Tag Archives: Hexagram

Mettle rules graft v0.1

This is a hack that integrates an alternative partial-success d20 resolution system and replacement health system. The original posts on some of these ideas:

Halfway houses (five level d20 partial success resolution system)
Catastrophe magic (using the resolution system to replace traditional Vancian magic)
Mettle, trauma, and grit (replaces hit points)

The primary design priority is fluent ease of use.

For me, this is essentially subsystem playtesting (for my ongoing, slow-burning Hexagram project), but I think this could be useful as a mod also.

(See the downloads page for a PDF version.)

Necropraxis Mettle Rules Graft

Start with something like B/X D&D, Labyrinth Lord, or Lamentations of the Flame Princess and then suture in the following systems and rules. This is a draft playtest document and I assert no compatibility.

Tests

Resolve uncertain actions using the test procedure (1d20 +modifier), interpreting the result as follows:

1	2-9	10-15	16-18	19+
Hindrance & Catastrophe	Hindrance	Progress & Hindrance	Progress	Progress & Triumph

Tests replace attack rolls, ability checks, and saving throws
If the unmodified result is 1 or 19+, ignore the modifier

Basics

- Moves are actions with predefined sets of potential test outcomes (see combat, below, for examples)
- Add proficiency bonus to class-relevant tests given proper equipment
  - Weapons for fighters, lock picks for thieves, wands for magic-users, and so forth
- Proficiency bonus follows 5E: = ceiling(level / 4) + 1

1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	19	20
+2	+2	+2	+2	+3	+3	+3	+3	+4	+4	+4	+4	+5	+5	+5	+5	+6	+6	+6	+6

Gear & Equipment

Characters have 25 gear slots: 5 panoply, 4 hand, 6 belt, & 10 pack
- Panoply slots correspond to hit locations: 1 head, 2 legs, 3 arms, 4 abdomen, & 5-6 body
- The 4 hand slots are primary (left, right) & secondary (left, right)
- Place any additional gear in burden slots (burden imposes penalties)
Each gear slot has a uses track with up to six boxes
- The uses track represents wear and tear or uses remaining
- Gear determines the max uses: quiver of arrows (6), sword (3), and so forth
- When the number of marked boxes equals the max uses, gear is broken, ruined, or used up

Magic

Spell slots = level + 2; each slot has uses = proficiency bonus
During haven turns, cast spells from grimoires
- Other magicians can tell when spells are active
After casting a spell, magicians can cause effects using the invoke move
- +INT for black magic, +WIS for white magic
- To add proficiency bonus when invoking, equip a focus, such as a staff or wand
- When invoke test outcomes include hindrance, mark a spell use

Combat

Peril—such as monster attack—results in death unless an action forestalls such fate
The block and dodge moves replace opponent attack rolls
The endure and suffer moves replace taking damage
- Mettle = level +CON
- To mark mettle, mark a number of hearts = opponent threat (HD, level, or whatever)
- If directed to mark mettle when none remain, make the suffer move to avoid death
- Dying characters expire at the end of the current round
Sprain and fracture conditions disable the relevant hit location
- 1 = head, 2 = legs, 3 = arms, 4 = abdomen, 5-6 = body
If a character is already bleeding and the condition comes up again, the character bleeds out and dies
Armor bonus applies to the endure move
- Light armor = +2, medium armor = +4, heavy armor = +6
- Proficiency: fighter = heavy, thief = light, wizard = none
- Characters are burdened if wearing armor without proficiency
Two-handed weapons provide advantage for strike, shields provide advantage for block

Approach Moves	Strike	Shoot	Maneuver
Prerequisite	Melee equipment	Weapon & ammo	Situational
Modifier	+STR	+DEX	+STR or +DEX
19+	2 hits	2 hits	Attain objective & 1 hit
16-18	1 hit	1 hit	Attain objective
10-15	1 hit & mark use	1 hit & mark ammo use	Attain objective & mark use
2-9	Endure	Mark weapon use	Endure
1	Endure & mark use	Mark weapon & ammo use	Endure & mark use

Avoidance Moves	Block	Dodge	Endure	Suffer
Prerequisite	Melee equipment	Unburdened	—	—
Modifier	+STR	+DEX	+Armor	+CON
19+	1 hit	Position & 1 hit	Recover 1	Recover 1
16-18	—	Position	—	Sprain
10-15	Mark use	Position & lose balance	Mark use	Fracture
2-9	Endure & mark use	Endure & lose balance	Mark use & mettle	Bleeding
1	Endure & mark use	Endure & mark use	Suffer	Dying

Catastrophe magic

3 Replies

Adapted from Wikipedia

This is a magic system I have been testing. It is general enough that I think it should be easy to use with other traditional fantasy games, if you like, given a small amount of adjustment to the system you are using.

This is a roll to cast system. You need to decide on a set of known or prepared spells for a character. Then, the die outcome will take care of the resource aspect of spells. You also need a resolution system that provides five levels of outcome. You can think about these outcomes as levels of player character success or as augury into the fictional world. The five outcomes are:

Principle intensified
Principle
Principle & corollary
Corollary & decline
Catastrophe & decline

The principle is the basic spell effect, the thing that the sorcerer is generally attempting to bring about. The principle intensified is the critical hit version of this. The corollary is an unintended side effect that generally complicates the magician’s life but may occasionally be useful. Decline represents a decrease in future spell potential or magical energy. The simplest implementation of decline is, following a Vancian approach, forgetting the spell. And finally, catastrophe is a total misfire which may have personally deleterious effects. This set of outcomes means that something magical always happens but the potential corollaries and catastrophes should make players think twice about playing with arcane fire.

To resolve the casting of a spell, I use an ability check, similar to the approach described here, with intelligence for black magic and wisdom for white magic.

For an approach closer to classic d20, consider the following:

Let target = 10 + spell level. Then, roll 1d20 and add spell bonus (something like one-half level, rounded up). Interpret the result as follows:

Natural 20: principle intensified
Target + 4: principle
Target: principle & corollary
Below target: corollary & decline
Natural 1: catastrophe

Further, you need a way to determine what each class of outcome means for a given spell. Writing new spells with extensive corollary and catastrophe tables is wonderful but by no means necessary.

Ideally, catastrophes are specific to individual spells, but lacking specific catastrophes, you can fall back to some general outcomes, such as these:

Wonder & Wickedness: spell catastrophes
Vaginas are Magic: miscast table (inside front cover)
Last Gasp Grimoire: Do not take me for some turner of cheap tricks
Basic Red: Wild sorcerer effects table for 5e

(I am sure there are others available too.)

Hacking a spell to support this system can be easy. For example, here’s a hack for the classic spell magic missile:

Principle intensified: +1 extra missile
Principle: as written
Corollary: an additional missile targets something non-animate (determine randomly)
Catastrophe: determine target of each missile randomly (friends and foes)

For many spells, it is feasible to rule on potential corollaries and catastrophes in real time. I would just clarify with the player what the potential scope of outcomes would be and confirm intention to cast the spell prior to the roll.

Mettle, trauma, and grit

6 Replies

For me, the ideal hit point or vitality system for tabletop roleplaying games involves the constant threat of engaging consequences while also mitigating the disastrous influence of luck. Using OD&D and sticking to the three little brown booklets comes close to this ideal when run in a certain manner, but still perhaps gives luck too much influence at first level and creates too much of a hit point buffer at mid to high level. Put another way, I want a system that encourages players to always care about combat consequences but rarely if ever shanks without warning. And, of course, the system must be fluent, easy to use, plugged in to the core flow of play, and require minimal bookkeeping.

Playing Kingdom Death gave me some ideas regarding ways to build a combat system that better prioritizes these goals, and that influence should be clear in the following sketch. As written, it may be too invasive to just trivially drop into a game using a B/X type engine, especially given that it requires replacing traditional armor class with ablative armor, but I think it would be possible.

Before anyone gets all up in my business about the dynamics of real armor or wounds, I want to emphasize that realism is a relatively low priority apart from maintaining predictable fictional consequences, necessary for allowing creative problem solving. Instead, the point is to create rules that facilitate choices and consequences while reinforcing the overall feel of the kind of survival fantasy that is my preferred mode for tabletop roleplaying games. This system assumes the turn structure of the Hazard System.

Section of the Hexagram character record sheet relevant to armor and mettle

Mettle

Rather than hit points, player characters have mettle, which can be both bound to hit locations (all player characters have this kind of mettle) or floating (for tougher characters, those with high constitution). Instead of taking damage, player characters mark mettle boxes. The hit locations are head, body, abdomen, arms, and legs. Each location has two points of mettle except the head, which has one point. Additionally, player characters have a number of floating mettle points equal to the constitution modifier. These points can absorb damage to any hit location.

Defending

Currently, Hexagram uses active defending—blocking or dodging—sort of like this, rather than resolving monster attack rolls versus player character armor class. The details of the monster attack step are less central to the mettle and trauma system, and any method to decide if an opponent hits a player character in combat should slot in fine here. Even just leveraging the saving throw system seems like it would be a totally functional system for determining whether a character risks taking some damage, bringing armor, mettle, and so forth into play.

Armor

Player characters can equip pieces of armor to any hit location. Armor is ablative, meaning that it reduces incoming damage. The protection offered by a piece of armor maps roughly to the traditional light, medium, heavy (or leather, chain, plate) scale with light armor offering 1 point of protection, medium offering 2 points, and heavy offering 3. Since player characters have five hit location slots, they can mix and match, for example by wearing a heavy visored helmet but a light, boiled leather breastplate. Equipped armor still takes a gear slot, so piling on protection comes at the cost of lower versatility. Additionally, player characters act at a disadvantage when wearing armor with protection higher than the strength bonus.

Damage

When a player character takes damage, determine hit location randomly, subtract armor protection from damage taken (minimum zero), and then mark off one mettle slot for each point of damage remaining. I assume that the magnitude of damage is generally around 1d6 (following OD&D flat damage). If at any point a player character takes damage and has no remaining relevant mettle, then the character is in danger and must roll for peril. This is the step that can potentially lead to serious consequences, including character death.

Hit location (1d6): 1 head, 2 legs, 3 arms, 4 abdomen, 5-6 body

Peril (1d6): 1 messy death, 2-3 bleeding, 4-5 fracture, 6 sprain

Fractures disable the affected hit location. For example, a character with a fractured arm can no longer effectively wield a weapon using that arm. Healing fractures requires magic or taking a haven turn to recover (which would require retreating from a dungeon to town). Sprains work similarly but player characters can recover from a sprain by resting for a single dungeon turn (so, in effect, sprains only influence the current combat).

Other than being messy, gaining the first bleeding condition has no direct result. However, getting the bleeding result again, even to another hit location, means the character bleeds out and dies.

Trauma

Injuries are tricky to handle well in tabletop RPGs. On the one hand, they can make characters much less fun to play even for players on board with working out the implications of player character hardship. On the other hand, a fictional consequence is almost always more engaging than simple HP attrition through both adding narrative color—fan of blood—and changing the context as appropriate—a tiled floor slippery with blood. Further, while permanently changing settings and characters through play is satisfying, ruining characters is generally not. You can’t lose an arm in Dark Souls, and if you did I imagine the common response would be to restart the game. That would be a hardcore lose condition. For this reason, the peril table includes immediate fictional consequences beyond something like HP loss, such as heavy bleeding or broken bones, but defers the possibility of permanent disfigurement, the control of which falls to players through the grit system, described below.

Grit

Bleeding and fractures count as trauma, and surviving trauma strengthens tough characters. Player characters that survive a trauma can mark a grit box during recovery in a haven. Characters have a number of grit boxes equal to the constitution modifier. When a player marks a grit box, they should note how the trauma has permanently marked the character. This could be a scar or something else, and is entirely up to the player, but should be fictionally appropriate to the particular trauma (this would be a good place to insert fantasy prosthetics if such are setting-appropriate, such as necromantic grafts or enchanted wooden limbs). In effect, grit slots are like unlockable extra mettle slots.

False Machine has some creative ideas for scars here.

Implications

This system feels mechanically quite perilous. A mettle slot is roughly equivalent to one hit point, meaning that on average marking 1d6 mettle slots (expected value: 3.5) results in peril for all hit locations lacking armor. However, five-sixths (83%) of peril results are non-fatal initially. Strictly speaking, a one-shot kill is still possible, but is statistically much less common than the OD&D case of 1d6 damage versus 1d6 HP, and could easily be entirely eliminated if desired (such as by changing the messy death result to unconscious and dying, with final death occurring at the end of combat lacking miraculous intervention). Also, the odds improve dramatically with some armor while still maintaining the threat of real consequences.

In terms of complexity creep, this system requires an extra roll to determine hit location if an opponent hit is successful. So, there is a small increase in complexity, but the overhead seems minimal, which I have confirmed in preliminary play testing. The peril step replaces what I would otherwise run as a saving throw versus death, and that is an uncommon occurrence. Tracking the mettle and hit location slots does require a little help from the character sheet, but that seems manageable (see the character record sheet excerpt above).

Fight off, dodge, or block

2 Replies

Some Dark Souls dude

The combat system for my Stonehell Dark Souls game has drifted steadily away from traditional monster attack rolls toward monological combat (in short, players always roll, similar to Apocalypse World and Numenera).

Brief recap. In the initial December formulation, players chose between blocking or dodging (resolved using ability checks but also risking running out of stamina) or having the ref make a traditional monster attack roll versus character armor class. The trade-off was between relying entirely on ability scores or pitting character armor class against a monster’s potentially high attack bonus.

Making rules stick. In the past, I have sometimes had trouble getting combat house rules to stick because it is so easy to fall back on a familiar procedure, even when new rules result in more engaging outcomes and are advantageous to players. However, from the start of experimenting with the Dark Souls inspired active defense options, and across several groups of players with varying levels of tabletop roleplaying game experience, the active defenses seemed to remain top of mind. During the most recent session, players only ever defended actively, never letting the monsters make attack rolls, even with the risk of running out of stamina, which is punishing. I draw several lessons from this experience.

Choice prompts. First, the explicit choice prompt is an effective and low-maintenance way of communicating formal rules without needing non-referee players to read any rules (“zero homework” requirement). This is huge. Making such prompts habitual . This does place some constraints on potential rules, since the procedure must be fluent enough to survive being deployed all the time. That opposes complexity bloat which is positive more often than not.

Active options. Second, active options, assuming equal player effort requirements, have an advantage over passive options (such as submitting to a monster attack roll). Risking overgeneralization, I suspect this is universally true because players prefer a sense of control keeping all other factors constant.

Proposal. What follows is the procedure I am now considering, with parts that have not been play-tested in bold. Previously, armor class was a traditional passive defense score, but the approach below requires damage-reducing armor.

Resolve Monster Actions

Determine actions for each monster.
Match groups of monsters with defenders.
Resolve defenses.

Defenses

When monsters attack, to the defending player ask:

“Do you fight off the attack, dodge, block with a shield, or react in some other way?”

Resolve as specified below or by using the most relevant ability check.

Fight off. To defend using a melee weapon, roll the weapon’s damage and add the result to armor rating this turn, then suffer monster damage. In effect, this defends by comparing damage potential between player character and monster.

Shield block. To defend using a shield, make STR check (success → suffer no damage, failure → suffer ½ damage) and CON check (failure → out of stamina).

Dodge. To avoid monster attacks, make DEX check (success → suffer no damage, failure → suffer monster damage) and CON check (failure → out of stamina).

Suffer Damage

Add the damage from all monsters threatening a player character together, subtract armor rating from the total, and then suffer this amount of damage.

Notes

The fighting off procedure uses one roll per adventurer no matter the number of monsters. This means that the fight off option is more easily overwhelmed by multiple monsters, since the player character damage roll opposes multiple monster damage rolls added together.
Not needing to make tons of attack rolls for a host of enemies is a nice added bonus.
To simplify presentation for this post, I left out one small step, where player characters can intercede to block for an ally assuming the positioning makes sense fictionally. This can happen during the matching of monsters with defenders (step 2).

Playtest results

Let It Ride or Push Your Luck

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Following is a designer note from the current working draft of Hexagram, the ruleset I have been working on.

The game Burning Wheel has a principle called Let It Ride:

A player shall test once against an obstacle and shall not roll again until conditions legitimately and drastically change. Neither GM nor player can call for a retest unless those conditions change. Successes from the initial roll count for all applicable situations in play (Burning Wheel Gold, page 32).

This means that once the players agree upon a particular test to resolve an uncertain outcome, the result of that one test fully determines the outcome. For example, a player may roll to determine if a character is able to open a lock. According to the Let It Ride principle, the player gets only one try to accomplish this goal using this means. Spending more fictional time for another attempt is not possible. Players must consider other means to get past the lock, such as smashing it with a hammer that may come with additional unintended consequences.

Hexagram play is based on a different game design principle: Push Your Luck. In Push Your Luck play, the number of attempts is not limited but risk attends each try. Additional tries tempt fate. In Hexagram, making Moves requires taking a Turn and taking a Turn requires rolling the Hazard Die and possibility of setbacks. In other words, potential mechanical reward entails potential risk. Part of the risk in taking another Turn comes from advancing fictional time. For example, taking a Haven Turn to recover could result in opponents gathering reinforcements, weather taking a turn for the worse, a political crisis, or a natural disaster. Though Adventurers may be making the same Moves, the setting does not remain static in response.

From a general perspective, Let It Ride and Push Your Luck can be seen as two poles of a bipolar resolution finality spectrum. Let It Ride specifies that a resolution is final after one iteration while Push Your Luck specifies that resolution may be indeterminate. An Adventurer may fail to open a lock, take the outcome of the Hazard Die in stride, and then try again, repeating this procedure as many times as desired assuming the Adventurer remains capable. Various intermediate principles are also possible along this spectrum. For example, limiting the number of potential retests to some arbitrary number or requiring players to spend some consumable game resource to try again.

Neither principle is inherently superior, but they do have different properties and structure play differently. In Burning Wheel, the purpose of Let It Ride is to continuously push the fictional narrative forward. Additionally, Let It Ride may encourage more diverse problem solving over time as probability suggests that a given means will be insufficient at least some of the time, forcing players to use alternative strategies. Push Your Luck leverages the psychology of temptation, assuming the uncertainty in question stands between players and their desires. By allowing players to take on greater risk in pursuit of outcomes judged important, Push Your Luck also lends weight and consequence to player decisions.

Tactical Hazard Die

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NES Dragon Warrior

The current unreleased working version of the Hazard System uses six potential outcomes which are then interpreted relative to the current turn type. The four turn types, from most abstract to least abstract, are Haven, Wilderness, Dungeon, and Combat. The six outcomes, mapped to the sides of the 1d6 Hazard Die, are 1) Setback, 2) Fatigue, 3) Expiration, 4) Locality, 5) Percept, and 6) Advantage. This unifies the set of potential outcomes so referees need learn fewer exceptions. Additionally, the order roughly ranks the outcomes from most negative (Setback) to most positive (Advantage) taking the perspective of player characters.

Previous versions of the Hazard System only used the Hazard Die for Haven, Wilderness, and Dungeon Turns, not Combat Turns. This makes sense genealogically given that the Hazard System was adapted from the Overloaded Encounter Die which was inspired by traditional random encounter checks. However, there are uncertain outcomes that require dice resolution during combat regularly, such as initiative, so perhaps the Hazard Die can subsume the resolution of uncertainty at all levels of abstraction.

It is not hard to find analogues in combat for most of the Hazard Die outcomes. For example, Setback could mean that reinforcements arrive or the opponents act first. Fatigue could be general attrition, such as all engaged combatants taking a point of damage. Locality could be any kind of change on the battlefield, such as a door being locked or a table overturned. Percept could be information telegraphing an opponent’s future strategy. Advantage could be an additional move per player character or a forced morale check for the enemy.

This set of outcomes does not replicate the probabilities of initiative in the same way that the wilderness travel or dungeon exploration applications of the Hazard Die replicates the chance of having an encounter. As described above, opponents have only a 1 in 6 chance of acting first, compared to the traditional 50/50 odds. Whether this is a problem will depend on how one sees the purpose of initiative. If the point of initiative is to inject some regular uncertainty and tension into combat, then it seems like the set of abstract Hazard Die results should serve the same purpose while also increasing combat dynamism through variety of events.

Another benefit I see of overloading the initiative die is that some other aspects of combat, such as morale, which are easily overlooked but quite beneficial to the dynamics of play, can be potentially built into regular game procedures. I am not sure if a 1 in 6 chance of opponent morale check (on the Advantage Hazard Die result) is the best way to do this but it seems promising. Are there any other combat events that deserve a place in the Combat Turn Hazard Die interpretation guidelines?

As with most systems that replace bookkeeping with probabilities, such as tracking ammo abstractly, there are absurd edge cases. What if your torch runs out on the first turn in the dungeon? What if you run out of arrows immediately? I see three solutions to this sort of problem: 1) use rulings based on fictional appropriateness, 2) use illogical results as a kind of oracle demanding explanation, or 3) make the system more complex to handle such edge cases reliably. I lean toward option 1 and away from option 3. In my opinion, it is no particular shortcoming in the system to rely on the referee to determine whether it makes sense fictionally for reinforcements to arrive in any given instance. Illogical results can also just be ignored occasionally given that doing so just falls back to the traditional mode which works reasonably reliably.

More concretely, my current play test interprets Combat Turn Hazard Die outcomes as:

Setback: opponents act first or reinforcements arrive
Fatigue: combatants engaged in melee suffer 1 point of damage
Expiration: some or all ongoing effects end (such as burning oil)
Locality: the battlefield changes in some way
Percept: players gain some clue to opponent strategy
Advantage: players choose extra action or forced morale check

(Post image is only mildly relevant, but hey it’s combat right?)

Traditions and corruption

Spell attunement

1 Reply

I want spell rules that:

Do not require regular spell preparation (to decrease complexity)
Avoid locking players into a very small spell list (for variety)
Support acquisition of new spells through adventuring

Several other rule sets have systems that feel to me like they were built to satisfy similar goals. ACKS (2012) differentiates between repertoire, which are the spells available for casting, and formulae, which are all the other spells that a mage has access to (in something like a library). Mages in ACKS can swap spells in the repertoire with formulae, but only at extremely high cost (ACKS core, page 67):

An arcane spellcaster who already has a full repertoire of spells may sometimes wish to replace one spell in his spell repertoire with another of equal level. It costs 1 week of game time and 1,000gp for each spell level to replace a spell in the repertoire with another.

D&D 5E (2014) uses a similar approach where there is a difference between known and prepared spells but then adds an additional layer of complexity with spell slots, which are different in 5E than in previous editions, and function essentially as level-rated mana or spell points. To learn a new spell, 5E wizards must write the spell in a spellbook, which serves a similar function to formulae in ACKS, though there is only cost involved in the initial copying step, not when making the new spell available for preparation (5E Player’s Handbook, page 114):

For each level of the spell, the process takes 2 hours and costs 50 gp. The cost represents material components you expend as you experiment with the spell to master it, as well as the fine inks you need to record it. Once you have spent this time and money, you can prepare the spell just like your other spells.

Abstractly, both systems represent two pools of spells, essentially online and offline. I find both systems somewhat cumbersome to use and difficult to explain.

The traditional approach, probably represented most paradigmatically in AD&D (1978), also uses spellbooks as collections of offline spells, along with a complicated host of intelligence-based limits and checks to learn new spells (AD&D Players Handbook, page 10):

Acquisition of Heretofore Unknown Spells: Although the magic-user must immediately cease checking to determine if spells are known after the first complete check of each spell in the level group, or immediately thereafter during successive checks when the minimum number of spells which can be known is reached, it is possible to acquire knowledge of additional spells previously unknown as long as this does not violate the maximum number of spells which can be known. New spells can be gained from captured or otherwise acquired spell books or from scrolls of magic spells. In the latter event the scroll is destroyed in learning and knowing the new spell or spells.

Actually following all the AD&D procedures results in nicely differentiated magic-users that can acquire new spells from adventuring, but the overhead is rather high and the various rules are scattered all over at least the Players Handbook. The AD&D approach also warmly embraces and rewards high-maintenance spreadsheet-assisted play, which is not what I am looking for.

Below is an approach I have been working on, encoded in two rules: Attune and Scribe. The rules are written in cryptic Hexagram style, but for D&D application, replace Magic rating with class level or your favorite determinant of spell capacity. The transaction cost of swapping spells between equipment slots and spell slots is represented by magic ink, the cost of which needs to be squared with the other relevant economies of gameplay.

(For anyone that does not catch the allusion, this approach is inspired by Dark Souls.)

Attune. To attune a Spell, consume a Spell Scroll and add the Spell from the Scroll to the list of Attuned Spells. Attune no more Spells than the Magic rating. For example, an Adventurer with Magic rated 3 may attune no more than three spells.

Scribe. To scribe a Spell Scroll, consume magic ink, add a Scroll of an Attuned Spell to the Gear list, and optionally remove the Spell from the list of Attuned Spells. Like all items, each Spell Scroll occupies one Gear slot.

Weapons of unusual size

2 Replies

Young Guts from Berserk

Hexagram characters begin with stats rated from 0 to 3, using the arrays I originally developed for Gravity Sinister. (There is a random determination table for players that do not like to bother with making choices.) Then, each level, including first, players choose one stat to improve. The same stat cannot be improved two levels in a row. The max character level is 10, which means that the highest a stat can be naturally is 8 (3 initial + the 5 for every other level increases).

Among other benefits, characters with higher strength scores can wield ever more obscenely scaled weapons. There are three size categories beyond standard: huge, giant, and colossal. They require, respectively, strength scores of 4, 6, and 8, to wield effectively. (Category names are subject to adjustment.)

For normal weapons, strength adds to melee damage, up to +3. Larger weapons can express strength beyond this limit. Huge weapons allow up to +5, giant up to +7, and colossal up to +8. (In general, the max bonus is one less than the ability threshold for the next largest weapon category.) For simplicity, there are no special encumbrance considerations for oversized weapons. Each counts as one significant item. They do, however, cost more to repair (an additional 1d6 * 10 SP per exceptional size category).

Larger weapons retain any type benefits. Thus, a giant axe can express up to +7 melee damage from strength and also provides a sunder bonus to damaging enemy equipment. Oversized missile weapons apply strength to damage rather than perception, but are fixed at +4, +6, or +8, depending on the size category. For example, a huge elephant gun deals +4 damage even if the wielder has 5 strength. Such weapons still use perception for attack tests.

Though this system is designed with big weapons in mind, it would be easy to adapt to enchanted weapons that would only serve worthy warriors (that is, those strong enough or with large enough attack bonus for D&D), and so could be another way to explain and manage the traditional restriction that only fighters can use magic swords.

For AD&D (1E and 2E) ability scores, use the strength damage bonus rather than the Hexagram strength ability. For something like D&D 3E or 5E, use the ability modifier. The mappings are not perfect, but they should be good enough. Some other rulings may be required, given that HP quantities in 3E or 5E are higher that the OD&D standards I tend to assume, so adjust accordingly.

Edit: though above I noted that there are no special considerations regarding encumbrance, I am not fully convinced that is the right way to go. I think as written there may be insufficient incentive for diversity of weapon choices (that is, anyone with high strength would prefer an oversized weapon), which is perhaps uninteresting. I will need to see how this plays at the table, but one potential modification would be for each extra size category to count as a significant item, though I am wary of slipping graduated encumbrance in via the backdoor.

Inspiration:

Pursuer’s Ultra Greatsword from Dark Souls 2

Guts from Berserk

Monster Hunter concept art

Cloud from Final Fantasy 7

Saw spear from Bloodborne

Monster Hunter concept art

Monster Hunter concept art

Hexagram crafting

4 Replies

Adapted from Wikipedia

Several times over the past few years I have tried to create a Diablo style loot and gear generator that would work elegantly with a traditional tabletop fantasy game. This is hard, and I have not yet come up with something that I find satisfying. It is hard largely because I feel torn between writing something overly general and something overly specific. Ideally, such a generator should interface with the setting monsters, but then those need to be nailed down and the generator becomes less useful to any other setting that deviates from the setting implied by those monsters. That realization leads to a turn back toward generality, which tends to be too schematic and not particularly atmospheric.

VRA 1 mentioned the old 3E era tabletop supplement Diablo II: Diablerie which has such a generator. It is actually not bad. The prefix-item-suffix approach has potential and the volume of content alone is enough to create interesting sounding item names. Many (though not all) of the attached mechanics, however, are mostly just numerical inflation. Bonuses to attack, bonus HP, etc. It could be used, but would require so much at the table ruling and interpretation that it almost does not feel worth it.

So I have decided to try approaching the problem from a different angle. Rather than building the generator beforehand, instead I will build a game system that will build such a mechanism naturally as the campaign progresses. This sidesteps the problem of bland generalness versus specific atmospherics completely. The first time a component such as a mineral or monster part is used for crafting, a particular augmentation becomes associated with that component. Augmentations can either be taken from a list of examples or improvised using that list as guidelines to appropriate power levels. Harvesting monster parts takes one Dungeon Turn. The material and augmentation will also be added to the general gear generator table. I still sense a small amount of hand-waving here, but I think this is close enough to a workable mechanism that the remaining details will naturally reveal themselves through play tests. I can see this easily applying without fuss to just about anything, even things like gems, leading to an interesting gamble: sell that ruby for coin, or have it forged into some piece of gear?

Power inflation should be possible to keep in check through a combination of the always operative gear degradation rules (all items not made of adamant still have at least a 5% chance of being damaged during use depending on quality rating) and abilities that refresh only during haven turns. For example, I could see adding a lightning burst augmentation which would allow an adventurer to add a die of lightning damage to one successful attack per excursion.

Crafting is something you pay a Haven NPC to do for you during a Haven Turn. Though I would not say no to a player that wanted to take a crafting Expert Skill such as Smith or Brew, I am not going to include it as an option in the text because 1) I suspect (though am not sure) that it would feel suboptimal compared to skills usable within a dungeon and 2) really I am not trying to write Shopkeepers & Spreadsheets.

Specifically (now for the player-facing Haven rules):

Smithy

Repair: To repair a Damaged item, pay a smith 1d6 × 10 coins. Once a particular repair cost has been determined, it will not change on subsequent Haven Turns.

Forge: To forge a weapon or piece of armor from special materials, pay 1d6 × 100 coins and consume the materials.

Alchemist

Brew: To brew a concoction from special materials, pay 1d6 × 100 coins and consume the materials.

Smiths and Alchemists can each carry out up to 1d6 tasks per Haven Turn.