strength after all, as it gives us something to look forward to. I for one am very anxious to see more of this RPG masterpiece.

Old School Hack is a rewrite/revamp of another free RPG called “Red Book Hack.” Looking at both of them, I have to smile, because this, to me, is what the free RPG community should be all about. The majority of the innovations that “Old School Hack” boasts are given first breath in “Red Book Hack” this material is then sharpened, distilled and perfected by the author of “Old School Hack.”

This is a wonderful example of the power of the “Creative Commons” license agreement. One person put forth an idea. Another person took this idea and built upon it. Neither person has ever met. They did not set out to collaborate on a project. But because of the internet, their ideas have found each other and gamers like you and I get to reap the rewards of their labors.

To Kirin Robinson and Eric Provost I say, “Thank you.”

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Friends of HiLo Heroes

2012-01-30T10:59:00.001-06:00

Hi/Lo Heroes has been getting much love out in the blogosphere:

Sword and Board

HiLo Heroes Haven

And I just wanted to post a word of thanks to these guys and to everyone who plays/supports/enjoys Hi/Lo or any of the games that I've written. It's unbelievably gratifying to learn that people are playing a game that I created and I can't thank you all enough.

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Reading Comics

2011-10-13T14:15:00.000-05:00

So, is it not enough that my iPad has given me a convenient and usable means to sketch again? Back when I used to draw all the time, I also read comics all the time as well. This is a practice that I have fallen out of over the years. I grew up, got married. Trips to the comic shop grew less and less frequent. Long boxes of comics began to be shuffled around, from main room to bed room to garage ... to yard sale.

Enter the iPad. I started by downloading a few free comics. They were good. I found that I was mildly interested. The iPad screen was only slightly smaller than a comic page, the experience was pretty good. Also, no long box to lug around. Then DC started this whole "New 52" thing. I picked up a few issues. No need to make a trip to the shop. Just a few swipes of the finger and "presto" instant gratification.

I am of mixed feelings about this whole thing. First, it's amazing. I am 46 years old and I haven't read comics regularly for maybe 20 years or more. But, now I find myself anxiously awaiting Wednesdays so I can check out the latest arrivals and read something new. My life won't allow me to stop by the comic shop on a regular basis. The past 20 years is proof of this. So the iPad has opened a whole new door for me. I am excited, because I can read comics again, and reading comics makes me excited about drawing comics too. That's a win, win.

But I also wonder about what this means to the "brick and mortar" comic shop. I know this isn't a new concern, that electronic media has been around for some time now ... but, it's only just become apparent to me how much of an impact this can have, as I find the electronic reading experience may finally have surpassed the paper and ink one. With the iPad the books are just as portable (and not just a single comic, but your entire collection) the artwork is sharp and lovely to look at, and the reading experience is as close to the "real thing" as it's ever been. Plus, instant access to new material.

I would like to see a way to "share" purchases. I could give you one of my issues and it would disappear from my iPad and appear on yours instead. I think this would be cool because trading comics was one of those things you did as a kid that makes collecting them fun.

Now with electronic media, there is no reason for a comic to "go out of print" the issue of Action Comics #1 that I just bought could be bought by anyone this month, next month, or a year from now ... and why not? It means there will never be a sense of "rarity" from the electronic market, but then ... I think that's good. No rarity, means no speculation. There was a time when I felt like speculators were making it harder for the people who really loved to read comics to enjoy the hobby. If electronic distribution eliminates this, then I welcome it.

Also, if I am finding it easier to buy comics again perhaps others are too, and this could give the comics industry as a whole a healthy shot in the arm, which I also see as a very good thing.

I have a friend who owns a comic shop. He is struggling. He will continue to struggle. I say concentrate on back issues. There will always be those who wax nostalgic for the paper books. As for me, I see the electronic future as a saving grace ... both for myself, and for the comics industry.

Thoughts?

Jeff Moore

Feeling SUPER ...

2011-10-01T23:06:00.001-05:00

So, about a week ago I got an iPad 2. I am writing this entry with it. The thing is, this fantastic piece of technology ... This thing ... may very nearly replace my home PC entirely. It's just that amazing. But, not just my computer ... My game console ... My TV ... Everything. How can a single tool be so ridiculously useful?

It only just occurred to me today that I could use my pad as a ... Well, a pad ... Like a drawing pad. I grew up with my nose buried in a drawing pad. I used to want to draw comic books as a kid. Even as a young adult I clung to that dream. Now, as a 46 year-old man who is more adult than he ever wanted to be, I hold this pad in my hands and think ... "Yeah, I could draw again ... I could draw ..."

I downloaded the Art Studio app for my pad about 30 minutes ago. The quick sketch above isn't exactly the best thing I've ever done. But, I drew it with my finger ... With my finger using an app, I'd never seen before. Honestly, I'm proud of it and I felt the need to share. With some practice and a ten dollar stylus, I might be drawing again for real.

Today, I feel 20 years younger.

Regards,

Jeff

Introducing Mendi . . .

2011-09-21T14:48:00.000-05:00

In my previous entry, "Midnight in Paris," I mention the "significant one." Well, I thought it might be fun to introduce her. Pictured above, please enjoy this visage of the beautiful and glamorous "Mendi" on the occassion of her 40th Hello Kitty Pajama Birthday Party!

Regards,

Jeff

Midnight in Paris

2011-09-21T11:04:00.000-05:00

I am (or perhaps it would be more correct to say ... "was") a huge Woody Allen fan. Back in my formative years ... from age 13 or 14 to say my early 20's. I loved movies like, "Manhattan" and "Annie Hall." But my favorite was, "Play it Again, Sam."

Woody Allen spoke to me back then. So many of his films seemed to be about the personal struggle to find an identity. In these films, the guy "got" the girl, by first "getting" himself. And the heroes of these stories, like myself were dreamers. People who "imagined" more than pursued ... because the imagination is accessible.

To a small town kid in a small town world, everything seemed inaccessible ... so it was nice to be told that it's okay to dream. In "Play it Again, Sam," the main character was lost in a world of hero worship. To a kid raised on comic books and Doctor Who, this resonates.

Allan (Woody Allen's character) idolized Humphrey Bogart. The idolization was so complete that Bogart appears to Allan like an imaginary friend giving him advise and helping him learn to be more confident and brave, a lesson he ultimately learns as he sacrifices his own selfish happiness for the happiness of those he loves.

It is a lesson that I have carried throughout my life. I told my significant one the other day that, "The selfless decisions are the easiest ones for me to make, because they are the easiest for me to live with." It only occurs to me now, that Woody Allen taught me that ... and Humphrey Bogart taught him in the movie, Casablanca.

After "Play it Again, Sam" I too became something of a Bogart fanatic. I have seen 72 (I had a spreadsheet ... LOL) different Bogart movies all of which I taped with my VCR off of late night broadcast television and PBS back before the age of infomercials took classic movies away from TV.

Woody Allen had shown me another hero to worship, one as big and bold and brave as Superman or Doctor Who, but then he did a film with a message that seemed to kick my dreamer in the teeth. "The Purple Rose of Cairo" was a movie about a dreamer, about hero worship, about seeking an identity, and it was a film with a hard message, that seemed to say, "Dreams can't come true, and the real world is cruel, but it is all we will ever be offered."

The film shook me up (as I am sure it was meant to.) My "purple rose" colored glasses fell away ... and honestly, so did my love affair with Woody Allen. And I have not actually watched much in the way of Woody Allen since ... and that was way back in 1985 for those who are curious.

It's a shame, there is quite the filmography for Woody Allen between then and now, and although I have seen a few, (Hannah and Her Sisters, and Bullets Over Broadway) I have missed so much more. I need to revisit this inspirational force from my youth, and "Midnight in Paris" is proof of this.

"Play it Again, Sam" came to mind as I watched Owen Wilson meet his heroes in "Midnight in Paris" as did Bogart. In Casablanca, Bogart's passion is lost in Paris; in Sabrina, Audry Hepburn tells Bogart that Paris is most beautiful in the rain ... something that Woody Allen reiterates to us through Wilson.

I don't want to give away anything about this movie, so I won't ponder on the plot or events of the film, just that it made me feel the way "Play it Again, Sam" made me feel ... that we can learn from our heroes. But, interestingly it also had a message about not depending too much on dreams, but it didn't feel the need to "shock" us into this realization as "Purple Rose" had done, instead it is delivered to us as a gentle realization, as if to say dreams and reality can co-exist, and that the real danger is in placing too much importance on either one over the other.

In the end, Wilson's reality is made better for the dreams he entertains. I loved, "Midnight in Paris." Chills down my spine, loved it. I cannot recommend it enough.

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Putting the Money Where My Mouth Is ...

2011-09-19T18:00:00.001-05:00

So, I am seriously considering making a move from writer/designer to publisher ... in as much as I want to see some of my ideas evolved and developed beyond what I have proven capable of managing for myself. To that end I am looking at what it will cost me to hire a writer to write my game and an artist to illustrate my game.

I have always been an "idea man" kind of designer ... I think of something "neat" mechanically and I write it down ... then ... well, then I generally run out of steam and am onto the next "idea." ... now my ideas are mired in old school sensibilities combined with rules-lite personal tastes. My favorite RPG design is probably Mike Pondsmith's "Dream Park."

Five by Five is the game I wish to evolve. I'd like to find someone who can take my idea and shape what I want into a proper context. Give it some "legs" as it were. I have some ideas on the shape this should take, and if you took a look at the wonderful kid friendly character sheets that I plugged in my previous post you will know the direction that I want to go.

I have done some research and I believe that I can pay competitively so, the next question I have is ... how do I find the right writer for the job??

Jeff

DND for Dads ...

2011-09-16T19:10:00.002-05:00

If you haven't gotten the chance to look at these or didn't know about them, I feel like I really must spread the word. Over at the blog, "Art by STOWE" James has delighted his followers with a fantastic series of 4E character sheets just for kids in a series of posts that he calls, "DND for Dads!"

This stuff is so beautiful you really MUST give it a look!

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Zombie Game - Second Session

2011-07-18T17:02:00.001-05:00

(Zombie Beauty Queens)

So ... it seems as though my printer is always out of ink. I've gotten used to not being able to print things and my printer is generally a paper weight sitting on the desk. We had one copy of Five by Five at the table during our first game. I decided to reformat Five by Five for my Kindle so we could have two copies of Five by Five available for the next time. The Kindle handles the existing PDF okay ... but a version specifically designed for the format would be even better.

I spoke a bit about this on a previous post, but instead of importing the text and rearranging it, I just started retyping the whole thing. As I began putting the information down, and looking at things with a fresh perspective following our recent game session. I began to make changes.

The second version of Five by Five was written with the hope that I might be able to expand and advance on the first version to make a bigger and better game. However, bigger isn't necessarily better, and prettier isn't necessarily better either. The second version of Five by Five is not as concise as I prefer to be. It's still a small number of rules presented in a small number of pages. But, looking at it now it still seemed to be extraneous. Also, I am not sure why, but even though I had received a fair amount of positive feed back following the first release of Five by Five, the second one received very little.

I got it in my head that I wanted to go backwards a little bit, strip out some of the "new" stuff in the second version of Five by Five. I scrapped rules for miniatures and movement, that were never used and easily house ruled by those who would want it. I scrapped the tiered weapons and armor rules that just didn't fit and again, were not being used (at least not by my group.)

Also, for some reason, the six equals zero idea was confusing to some during play. I also really wanted consistency between the two-die rolls for task resolution and the one-die roll for damage, and more than one player complained when they rolled a "zero" for damage following a successful hit.

It suddenly occurred to me that 6 didn't have to equal zero and it could still work in exactly the same way. I changed my terminology, now calling 6 "Trump." Rolling trump would override the roll of your dice and give you something good in return. An automatic success for task rolls, improved damage for damage rolls. I got the consistency that I wanted. I fixed the "zero damage" problem. And, upon play testing the new terminology found that things were less confusing and easier to explain. Wins all around.

The term "Trump" also inadvertently created a new aspect of the game mechanic, something that could be manipulated. More little bits to play with was also a good thing. And, I had one more part of the rules that was bothering me: Doubles. The mechanic just didn't work as well as I wanted it to, and honestly, it wasn't all that popular with play testers either. It needed to go.

But, I like the idea that something fun should happen when you rolled doubles. I hit upon the thought that if you roll doubles, your very next roll would get the benefit of a doubled chance at trump (that is trump on a 5 or a 6). I liked the idea and put it on paper.

This meant that Experience and Advancement had to change. I chose the simplest system I could, and in the process eliminated the XP chart. I did the same thing for Hitpoints, incorporating the assignment of HP more properly into character creation, allowing players to assign it an importance along side their other descriptors, but also making HP equal to a simple: "Descriptor value plus 10", thus eliminating the HP table.

And while I was tinkering with character creation, I decided to add an additional descriptor to the process, there had been a few comments from various sources that maybe three starting descriptors was not enough ... so, I increased it ... but I like the simplicity and speed of character creation so I did so with caution, only increasing the number by one.

I talked to the GM about my changes and he was supportive of my new ideas. He was even excited about the new descriptor everyone would get.

Everyone got together and I explained how HP would now be assigned a value like every other descriptor on the character sheet. Players figured out their HP and then the GM revealed that he wanted everyone's new descriptor to be specifically something Zombie related.

This was cool, because in creating our characters we didn't know that we would be Zombies ... now we got the chance to add something Zombie specific.

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My character became:

Old Man Jenkins

6 - Scientist (nuclear physicist, retired)

4 - Tactician (expert chess player, steal initiative)

2 - Awesome Presence (reminds you of your dad, grouchy old man)

4 - Removable (still working) eye-ball

(Eye stops working after an hour away from "home". Must return to socket for 1d6 hours between outings. Task roll is activation upon removal ... if failed, eye must be returned to socket as if following a successful outing.)

12 - Hitpoints

We came up with the rules for the eye-ball in a matter of minutes on the fly. This is really the way I like to do things. Fast and easy. Everything was handled this way. It was quick and painless, it reminded me of gaming in the earliest of days before there was a "rule" for every thing.

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The game picked up where the other left off with us running through the sewers being closed in on from two directions. We found a manhole cover and decided to move above ground, but my one footed zombie fell landing on the beauty queen zombie knocking her unconscious. (This was a gimmick as the player who played the beauty queen zombie was unable to make it to the session that evening.)

It seemed like all was lost but another zombie showed up to help lead us out. It was the zombie street kid who had gotten beaten up in the last game. And he was being played by another player who joined our game session but missed the first one.

His character was created as a skater-dude, a young punkish kid with multi-colored "flock-o-seagulls" hair and typical skate boarding street kid attire. He led us back to "his" skate shop, where his handlers promptly used his shock collar to zap him into submission for bringing in strays.

My character "Jenkins" had retained enough scientific knowledge to be able to disable his collar and the collars of his companions, but had not had the chance to do the Skater's collar yet. So, down skater went, and as the remote was turned on us, Jenkins did the same, falling to the ground rather then reveal that the collar didn't work.

Our group, of now 4 zombies (including the still unconscious because her player wasn't there beauty queen zombie) was stacked in the corner like firewood. There we bided our time, waiting for Skater to regain his senses.

When, who should walk in ... but a security patrol who gave the owners of the skate shop our description.

"Sure, they are right over here."

And the combat was on. This combat lasted a good long while with me and Ninja Burger Zombie fighting for our lives. Eventually, Skater woke up, but apparently still suffering under the delusion that he is alive and owns the skate shop, steps in to try and stop his new friends from killing his employees.

It was fun and funny and fast a furious. Again, the system seemed to serve the combat well with the right mix of success, failure and uncertainty.

The new, "Rolling doubles allows you to count both 5 and 6 as trump on your next roll ..." rule worked well and made a difference on more than one roll, including allowing for at least one high damage hit.

We were given XP and several of us (including myself) bought a new descriptor at rank 2. Now with a few combats under his belt, Jenkins added "Brawling."

The only problem I had with the game was that sometimes in the excitement players would forget whether or not they had rolled doubles in the last round.

I already had an idea for how to fix that ... but it would have to wait until our next game ...

Regards,

Jeff

5x5 Zombie Game

2011-07-15T11:18:00.002-05:00

So we are playing a Zombie game that a friend is GM-ing. He chose to use the 5x5 rules (I didn't even have to pay him!) and I think we are all very pleased with the way things are working out.

Our first session was pre the most recent rewrite of 5x5 (and is what prompted it.) The GM told us to make up the typical victim turned hero type that might appear in a Zombie Apocalypse kind of movie.

He had us pick our three strong traits but informed us that HE would be "giving" us our one weak trait.

It took no time at all for each of us to pick three traits and write them down. Character creation was finished in moments, even though none of us had been prepared ahead of time.

I made a character and chose three strong traits.

Old Man Jenkins

6 - Scientist (nuclear physicist, retired)
4 - Tactician (expert chess player, steal initiative)
2 - Awesome Presence (reminds you of your dad, grouchy old man)

Once this was done, the GM informed us that we were in actuality all Zombies and explained to us the world we lived in based loosely on a movie called Fido.

He then gave us our "weaknesses" based on this revelation. Mine was that my character was missing a foot. Which I turned into a weak rank trait and added to my character.

Weak - Ambulation (dodge, missing left foot)

Add to this that the character is wearing a shock collar to keep him in line, using a walking cane (that serves as a +1 damage improvised weapon), and that he has 10 hit-points and we were ready to play.

We went from no characters, no ideas, to ready to play in less than an hour (including the time the GM spent explaining the setting and our individual situations).

It seems that our characters (and mine especially, given that I chose to create a character whose traits imply something of a brainiac) have become aware of our plight as the "slave labor" force to humankind and we have decided to try to organise some kind of revolt.

The assumed setting of "Zombie Apocalypse" was revealed to be, "Zombie Freedom Fighters" in a setting that seems very much to be like a post "Shawn of the Dead" world.

We began play by "escaping" from our various places of service/captivity to reconnoitre at a prearranged meeting place, the basement of a McDonald's. (Do McDonalds' even have basements?)

This one did, with convenient sewer tunnel access and was the place of employment of one of the other players, a zombie burger flipper who possessed Ninja like skills with spatula weapons and a weakness of "no thumbs."

The GM explained to the Ninja-Burger's player that because of his expertise with the spatulas he would not suffer any penalties while using them, but that other acts of manual dexterity would in fact fall under the umbrella of his debilitating thumblessness.

For the first game, it was just three player characters, and as we intersected with each other on our way to the agreed meeting place, we were spotted by security patrols who enforce a strict curfew forbidding zombies from being out alone after dark.

The last player was a Beauty-Queen turned zombie pleasure slave and of the three of us looked the least zombie like and the most like a normal human (although she is missing an eye - her weakness.)

She fastened collars on our necks to make us appear to be a wealthy human woman in the control of two zombie escorts, which might have worked except ... The patrol wasn't after us, they had spotted another lone zombie, a street hood zombie of some kind and proceeded to kick the tar out of the lone figure.

This, I decided, was just too much for my own character to bear, and I leapt into the fray, cane in hand, yelling, "Oppressors!"

The battle went well. The dice rolls seemed to work to create the right kind of odds, with the ratio of "hits to misses" feeling about like it would if we had been using a seasoned system like D&D.

The beauty-queen was badly injured however, and the GM had informed us that in this setting, the only way for we as zombies to recover from injury was through the consumption of human flesh. Beauty began snacking on one of the security guards, just as some pedestrians (children) came by and began screaming.

Adding to this, the GM informs us that we can hear "moaning" and it seems as though the other security guard is regaining consciousness. In a state of panic we flee the scene as quickly as possible ... by stealing the security guards' patrol car.

(Turns out the moaning wasn't from the downed security guard at all, but from the assaulted zombie laying helpless on the ground, that we now left behind as we fled the scene.)

We return to our perspective "homes" but, being without thumbs, Ninja is unable to remove the "leash" that Beauty had placed on him earlier, and we completely forgot about it.

Ninja's keepers are concerned that someone has attempted to steal their zombie burger chef and they investigate the possibility, discovering the sewer tunnels we've been using to move about.

Ninja is tethered for his own protection but escapes that night to try to rejoin us and report what has happened. In the process he triggers some new security and the chase is on again.

In the cliff-hanger ending of the evening, we are together lost in the sewer tunnels, with security teams approaching from two different directions.

It was, fun. It was exciting. 5x5's lack of rules proves to be liberating as we find that we have just enough structure to do what we need to do and a good framework for improvising the rest.

The action never slows down and the game system stays very nicely out of the way of the game play.

At the end I am concerned by the lopsided distribution of doubles and also with the scant amount. I make a mental note to look at 5x5's "Doubles equals Experience" mechanic with thoughts of replacing it somehow.

But, overall I am very pleased with 5x5's performance. And everyone has fun.

I will talk about the changes that I have made to the 5x5 rules (and why) and about our second zombie game session in my next post.

Regards,

Jeff

Five by Five Print ver. and Character Sheet

2011-07-13T14:50:00.000-05:00

I have put up a print version of Five by Five. Each page of the Kindle/screen version is one fourth of the print page so the print version came in at 7 pages. I went ahead and added a character sheet to make the page count an even 8.

The character sheet design is courtesy of my friend Burl King. Check it out!

Regards,

Jeff Moore

PDF Archive

2011-07-12T12:41:00.002-05:00

Seems like I am always finding out about something new. I wanted a place to host my PDF documents so that I can share them here in my blog. I have been using Google Docs and Scribd. These work, but what I really want is a way to host my documents so that the direct link to the file is relatively seemless.

I thought that I had found the storage solution that I was looking for in PDF Archive. It is actually pretty slick and allows you to download files without membership which is something that people have complained about with scribd.

The link takes you to a page dedicated to the PDF in question that then allows you to download. it's as unobtrusive as they come so I am thinking about putting my stuff there as well as scribd.

I still really like scribd's enbedded viewer that allows visitors to read my PDF's directly from my blog.

pdf file: Five by Five 2.5.pdf

The above link goes to the latest version of Five by Five.

Regards,

Jeff

Five by Five version 2.5

2011-07-08T22:14:00.000-05:00

So, it's been ages since I posted. A friend of mine was talking about how he needed to brush up on his writing skills. I suggested that he consider blogging, but this made me realise how neglectful of my own blog I have become.

I usually blog quite a lot if I am working on an RPG project. But these days I don't have any RPG ideas knocking around inside my head ... so, I haven't been writing at all.

That is unfortunate, as I feel writing is a very good exercise for my brain. One of the reasons I have created as many RPG's as I have is just for the exercise it provides me. It's fun, and creative, and very personal. If any of the games I create prove to be playable, and are actually played ... this is an unexpected boon.

So, just for the heck of it I start "re-writing" Five by Five. Not changing it, just recomposing it, in case I might accidentally discover some new elegant way of saying things. I also wanted to format Five by Five for my Kindle. The Kindle can read PDFs but working with multi-column PDFs on the Kindle screen is actually more of a pain then it is on the computer screen.

So I am reformating for an age of eBook Readers, Kindles, and iPods. I also got lazy and cut-and-pasted some of my text in some spots which defeats the whole re-write exercise, but I did find that while I was working on it, I had a few new ideas.

Sixes when rolled are no longer regarded as zero but still work the same way. A simple change in terminology created a new mechanic for the game that adds some fun new possibilities.

I have stripped out a bunch of stuff I added to ver 2 that don't really help the game and have actually taken a few steps back to be closer to the first version of the game.

Things aren't complete, but I felt a need to blog and share ... so, here we are.

Five by Five 2.5

Doctor What

2011-04-29T13:17:00.000-05:00

Charlie McDonnell and his band Chameleon Circuit write and perform songs about Doctor Who! (They are so cool like! Check them out on YouTube!)

Regards,

Jeff

CONFECTION-ATE!

2011-04-27T16:28:00.000-05:00

My friend Larry made me some awesome Dalek cupcakes to celebrate "Doctor Who Day" this past Saturday.

They tasted super-yummy! They were Dalek-cious!

Regards,

Jeff

If you are interested, here is a slide show of pictures Larry took detailing the process as he made the cupcakes!

Decorating for Easter

View more presentations from larrystraining

Getting Ready for the new season of Doctor Who!

2011-04-18T13:37:00.001-05:00

This is a music video (song by Charlie McDonnell) that sums up the events of the finale of Season 5 of Doctor Who.

Now you should be all up to date and ready to watch the new season of Doctor Who!

I am so excited!!

Regards,

Jeff

Doctor ... Me!

2011-03-12T10:15:00.000-06:00

A friend posted this photo of me from a convention some 20 years ago and I just had to share it. I've always been such a huge Doctor Who geek.

In Memory of my friend, Robert Briggs – January 4, 1961 ~ February 13, 2011

2011-02-20T17:54:00.002-06:00

I want to take a moment to speak out on behalf of one of the lowest ranked tiers on the modern world's tree of social hierarchy: the gamer geek.

I am a gamer geek. On the ladder of social acceptability, I fall pretty close to the bottom. It's not a place I necessarily chose to be. But I reside there happily now, and with some pride.

It happens like this:

From the moment a child enters school they learn to cluster into small social groups. The athletic, strong, and bold children tend to tower over the intelligent introspective children at an early age. On the playground which is a school age child's greatest venue for social interaction, it is he who runs fastest, climbs highest, and kicks the ball the hardest who earns accolades and respect.

The value of things like books and reading has not yet really been recognised. It is not part of the playground social experience and so if a child wants to fit in and grow strong socially, he abandons such things in pursuit of the more physical activities and the social acceptance that goes along with them.

I didn't make that transition. It was never in me to be an athlete. The sad thing is, patterns learned early in life, are hard to unlearn, and once delegated the role of social misfit, that role and the stigmas associated with it tend to stick with a person. And so, I became a social outcast. I had very few friends and grew accustomed to the idea, that for me, this is the way my life would remain.

That is until something special happened to me in high school. I was 15 years old and I was introduced to a game called, Dungeons and Dragons. I joined forces with a few other kids … kids like me, who had been outcasts, who weren't the fastest, strongest, boldest, children on the playground. And if it weren't for this game, we might have remained strangers. Even if we weren't the popular kids on the playground, society had taught us to want to become that, and that meant staying away from the other geeks in hopes of drawing the mercy and attention of the popular kids.

But, this game … it gave us a reason to be together, and the playground … it existed too, in our imaginations. In this game, we could be strong and fast and bold. We created a playground in our minds and we were its heroes. And for the first time in my life, I made friends … real friends. Friendships that survive to this day, 30 years later.

I mention all of this for a reason. I link posts to my gaming blog (this blog) to my Facebook page. So, it's quite possible that someone reading this may be unfamiliar with how a person might come to be a gamer geek. Those of us who lived it, know it's no mystery. It's just a small group of friends united by their uncommon imaginations and the joy found in using their minds to participate in the sports that other “physical” athletes practice with their bodies. Perhaps if more people perceived gamers for what they really are, athletes of mental prowess, the societal preconceptions regarding our ilk might become a bit more friendly.

Anyway … before I forget why I started this post, let me continue. My first and best social interactions began at the gaming table. As an adult when I moved to Tulsa (where I still live twenty five years later) I didn't know anyone and I needed to find some friends. I looked to the one community where I had felt welcome before. The gamer community.

It started in a comic book store, “World of Comics” (Gamer geeks and comic book collector geeks share a lot of crossover. It's all about exercising the imagination to become the best mental athletes that we can. I want to enter “Doctor Who Trivia” in the Olympics.) The owner of the store and I had chatted about gaming a bit (as I was prone to spending my pay checks on gaming books) and one day he approached me about “running” a game at his store. (In role-playing games, one player serves as a sort of auteur /director sort of like the way Charlie Chaplin made films. He presents a scene and allows the other players of the game to react to it, contributing the way the character they have chosen to represent might react or respond within the scene. It's a sort of storytellers brainstorming session lead by a single director.) When Doug (the owner of the comic shop) asked me to run a game, he was asking me to be that “director.”

I agreed, and actually found myself in the back room of Doug's store the rest of that afternoon jotting down notes and forming ideas for some possible scenes and scenarios with which to challenge some players that very evening. And we played that night. The game wasn't Dungeons and Dragons but another of its ilk called Champions. Where Dungeons and Dragons is a game of telling stories about Knights and Wizards in days of yore, Champions was about the heroic battles of superheroes in a modern day metropolis (we were playing in a comic book store after all.)

That first game consisted of myself and Douglas Goodsell who owns World of Comics along with a few of Doug's customers, none of whom I had met before. They were Robert Briggs, Robert Ohlde, and Roland Vogt. So, it was me, the director/referee (called a GM or Game Master) and the four players, Robert, Robert, Roland, and Doug. It was a nice little group and we had a great time. We had such a great time in fact, that each player invited a friend to play the next time, and our little group doubled in size. That's when I met Robert Brigg's best friend, David Crockett. (Yes his name's Davy Crockett … don't make fun, he doesn't like it, and I will hurt you.)

We played in the back of the comic store with 8 or so players for awhile, and it was a great beginning to a new chapter of gamer geekdom social climbing in my life. Doug as a responsible store owner really couldn't in good conscience deny any of his customers who inquired, the opportunity to play. In short order, the group had grown to 25 players and I had to slam on the breaks. There were just too many people to play the game, but despite this, everyone seemed to have a good time hanging around and chatting. Still the game degraded and collapsed under its own weight.

Some of the first and best friends I made in Tulsa, came from that group. In fact, desperate to keep playing, Doug and Robert and David and myself concocted a scheme to play and keep our group smaller and more manageable. Doug really couldn't tell the folks at his store that they couldn't play in his game … but we knew from our past experience that once you said yes, it opened the flood gates to gaming oblivion. So we conspired to meet secretly to game, in a top secret, undisclosed location, the game that no one could know about.

We drove to Broken Arrow, a suburb of Tulsa, and gamed in the back room of my sister's house. No one knew where we were, or what we were doing. We had dropped off the geek radar. We were Ninja Gamer Geeks. And the small group of Doug, Robert, Dave, and Jeff had great fun. Unfortunately, Robert, bless his generous outgoing boisterous little heart just could not keep a secret. And word of the Ninja gamers got out pretty quickly.

Doug at that point dropped out, because he just didn't feel right about running a store and denying access to the gaming group to the various customers that all counted him as a friend. David, Robert and I kept playing. And despite the tiny size of our group we remained exclusive. Not because we were “snooty” or anything, just because the experience at the comic store made us gun shy. At least at first, then after that, it was just habit.

Our little group met once a week for fifteen years, we added a member or two here or there, then I allowed my life to pull me away from the game and for the last five years I haven't played. Although Dave and Robert (with my brother Chris) continued to play.

On February 13 of this year, Robert Briggs passed away in his sleep. I am so incredibly shaken by the sadness of this event, that I can't begin to express it. All I can do, is tell you here about how we met, about the kindred spirit I found in a fellow gamer geek, and about the love and camaraderie two long time friends were able to form from across the gaming table.

I saw so much of myself in Robert. A gamer like me, not an athlete, not one of the popular kids, but a kid like me who dreamed and imagined and lived a world of grand adventure within the limitless confines of his imagination … a mental athlete of the highest degree. At the memorial service, they didn't ask people to come forward, and give testimony. I wish that they had. I feel that I need that. I am going to do that here.

I remember that Robert never walked into a room … he bounded, like Tigger on Winney the Pooh. He shared a lot in common with that lovable character, the exuberance and enthusiasm. I can almost hear him declairing, “That's what Robert's do best!”

He was a gamer geek and he loved to game. But, unlike the rest of us gamer geeks who were well aware of our lowly status as social outcasts, Robert had no such preconceptions. And in his case, this ignorance was truly bliss. We worked together in the same company. (He recommended me for my job there, and I work there to this day.) He would come to work on Monday morning after a weekend gaming session and bounce around the office telling everyone about the dragon we had slain (or as was more likely in a game in which Robert was playing, the dragon we befriended.)

And … I was … ashamed. I didn't feel comfortable telling everyone about gaming. Men were meant to talk about football, and pro-wrestling, and the stock-market, or some shit … I don't know … but, not gaming … not in public … at work! Didn't he know people would laugh at him?

But, I was wrong. I was very wrong … People didn't laugh at Robert, they embraced him. They embraced him because he was open and honest and genuine, more than any person they were ever likely to meet in their lifetimes. And they all loved him. Everyone who knew Robert loved him almost as much as I did. Because genuine people are rare and they must be cherished.

Robert lived his life as nobly as he played the characters in our games. He was as brave as any knight, and as magical as any wizard. If I believed in an afterlife and a place called heaven, then I think that each heaven would have to be custom made for the spirit who dwells within it, and if that's true, then I know that brave sir Robert is up there somewhere casting magical spells, and befriending dragons even as I write this.

Robert you are loved, and there will always be a place for you at my game table.

Jeff

Starting Age for Adventurers in Castles and Crusades

2011-01-22T23:02:00.000-06:00

So I am transcribing Mendi's new Castles and Crusades Gnome character onto a character sheet and the question of "age" confronted me. There is a racial age chart on page 31 of the Castles and Crusades Players Handbook, but it only talks about ages starting with Middle aged and goes older from there.

I thought about it and we know that humans likely begin adventuring around 18. Well the age chart shows human middle age as 35. Using that as a guide I can extrapolate that a character might normally begin adventuring at half of middle age (35 / 2 = 17.5.)

Using the age table on page 31 and applying this formula I can find the approximate age at which each character likely began adventuring. Problem solved right? Well … That would make Mendi's Gnome 87 years old. And the Elves and Eladrin in the party would be 250 years old and assumed to be of a maturity level roughly similar to a 17 year old human.

That doesn't seem right to me. Neither does the idea that all these races reach maturation at age 18 and the difference in their aging only kicks in after this. I decided to enforce my own concept of character maturation at younger ages that assumes that the races evolve through adolescence at a similar but not exactly the same rates.

Here is what I have devised. I have based choices on the age chart on page 31 of the C&C Players Handbook, but these rules are completely my own.

First I will start with Humans. I am going to include a randomizer to vary things up a little. Consider this. The closest things to humans on the table are Halflings and Half-Orcs. Half-Orcs have shorter life spans while Halfings live longer. After Halflings age jumps get bigger and bigger.

I chose to play with the variation of age range while keeping the minimum starting age fairly close. I have Steve Kenson and his unique approach to Fudge Dice (with the Icons RPG) to thank for the way I applied the age modifiers. I think they work quite well.

Half-Orc starting age: 16 + 2d4–5
(+ or – up to 3 years … 13 – 19 with 16 the average.)

Human starting age: 18 + 2d4–5
(+ or – up to 3 years … 15 – 21 with 18 the average.)

Halfling starting age: 20 + 2d6–7
(+ or – up to 5 years … 15 – 25 with 20 the average.)

Half-Elf starting age: 22 + 2d8–9
(+ or – up to 7 years … 15 – 29 with 22 the average.)

Gnome starting age: 24 + 2d10–11
(+ or – up to 9 years … 15 – 33 with 24 the average.)

Dwarf starting age: 26 + 2d12–13
(+ or – up to 11 years … 15 – 37 with 26 the average.)

Elf starting age: 34 + 2d20–21
(+ or – up to 19 years … 15 – 53 with 34 the average.)

Okay, so this allows for an Elf to begin his adventuring career at over 50. Which seems old. But not nearly as old as 250 … and for a people that live to be almost 2000 years old, I can see 50 seeming to be quite the young pup.

What do you think?

Regards,

Jeff

Leaving 4E but finding joy in C&C

2011-01-20T18:44:00.001-06:00

So, I have been running 4th Edition Dungeons and Dragons on Tuesday nights for some months now. This was an experiment by myself and other players to give the new 4th Edition (maybe not so new any more) a go. What we found was that the tendency of the rules to tie everything a player might try to do to a simplified modular process seemed to hamper creativity and made the players feel tied to those processes. Game play felt like a board game, and characters seemed like they came straight from an MMO computer game.

I believe 4E is doing what it intends to do by design. And as a board game it balances all its pieces so that everyone feels like they are getting a fair deal. But for us, a big part of role-play is what you do "outside" of the rules. The creativity the players feel that they themselves are able to bring to the table. The 4E rules don't encourage you as players to "break" them. As silly as it seems ... that's a mistake.

This past week, I decided to switch to Castles and Crusades. I have a first print C&C Players Handbook and a first print Monster and Treasure book which I bought from Peter Bradley (fantastic artist!) at the Troll Lords table at a local convention a few years ago. We are using these rules, but I understand the 4th Printing is out (pictured) and includes some improvements. If someone can clue me in on what I am missing, I may need to make that purchase. At least an electronic copy if nothing else.

Two of my players: my friend, Larry ... and the love of my life, Mendi. Each decided they did not wish to convert their 4th Edition characters and would rather start new characters instead. We chatted about it and all decided that it might be fun if their character's died in some spectacular way. Plans were made.

The last game ended in a cliff hanger as the party was attacked by a group of giant weapon wielding, armor wearing gorillas. I informed the group that these Gorillas had mental powers and that Tieflings (Larry's 4E character's race) were especially susceptible to the mental powers of these Gorillas. Larry played to the plan and when I told him that his character had been mind controlled and that he must attack the party, he of course, attacked Mendi.

The combat against the Gorillas was pretty exciting. I rolled two natural 20's against the same player. This left her at a negative 3 and unconscious. I looked up C&C's rules on death and it seems characters don't die until negative 10 (pretty standard old school) and don't start bleeding out until -5 (I think that was it ... which was happy news to me, because it meant the character was down but stable and not out and I hadn't started my first C&C session by killing (unintentionally) someone.

The character that was down was created as Mendi's character's twin sister. I saw it as a bit of good fortune that she fell early because she was the most likely to put herself between Larry's character and Mendi's character, and ruin one or both of their deaths.

Larry and Mendi happily fudged dice rolls at each other and the other players occupied with armored gorillas and a fallen comrade hardly seemed to notice them. That is, until Mendi announced that she had only two hit points left (who knows how many she really had, but this was what she chose to announce as she set up the group for her impending death) and Larry's fifth level Warlock, now a fifth level C&C wizard announced he was casting fireball.

Larry rolled 5d6. He rolled a total of 16. If Mendi made her save she would take 8 points of damage. Since she had just announced that she had 2 hit points that would mean she would be left with negative 6. Down, but still alive. The tension was palatable. The funny thing is, there was just as much anticipation for Mendi who wanted to fail the roll as there was for the the other players, who weren't in on the plan, and all hoping she would survive.

Now all eyes were on Mendi. There was no fudging this roll. Every player watched in anticipation. She rolled a 1.

Negative 14. Dead. I took great pleasure in describing the charred remains of Mendi's character as the other players all looked at me aghast! The player who played the character who was Mendi's character's twin was beside herself.

"What do you mean she is dead?"

"Isn't there anything we can do?"

"I will avenge you, my sister. I will!"

Then Mendi says, "My ghost comes to her in a dream and demands vengeance!"

Perfect. I announce to the player of the twin sister that her divine visitation from her dead sister's spirit demanding vengence has awakened her and that she is now up and has 5 hit points.

No hesitation, no questions, she charges straight at Larry. Boom! She hits him for 5 points of damage. He announces that he's at negative 2. That's not going to work. He's down ... defeated, but not dead. Mendi, playing devil's advocate coaxes the other player ... that's not going to satisfy your sister's spirit ... he's still alive.

I allow her an automatic critical hit for double damage against a helpless target and it's all over. Larry's character dies a bloody death at the hands of another player and everyone not in on the plan looks around in shock. Except for the player who killed Larry, she seemed exceptionally pleased with herself that she was able to avenge her sister.

It was awesome!

The remaining Gorillas are defeated and only after all is said and done do I reveal that it was all a set up, and that both Mendi and Larry have requested permission to make new characters.

At this point there is a great sense of relief from everyone and everyone shares how excited they were and how afraid they were that everyone was going to die.

Did I mention that, "It was awesome!"

Castles and Crusades may well prove to be more dangerous and deadly than 4E ... but it seems like that's okay with my players. I already feel liberated from 4E and free to interpret and house rule various aspects of C&C to fit my play-style and that of my group. Something I never felt I was able to do with 4E. The rules just didn't seem flexible enough.

The difference between 4E and C&C is that of Computer MMO RPG's and old school Tabletop RPG's, digital and analogue, Lego Blocks and a lump of clay. There is nothing wrong with 4E, but I think I prefer the freedom of a game where less is more.

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Oh, yeah ...

2010-12-19T01:00:00.000-06:00

Merry Christmas

2010-12-17T09:33:00.000-06:00

Announcing the PAKISTAN FLOOD RELIEF RPG Bundle

2010-10-20T17:32:00.002-05:00

Click Here or read the press release below.

October 19^th, 2010

DriveThruRPG Launches Charity Bundle for Pakistan Flood Relief

(Atlanta, GA) – DriveThruRPG, an Internet-based business that specializes in the marketing and distribution of RPGs and roleplaying accessories for traditional dice-and-paper gaming, has posted a bundle of products provided by participating publishers for the purpose of generating charity revenue for the relief of Pakastan's flood victims.

As was done earlier this year for the people of Haiti, DriveThruRPG is calling upon the gaming community to once again make donations towards a fund that will ultimately be wired to Doctors Without Borders. The bundle is priced at $25.00 and contains dozens of donated products valued at over $700.00. The entire amount received from those making donations will go to Pakistan relief.

“Though it has long since moved out of the primary news cycle, the plight of the Pakistani people remains a terrible story,” said Sean Patrick Fannon, Marketing and Communications Manager for DriveThruRPG. “Millions remain homeless, and many thousands of lives are at risk due to injuries, illness, and starvation. We proved once before that we can provide some help to those in need, and we are determined to do so again.”

DriveThruRPG remains committed to its relationship with Doctors Without Borders; thanks to their non-partisan, non-philosophical agenda and their dedication to provide medical assistance and aid all over the world, they remain the perfect choice to channel help where it is needed.

“Discovering the power to make a difference, as we did with our Haiti efforts, was inspirational,” said Steve Wieck, Co-owner of DriveThruRPG. “Once again we are driven to leverage our tools and our marketplace to reach out to those who suffer, and we are grateful that we have the ability to do so.”

The Pakistan Flood Relief RPG Bundle, provided at a donation price of $25, will remain available until Monday, October 25^th, at www.drivethrurpg.com. As well, DriveThruComics (www.drivethrucomics.com) has a similar bundle for $10, containing over $100 in comics titles.

DriveThruRPG.com is the world's largest source of RPG products available for download, as well as a burgeoning source of digital content for gamers. It is an industry leader in modern business and technology developments for the tabletop gaming fan. For more information, contact Sean Patrick Fannon (sean@onebookshelf.com, 614-946-9371).

Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) is an international medical humanitarian organization working in nearly 70 countries to assist people whose survival is threatened by violence, neglect, or catastrophe. For more information, contact Emily Linendoll, Press Officer (emily.linendoll@newyork.msf.org, 212-763-5764).

Tormenta (Storm) - The most popular RPG in Brazil

2010-08-27T11:01:00.006-05:00

So, since a friend ... okay, someone I completely don't know ... but I call him friend because he found my game! (see previous post) ... Anyway ... since this friend found my game, I've been browsing his blog site. It's an RPG news site written in Portuguese that's been around since 2002 (8 years is a pretty impressive lineage on these interwebs IMO.) He talks about Mini-Six which is a super cool free RPG that I've also mentioned here as well as others, and he talks about games written in his native language (obviously.)

One that I have never heard of (no reason why I should have) is called "Tormenta" (translated from Portuguese as Storm or Tempest.) It's a D20 fantasy game using the 3.X Dungeons and Dragons framework but it seems to be its own unique animal. And I want one.

Just look at these bullet points (Roughly translated by Google translate):

Storm D20: Player's Guide
We make a better world!

The Goddess of humanity has been transformed into a statue. The Alliance of Black goblinoids relentless advance of the kingdom. The Lords of the Storm launch storms of blood and demons. This is a world giant dragon-kings, high priests invincible and conflicts between the gods. A world that desperately needs heroes.

You agree to be one of them?

STORM is the first and largest Brazilian medieval fantasy setting compatible with the d20 System. Now updated with version 3.5 of the Rules, Storm D20: Player's Guide offers:

6 new races: Centaur, Minotaur, Sea-Elf, Goblin, Nagahara and Sprite.
2 new basic classes: Samurai, master of the katana sword, and the gallant Swashbuckler.
10 new prestige classes: Goblin Balloonist, Goblin Engineer, Explorer of the Storm, Imperial Gladiator, Woodsman, Wizard of the Storm, Nomad, Gunslinger, Ranger Priest, and Black Cave.
76 talents, including new talents and skills of regional and Samurai Swashbuckler.
All spells classified Pathways Elementary, and 28 new spells.
21 new magical items and artifacts, including Rubies of Virtue, the Eye of Sszzaas, and the Holy Avenger Sword.
Rules for clerics and paladins of the twenty gods of the Pantheon, including Powers Granted.

I don't know about you, but it looks pretty awesome to me. I have been playing 4e for a few weeks now, and honestly I've become a bit disenchanted with the newest version of D&D.

I see 4th Edition this way. The rules have been streamlined to create a cohesive and consistent combat mechanic. Where ever possible the rules have tried to make every form of action work the same. A swing of a sword and the casting of a magic missile now use the same mechanic for example, but are based on different character stats. (And a magic missile can "miss" its target.) This "streamlining" and "consolidating" of systems has served to make the game more uniform. This uniformity is then "cheated" by rules exceptions called "exploits."

Exploits are everything your character can do. A wizard casts a magic missile. That's an exploit. A warrior cleaves through an enemy. That's an exploit. And there are many, many of these. Exploits each do something a little extra, above and beyond the basics of the rules. They are what makes each character unique and interesting (or at least, this is the intent.) Think of a collectible card game. There are strict rules and structure and then cards are provided to "break" the rules.

That's 4th edition. It's a collectible card game, or a board game. It's a tight structure with a simple streamlined system that is then riddled by "micro-rules." Exploits manipulate structure in exactly the same way as a card in a collectible card game might do. They don't however inspire a lot of "ideas" for ways to manipulate, change or re-imagine the effects of these exploits within the context of role play. They are only mechanical. And because everything has been streamlined to work identically and everything is "only mechanical" ... everything feels the same.

Before 4th edition we had a Fighter, a Magic User, a Cleric, and a Thief represented as an Apple, an Orange, a Pineapple, and a Pear. Now with 4th edition we have four Watermelons. Big impressive looking fruits, and painted on them is a picture of an Apple, an Orange, a Pineapple, and a Pear ... but they all taste exactly the same.

I want some tasty new fruit. Does anyone know if there are any plans to translate Tormenta into English for North American consumption? Because it looks like an amazing fruit salad of goodness to me!

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Xerospace - My first RPG!

2010-08-26T23:55:00.002-05:00

This is a science fiction role-playing game with a sort of superheroic bent. The idea is that traveling through hyper-space (Xerospace) causes mutations. It's sort of X-men meets Star Trek. It is also the first RPG that I ever wrote. My thanks to Daniel "Talude" Paes Cuter (a wonderful man who writes a RPG Blog in Brazil (translated from Portuguese - hope this link works) for finding it for me so that I can share it with you.

Xerospace was written and laid out with Word Perfect 4.1 (I think?) on a Tandy Computer running MS DOS 5. It was a 286 with a 20 meg hard drive. My internet provider was Mindspring (dial-up) and they provided me with a little space to host my files. I built a simple web page and linked the document to unclebear.com which had one of the biggest collections of free RPG's on the web at the time (in fact, the ONLY one that I knew of.) It was 1997 to 1998. I had thought I had lost this work forever! The internet is an incredible place. Thanks, again Daniel!!

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Print on Demand "Five by Five" Available!!

2010-08-22T23:23:00.002-05:00

The Print on Demand version of Five by Five is available! It's full color for only $5.95! I am really excited about this one! The POD of Five by Five looks awesome!!

I will offer a small warning/word of advise ... the cheapest shipping option is standard post and my copies got to me pretty beat up. For a few dollars more you can have them ship FedEx and that got my book shipped in a light weight card stock mailer which provided enough protection to make it worth the extra. All told you should still be able to get a beautiful full color version of Five by Five of your very own for about $10.

Regards,

(a very excited) Jeff Moore

Hi/Lo Heroes

2010-08-16T18:02:00.008-05:00

It has been brought to my attention that you have to be a member of Scribd in order to download documents and some people don't wish to do that.

Here is an alternative link to Hi/Lo Heroes on Google Docs for those who want to download the game but don't want to join Scribd.

Hope this helps!

Regards,

Jeff Moore

MagCloud Print On Demand Alternative

2010-08-16T13:41:00.003-05:00

So, I have plans to make a print version of Five by Five available from MagCloud. The production cost seems kind of high and I want to make the print version available for as little as possible. I am settling on a cost of $5.95. I'm hoping that's affordable enough that people will opt to go ahead and buy it, because although I lament the production cost above (stating it's 'kind of high,') I just got my proofs in the mail, and the production values are equally high.

MagCloud is set up to allow small independent publishers to publish magazines. The magazine format serves Five by Five's low page count and use of color interior quite well. The Five by Five 'magazine' is full color throughout on a nice coated stock. The colors are bright and the whole thing is just truly beautiful. I am very pleased with the results.

I am also quite happy with my experience with the MagCloud website. I was able to upload my PDF and preview the 'print' copy with very little effort or technical know how. It was easy, and it was fast. And they sent my draft copy to me for review free of charge (all I paid was shipping.) If I have any complaints at all, it's that the cheapest shipping option ($1.40) saw my copy of Five by Five get banged up in the mail. The issue is sealed in plastic that's fairly durable, but it's still just plastic, and the postman doesn't have any reservations about bending the magazine in half.

I have made a number of minor revisions to Five by Five since its release only a week ago. Most of these were tiny, tweeky, perfectingish sorts of things, and I am feeling really good about where the game is right now. It was really cool to hold the printout in my hands even if it was bent up a bit. I am expecting another draft to arrive within the week with all my final changes, and then, hopefully, I will be ready to go live. This time I chose a slightly more expensive shipping option (FedEx for $4.04) to see if that might ensure the magazine gets to me in slightly better condition.

I am concentrating efforts on play testing for right now to make sure all the "numbers" I have chosen to represent all the various things in the game actually work in play as well as I hoped they would when I committed them to paper. I will complete several play tests before I make the print version available. I don't want people paying money for something "half-baked."

By the way ... if anyone else is trying Five by Five at their game table I would love to hear the results of your game sessions.

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Five by Five on Scribd

2010-08-13T21:19:00.001-05:00

I have decided that publishing on Scribd is far superior to what I have been doing with Google Docs. For one I can embed the document here in my blog and it makes it possible to access and read my game without leaving the Dreams and Dragons blog site. Second, I can publish updates and revisions to my documents on Scribd without effecting the link addresses. This is a major deal. Every time I update a document in Google Docs I would have to go through and update all the links to that doc. It was a real hassle. I am updating my site to use the strength of the new links. Also, I just got my draft print of Five by Five Print version from Mag Cloud and it looks awesome!! I hope to make that available soon.

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Three great ways to Five by Five!

2010-08-13T21:08:00.021-05:00

Print On Demand

Get a beautiful full color Print Copy of Five by Five from Mag Cloud for only $5.95

(I strongly recommend choosing the FedEx shipping option. Regular post can be a bit abusive of your new purchase.)

Full Color PDF

Read online or download absolutely free!

(Altenative Link to Google Docs for those who don't want to join Scribd to download.)

Text Only (No Art)

Download and print. Won't strain your printer.

(Alternative Link to Google Docs for those who don't want to join Scribd to download.)

Five by Five (printer friendly version)

2010-08-13T20:57:00.001-05:00

This is the printer friendly version of Five by Five. All graphics have been removed.

New Five by Five Review (hopefully first of many)

2010-08-11T17:01:00.002-05:00

Rob Lang over at the FreeRPG Blog has reviewed my game Five by Five!

Thanks, Rob!!

The Free RPG Blog: Five By Five by Jeff Moore, making me excited abou...: "'Hold it right there, limey ginger guy! You don't like generic systems very much. You say there is nothing between them and need a setting t..."

Five by Five (version 2)

2010-08-10T13:12:00.009-05:00

You can click "Fullscreen" to read Five by Five without leaving Dreams and Dragons, or "Download" the PDF to read off-line. Alternatively, you can click HERE for a printer friendly version of the rules (no art.)

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Homestar Runner: Strongbad (Trogdor the burninator!)

2010-08-09T23:23:00.002-05:00

Trogdooooor!!

Tim Minchin: Not Perfect

2010-08-09T10:49:00.002-05:00

I am a huge fan of Australian comedian / musician: Tim Minchin. I realized as I was sharing his unique vision with a friend this weekend that I had never bothered to mention him on my blog ... so, I'm here to remedy that.

The song that I link above isn't one of his humorous ones so much as it is one of those that makes you think, and it's a personal favorite of mine. If you choose to pursue Mr. Minchin further be aware that his open disdain for religion and things of that nature might hit some people the wrong way, and he is a free user of the more tabooish elements of the English language (What Spoke would call, colorful metaphors.)

Still, I think Tim Minchin F** ing Rocks! And, I felt compelled to share.

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Five by Five - All the Rest ...

2010-08-08T22:27:00.005-05:00

The Setting ... Game Master Section ... Appendix ... Back Cover.

Those are the elements that I haven't yet covered, and the order in which they appear in Rob Lang's Free Guide to Organizing Your RPG. I completed work on my Five by Five rewrite this weekend, so here then is my final blog entry on following the guide.

The Setting

The next section following mechanics that Rob not only recommends, but pretty much demands that you put in your RPG is the setting. Rob argues that a free RPG lives and dies on it's setting. The thought is that there are dozens (if not hundreds) of commercial and free RPG's already available that cover the topic of the role-playing game. He argues that persons who are surfing the interweb looking for a free RPG are going to be hooked by a unique and interesting setting, because it is only through a unique or interesting setting that a free RPG designer can truly offer something special.

I disagree with this view pretty much full stop. Settings and backgrounds are more widely available than any other form of gaming resource. Why? Because when gamers choose a setting, they don't restrict themselves to looking at role-playing games. They look to books, movies, television ... the entire embodiment of adventure and dramatic fiction is available to the game player as a source for settings inspiration.

When I look for free RPG's on the web, setting isn't a concern ... it's playability. I look for a system that looks fun and easy and accessible. Commercial games are generally tied to their settings in such a way that they can't be separated from them, or they are based on the same d20 system that everything else is based on ... and I don't want to play that. I want a GAME that I can apply to MY Setting. A game that's lite and accessible that's not strangled by someone else's idea of a setting and that isn't overblown and over written to sell volume after volume of gaming book.

I created Five by Five to be a lite and easy system that gamers can apply to the setting of their choice and play with a minimal learning curve. I believe I have succeeded in offering something special by creating a truly usable and fun game system. It's my hope that my system will attract those who are looking for another way to play.

All this to say ... Five by Five is a generic rules toolkit. It doesn't have a setting. So, this section is omitted, and those are my reasons why I don't think that is a bad thing.

The Game Master Section

The original Five by Five didn't have a GM's section, and it needed one. With a game that is as open to interpretation as Five by Five, some general guidelines on ways to control and adjudicate the use of traits is sorely needed. I have added some of that here and also a brief discussion regarding selecting a setting. This section could use some more work, but it's just been added and I think I will let it be for awhile and perhaps revisit it for a rewrite later on.

For now the GM section serves the rules in a positive way and that's good enough for me. There is no sample adventure here for much the same reason that Five by Five doesn't have a setting. Down the road it might be fun to include a number of sample settings and adventures to go with them that could highlight the versatility of the system, but for now I have decided that I would rather do without that stuff all together rather than do it half way.

Appendix

Ah, finally a place for my equipment list and for a generic list of possible traits. These were both in line with the rules text in the original Five by Five but moving them to the back as Rob suggests truly does help the document flow.

Back Cover

I actually had a few unsolicited testimonials from the original Five by Five that I put on the back cover. It makes my game seem like something someone has played rather than just something I work on in my parents basement for my own amusement. Life is good.

The Future

Five by Five version 2 is done. I am going to be play-testing this with my friends and I am excited about this new version.

When I wrote Xceptional I was trying to marry Five by Five with Powers Brawl. That was a mistake. Five by Five is a free form rules-lite RPG designed for story telling. Powers Brawl is a strictly mechanics driven, structured combat miniatures game designed for strategy. I was hoping to mix the two and create something that was the best at both. Instead I ended up with something that wasn't as good as either one. I call it a failed experiment.

That being said, I am done reinventing the wheel. I have written one half-baked game after another looking for the magical cookie-dough recipe that would make me happy and I think I have found it in Five by Five.

Five by Five is the first game I've written a revision for. It's the first game of my own design that I have felt strongly enough about to bring it back to the drawing board. It's a game that I want to bring to my gaming table and play. It's a game I believe I will be able to promote and pursue beyond it's very basic beginnings.

I am offering Five by Five to the world under the creative commons attribution license in the hopes that the game might become the mechanical vehicle for settings and back grounds created by others. I see Five by Five supplements for fantasy, science fiction and super hero genres appearing in the future, authored by other game designers than myself.

Pretty much moments after I had finished Xceptional I looked at the finished product and frowned. Despite the hyperbole of my own creation here in my blog, it didn't take long for me to realize that I had missed the mark with that game.

Five by Five is different. I started with a game I felt very good about and improved it. I fought hard not to allow myself to change the things that worked, and worked just as hard to be honest with myself about the things that didn't. I feel like every choice I made has made the game stronger. But, I also feel like I was successful in not changing too much.

This version of Five by Five is available in my free RPG list for download. Please give it a look. If you are so inclined, compare it to the original to see what I have changed. I think you will see that the evolution of the game from version one to version two is a beneficial one.

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Classic Movie Night - Father Goose (1964)

2010-08-08T16:52:00.003-05:00

This week's classic movie was "Father Goose." It stars Cary Grant and Leslie Caron and was chosen by one of my friends who doesn't consider himself a classic movie fan. That said, the choice was rather awesome. Set during World War II and specifically the campaign in the Pacific, Father Goose looks at a man stationed in one of many small islands in the Pacific who is positioned there to observe enemy movement through the region. That said, Father Goose isn't a war movie at all.

Father Goose is Cary Grant, a cantankerous old American bullied by the British Navy (and an old friend played by Trevor Howard) to serve as a sentry on one such island in the Pacific. Grant's character knows the islands well, and the British Navy is spread thin. The set up which has Howard tricking Grant into doing his bidding by hiding Grant's whiskey feels painfully contrived but is forgivable once the real fun of the film begins.

Another sentry on a nearby island is endangered and Grant is pressed to go to that island to rescue his counter part, promised that should he succeed, the rescuee will take Grants place on his island and Grant will be free to return to his normal life as a bounder. Grant goes to the island to find the other sentry dead, and something else. A school teacher (Leslie Caron) and several young students (all girls.)

Grant manages to get the entire group back to his island, but is seems that it will be weeks before Howard can get a rescue team to the war sieged island to recover the girls. The rest of the film features Grant trying to cope with intrusion of the girls and Caron specifically.

There is an "opposites attract" chemistry between Caron's seemingly prudish schoolmarm and Grant's seemingly uncultured old goat. Each reveals a hidden depth that betrays their outwardly demeanor and Grant not only bonds with the young schoolgirls under his care, but also Caron. In the climactic final scenes of the film, Howard marries Caron and Grant via radio while Japanese planes strafe the island with machine gun fire.

The film is meant to be a comedy, I think. But, the comedic moments aren't so much "laugh out loud" funny as they are "put a smile on your face" amusing. The film has a charm that kept the audience engaged and entertained from start to finish and the overall opinion from our group was a positive one.

Next week my girlfriend the "I hate old movies girl" chooses a movie ... and wait until you find out her choice ...

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Doctor Who "The Anime Movie Trailer!"

2010-08-06T10:55:00.000-05:00

Season 4 of the Guild!! (Game On!)

2010-08-05T10:50:00.004-05:00

<a href="http://video.msn.com/?mkt=en-us&from=sp&fg=shareObject&vid=8cb424dc-cbdb-40be-90c5-8fb450462d2f" target="_new" title="Season 4 - Music Video - "Game On"">Video: Season 4 - Music Video - "Game On"</a>

Somehow I had missed that Season 4 of "The Guild" had started! This show is awesome and very funny. I am a huge fan. If you haven't done so already check it out!

Now back to my regularly scheduled program of erotic daydreams featuring Felicia Day and Karen Gillan.

Regards,

Jeff

By the way, was I the only one who caught Vork's (Jeff Lewis) awesome cameo appearance in Glee!?

Five by Five - The Mechanics

2010-08-05T10:01:00.002-05:00

Rob Lang's Free Guide to organizing your RPG defines the next section of your RPG to be: The Mechanics. Most of what Rob suggested belongs in this section actually comprised the majority of my original text. In fact everything from this point forward that I talk about while following the guide will be new material, because everything from the original Five by Five that I have written that isn't about character creation belongs in here.

Mechanics

I love game mechanics. Tinkering with differing methods for resolving randomized tasks using different dice or different ways of reading dice is what this game designer is all about. I did find as I was importing my original Five by Five text into this new edition that the text didn't flow very well. I read through what I had a couple of times, moved a few things around, pushed the piece about equipment further to the back as it still didn't fit, and added some new explanations and transitional text.

The biggest change here was with combat. As I read over my original text I realized that I didn't really explain combat at all. I explained how to roll "to hit." I explained how to roll "damage." But, I didn't place these instructions into any sort of context.

I added a specific section for combat and introduced new initiative rules (that I think are brilliant) that treat initiative the same as any action roll to complete a task.

To roll initiative you DON'T play "high card" with the other players and go in order from highest to lowest. It's a task roll and you try to roll equal to or lesser than your initiative trait as you would when attempting any task roll.

That the initiative mechanic works the same as all other task rolls and doesn't use it's own special rules is a "win" in my book and I don't think I've ever seen another game handle things quite this way. It's a simple and I believe eloquent approach to a legacy mechanic that's remained unchanged for ages.

Task Resolution

Task resolution itself remains unchanged. It's the strong point of Five by Five and it's where the game gets its name. To review it works like this:

All task rolls are trait tests. To complete a task first determine what trait is most appropriate for completing the task at hand.

Roll 5x5

If the number rolled is equal to or less than the value of the related trait the action succeeds.

A 5x5 roll is a roll of 2d6 multiplied together with one special qualification, if either die rolled shows a "6" the result of the roll is "0."

Trait values range from 2 to 16 with anything undefined having a value of 0.

The graphic this time around is the page that talks about the dice and basic task resolution, give it a look if you are curious or click on "My Free RPG's" at the top of the page and down load the original version of Five by Five and give it a look. Everything is described there.

Despite being the least changed section from the original, this section has taken me the longest to pull together and format thus far. That said, I expect the next portion to require even more work. It has never been written.

Next: Rob says "Setting" ... I say "GM section."

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Classic Movie Night - Funny Face

2010-08-02T17:08:00.000-05:00

Funny Face was chosen by my fellow classic movie fanatic. She is a fan of musicals, and of dance movies in particular. Funny Face is just that, a big, beautiful, dance / musical. Honestly though, I am not sure how much I really liked it.

Audrey Hepburn is absolutely beautiful in the title role and her dancing is superb, but she can't sing. Fred Astaire is also not the best of singers and generally more remembered for his dancing. The two strong dancers produce some very nice dance numbers. But the musical numbers are mostly weak and forgettable.

I have stuck in my head another Astaire dance vehicle with Leslie Caron called Daddy Long Legs that he had done a few years earlier and I seem to remember liking that one so much more although I think it was very similar to this film in many ways. I think this film is so warmly remembered specifically because of America's love affair with Audrey Hepburn, who certainly is lovely ... but for me it wasn't enough.

The story is a woman who runs a bookstore is recruited as the new face in fashion because of her "Funny Face." She agrees to go along with the scheme because it means a trip to Paris to meet a personal idol of hers. She gets to Paris and her idol has his hands all over her. She is rescued by the fashion photographer who she has fallen in love with and after a bit of a contrived game of cat and mouse / hit and miss, they end up together in the end.

There's no real chemistry between Astaire and Hepburn and the plot is just an excuse to string some dance numbers together. I felt like I was watching an 80's porn movie and suffering through the inane dialogue to get to the next sex scene. At least, unlike the sex scenes in most 80's porn, the dance numbers here are good.

I do however seem to be in the minority in my opinion here. The rest of the group enjoyed the movie and my girl stayed awake all the way to the end which she claims is testament to the fact that "Funny Face" was better than "Harvey."

I think it might have something to do with how tired she was, but maybe I'm just being too hard on "Funny Face" ... it is a recognized classic among classics and loved by many. So, on this we will agree to disagree.

For our next film we allowed one of our "non-classic movie watchers" to pick. He was up to the task and picked a classic he remembered enjoying as a kid ... "Father Goose."

This is a Cary Grant movie, that also stars the aforementioned Leslie Caron. I haven't seen it, or at least I don't have a strong memory of it ... so, I look forward to our next classic movie night.

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Five by Five - Character Creation

2010-07-31T15:33:00.000-05:00

In revising character creation for this new version of Five by Five, I tried to actually streamline the process even more than it was in the original version of 2 years ago. I cut back on the number of starting traits and tried to make rating of traits more intuitive.

This is also a part of my rules that had changed a bit from the original as I introduced the idea of defining traits as "Action Traits" (the default type of trait and the only type of trait discussed in the original Five by Five rules) and "Intensity Traits" a new type of trait that should make Five by Five work better in settings with super powers.

With the new rules and the first substantial rewrite from the original edition the character creation section looked a bit of a mess.

Rob Lang's Free Guide to organizing your RPG has some very specific instructions regarding the content and organization of the character creation section ... maybe it will help. Rob advises:

Begin this section by listing all of the steps so that the reader knows what is coming.

Then describe each of the steps, giving examples when needed.

Optionally, include a start-to-finish character generation.

Make sure your example character will fit into the example adventure you provide.

Don't put your skills inline unless there is only half a page of them. Put them in the Appendix.

The step-by-step summary of character creation helps a little to pull things together, as does the start to finish example of character creation placed at the end. But things, still didn't flow.

Rob advises not putting you "skill lists" in the character creation section. All though this has been a topic of some debate, I had already pulled my rather random (and long) list of skills out of the section and tucked it away in the back.

An explanation of Trait values included a few tables in line, but I didn't want to move them. But there was something here that did need moving. I had placed lists of equipment and information about equipping a character in my character creation section and I decided that this stuff needed to go.

I pulled the information about Equipment out of the character creation section and things got much better very quickly. Now I am feeling pretty good about the flow of the document and I am ready to take the next step:Mechanics.

Regards,

Jeff Moore

(I was really pleased with the character creation example. The example character's concept changes as a result of the player's choice of "weak trait" and is reevaluted mid-stream. I think it's a good example of how a character concept can evolve as you begin to apply the "rules." The example character page is shown above as my blog post image. Click on it and check it out at full size.)

Superhero RPG Renaissance

2010-07-26T15:13:00.001-05:00

Are we living in a Superhero RPG Renaissance? I just saw the announcement of the Smallville RPG from Margaret Weis Productions. I have bought the Serenity RPG and also have the PDF copy of the Cortex System (which I received as part of my free package of goodness following a donation to Haiti survivors.)

I like Cortex and Margret Weis seems to be making a nice niche for themselves with licensed products. Good on them. I look forward to seeing this updated version of Cortex, and to see how it handles super-powers. But Smallville isn't the only supers RPG on my wish list.

There's also The DC Adventures RPG (using what will become the new Mutants and Masterminds 3rd Edition) and BASH! Basic Action Super Heroes Ultimate Edition (up for an Ennie for best game system!)

... then there's recent purchases of Icons (by Steven Kinson of M & M fame)

... and Villans and Vigilantes (the original classic returns!)

Add to that the sixth edition of Champions from Hero Games ...

... and Truth and Justice which is still available (and is a personal favorite) ...

... and I have to ask ... "Has there ever been a more diverse selection of Super-Hero RPG's available to the gaming consumer?"

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Classic Move Night - Harvey (1950)

2010-07-26T12:34:00.001-05:00

So for our second weekly classic movie night we watched the Jimmy Stewart film: "Harvey" from 1950. Harvey is another comedy. I begin to realize as I look back at movies that I want to watch that many if not most of them are comedies. I personally think that the classic movie comedies had more style and substance than the majority of what we have today. I am not sure it's really the case, but it's just the romanticized memories I have of them.

Harvey is about a man, Elwood P. Dowd (James Stewart,) his sister Vita (Josephine Hull - who positively steals the show,) and her daughter (Elwood's niece) Myrtle Mae (Victoria Horn.) The Dowds are a well-to-do family and Vita has high aspirations for her daughter Myrtle Mae to marry a wealthy influential man. Vita's plans are challenged however by Elwood, or rather Elwood's unique problem.

Elwood it seems is the town crack-pot. I am not sure when "Harvey" is set, but I am going to guess 1919 which puts the story just after World War 1 and just before prohibition. (Elwood frequents bars and Vita makes a point of criticizing his drinking.) There are telephones, but I never see a radio or TV ... there are cars, but I am terrible with identifying models of cars, so for me ... they are no help. But the asylum where Vita tries to have brother Elwood committed has a new electric gate (invented by the gate guard) that is seen as a novel and new concept, if that's any indication. Anyway, the point I am trying to make is that in this setting or time period, it seems that people's views of "crazy" are pretty extreme, as most, after meeting Elwood, go running in the other direction screaming.

Elwood has an imaginary friend. A six-foot tall upright walking, talking rabbit named, "Harvey." Elwood introduces "Harvey" to Vita's guests at a fancy dinner party that Vita has arranged for her daughter Myrtle Mae and this has the effect mentioned above, scaring everyone away. Vita is at her wit's end and calls her good friend the mayor (who obviously has a soft-spot for Vita) and puts into action their plan to finally have dear old Elwood committed.

"Dear-Ol' Elwood" is an appropriate moniker because no one in town is kinder, sweeter and more generous than Elwood P. Dowd. As a human being he is "pleasant" to a fault. It is this quality that endeared me to Elwood and to the movie Harvey. It is this quality that ultimately saves him from the asylum and allows the movie to end happily ever after.

I remembered really enjoying Harvey when I saw it as a teen, but my fellow classic movie cohort admitted to not really loving the film. ("It's okay ... " she had said.) I don't believe this re-viewing of the film changed her mind any, nor did it mine. I loved the film as much as I had remembered, despite forgetting about the absolutely forgettably contrived romantic story thread between the doctor at the asylum and his nurse. The nurse ends up with the doctor that she is obviously crushing on (some women are attracted to abuse) but, if I were her I would have slugged the obnoxious doctor in the chops and ran away with crazy, lovable Elwood. Perhaps it was this story line that had annoyed my friend. It detracts from the movie as a whole ... but it's not really important.

What is important is the mirror that the film holds up to the world as it asks the question, "Must we all go insane before we decide that it's okay to be kind to each other?"

I love this film. I love it because it has a genuine heart and soul that so many films today lack. I like it because I see a tiny bit of myself in Elwood and a lot of my dad and mom in the relationship between Elwood and Vita, as a man who was maybe too kind to every person that he met and a woman who wasn't so sure that this overt friendliness wasn't just a bit too overt.

The group had mixed feelings on this one, I obviously loved it, as did the other male member of our classic movie club. My girl friend fell asleep near the end, an indication that the film moved just a bit too slow. My classic movie partner in crime, seemed to be fairly indifferent, enjoying the film, but not over much. So, to engage her for next week I asked her to pick the next movie. She has chosen the Audrey Hepburn and Fred Astaire classic musical, "Funny Face." I've never seen Funny Face so, I look forward to next week.

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Five by Five: The Introduction

2010-07-22T11:00:00.001-05:00

Rob Lang's Free Guide to organizing your RPG defines the next section of your RPG to be: The Introduction, and Rob has some pretty specific ideas regarding what that introduction needs to contain. Here's what Rob has to say:

The introduction is likely to be the first thing that the reader will go to after the cover, so ensure it is fluffless.

It must include the following:

What is in the book? System? Setting? Sample adventure?

What is the genre of the setting? What are the major themes?

What will the characters do?

What sort of mechanic is it (dice/diceless/pool)?

At first, I took a look at the text of my "Introductory Section" which is really a collection of sections that contain what I consider to be introductory-like content, and thought ... this isn't going to work at all ... I'm going to have to rewrite everything. But, I took a deep breath and a step back, and in a moment, I was feeling up to the task.

One of my primary goals with this specific project is to revise the Five by Five rules while retaining as much as possible of the original (without rewriting it.) I don't want to create another new game. I just want to improve an old one. Ultimately, I added one paragraph to the beginning of my "introductory-like content" and in so doing satisfied most of what Rob is asking for in the Guide.

My original introductory-like content is sort of a lite and very broad / breezy look at what an RPG is. I haven't gone back to find it in Rob's guide but I seem to recall that the guide specifies another place for the "this is an RPG/How to RPG" type stuff (I think in an appendix.) I considered moving it, but decided not to.

Many games that I have read begin with a "this is how to RPG" section and although it's true that free online RPG's are most likely being read by experienced gamers only, I also know that experienced games have all seen this kind of content before and are adept at skimming through it to the next useful bits.

That said, should aforementioned experienced gamer give a copy of my game to her inexperienced little brother, I want the "How to RPG" type stuff right there up front in line where he can't help but find it. So I chose to leave this content as is. I don't consider it "fluffy" and to certain readers, I think it's essential. Plus, in reading over the introductory bits of my original text I found that they segue nicely into the section on character creation that comes next. So, I kept everything ... but I did add a little more.

What is in the book? System? Setting? Sample Adventure?

My original content didn't really seem to address this directly so I added a new paragraph at the very beginning of my introductory content with the header, "About These Rules" and I placed this information there.

There was a tendency to get "listy" here making the rules read like a text book. I don't want that and tried to keep the tone of this information more conversational. I talk about system in a very general way, letting hardcore RPG folks know that Five by Five is not the crunchy combat simulation they've been looking for. I don't talk numbers and processes here, but rather ideas and concepts.

What is the genre of the setting? What are the major themes?

Five by Five is a genreless RPG toolkit by design. It's what I want. I would love to see others with an interest in the system create "settings" books for Five by Five that narrow the system down to specifics, but that's not what I want to do here. That said, my introductory-like content from the original text talks about genre and themes in a very general way. It speaks about Five by Five's flexibility to adapt to any genre and any theme. I felt that filled the requirement here.

What will the characters do?

This is there in the final section of introductory content called, "Epic Heroes." It talks about the roles the players will take and the kinds of heroic characters they will play. This is the bit that I felt transitioned into the character creation section so well. Retained from the original rules unchanged.

What sort of mechanic is it (dice/diceless/pool)?

The technical bits about the system didn't exist, but I added just enough in the new paragraph I mention above to cover this final bit of "required information."

***

So, does the new paragraph add anything to the Five by Five rules? Well, it certainly can't hurt. Also, one thing this process did was make me realize that my "introductory-like content" was not really defined as a cohesive whole. It was made up of several small independent sections each with its own header. I changed this by creating sub-headers (which the original rules didn't have.)

Now all that "introductory-like content" that had it's own headers are all sub-headers under the "About These Rules" main header that I mention adding above. And that is an improvement because the added paragraph ties all the "introductory-like content" together under a single header and suddenly my "introductory-like content" becomes a proper introduction.

Looking at the text now and seeing the introduction as a cohesive whole, and as an independent section distinct from the sections to follow, improves the flow of the Five by Five text quite a bit and Rob's Guide once again fulfills it's purpose as an effective organizational tool.

***

Next: Character Creation

Regards.

Jeff Moore

BIG BANG BIG BOOM - the new wall-painted animation by BLU

2010-07-18T21:40:00.000-05:00

My brother showed this to me and it was a bit too awesome not to share.

Regards,

Jeff

Classic Movie Night - Some Like It Hot (1959)

2010-07-16T16:59:00.004-05:00

So, I have a friend who, like me, is really into older classic movies. I grew up spending the wee hours of the morning watching really old movies on TV in the days before cable TV (or at least the days before we had cable TV.) Local broadcast networks would show old movies and there was no such thing as Turner Classic Television or whatever that old movie channel is called. We got to talking about old movies while other friends who were with us sort of "rolled their eyes" like we were crazy ... and we decided then and there to institute a "Classic Movie Night" to watch an old movie together and show these uppity young'ns what they were missing.

For our very first Classic Movie Night I chose the Billy Wilder / Marilyn Monroe comedy, "Some Like It Hot."

Some Like It Hot is about two down on their luck musicians from Chicago, Joe and Jerry (Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon,) who play any job they can get during the prohibition era of the 1920's. The beginning of the film finds the pair playing jazz at a speak-easy run by mobster Spats Colombo (George Raft.) Joe plays tenor sax and Jerry plays base fiddle. Working for the mob proves to be dangerous business however, and the two are witness to the massacre of a rival mob (on Valentine's Day, no less.)

The only witnesses to the murders and being pursued by the mob, Joe and Jerry need to get out of town in a hurry, but they have no money and no real means of escape. Fortunately, a local talent agency is looking for a sax and a bass to play on an all expenses paid gig in sunny Florida. It's perfect. The catch? It's an all girls band. What happens next is obvious as Joe and Jerry become, Josephine and Daphne (Jerry never did like the name Geraldine,) and Some Like it Hot becomes one of the first buddy-movies in drag.

Initially, the two plan to maintain the ruse just long enough to get to Florida and then run for it, but on the train bound for Florida, Joe becomes enamored of Sugar (Cane) Kowalski (Marilyn Monroe) and convinces buddy Jerry to stick around for the long haul. Before the plot has even a second to settle down, Jerry is taking on a third persona as a millionaire named "Junior" (Shell-Oil, Junior) which Curtis plays in a cheesy Cary Grant affectation. Sugar falls for Junior/Joe/Josephine's shtick and Jerry/Daphne is roped into dating an actual millionaire (a dirty old man who pinched her/him in the "elevator") so that Junior can stage his date with Sugar on the millionaire's yacht.

Just when you think things can't get any more crazy, who should show up but, Spats Colombo and his gang; there to attend a convention for "Lovers of Italian Opera" which is code for every mob family from every major city in the United States. Joe and Jerry spot the mobsters and try to run, but stumble instead into another massacre.

"Some Like It Hot" is nothing short of zany. The changes are fast and furious and that made this a perfect first movie for our group of skeptics who expect old movies to be slow and boring. "Some Like It Hot" is neither. Also, despite being over 50 years old, the comedy is funny. "Some Like It Hot" is very funny. Everyone enjoyed the movie and we all had a great time, despite some terribly Styrofoam-like popcorn.

As a side note, Marilyn looks absolutely beautiful in this movie. Despite being at her largest size on screen, she is also at her sexiest. And she wears some of the most fantastic (and sheer) sequined gowns ever seen on the silver screen. This movie pushed me from boyish innocence to lustful manhood when I was fourteen, and it probably explains why I've always found the most beauty in "full-figured" gals.

Now, if I can just convince my gal to dress as Marilyn for Halloween. I think "Some Like It Hot" just may have convinced her. Anyway ... a great time was had by all, and I am happy to declare my first official Classic Movie Night a grand success.

Next Movie: "Harvey"

Regards,

Jeff Moore

A Closer Look at the Process ... Dedication Page

2010-07-15T14:50:00.002-05:00

Rob's Free Guide to Organizing Your RPG recommends that following the cover the very next thing you put in your RPG is the Contents Page. I agree with this assessment, but it is also perhaps the very last thing that I will actually produce during the creation process. So, for now I have inserted a place holder and a page break. We will come back to the contents page later.

Dedication / Version Page

The Guide next recommends that your RPG has a "Thank you / Version / Dedication (TYVD)" page. It also says this is optional, but I am not sure that's entirely true, because it also seems like from Rob's example that this is where your copyright information should go. He even says "Always put a version on and a date." So, that doesn't seem so optional and shouldn't be ... so, Dedication Optional? -Yes ... Dedication PAGE Optional? -No ... you need to include a version and date for your work, even if you don't want to write any thank you's.

As it happens, I had a lot of thank you's I wanted to make and ended up paring things down to get it all to fit. I also needed a place to put the copyright/licensing notice for the artwork and chose to put it here. Add to that the creative commons license that I will eventually be placing all my works under I now have a pretty full page.

I laid this one out in a single column although my main document is all double columns. I just think that the Dedication Page looks better as a single column page.

I've titled the page: Acknowledgments rather than Dedications, but it's the same thing. To begin with I mentioned the two games whose design have the greatest influence on the creation of Five by Five. Those would be "Fable" by Benjamin E. Sones and Games Workshop's "Warhammer Fantasy Role Play."

Ben Sone's Fable is a free RPG. You can get it from John Kim's Free RPG's on the Web and nowhere else that I have been able to find. It appears that John is hosting the game for its original author. John has Fable listed in the "rules-lite" section of his site. Fable is sort of a Risus style "choose your trait" RPG. It's crunchier than Risus and does some fun things with dice and combat so I was motivated to give it a try. I played a handful of sessions of Fable with my friends and liked it enough that I began work on "my own version" ... this is what became Five by Five.

If Fable is to be credited for the "choose your trait" nature of Five by Five's character definition, then the combat system and in fact Five by Five's entire basic mechanic comes from Warhammer Fantasy Role Play. It's simply this. Everything has a value on your character sheet. For every task find the relative value on your sheet and roll equal to or less than that number. It was clean, easy and fast. No arbitrary difficulty numbers and no math, just roll and go. Some may criticize the mechanic as too simple (or even broken) but it remains one of my favorite game systems. It's just so effortless.

I find that when we bring a game to the tabletop, eventually we all become game designers after a fashion... taking our favorite bits from various games and incorporating them into whatever game we happen to be playing at the moment. It's in the spirit of these house-ruling moments that Five by Five was built. It's really little more than a mash-up of Fable and W.F.R.P. It's only fitting that I acknowledge that fact on my dedication page.

About the only original thing (at least in the RPG world) is the way that Five by Five deals with a six-sided dice, creating a "d5" ... but even that can be traced to inspiration from another source. James Kyle invented and released to the International Public Domain a set of components for a board game called, "Piecepack." Piecepack is to a board game what a deck of cards is to a card game. Generic components easily available to anyone, but with no specific rules. When you buy a deck of cards, you aren't buying one game ... you are buying the means to play many games. That's what Piecepack is.

Piecepack has among its components four six-sided dice, but these dice aren't numbered 1 through 6; they are numbered Ace (1) through 5 and one face is left blank. The blank face is referred to as a Null (0). I am sure it was in playing with the Piecepack and attempting to create an RPG style board game in the spirit of Milton Bradley's Hero Quest that the 5x5 die roll (where Five by Five gets its name) was born. So a tip of the hat goes to James Kyle and Piecepack as well.

Next, I thank Rob Lang. He's the reason you are reading this now. I have made Rob's Free Guide to Organizing Your RPG a permanent part of my creation process. Plus Rob has been a major champion of Free RPG's these past few years. He's a real life Free RPG Superhero.

And last I wanted to thank the guys who started it all, Dave Arneson and Gary Gygax. Really, without them, my life would be so much different ... I can't even imagine it ... it would be a life as bleak as that one created when Cordelia had wished that Buffy had never come to Sunnydale. Gary and Dave have made my world a better place.

I put the licensing stuff for the art I bought from Skortched Urf' Studios next. I would love to use all "free" components in my projects if I could ... but good art of abundant and consistent quality is pretty hard to scratch up for free, and it's really amazing how inexpensive art packages like this have become.

Last it's my own creative commons notice of ownership and attribution. I had to go back and sneak in a version number after re-reading Rob's Guide. But, that was the only important bit I had forgotten.

So, there we have it. Step by step through my Dedication Page. A graphic copy of the page appears above and if you click on it you go to a slightly larger copy that is quite legible for those who want to see how things are turning out.

Next: The Introduction.

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Doing it right ... this time (The Cover)

2010-07-08T14:47:00.003-05:00

So when I originally set down to "Follow the Guide" (wow... over a year ago now), the intent was to go through the guide step by step and blog about the process along the way. Unfortunately, I got sort of lost in the creation process and my analysis and evaluation of the guide as a tool sort of fell by the way side.

I'd like to try again; to start fresh with the guide and make the next handful of blog posts not only an examination of an evolution of my game project but also a sort of critical analysis of the RPG Guide to point out what aspects of the guide were particularly worth while to me.

For example: my original post "glossed over" the first step in Rob's Guide, "The Cover." That was incredibly short-sighted of me, and this time I intend to make amends. So, without further adieu ... here is my guide to Rob's Guide ...

The Cover

I mentioned in my previous post that I had purchased some clip-art licenses from Skortched Urf' Studios and that I wanted to use them. Drive Thru RPG has a large number of commercial grade clip art collections available for use in projects by independent game designers like me, and the pricing is very reasonable. I bought the Modern Figures 1-4 Sketchbook Bundle. And for the most part I am happy with the purchase. However, the images are really only suited for "spot illos" with maybe two exceptions. Those two exceptions are both very nice full color illustrations with backgrounds and so I set about putting the two pieces together in the hope of creating something original for my cover.

Ultimately, my options in arranging the two images seemed very limited and I have had to resort to an unusual arrangement for the cover text to make things work. However, when all is said and done I find that I am very happy with the results and the necessity to squeeze my title text into the space available has resulted in what I think is a very interesting and striking title logo. So, for me, this was a win win.

Rob's guide mentions the cover should contain the title of your RPG and your name. Check. Now, these things may seem obvious, but let me tell you ... I have links to a number of free RPG sites listed here on this blog and a handful of those don't have covers on them ... so, maybe the necessity for a cover isn't obvious to everyone, or perhaps some would consider its inclusion optional.

All I know is that when I took my revised 5x5 text and I put this cover in front of it, I gained an immediate sense of accomplishment. Somehow my work didn't feel as complete or professional without its cover as it does now. It's amazing how a simple thing like a cover makes my 8 page document feel so much more like a "real book" and not just an amateur fanzine or pamphlet. Those individuals who have created their own free RPG's and have decided to distribute them without covers, I urge you to reconsider.

It's amazing what a cover can do.

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Back to the Guide ... New 5x5 on the way.

2010-07-08T02:31:00.000-05:00

So, just a quick update to say I am working on a revised edition of Five by Five that unlike Xceptional will stay as close as possible to the original game while cleaning up just a few rules. Character Advancement has changed. Character level has been removed. And a few new ideas are introduced, but as much as possible I am keeping it the same game. So what am I doing to make this a proper revision worth excitement and hyperbole?

Well, I've completed the rules updates and added them to the body of the original text. So, I am now taking that text and squeezing it through Rob Lang's Free Guide to Organizing your RPG. The difference between this project and Xceptional is that the game is written. The design work is done and I believe that will actually put me in a better position to use the guide properly. It's called a guide to organizing an RPG, not a guide to creating one... so I think it will be interesting for me to see how applying the guide enhances a work that was already completed sans the guide.

Also, I have bought license for a bunch of professional clip art from Skortched Urf' Studios, and have been anxious to use it, so this revised version of Five by Five will have all new art work.

And finally, I will be releasing this version of Five by Five with a creative commons, attribution license that will allow other creators to use or add to Five by Five however they might like.

I think that's plenty to be excited about.

Regards,

Jeff Moore

the big bang watched with steven moffat

2010-06-30T15:14:00.000-05:00

Spider-man and Batman Hi/Lo Heroes

2010-06-28T22:46:00.001-05:00

I wanted to post a quick shout out to the Bane. He's been posting about his work with my RPG Hi/Lo Heroes over on his Blog: Mutants and Masterminds Medley. He's got some great ideas for new rules and Hi/Lo Heroes stats for Spider-man and Batman over there. Check it out!

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Narwhals

2010-06-28T22:29:00.001-05:00

The urge to create a "beer and pretzels" RPG based on this is almost irresistible.

Regards,

Jeff

Squadron UK may be the best Free RPG on the web ...

2010-06-22T17:05:00.006-05:00

Squadron UK was originally published as a game called: Golden Heroes. Interestingly, I owned the boxed edition of Golden Heroes but never played it. I traded the game for a copy of the revised edition (2nd Ed) of Villains and Vigilantes. I owned the original first edition of V&V but wanted the superior updated version. Besides, friends had played V&V ... no one had played Golden Heroes, so, V&V was an easier “sell” to my gaming group.

My traded copy of V&V came with a lot of supplemental materials, a slew of villain books that had wonderful illustrations by Jeff Dee and paper counters on the back cover. I don’t regret the trade, but thinking back now, Golden Heroes was a beautiful package and one I should have found a way to keep a hold of.

This feeling that I had really given up something great is compounded as I look at the free version of Golden Heroes called, Squadron UK: Basic.

There are a handful of free “quick-start” game products out there. Most of these are stripped down versions of a game meant to give players just a “taste” of what they can expect from a game. These are cool, but I don’t categorize them as free RPG’s. I categorize them as advertisements. Nothing wrong with that, but it’s a distinction I think I should make before pointing out that, Squadron UK: Basic is no advertisement. It is a free RPG.

The free download available from RPG Now is 31 pages and very complete. It looks to me to be tighter and better presented than 4C and it might be (at least on paper) the best free supers RPG available if it plays as well as my “gut” tells me it will. As I mentioned, I never played Golden Heroes. So, I don’t know how it plays, but being a fan of old school RPGs, I see a lot to like here. I am newly excited about this game in a way that I never was back in the late 80’s.

Squadron UK is pretty old school in a lot of ways but it looks like it can handle comic book style super heroes with flair, and given that 4C just somehow failed to excite me, this gem was a joy to find. For most of you, this won’t be news ... but I hadn’t given it a look before now, so maybe there are others out there who missed it too.

Squadron UK: Basic is free and very complete, but there’s more good news ... It’s just the beginning. The game has a pay version that includes helpful examples, a few more powers, and attractive artwork. All wonderful things for those who try and enjoy the basic game and decide that they want more. Plus supplements ... additional materials to add to your game should you find Squadron UK as wonderful as I believe you will.

Give it a look. The price is definitely right. Supers RPG’s ... I love them.

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Villains and Vigilantes Returns!!

2010-06-22T12:08:00.000-05:00

My thanks to Andrew at Zenith Comics for bringing this to my attention. Just felt like I needed to share because the more people to learn about great stuff like this the better! Jeff Dee and Jack Herman the original creators of Villains and Vigilantes have formed Monkey House Games and announced the return of Villains and Vigilantes "... back in the hands of its creators ..."

I have very fond memories of playing V&V way back when. It was truly a marvelous supers RPG and has inspired much of my own work in RPG creation. Back when "Living Legends" came out I was very excited to see Jeff Dee returning to create a supers RPG. I remember buying it and signing up at my local convention to run the game. But unfortunately, "Living Legends" just failed to appeal to me like I had hoped that it would and I would up running a different supers game that came out at that same time, "Truth and Justice."

There is really nothing wrong with Living Legends (although I haven't played it.) It just wasn't Villains and Vigilantes. It wasn't even close. It wasn't an upgrade, a modernizartion, an evolution of that great old game at all. But, it was the work of Jeff Dee, one of V&V's original creators ... so I bought it, and I soon gave up any hope of ever seeing an updated supported V&V. I just accepted that it wouldn't happen.

Then I read this!

Yippee! Yooo! Wooo! Hoooo!

This is really great news for us old school supers fans. I just had to share! Thanks, again, Andrew! And thanks Jeff and Jack!!

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Reviews of MY GAMES on The Web!

2010-06-14T08:47:00.006-05:00

There is some talk of my games on RPG.net Check them out!

Thanks to the reviewers for taking the time to comment on my games. It means a lot to me!

Regards,

Jeff Moore

My Free RPG's

2010-06-14T08:40:00.022-05:00

I have pulled out my favorite games and created separate links for them to the right. The list below contains everything I have done and I have left this available in the interest of completeness, but I do recommend you check the links to the right first.

Thanks!!

Jeff

--------------------------------------------------------------------

Here are links to all of my Free RPG's - These are Google Docs archive links that open in Google reader. Google reader works, but I highly recommend downloading anything you want to peruse and then reading it locally.

Everything is here, even some fairly sketchy projects. I think the best of the best here are A+ Fantasy, Hi/Lo Heroes, Powers Brawl, and Five by Five. Not sure about Xceptional my latest project. After completing it I have been questioning whether I like how it came out. Let me know what you think.

Regards,

Jeff

How much is that Puppy in the Window?

2010-06-08T13:09:00.000-05:00

So I was at a seemingly legitimate geek type news site reading about "Torchwood" ... I am not sure what site it was ... not one of my usual haunts ... when a thingy pops up telling me I have a virus. It looks a bit like my anti-virus software, but it's not ... it's a lie. Something called "scareware" ... an illegal scam that gets people to try to "buy" antivirus software so it can doink their credit card for a hundred or so bucks.

Needless to say, I wasn't amused. Now I have had some viruses before (despite the fact that I keep up to date anti-virus software running on my PC) and I have dealt with them. I consider myself fairly computer literate, and work on computers (voicemail or messaging servers) in my professional capacity. So let me just say that this particular "scareware" is a genuine pain in my backside and after several hours research and trying different tactics to get rid of the damn thing ... I am genuinely angry. Not an emotion that I am accustomed to or enjoy.

I am online now writing this, because I had put a LINUX partition on my computer a while back so I could play with it and LINUX is working fine. I am at this stage seriously considering scrapping my Windows Partition all together, reformatting the thing and just sticking to LINUX.

Thing is, my computer is an older model and because of this the build of LINUX that I am using is a sort of a LINUX lite called "Puppy Linux." I haven't been able to get Open Office to work with it and so I am using the included writing package called "Abiword" none of my current projects are compatible with this and so I am starting something new.

I have been meaning to update 5x5 for a while now. I've gotten more positive feedback on 5x5 than on any of my other RPG projects, so I think I'd like to revisit it. Xceptional uses the 5x5 die roll, but it isn't the simple toolkit that 5x5 is ... it's really a completely different beast and that beast has not received the attention that 5x5 has, so clearly I missed the mark there. So, I am going back to 5x5 and am going to attempt an update and clean-up of those rules that tries not to change things over much.

This is a test for me too ... to see if I can do the things I want to do solely in LINUX and leave Windows and awful things like "scareware" behind me. So I am going to start putting together an updated 5x5 and see what comes of it and if working on a completely LINUX driven PC will do the job for me. I hope that it does for the sake of my sanity and piece of mind ... this whole virus thing really shook me up.

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Something old ... something new ...

2010-05-25T11:24:00.003-05:00

So lately I have been working on a medieval skirmish combat version of the Xceptional Game mechanic that would allow me to concentrate on combat in general and weapons and armor specifically. I had a bunch of rough ideas on paper which I decided to dump here because I felt like I needed to post something, and every once in a blue moon (oh, so rare, but really welcome) some one will read something I've posted and say something encouraging ... and I needed some encouragement.

Then a few days later I look at the post, and ... well as you know, I found it to be a mess. So I have "gone back to the drawing board" as it were. The thing is, I am in fantasy skirmish combat mode now and still haven't put that to bed. So some of the work I did in trying to improve the weapons and armor aspect in Xceptional is finding its way into what I am doing now, but what I am doing now isn't Xceptional ... it's new.

Or, actually it's really old. As I decided that trying to force the Xceptional Game mechanic to become something it wasn't was like trying to chop down a mighty oak tree with a small herring, I began to look for something to replace it with. And I had something already prepared. Or at least remembered from long ago.

The very first RPG that I ever tried to create was called Xerospace. It was science fiction and a mix of space opera and mutants with super powers (the premise being that the act of traveling through Xerospace (my own version of hyperspace) actually caused mutations (aka super powers) ... it was Star Wars meets the X-Men. And as with everything I do, it had it's own quirky little game mechanic. One that I haven't fiddled with since 1997. Just for fun I laid it in to the work I was doing with Player Facing Rolls to see what might happen and ... wow!

So now I'm working on a completely new fantasy based game system and here we go again.

I am thinking of just calling this one Rage Precognition Grace after the three primary character Ability Scores which I am retaining. That was also the name I used for a 1 page RPG that I did, but it's mine name so I can reuse it if I want to.

I want to drop a quick note of thanks to Rob Lang at the Free RPG Blog. He gave a very nice little shout out to me on his blog that I only just read today (and it couldn't have come at a better time.) After throwing up my hands in exasperation as my efforts to make the Xceptional mechanic do something it couldn't. I was really questioning myself. Sometimes when our creativity takes a hit, it's hard to recover. And there is very little gratification in the "free RPG game" let me tell you.

Rob's kind words gave me a much needed boost of self-confidence and renewed determination. So, I am writing again and feel invigorated in doing it. Thanks for that, Rob!

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Back to the Drawing Board ...

2010-05-24T10:45:00.002-05:00

Blah! Look at that last post ... what a mess! All those tables and notes and all in the name of making Xceptional easier?! LOL. Sometimes I need to take a step back and look at my work objectively. Or at least attempt to look at it objectively.

Xceptional is supposed to be an easy to use rules light system. It's not. The "control damage" mechanic is interesting in its own way and I like what it does in theory. But in practice I find that I am constantly trying to "fix" it. Okay, maybe it's time to admit that sometimes something isn't worth "fixing" and just leave it be.

The Xceptional document as it appears here doesn't suck. If someone finds something of interest within it ... that's awesome. But, as a playable game I believe it's scope of appeal is small and it's flexibility for growth and adaptation is even smaller.

A good game should be "home rule-able." That is the system should be accessible enough to encourage tinkering and tweaking from the folks around the table who play it. I think that "Five by Five" manages to capture that appeal. I don't think Xceptional does. The system is too inflexible. I am discovering this as I try to "home rule" the system myself ... and fail.

So I am scrapping those efforts and moving on. No harm; no foul. I just use what I have learned from this exercise and move on.

To start with I am going to define some clear cut design goals.

[1] A generic (read genre flexible) super-powers RPG. (I like superheroes, but believe the best thing about a good superheroes RPG is that it can be adapted by it's players to be any genre.)

[2] Choice based character creation that can be randomized (Xceptional does this, as does Hi/Lo Heroes - see those for examples of what I am trying to do. New players and players who are uncertain what sort of character they want to play can roll a few dice for inspiration. I think this is especially important in a genre as wide open and versatile as comic-book heroes.)

[3] No point buy. (I hate math based character creation. It's slow and demanding. It seems to be the "go to" method for most of the games of today which is the main reason why I believe there is still room in this crowded RPG market for what I hope to offer.)

[4] Character Classes (These old-school RPG mainstays remain to my mind the easiest way to introduce new players to their role in a play group. It's adventure hero stereotyping, and although some players argue that a class system in limiting, I have yet to experience a game where my character class prevented me from playing the character that I wanted to play.)

[5] Levels (Clearly defined character advancement guidelines that like the character generation mechanic do no depend on a "point" system to purchase power ups.)

[6] An easy and flexible resolution mechanic that lends itself to house-ruling should the players wish to do so. (The system should use 2d6 as the primary randomizer - this is my randomizer of choice.)

- There you have them ... my goals for the game I want to build. Any thoughts?

If you look back at my previous games, you can see signs of these goals in my works. That being said, I have not yet managed to capture that "perfect" mix. Hi/Lo Heroes is actually pretty good, but all the powers in the game are merely fancy names for die roll modifiers and nothing more.

I like Xceptional's approach to powers. The idea here was establishing a tight game mechanic and then using powers to "break the rules" in a very "collectable card game" kind of way. I'd still like to explore this, if I can do it without making the game too complex.

Interestingly, the soon to be released ICONS RPG comes close to matching many of my goals and I was tempted ever so briefly to simply abandon my quest for "my perfect" RPG and just to house rule Icons (It's system looks very easy and flexible and open to the type of tweaking any group might require to make the game their own.)

But, then I would have to live with the knowledge that I was never able to achieve this goal for myself. That I had presented myself with a challenge and that I had failed to meet that challenge. I like tinkering with game design. I want to see this through. Ultimately, If I can ever beat this beast it would be available here for free ... and that's a cool thing too for all us poor gamers who unfortunately can't afford to support a market that desperately needs our support.

That said, buy Icons when you get a chance. It's a good bit of work. If nothing else, use it to roll up random characters when you are stuck for ideas ... then convert the randomly created character to the "point buy system" of your choice ... if that's the way you roll. If that's all you ever used it for, I think you'd still get your money's worth. (Although, you might also try using my own Hi/Lo Heroes in this same capacity. I really do believe that Hi/Lo's random character creation works pretty well.)

Anyway ... this is me ... back to the drawing board.

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Player Facing Rolls in Xceptional

2010-05-18T12:27:00.008-05:00

So I just read Ron Blessing's article on "Player-Facing Rolls" and it occurs to me that this sort of approach when applied to my Xceptional game mechanic may be exactly what I need to push my game system from pretty good to pretty awesome.

Player-Facing Rolls simply means that the GM doesn't roll dice. Every die roll falls to the player. The old Marvel SAGA system did this (but with cards) and the new ICONs game does too.

My system currently uses a "roll to hit" made by the attacker, followed by a "control damage roll" made by the defender. While not really an "opposed roll" system, it is one where both sides roll to resolve every attack and one where if we were to make the system "Player Facing" the total amount of dice rolling would be cut in half. This simplifies and speeds things up immensely.

Here is how I see it. The Xceptional combat system eliminates all the "ineffectual rounds" of combat keeping things fast and deadly by assuming that every declared attack scores a successful "Hit." The only roll remaining is the "Control Damage" roll and its effect depends on which side of the attack the player is on.

PLAYER IS THE ATTACKER

Player rolls an Offensive Action check.

Critical Success = Monster suffers one hit. Player chooses which Ability takes the hit. Player Rolls to Attack again!

Basic Success = Monster suffers one hit. Player chooses which Ability takes the hit.

Basic Failure = Monster suffers one hit. GM chooses which Ability takes the hit.

Critical Failure = Monster suffers zero hits. No Ability takes a hit.

PLAYER IS THE DEFENDER

Player rolls a Defensive Action check.

Critical Success = Player suffers zero hits. No Ability takes a hit.

Basic Success = Player suffers one hit. Player chooses which Ability takes the hit.

Basic Failure = Player suffers one hit. GM chooses which Ability takes the hit.

Critical Failure = Player suffers one hit. GM chooses which Ability takes the hit. Player must roll to Defend again!

Difficulty and Opposing Skill Values

Making "Player Facing Rolls" work by incorporating Difficulty ... skill vs. skill ...

Normally the roll under system is Trait x Skill. To improve the game mechanic to recognize difficulty (especially important since only the player is rolling dice) the multiplier applied to a Trait is no longer a flat skill value but rather a reflection of the difference between skill vs. skill ... this opens up the skill ranges immensely and allows for more freedom in character advancement as well.

The multiplier for the player's roll is based on the difference between his skill and the skill of his target.

Skill Factor is Player Skill minus Monster Skill:

Skill Factor	Roll Under Trait *X	Explanation
-6 or less	W	Weakness (roll 0 on 1 die only)
-4 to -5	x0	Roll 0 on 5x5 roll
-2 to -3	x1	Roll Trait or less on 5x5 roll
-1 to +1	x2	Roll Trait x2 or less on 5x5 roll
+2 to +3	x3	Roll Trait x3 or less on 5x5 roll
+4 to +5	x4	Roll Trait x4 or less on 5x5 roll
+6 or more	x5	Roll Trait x5 or less on 5x5 roll

SKILL VS. SKILL

Player Skill minus Monster Skill (Find Player Skill down the side.)

	M0	M1	M2	M3	M4	M5	M6	M7	M8
P0	x2	x2	x1	x1	x0	x0	W	W	W
P1	x2	x2	x2	x1	x1	x0	x0	W	W
P2	x3	x2	x2	x2	x1	x1	x0	x0	W
P3	x3	x3	x2	x2	x2	x1	x1	x0	x0
P4	x4	x3	x3	x2	x2	x2	x1	x1	x0
P5	x4	x4	x3	x3	x2	x2	x2	x1	x1
P6	x5	x4	x4	x3	x3	x2	x2	x2	x1
P7	x5	x5	x4	x4	x3	x3	x2	x2	x2
P8	x5	x5	x5	x4	x4	x3	x3	x2	x2

While I'm at it, I also want to mention what I've come up with for weapons and armor. You may note that my new Player Facing Rolls mechanic derives a lot of meaning from not only basic success and failure but also critical success and failure. I have tied the frequency of critical effects (both success and failure) to weapons and armor. This opens up a wide range of useful weapon and armor values.

WEAPONS and ARMOR have values. These are cross indexed to determine "Critical Factor"

The 5x5 roll now uses dice of differing colors. Record the color of your "Critical Die" on your character sheet. A good option is a red and white die, where red is the Critical Die.

There is a target number that this die must reach before a critical success is achieved with a successful roll, or a critical failure is achieved with an unsuccessful roll.

Critical Factor	Critical Success if ...	Critical Failure if ...
-6 or less	(No Critical Success Possible)	Critical Die is a 3, 4 or 5
-4 to -5	Critical Die is a 0	Critical Die is a 3, 4 or 5
-2 to -3	Critical Die is a 0	Critical Die is a 4 or 5
-1 to +1	Critical Die is a 0 or 1	Critical Die is a 4 or 5
+2 to +3	Critical Die is a 0 or 1	Critical Die is a 5
+4 to +5	Critical Die is a 0, 1 or 2	Critical Die is a 5
+6 or more	Critical Die is a 0, 1 or 2	(No Critical Failure Possible)

Check the Critical Success Column when you succeed at a task.

Check the Critical Failure Column when you fail at a task.

Critical Factor is equal to the difference between Armor and Weapon values and is dependent upon whether player is attacking or defending.

Player is ATTACKING (FIND WEAPON DOWN THE SIDE)

	A0	A1	A2	A3	A4	A5	A6	A7	A8
W0	0	-1	-2	-3	-4	-5	-6	-7	-8
W1	+1	0	-1	-2	-3	-4	-5	-6	-7
W2	+2	+1	0	-1	-2	-3	-4	-5	-6
W3	+3	+2	+1	0	-1	-2	-3	-4	-5
W4	+4	+3	+2	+1	0	-1	-2	-3	-4
W5	+5	+4	+3	+2	+1	0	-1	-2	-3
W6	+6	+5	+4	+3	+2	+1	0	-1	-2
W7	+7	+6	+5	+4	+3	+2	+1	0	-1
W8	+8	+7	+6	+5	+4	+3	+2	+1	0

Player is DEFENDING (FIND ARMOR DOWN THE SIDE)

	W0	W1	W2	W3	W4	W5	W6	W7	W8
A0	0	-1	-2	-3	-4	-5	-6	-7	-8
A1	+1	0	-1	-2	-3	-4	-5	-6	-7
A2	+2	+1	0	-1	-2	-3	-4	-5	-6
A3	+3	+2	+1	0	-1	-2	-3	-4	-5
A4	+4	+3	+2	+1	0	-1	-2	-3	-4
A5	+5	+4	+3	+2	+1	0	-1	-2	-3
A6	+6	+5	+4	+3	+2	+1	0	-1	-2
A7	+7	+6	+5	+4	+3	+2	+1	0	-1
A8	+8	+7	+6	+5	+4	+3	+2	+1	0

Since players make all rolls, Monsters won't need Abilities except as a means to track damage, (but will still need skills to act as opposing values to determine difficulty.)

MONSTER ABILITIES

Monsters only have two Abilities: HIGH and LOW

HIGH = the larger pool of life points, usually where the Monster will choose to take damage when given a choice.

LOW = the smaller pool of life points, usually a small number, the Monster's "vulnerable spot." Generally, this is where the player will want to apply damage.

Monsters also have weapons and armor ... these may be actual weapons and armor or reflections of natural abilities like claws and scales.

This post seems a bit all over the place. It's a stream of ideas reflecting what I am working on right now and the kinds of changes that Xceptional is likely to see in the near future.

Just thought it might be fun to share.

Regards,

Jeff Moore

ICONS RPG - First Impressions

2010-05-17T22:56:00.003-05:00

Yay! I got my pre-order PDF copy of ICONS today and I couldn't wait to get home from work so that I could give it a read through. I also wanted to post about it right away to get out some first impressions!

First Glance... it's beautiful. Full color pages throughout (I think the print version will have black and white / gray scale pages ... oh, well.) The art is really neat and clean and bright and has a Bruce Timm influence. It matches the atmosphere and flavor of the game text and rules. The presentation is top notch ... that being said, the PDF lacks both a Table of Contents and an Index. That seems like a crime to me.

The game has both random character generation and a point buy option. I actually love the approach here to random generation. You will end up with characters of wildly differing power levels, but this is off-set by a special aspect called "Determination."

Determination is used for a variety of special things during game play and everyone has some to use, but characters with fewer powers have more than those characters with a lot of powers. This is meant to create a bit of balance. It means that even if you don't roll so well during character generation you will have more Determination to even things out.

I liked the random character tables a lot and they made me want to create a hero right away ... (that's cool!) I love random generation for games like this (and it's super rare!) because conceptually it's often hard for new players to know what they want to play when they step up to the table and are presented with a genre as wide open as comic book heroes. This game isn't for game balance Nazis or rules lawyers ... the system is pretty quick and dirty (but to me that reads, accessible and fun.)

I did notice some editorial discrepancies even in just my first few minutes with the book. Page 14 says Abilities greater than 6 count as Powers. Page 16 (the character creation example) says Ability over 7 ... later I found another reference (page 29) that says over 6 ... so, I can assume that any ability 7 and above is considered a power (for purposes of finding Determination) so, it's no big deal. On one of the tables a symbol meant to represent a Specialty Group (as opposed to a single specialty) is placed next to Wrestling, but it should be placed next to Weapons. I can figure this stuff out, but it kind of bothered me that the editor didn't catch things that bothered me on my first read through. (Plus no Table of Contents maybe the print version that I receive will have one of those though.)

The game system is loosely based on FUDGE but looks to be faster and easier and doesn't use FUDGE dice ... so, calling it FUDGE based to me is really only tipping of the hat to the game systems original source of inspiration. Everything about the system looks good and complete but I didn't see any form of character advancement or experience rules.

Despite this, the game looks good ... the book is gorgeous and I want to play this.

I'll post a more complete review of the game once I've had some time to absorb the material properly.

Regards,

Jeff

Kids who RPG ...

2010-05-14T15:25:00.002-05:00

So, being a father with a 5 year old, I am always open to RPG type documents that are designed to introduce children to the hobby. A wonderful document called "RPG Kids" has been inspiration for a few one-off games with my daughter.

Last weekend, she asked me to play. I was thrilled! I had kind of coaxed her into it the first time. But this time, she asked me ... "that game with the treasure chest ... you know..." So, I quickly threw something together using Advanced HeroQuest tiles and prepainted mini's from HeroScape and we were ready in a few minutes.

I sat up a "dungeon" from the tiles in a sort of cross pattern (well a double cross) with four rooms with monsters and a final room at the end with a dragon. I set a miniature for me and one for Kaylee at one end of the dungeon and a dragon at the other end. I explained that hidden in the dungeon (one in each room) were keys to the Dragon's room and that we needed to get all four keys in order to enter the Dragon's lair and defeat the dragon.

I used different dice for our "characters" and the monsters. I gave Kaylee a d12 for her character and took a d10 for myself. The monsters in the first two rooms used a d6, the monsters in the next two rooms used a d8 and the Dragon used the d20!

Rolling to hit was an opposed roll of the dice ... high roll wins. When my character acted, Kaylee rolled for the monster, and when Kaylee's character acted, I rolled for the monster. One hit marked a character/monster as wounded, the second hit removed them from the board.

She was very competitive. When she was the monster she wanted to "win" just as much as when she was the Elven Princess. She didn't seem to understand that as fellow adventurers it was better when the Brave Knight beat the monster in a dice roll because the Knight and the Princess were on the same team. (My character was the knight, whom I couldn't name Jacob because that was a boy in her school and so I couldn't use that name ... she instead dubbed me, Sir Knight-Head.)

But despite this bit of confusion concerning just which "team" she should be rooting for, we both had a good time. She seems to understand the mechanics of the game in so much as "higher roll wins." But the Role-play aspects even simply understanding that the Princess and the Knight were one team unified to battle the monsters, seemed to allude her.

I want to try again this weekend and I want to include my girl friend in the game. I think that if my girl friend plays with us, and I maintain the exclusive role of the monsters, while she maintains the exclusive role of hero that it will all make more sense to her.

I'll let you know how that goes.

Regards,

Jeff

This is the Free Trader Beowulf, calling anyone ...

2010-04-09T13:30:00.002-05:00

Traveller is the first RPG that I played that was not Advanced Dungeons and Dragons. It's a great old school sci-fi RPG and as good as the new Mongoose Publishing hardcover edition is (and it is EXCELLENT) it doesn't stray from the original design over much. That being said, original Traveller is available for those who might be curious about this classic science fiction RPG. And it's available for FREE!

The edition being offered is "Starter Traveller" it contains the same books that I started with (although the edition I first bought was called "Deluxe Traveller" ... the books are the same) and although it is called a "Starter" edition, make no mistake, it is a complete and fully developed game.

I can't recommend this download strongly enough. It's a classic game and it's appeal in this era of "old school renaissance" should be unequaled. One word of warning... when I clicked on the "Get it Free" button, I got the first book, but not the rest (there are 3 books in all.) If this happens to you, just click on "My Account" and go to your order history. A download link for all three books will be there. (Did I mention, It's FREE!)

The books are broken into three fairly small (and therefore very "printable") volumes. Book 1 is the primary rules text. This information is supported by Book 2, the charts and tables book. During a casual read through of the rules, navigating the 2 books may prove to be a hassle, but as a Referee who used these very books for years at the tabletop, the division of this material in this fashion is brilliant. In actual play, almost everything you need is in the Charts and Tables Book and separating it from the body of descriptive text means that reference during play is lightning fast and easy.

The third book is an Adventures Book that contains two adventures for players to get started playing Traveller right away.

If you are at all interested in (one of?) the first, and arguably the best science fiction RPG ever published, don't miss your opportunity to download Traveller for free.

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Making a Better Game ...

2010-03-26T12:31:00.002-05:00

So now that I have finally "given birth" so to speak ... I find myself looking back at Xceptional with a critical eye. I like much of what has been done here but I also find that I feel there are things that could be handled better. Perhaps my biggest disappointment is in the way I have handled (or not handled) the subject of weapons and armor. Translating Weapons and Armor arbitrarily to specific Xceptions feels tacked on ... and it is.

I have been a game designer who has switched gears a lot. Trying on this way of doing things, then that ... I have experimented with dice and mechanics, stealing ideas from every source that has inspired me, then started over from scratch with a new idea as soon as the next inspiring clever little idea tickled my fancy. I mention this mainly to say, that I believe I am settling in a bit at last. What I mean by this is ... "I like Xceptional."

The game mechanic, the game that I have built and specifically everything about the system that deals with task resolution and combat, feels good to me. I like it. I want it. I am going to stick with it. So, if I have finally settled on a way of handling these very basic things and I plan only to build up from here, and NOT to start over yet again ... then maybe ... finally, I am on my way to producing a "real" game. A game that can evolve into something better than a few interesting ideas. A game that people will play.

So, I love Xceptional but am not crazy about its current rules for weapons and armor. I want to change those and I need a plan to do that. What I am planning right now is to create a micro-game in the spirit of Steve Jackson's "Melee" that deals with simple skirmishes incorporating new rules for weapons and armor. My goal is to use the game mechanic from Xceptional (pretty much everything from pages 11-17 of the rules) with a minimum of alteration.

The intention is not to barrow from the rules for "Xceptions" in the creation of the weapons and armors rules. (Maybe I will save the Xceptions for a second, "Wizard" inspired micro-game.) I am going the independent micro-game route to narrow my focus to exactly what I wish to accomplish while not tying myself to trying to actually adapt the existing Xceptional document. Once I have created something that I like, I can fold the new weapons and armor rules into the entirety of the Xceptional framework (I will also want to incorporate my new "Elements" rules into the system as well.)

If anyone who has looked over the Xceptional document has suggestions for more integrated mechanics for weapons and armor, I'd love to hear your ideas.

Regards,

Jeff Moore

"You give me Fever!" - Adding ELEMENTS to Xceptional

2010-03-19T13:17:00.007-05:00

In the comics, Super Powers have elemental sources (like fire or electricity) and heroes and villains are victorious or defeated often based upon their resistance to, or vulnerability against certain elements.

Adding elements to Xceptional is actually really easy. The trick is determining what sort of element a character's powers are based on, and then what that means to the character in terms of strengths and weaknesses.

Every character will gain three new properties.

* Foundation Element (FE) - this is the element the character's damage is based on. This Element forms the basis for all of the character's abilities and exceptions. When an opponent rolls to Control Damage caused by this character, the defender must take the attacker's Foundation Element into account.

* Element Vulnerability (EV) - this is an element that the character will take more damage from. It will often be an element that opposes the character's Elemental Foundation. For Example: Fire and Ice are opposing elements. Choosing a vulnerability that is opposed to a foundation is common but not required. A character's Elemental Vulnerability cannot be the same as their Foundation Element.

* Element Resistance (ER) - this is an element that the character will take less damage from. It will often be the same element as the character's Elemental Foundation, but it doesn't have to be. A character's Elemental Resistance cannot be the same as their Elemental Vulnerability.

CHARACTER CREATION

Foundation Element (FE) - Roll or Choose one Foundation Element for your Character.
Element Vulnerability (EV) - Roll or Choose one Elemental Vulnerability for your Character.
Element Resistance (ER) - Roll or Choose one Elemental Resistance for your Character.

ROLLING ELEMENTS:

[0-2] Roll or choose from set A [A0-A5]
[3-5] Roll or choose from set B [B0-B5]

[A0] Kinetic (knives, guns, rocks, clubs, fists)
[A1] Light (photons, positive energy)
[A2] Ice (or extreme cold)
[A3] Good (Holy, Life)
[A4] Psionic (mental powers, chi)
[A5] Corrosive (acid, water)

[B0] Cosmic (Generic Comic Book Energy)
[B1] Shadow (dark, negative energy)
[B2] Fire (or extreme heat)
[B3] Evil (Unholy, Death)
[B4] Lightning (electricity)
[B5] Toxic (radiation, poison)

HOW RESISTANCES AND VULNERABILITIES WORK.

If a character is Resistant to a certain Foundation Element they improve their Control Damage effect by one "level" when being attacked by a character of that Foundation. A basic success becomes a critical success and a failure becomes a basic success.

If a character is Vulnerable to a certain Foundation Element they reduce their Control Damage effect by one "level" when being attacked by a character of that Foundation. A critical success is only a basic success, and a basic success is a failure.

There are no effects greater than Critical Success or lesser than failure.

UPDATING THE STAT BLOCK

I am fond of mnemonics and like to use them to make the stat block easier to read. In the case of Elements, I use the word FEVER to help remember the order of FE (Foundation Element,) EV (Element Vulnerability,) and ER (Element Resistance) on the stat block.

The character's FEVER appears in Parenthesis, after the character's name, and before the ability scores. (I originally thought to append the information at the end of the block, but I was afraid this might make the character's Elements become confused with the character's Xceptions.) I also think dropping the rest of the information (following the FEVER) to a second line will make the whole block easier to read, and a two line block isn't too bad.

The New Stat Block would look like this.

OLD:
Dark Lord, 343, U2U, 121, Flight, Regeneration

NEW:
Dark Lord (Shadow/Light/Shadow)
343, U2U, 121, Flight, Regeneration

Remembering the mnemonic FEVER, we see that the Dark Lord above has a Foundation Element (FE) of "Shadow," an Element Vulnerability (EV) of "Light," and an Element Resistance (ER) of "Shadow."

ADDING ELEMENTS TO XCEPTIONAL ALSO SUGGESTS A FEW:

NEW XCEPTIONS

ELEMENTAL CHAMELEON: You can change your Foundation Element to a different one for the duration of your turn. You can only use this Xception if your unadjusted Initiative roll is equal to or lower than your ranks in Elemental Chameleon.

LACK OF WEAKNESS: Ignore the effects of Element Vulnerability until the next Initiative Sequence. You can only use this Xception if your unadjusted Initiative roll is equal to or lower than your ranks in Lack of Weakness.

INVULNERABILITY: You can change your Element Resistance to a different element until the next Initiative Sequence. You can only use this Xception if your unadjusted Initiative roll is equal to or lower than your ranks in Invulnerability.

Elements make a logical addition to the Xceptional game mechanic, and their inclusion seems to integrate well into the existing rules set.

As always, feedback is welcome.

Regards,

Jeff Moore

The Play's the Thing!

2010-03-12T15:37:00.005-06:00

I haven't posted in a while. After a

very active January and February, I find that I have fallen off drastically in the "blogging" arena. This is due in part to the completion of Xceptional that finds me taking a bit of a rest. But also, I have shifted gears a bit. I spent a few weeks trying to learn about Linux and put it on my home PC, but I can't get my sound to work (sigh.)

Also, something the community that only reads about my RPG's online might not know about me is that my interest in RPG's blossomed in my earlier days into a full blown interest in theater. When I moved to Tulsa (more than 20 years ago now) I became involved in community theater here and stayed active in theater for over 10 years. I was even directing theater professionally (still community theater, but with a paycheck) by the time I eventually left it behind (for a technical profession that paid much, much better.)

I mention this because some of my recent "writing energy" is focused on writing a play for the stage. I found an interesting and useful website for organizing and formatting scripts. Zhura is a place to work online on your creative works and it has formatting options that will allow you to produce a final PDF version of your play that is preformatted for professional submission. I am working on a stage play, but geeky friends who are interested might also like to know that there is a different form for authoring scripts for comic books (as well as screen plays for movies and TV.) So, it might be something to check out if you are feeling creatively inclined.

Regards,

Jeff

Following the Guide ... Finally!!

2010-02-21T11:20:00.015-06:00

So, if you haven't done so in awhile go read Rob Lang's Free Guide to Organizing Your RPG. Go ahead ... I'll wait. I had orginally started working on the project now called, Xceptional several months ago, and at the time I was determined to follow Rob's Guide as I created.

Rob's guide was helpful in the creation of my RPG. Mostly it was nice to be reminded of the kind of content that an RPG should probably contain.

Originally Rob's Guide had me spending more time worrying about trying to fit my creative process into a particular mold and less time actually creating. So, this is what I have learned and what I will personally advise from my experience.

"Organizing" as in Rob Lang's Free Guide to ORGANIZING Your RPG, is an editorial process. Creativity is rarely organized and when inspiration hits you should follow it and organization be damned.

Read through Rob's Guide. Read it a few times. Get comfortable with the information it contains. Then ... forget it, and create your game. Create in whatever wonderful wacky process works for you. Carve your dice mechanics into the sides of carrot sticks, if that gets the creative juices flowing.

Do whatever you need to do to get the words down on paper, and don't worry if it only makes sense to you. Rob's Guide is an editor's tool, and it comes to the rescue after the creative work is done ... that's what I have learned.

I finally finished Xceptional, the UNGUIDED version and presented it here in the Playtest Version linked above. In days past that might well have been "all she wrote" for me, but I started this whole project with the intent to use Rob's Guide to produce the final version of an RPG and so I'm not done yet.

Looking back at the Guide we see the components we need to present ...

COVER - The one I have is guide compliant as is ... check!

CONTENTS PAGE - Uh, err ... my version of the game didn't even have one. I always try to keep my page count small, so I have rarely bothered with one of these before. But, adding one is easily done ... so, presto! Page 2 is now, Table of Contents!

DEDICATION - This got added under the TOC. It got a bit scrunched once I added the Creative Commons License (see below) but, it's there and this seems to be the perfect place for it.

INTRODUCTION - Had to write one of these too. My playtest is apparently pretty sparse. But, it's okay, now that the playtest document is completed, I know what information actually goes here, so writing the introduction becomes pretty easy.

CHARACTER CREATION - Ok, I am again adding content to become Guide compliant, but after a basic introduction the rest was simple reorganization of stuff already written. I kept the lists of Skills and Xceptions in the Character Creation section; they're brief and as character creation makes use of random die rolls, I felt they were necessary, but I moved all the descriptions to the back of the book in Appendixes for easier reference during play per Rob's advice.

THE GAME MECHANICS - This bit I was able to keep pretty much unchanged.

THE SETTING - This information was in the playtest and was transplanted easily enough, although admittedly it would not have existed at all if not for Rob's Guide. I wrote it for the playtest specifically because I knew the Guide would call for it.

GM SECTION - Oops. Don't have one of these either. Had to write all new material for the GM section. Rob mentions the importance of a sample adventure, so ... I had to write one of those too. This proved to be a sizable addition to my document and I am glad that I took the time to do it.

APPENDIXES - Moved Skills, Xceptions, Equipment, Advancement Tables, Character Creation Summary and the Character Sheet here, also added some Example Characters to help round everything out.

The document jumped from 28 to 36 pages. I tend to favor small concise tool kit sorts of games over massive volumes and I am very happy with the 36 page final count.

All in all, looking at the versions of my game both before and after the guide I am very pleased with the result.

The last thing that I did was remove my copyright and change it to a Creative Commons: Attribution - Share Alike License. If I am going to offer my game for free, I may as well make it really free. I also updated the game version from 1.0 to 1.1.

I have posted the finished game as well as the "playtest version" (made prior to Following the Guide) so that folks can compare the change in content if they like. (Again these look better if you download them and view them with Adobe rather than using the Google Docs Application.) Eventually the playtest version will go away but I'll keep the final version available with the rest of my Free RPG's.

Regards,

Jeff Moore

It's Done!!!

2010-02-12T17:02:00.011-06:00

I know that I promised to present Xceptional's Skills rules next, but in the past few days I have been more motivated than usual to see this project in some sort of presentable form and to that end, I offer: Xceptional version 0.1 playtest edition!

That's right, it's finally done. At least the rules text and a basic presentation has been completed. I have not taken the document through Rob Lang's Guide to Organizing Your RPG yet, this is more of a "stream of consciousness" version, featuring a linear presentation of my ideas as they came to me. I believe the document flows well enough and at 28 half pages it shouldn't be too hard to find what you're looking for.

Please take a look and let me know what you think! The document looks better if you download it and read it full screen with Adobe rather than reading it with Google Documents Reader.

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Xceptional rules on Healing and Recovery

2010-02-10T10:03:00.004-06:00

HEALING

Each successful application of the Healing Skill will remove the effects of one Hit. (Increase the current value of the lowest valued Ability Score that has had its value reduced through damage by +1.)

Healing Conscious Characters

The first time the Healing skill is used on a conscious character in a given day, resolve the test normally. The second time the Healing skill is used on the same conscious character in the same day, the skill test suffers a negative rank shift.

No more than two attempts at using the Healing skill on a single conscious character can be made each day regardless of the success of these attempts.

Healing Unconscious Characters

Only one attempt to heal an unconscious character can be made in a day. This attempt suffers a negative rank shift.

An unconscious character who has had all Ability Scores restored to a value of 1 or greater will regain consciousness immediately following the successful application of the Healing skill. -- No further use of the Healing Skill can be applied to this character for the rest of the day.

A character can still benefit from Recovery ( Guided or Natural) even if the maximum number of attempts to heal the character have been reached for that day.

RECOVERY

Each night a character can recover from damage through rest. There are two types of recovery: Natural and Guided Recovery.

Guided Recovery

Any patient who has been successfully treated with a Guided Recovery (Healing) Test will benefit from Guided Recovery. A character that has not been successfully treated by a Guided Recovery Test will recover according to the rules for Natural Recovery.

Guided Recovery for Conscious Characters

Guided Recovery can be attempted on each patient once per day before sleep. (This is independent of the limit on Healing Skill Tests listed above.) Guided Recovery is a Healing (Precognition) Skill Test. Successful application of the Guided Recovery test to a CONSCIOUS patient restores 1 Hit to the character's lowest damaged Ability Score over night.

Guided Recovery for Unconscious Characters

Guided Recovery for Unconscious Characters works the same as indicated above, but the skill check suffers a negative rank shift.

Natural Recovery

Without benefit of skilled healing, a character's body still struggles to recover and regenerate itself naturally.

Natural Recovery for Conscious Characters

Conscious Characters who have not benefited from the successful application of Guided Recovery (Healing) can attempt Natural Recovery by rolling a Survival (Rage) Skill test.

This test suffers a negative rank shift (Guided recovery is easier on the body.) but if successful, Natural Recovery restores 1 Hit to the character's lowest damaged Ability Score over night.

Natural Recovery for Unconscious Characters

Unconscious Characters who have not benefited from the successful application of Guided Recovery (Healing) can attempt to Fight for Life by rolling a Survival (Rage) Skill test.

If the Fight for Life check is successful, the character immediately attempts a Natural Recovery check as if they were a Conscious Character. (See: Natural Recovery for Conscious Characters above.)

If the Fight for Life check is failed, the character is Dead.

An Unconscious character, who has all Ability Scores with values of 1 or more, will regain consciousness following Natural or Guided Recovery.

________________________

That covers Healing and Recovery in Xceptional ... Next: Skills!

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Xceptional Combat

2010-02-07T11:24:00.003-06:00

COMBAT SEQUENCE

Initiative

Combatants roll Initiative on 1d5. (Roll one six-sided die and count the six as a zero.)

Combatants take turns in order from highest to lowest Initiative roll.

In the event of a tie, Player Characters act before GM controlled NPC's (Non-Player Characters.)

Movement

On their turn a character can move up to their Initiative roll in inches on the tabletop.

If a 0 was rolled for Initiative the character can still move 1 inch.

Following Movement a character can attempt an Offensive Action.

Offensive Action:
MAKING A HIT!

After moving a character can attempt an Offensive Action (Strike, Aim, Focus) if they have a legal target.

To succeed at an Offensive Action, the player must roll:

"Combat Rank in Offensive Action" X "Ability Score relative to the Combat Rank" or less with a 5x5 roll.

Success is referred to as Making a Hit.

For example: To Make a Hit with a Strike Rank of 2 and a Rage Ability Score of 3, the player would need to roll (2 x 3 =) 6 or less on a 5x5 roll.

Once an attacker Makes a Hit, the target must roll to Control the Hit.

Defensive Action:
CONTROLLING THE HIT!

Controlling the Hit is a Defensive Action. Defensive Actions (Parry, Dodge, Resist) are attempted after an enemy has successfully Made a Hit against a character.

To succeed at a Defensive Action, the player must roll:

"Combat Rank in Defensive Action" X "Ability Score relative to the Combat Rank" or less with a 5x5 roll.

Success is referred to as Controlling the Hit.

For Example: to Control the Hit made against them with a Focus Offensive Action, the player with a Resist Rank of 1 and a Precognition Ability Score of 2 would need to roll (1 x 2 =) 2 or less on a 5x5 roll.

Defensive Actions are paired with their Offensive Action counter parts. Defenders must use the Defensive Action relative to the Offensive action that Made the Hit when attempting to Control the Hit.

Use Parry to Control the Hit from a Strike attack.

Use Dodge to Control the Hit from an Aim attack.

Use Resist to Control the Hit from a Focus attack.

ASSIGNING DAMAGE

A character who has been the successful target of an Offensive Action has Taken a Hit. A character that has Taken a Hit must reduce one of their three Ability Scores by 1. An Ability Score reduced by Taking a Hit is: Damaged. If any Ability Score is reduced to 0 the character is rendered Unconscious.

When a character succeeds in a Defensive Action, they Control the Hit. If the Defender Controls the Hit, they choose which of their Ability Scores to Damage.

If the Defending character fails in their Defensive Action, they do not Control the Hit. If the Defender does not Control the Hit, the Attacker chooses which Ability Score the Defender must reduce.

ATTACK SUMMARY

Attacker rolls to Make a Hit.
Is the attack roll equal to or lower than:
Offensive Rank X Ability Score?

NO: The Attacker's turn ends and the turn passes to the next player in the initiative order.

YES: Defender rolls to Control the Hit.

Defender rolls to Control the Hit.
Is the defense roll equal to or lower than:
Defensive Rank X Ability Score?

NO: Attacker selects which of the Defender's Ability Scores to reduce by 1.

YES: Defender selects which Ability Score to reduce by 1.

CRITICAL SUCCESSES

If an Offensive or Defensive Action is successful AND the 5x5 roll shows DOUBLES (both dice show the same number) the action produces a Critical Success.

Offensive Critical Success

If the result of an Offensive Action is a Critical Success, the Attacker has Made a Double Hit.

The Defender of a Double Hit must attempt two Control the Hit rolls as though they were the target of two simultaneous successful attacks.

Defensive Critical Success

If the result of a Defensive Action is a Critical Success, the Defender has Blocked the Hit.

If a Defender has Blocked the Hit, the Hit is completely eliminated and no Ability Score is reduced; no Damage taken.

The Effects of Damage

When an Ability Score is reduced by a Hit, this immediately impacts the Damaged character's effectiveness in combat. When rolling Offensive and Defensive combat actions always multiply the Combat Rank by the character's current (damaged) Ability Score.

UNCONCIOUSNESS AND DEATH

If an Ability Score is reduced to a value of 0, the character is rendered Unconscious.

If any single Ability Score is reduced to a value of less than 0, or if any two Ability Scores are ever both equal to 0 at the same time, the character is Dead.

Instant KO

If any one Ability Score suffers the Damage of two Hits from a single Offensive Action, the defender is rendered Unconscious even if no Ability Score has been reduced to 0.

COMPLETING THE COMBAT

After a character has made an Offensive Action, and the target of that action has had an opportunity to perform a Defensive Action in response, the current player's turn ends, and play is passed to the next character in the turn order.

After all characters in the turn order have had an opportunity to take Offensive Action as described above, the Combat Round ends and a new round begins.

Return to the top of the Combat Sequence and roll new Initiatives for all participants. Continue this pattern until all combatants on one side or the other have been eliminated from the combat.

Once the Combat Encounter has ended all participants on the WINNING side of the conflict gain an immediate Victory Rush.

Victory Rush
Characters (Not Unconscious) getting a Victory Rush instantly regain 1 point to a Damaged Ability Score of their choice.

___________________________________

That covers the basics of combat. Next is Healing and Recovery.

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Doctor Who Love

2010-02-05T15:47:00.002-06:00

This is just a quick post to share a recent discovery. A collection of DOCTOR WHO LINKS. Always nice to share the Doctor Who Love.

Jeff

I Helped!!

2010-02-05T08:32:00.014-06:00

Got this bit of news in my INBOX this morning and I felt the overwhelming need to share!

We Made History, and We'll Save Lives

As far as I know, and as far as anyone I've talked to knows, there's never been anything like this accomplished before.

We raised $178,900.00

That is the amount we wired to the fine folks of Doctors Without Borders. When I spoke with their representative about this recently, she was literally moved to tears (as was I). And now I want to point out each and every one of our incredible publishers who contributed to the package that accomplished this incredible feat:

4 Winds Fantasy Gaming, A Terrible Idea, Adamant Entertainment, AGES Gaming, Applied Vectors, Arc Dream Publishing, Art Fantasies, Bards and Sages, Basic Action Games, Berengad Games, Better Mousetrap Games, Black Snake Studios, BoxNinja, Brave Halfling Publishing, Cellar Games, Chaotic Shiny Productions, Crafty Games, Creative Conclave, Dane of War, Day Dreamer Interactive, Dork Storm Press, Encompass, Erisian Entertainment, Evil Hat Productions, Fabled Worlds, Fat Dragon Games, Fiery Dragon, Fire Ruby Designs, FJ Gaming, Flames Rising Press, FSpace Publications, Fuller Flippers, Game Monkey Press, GameVein, Generic Universe Publishing, GMC, Grasshopper Games, Green Ronin, Greg Stolze, Gun Metal Games, Hex Games, Highmoon Games, HinterWelt, Jessup Games, Jon Brazer Enterprises, Justin Achilli, Kallisti Press, Keck Publishing, Knowledge Arcana, Lamentations of the Flame Princess, Machine Age Productions, Magique Productions, Malcontent Games, Marcus L. Rowland, Margaret Weis Productions, Mesozoic Press, Mystic Ages Publishing, Nevermet Press, Nomadic Delirium Press, Open Design, Open Game Table, OtherWorld Creations, Palladium Books, Paper Make iT!, Pelgrane Press, Peryton Publishing, Planet Thirteen, Point of Insanity Game Studio, Polgarus Games, Prince of Darkness Games, Red Anvil Productions, Rhallen Enterprises, Rite Publishing, Rogue Games, Shield of Faith Studios, Silent7Games, Silver Gryphon Games, Skirmisher Publishing, Skortched Urf' Studios, Sonic Legends, SPQR Studios, StoryWeaver, Sword's Edge Publishing, Tabletop Adventures, The Le Games, Thenodrin Presents, Third Eye Games, Tricky Owlbear Publishing, Troll Lord Games, WorldWorks Games, Wydraz, Ye Olde Gaming Companye

My personal thanks to all the publishers who donated product to make this happen. I have over a thousand dollars worth of electronic RPG documents on my hard drive to read over the next few months. (This whole thing is just awesome!!)

I talk a lot about free RPG's that you can get on the web, but if you decide to spend some money, I urge you to consider RPG Now as your one stop RPG shop. They have proven to be a wonderful source of RPG materials for my self these past years and even if (like me) you spend the majority of your time dead broke, they also have an incredible selection of free products!

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Xceptional Rules - Combat Classes and Ranks

2010-02-03T22:55:00.009-06:00

COMBAT RANKS

Combat Ranks work exactly like Skill Ranks and are used instead of Skill Ranks when performing Offensive and Defensive Actions.

Offensive Combat Ranks

Strike – Use this Offensive Combat Rank to "Score a Hit" when attacking an adjacent target. Such attacks might include use of a melee weapon, or boxing, or brawling.

Aim – Use this Offensive Combat Rank to "Score a Hit" when attacking a distant target. Such attacks might include use of a ranged or thrown weapon, or even projected super powers.

Focus – Use this Offensive Combat Rank to "Score a Hit" with a mental or mystical attack. Any visible figure, distant or adjacent, can be a target of this attack. Focus cannot be used unskilled.

Defensive Combat Ranks

Parry – Use this Defensive Combat Rank in response to a successful Hit scored against you by a Strike attack action.

Dodge – Use this Defensive Combat Rank in response to a successful Hit scored against you by an Aim attack action.

Resist – Use this Defensive Combat Rank in response to a successful Hit scored against you by a Focus attack action.

COMBAT CLASSES

Combat Classes are special designations that define a character's strategic role in tabletop combat.

There are three Combat Classes in Xceptional.

Brawler - Brawlers specialize in close combat. They excel in the offensive and defensive ranks of Strike and Parry.

Shooter - Shooters specialize in ranged combat. They excel in the offensive and defensive ranks of Aim and Dodge.

Mentalist - Mentalists specialize in psychic combat. They excel in the offensive and defensive ranks of Focus and Resist.

To find your character's Combat Class answer the following:

Is one of your Ability Scores a 2?

"No." - consult Table A.

"Yes, and it's Rage." - consult Table B.

"Yes, and it's Precognition." - consult Table C.

"Yes, and it's Grace." - consult Table D.

TABLE A (Roll or choose):

[0-1] Brawler

[2-3] Shooter

[4-5] Mentalist

TABLE B (Roll or choose, on the appropriate sub table):

Precognition is 4

[0-1] Shooter

[2-5] Mentalist

Grace is 4

[0-3] Shooter

[4-5] Mentalist

TABLE C (Roll or choose, on the appropriate sub table):

Rage is 4

[0-3] Brawler

[4-5] Shooter

Grace is 4

[0-1] Brawler

[2-5] Shooter

TABLE D (Roll or choose, on the appropriate sub table):

Rage is 4

[0-3] Brawler

[4-5] Mentalist

Precognition is 4

[0-1] Brawler

[2-5] Mentalist

COMBAT RANK ADVANCEMENT TABLES

A character has Combat Ranks as indicated on the Combat Rank Advancement Table that corresponds with their Combat Class.

As a character Advances their Combat Ranks improve. A newly created character has Combat Ranks equal to those indicated for a character with 0 (zero) Advances.

As the group meets to play the GM will award "Advances" to the players. Advances add up, so the first time the GM awards an Advance the characters will have 1 Advance; the second time the GM awards an advance the characters will have 2 Advances ... etc.

It is recommended that the GM award Advances to the characters in a play group approximately every second or third game session.

A character cannot advance more than 20 times. A character with 20 Advances is said to be: Maxed Out.

On the Combat Ranks tables a "U" is used to indicate a Combat Rank that is "Unskilled."

The Focus Combat Rank is special in that it is exclusive to the Mentalist Combat Class and cannot be used by the Brawler or Shooter Classes at all.

BRAWLER CLASS COMBAT RANKS

Advances	Strike	Parry	Shoot	Dodge	Focus	Resist
0	1	1	U	U	-	U
1	1	1	U	U	-	U
2	1	1	U	U	-	U
3	1	2	U	U	-	U
4	1	2	U	1	-	U
5	1	2	U	1	-	U
6	2	2	U	1	-	U
7	2	2	1	1	-	U
8	2	2	1	1	-	1
9	2	3	1	1	-	1
10	2	3	1	1	-	1
11	2	3	1	1	-	1
12	3	3	1	2	-	1
13	3	3	1	2	-	1
14	3	3	2	2	-	1
15	3	4	2	2	-	1
16	3	4	2	2	-	2
17	3	4	2	2	-	2
18	4	4	2	2	-	2
19	4	4	2	2	-	2
20	4	4	2	3	-	2

SHOOTER CLASS COMBAT RANKS

Advances	Strike	Parry	Shoot	Dodge	Focus	Resist
0	U	U	1	1	-	U
1	U	U	1	1	-	U
2	U	U	1	1	-	U
3	U	U	2	1	-	U
4	U	U	2	1	-	1
5	U	U	2	1	-	1
6	U	U	2	2	-	1
7	1	U	2	2	-	1
8	1	1	2	2	-	1
9	1	1	3	2	-	1
10	1	1	3	2	-	1
11	1	1	3	2	-	1
12	1	1	3	3	-	2
13	1	1	3	3	-	2
14	2	1	3	3	-	2
15	2	1	4	3	-	2
16	2	2	4	3	-	2
17	2	2	4	3	-	2
18	2	2	4	4	-	2
19	2	2	4	4	-	2
20	2	2	4	4	-	3

MENTALIST CLASS COMBAT RANKS

Advances	Strike	Parry	Shoot	Dodge	Focus	Resist
0	U	U	U	U	1	U
1	U	U	U	U	1	U
2	U	U	U	U	1	1
3	U	U	U	U	1	1
4	U	1	U	1	1	1
5	U	1	U	1	2	1
6	U	1	U	1	2	1
7	U	1	U	1	2	1
8	U	1	U	1	2	2
9	U	1	U	1	2	2
10	U	1	U	1	2	2
11	U	1	U	1	3	2
12	U	2	U	2	3	2
13	U	2	U	2	3	2
14	U	2	U	2	3	3
15	U	2	U	2	3	3
16	U	2	U	2	3	3
17	U	2	U	2	4	3
18	U	2	U	2	4	3
19	U	2	U	2	4	3
20	U	3	U	3	4	4

_____________________________________

That's the basics of the three Combat Classes and Combat Ranks ...

Next time: COMBAT!

Regards,

Jeff Moore

More Rules Xcerpts from Xceptional ...

2010-02-03T00:02:00.023-06:00

Ability Scores

These are scores that measure a character's physical and mental aspects. The same three Ability Scores are used to define every character and creature in the game.

Rage (R)

● force, physical energy, power, strength, vigor

● frenzy, passion, fury, blood lust

Rage is the representation of a character's physical power, strength, and lust in battle. It is the key Ability of Brawlers.

Precognition (P)

● forethought, canniness, caution, intellect, perception

● psychic power, clairvoyance, intuition, second sight

Precognition is the representation of a character's mental power, intelligence, and psychic potential. It is the key Ability of Mentalists.

Grace (G)

● agility, nimbleness, dexterity, finesse, suppleness, balance

● allure, beauty, comeliness, elegance, dignity, refinement

Grace is the representation of a character's physical presence and control. It measures coordination and manual dexterity as well as general physical appearance and charisma. Grace is the key Ability of Shooters.

Ability Scores and Skill Ranks

Ability Score / Skill Rank Descriptors

1 – Decent (Basic Skill, Average Ability)

2 – Capable (Skilled, Above Average Ability)

3 – Brilliant (Expert Skill, Excellent Ability)

4 – Amazing (Highest Skill, Unequaled Ability)

Player Character Ability Scores begin above the average with a score of 2 (Capable) and may increase from there to a maximum score of 4 (Amazing.)

Character Profiles

Character Profiles are composed of 3 Aspects. These Aspects help to define the character's strengths and weaknesses in the game:

Aspect 1: BUILD

Build is a reflection of a character's body type. Player Characters come in one of two Builds:

Quick - the character is more agile than strong;

or

Powerful - the character is more strong than agile.

Aspect 2: PROCESS

Process is a reflection of a character's approach to problem solving. Player Characters come in one of two Processes:

Theory - The character takes a cerebral approach, processing information more internally than externally;

or

Practice - The character takes a hands on approach, processing information more externally than internally.

Aspect 3: TEMPERAMENT

Temperament is a reflection of a character's personality type. Player Characters come in one of two Temperaments:

Bold - the character is more impulsive than careful;

or

Cautious - the character is more careful than impulsive.

PROFILE CREATION

The combination of Temperament, Process and Build forms a Character Profile.

Players can simply choose a value for each of the Aspects in their Profile, or they can roll a d5 to determine the Aspects randomly.

A player's Character Profile grants bonuses that will increase the values of their Ability Scores.

Finding Ability Scores (and Random Profile rolls)

Based on Character Profile find the scores for each of the three Abilities (Rage, Precognition, and Grace.) Every Ability begins with a score of 2 and is increased from there.

BUILD: Quick or Powerful?

[0-2] Quick (+1 to Grace)

[3-5] Powerful (+1 to Rage)

PROCESS: Theory or Practice?

[0-2] Theory (+1 to Precognition)

[3-5] Practice (+1 to Grace)

TEMPERAMENT: Bold or Cautious?

[0-2] Bold (+1 to Rage)

[3-5] Cautious (+1 to Precognition)

After adding the bonuses to the three Ability Scores as indicated by their Character Profiles, characters will have a total of 9 points assigned to Ability Scores with no score smaller than 2 or larger than 4.

___________________________________

And there you have a look at Ability Scores and Profiles and how they are generated.

Next: Combat Ranks and Character Classes

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Blake's Dollhouse

2010-02-01T16:55:00.003-06:00

The news that FOX is working on an American version of Torchwood (and maybe Doctor Who) is weeks old now.

But, it got me thinking ... if FOX really wants to bring a British science fiction series to the American small screen. Why do Torchwood that everyone in America has already watched (and the British version will always be better?) Why not choose a series that NEEDS a relauch and that would be unfamiliar enough to the American public to avoid the danger of a comparison?

In the interest of geeking out for the sheer pleasure of geeking out ... I share my dream British Scifi series remade for American Television:

Blake's 7!

Personally, I would approach Joss Whedon and Mutant Enemy Productions and beg them to take on the project. Joss tends to favor actors he's worked with before so going this route will give us a head start on a cast too! Since the cast of Doll House are out of work...

Blake - the rebel leader - Tahmoh Penikett (who played Paul Ballard)

Vila - the cowardly thief - Fran Kranz (who played Topher Brink)

Gan - the gentle giant - Harry Lennix (who played Boyd)

Avon - the arrogant genius - Alan Tudyk (who played Alpha)

Jenna - the bombshell space pilot - Eliza Dushku (who played Echo)

Cally - the psychic - Dichen Lachman (who played Sierra)

Servalan - the evil seductress - Olivia Williams (who played Adelle)

Travis - the vengeful arch enemy - Enver Gjokaj (who played Victor)

Zen - the ship's computer (voice) - Alexis Denisof (who played Senator Perrin)

Tah Dah! Welcome to my Americanization that I call: Blake's Dollhouse!

(Yes, I am a geek.)

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Mini-Six

2010-02-01T11:30:00.004-06:00

Mini-Six is a super condensed free version of Westend's D6 game system that was originally created by Greg Costikyan for the Star Wars RPG in 1987. It does a good job of keeping things simple and concise and packing a lot of information into a small page count. These sorts of projects tend to excite me as a game player more than others as I like to work from RPG tool kits. I like a quick rules over view. I want to be able to digest a system's concepts without reading a novel and Mini-Six gives me that.

Greg Costikyan is a my kind of game designer. He created Toon (and the 'template' nature of attribute/skill assignment seems to be carried over from Toon to Star Wars.) He certainly seems to understand the concepts of accessibility of system and quick game play. His dedication to "playability" is evident in Star Wars, and it is retained in the small playable Mini-Six. The d6 system is a good one. It works. It is easy to teach and quick to play.

Interestingly, Westend's D6 core documents, D6 Adventure, D6 Fantasy, and D6 Space are all available for free download over at RPG Now.

This may seem to make Mini-Six obsolete, but I personally prefer the small package in which Mini-Six is presented. It's got everything you need and nothing you don't. I say download it all, take Mini-Six to the table with you to use as a reference while you play and keep the rest to read when you feel the urge.

Realizing my preference for the small and concise Mini-Six over the fluffier, prettier, official D6 Documents (which are fully illustrated, nicely detailed and quite attractive) has got me thinking. Both are free. Many would argue that the larger more attractive volumes are the better choice. Why don't I think so?

I am curious about the kinds of game information that GM's and players take to the table top when it comes to actual play. I want things that are easy to remember and reference, and that won't get in my way. That's why I like RPG's in small packages. I also think this is a big part of the OSR. Old School is familiar and simple and easy to deal with at the tabletop. The problem with this is that game systems don't sell games. A good clean easy game system will sell a copy to a group who will then play the game for years.

Fluffy games with loads of information and juicy setting details and all the trimmings will be sold and read and then put on a shelf. The gamer goes back and plays the familiar game he already has. The reader having read fluffy game "A" goes to the store and buys fluffy game "B." Gamers will buy a game to play, but readers drive the market. Readers are the ones who will buy games returning to the store looking for the next interesting "read." All the fluffy, juicy bits are what grabs the reader, because reading a game is a different experience than playing a game.

Game players do not drive the industry. Game readers do. Game readers purchase more product. But game reading is not game playing and that is why we have things like Mini-Six available for free. As I look back at the games on my shelf that I love the most, it's not the game with the most clever genre twist or the most clever setting that grabs my attention. It's the game with rules that are easy to play or to mentally envision "in play" that are the ones that speak to me. This is an important distinction because it reflects what drives me as a game designer and helps me to stay on point as I move forward in my own endeavors.

Regards,

Jeff Moore

Emergency Post!

2010-01-31T13:41:00.004-06:00

So, I just saw this posted at one of the sites that I follow:

Reminder: Huge Bundle with Haiti Relief Donation - Last Day

And I had to post a quick supporting message just to help spread the word. This was a fantastic deal. I participated and not only do I get the warm fuzzy of knowing that some of my hard earned cash is going towards the Haiti Relief effort, I got enough downloadable RPG material in my inbox to keep me reading for months!

It really is a fantastic effort, and a fantastic deal, and today is the last day!! If you haven't done so already, check it out.

P. S. - So, I just noticed that I had 17 posts in January which is more than my total number of posts for all of last year! Cool!!

Regards,

Jeff

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