Where in the World is Xoth?

Xoth is here actually. Well, only in my multiverse. The World of Xoth is Morten Braten's creation for his Pathfinder game. I took his setting material and used it for my playtesting of USR Sword & Sorcery. This, an the "Known World" of Mystara from B/X D&D, are my touchstone campaign worlds when I got back into gaming five years ago. With some regular play it didn't take long to start  daydreaming about intersecting gaming worlds and gaming groups with each other. The Flailsnail's conventions showed me that I didn't even have to be thaaat concerned about different systems mashing with different system PC's. Running some Classic Traveller and keeping a Clockwork & Cthulhu campaign going the pieces of my multi-verse are mostly full-formed now. Mystara, Xoth, 1646 C&C Earth and the super-future of my Outer Frontier Traveller Universe I'm placing all in the "normal", terrestrial universe, with only Clockwork & Cthulhu and Traveller necessarily being separated in time.

I quickly populating the different campaign worlds with many different "doorways" out of the terrestrial universe and into other "realms", the multiverse of my game world; "Murph's Multiverse"! Mystara PC's ventured into the far future, Mystara's the-end-of-time (my Ro'Myr setting?) as well as crossing over into A Red and Pleasant Land. Xoth, these PC's activated ancient devices which connected to beings in Outer Frontier Traveller Universe, as well as through Lotus poisoning in the far-east they ended up in a strange mushroom-dreamland. The PC's from my current C&C game have entered the realm of The Pale Lady (shares space with A Red and Pleasant Land) and became acquainted with "trans-arcana" penetrations. In the Outer Frontier that PC group investigated and activated more troubling powers started in another time and place on Xoth which brought my multiverse its first glimpse of horror-scarred Carcosa...

Which gets me all thinking about a visual map of all this. Where all these great settings get placed and their linkages get tracked.

So now I know where Xoth is, Trappist-1, and Earth. Mystara can be place anywhere in the known universe (or beyond) and right now there really isn't a pressing need at this point to pin it down. The Outer Frontier will eventually get mapped back to "original" Earth. Oh yeah, I even have some modern-day adventures from Anthropomorphic USR and Fear & Loathing USR to bridge all my imaginings to the here and now!

The inspiration for my map is coming from that great map of Kamandi's world by Kirby. Now I guess I just got to draw it :) 

The Why? of doing this is to hone a functional DM'ing device to tap crossover opportunities by retaining, recognizing and cataloguing mentally them for later use. If I have a multidimensional model of my homebrewed gaming universe I can hang cool ideas like ornaments on a christmas tree. Or stars in the night sky I guess.

Rom'Myr, a dying earth setting for Magic World

Fantasy Adventures in the dying world of Rom'Myr

An OSR setting using the Magic World role playing game rules

Dying Earth is a subgenre of science fiction, fantasy, or science fantasy which takes place in the far future at either the end of life on Earth, or other Earth-like planets. The End of Time when the laws of the universe themselves fail is also a common trope. Themes of world-weariness, innocence (wounded or otherwise), idealism, entropy, (permanent) exhaustion/depletion of many or all resources (such as soil nutrients), and the hope of renewal tend to predominate.

I started this campaign setting with BFRPG in mind, but I want to have a setting to use with the d100 rules of Magic World so I am in the process of adapting the setting. Here I jigger the Character Creation rules of Magic World to fit my conception. This post will then be followed with a post outlining how the magic system works in the game. When I build up setting details suitable for use by the GM I will post them as well, but I work in fits and starts so don't hold your breath on any of this.

Here is a link for a Magic World form-fillable character sheet for those inclined.

1. Character Creation:

Only human characters may be chosen for race. The available human racial identities are Rom'Myr, and the Fir'Bax.

Rom’Myr humans are citizens of the Blue Borderlands, the farthest province east in the realm of The Trackless Empire. Sandwiched between the Cold Heath and the Groaning Mountains on the shores of the Inland Sea. The Rom'Myr of the Blue Borderlands trade for Bolfian Silk from the non-human desert nomads known as the Strangled.

The land of Fir'Bax lies north of the Blue Borderlands. Uncouth barbarians, the elaborately tattooed Fir'Bax scratch a living from the small arable land surrounding the high peaks of the Yani'Hor, the Groaning Mountains. They are extremely xenophobic and war incessantly with the Strangled. This small barbarian kingdom also resent the encroaching Rom'Myrians into their wilderness domain.

Turn to page 20-21 of the Magic World core rule book and follow “A Guide to Creating your Adventurer”. Below are listed (if any) changes to this standard procedure as they occur in the process.

Step 1: Names & Characteristics No changes.

Step 2: Characteristic Rolls No changes.

Step 3: Derived Characteristics No changes. Please note Human Move is 8, not 10. This is a typo in the rule book.

Step 4: Age and Experience Any PC choosing the Shaman occupation rolls 17+5d6 for starting age, otherwise no changes.

Step 5: Magic Adventurers must have POW 16 or higher to be able to use magic. How the magic system works in Rom'Myr is detailed in its own chapter.

Step 6: Culture and Species Only human can be chosen for PC species. All Culture options are available.

Step 7: Skill Category Modifiers No changes.

Step 8: There appears to be no step eight so this is probably a good time to assign your starting Allegiance (page 28-33).

Step 9: Occupation and Skills All Occupation and skills are available and you are free to build your character as you like. Just keep in mind you will be fitting your character into one of seven Character Classes. These seven classes are; Assassin, Barbarian, Druid, Jester, Paladin, Ranger and Thief. The significance of these classes are detailed in their own chapter.

Step 10: Starting Money and Equipment No changes. I recommend you add Thomas Wiegel's a Wretched Catalogue for more equipment choices than what is offered in the Magic World core rule book. Just convert the cost in silver to cost in bronze.

1.1 Character Class Rules:

All the classes are available to any new PC. All but the Assassin, Barbarian and Thief class have the ability to learn and or acquire magic per the included magic rules if they have a POW 16 or greater. Each particular Class may have additional limitations which are outlined below;

All Barbarian PC's must be Fir'Bax. Only the Band and Tribe cultures are available to this Class. Any of the available Occupations listed for these Cultures are available.

Jester PC's should consider themselves more as traveling monk/scholars as opposed to being a kept clown for royalty. The Jester PC may be either human race (Fir'Bax/Rom'Myr). If Fir'Bax is chosen as race only the Band and Tribe cultures are available. Rom'Myr racial identity does not limit choice of Culture. They are limited to the following Occupations: Astrologer, Begger, Crafter (Tribal), Diplomat, Lost/Forgotten, Minor Noble, Nomad, Peasant/Farmer, Physician/Apothecary, Sailor, Scribe, Shaman/Priest/Cultist, Slave (Freed or Escaped), Small Trader, Sorcerer, Thief, Troubadour/Entertainer.

The Druid is a wild shamans roaming the dying lands of Rom'Myr. A Druid must be Fir'Bax. Only the Band and Tribe cultures are available to this Class. Any of the available Occupations listed for these Cultures are available plus Astrologer, and Sorcerer.

The Ranger, civilized cousin to the Druids must be of Rom'Myer descent. Rom'Myr racial identity does not limit choice of Culture. The Ranger is limited to the following Occupations: Bandit, Craftperson, Crafter (Tribal), Fisher, Hunter, Lost/Forgotten, Nomad, Peasant/Farmer, Slave (Freed or Escaped), Small Trader, Tax/Rent Collector.

Assassins are highly trained guild specialists. They owe their skills to an established order or institution. They must be Rom'Myr and must take the State culture. The Occupations available to the Assassin are; Bandit, Hunter, Minor Noble, Paid Assassin, Cultist.

Thieves are your most common of adventuring rogues found within the Blue Borderlands. They can be either Fir'Bax or Rom'Myr. If they choose Fir'Bax they are limited to the Band and Tribal culture. All the Occupations of these cultures are available, except replace Shaman with Thief. Rom'Myrian identity requires the State culture to be chosen. They are limited to the following Occupations: Bandit, Beggar, Craftsperson, Lost/Forgotten, Sailor, Slave (Freed or Escaped), Thief.

A Paladin is a PC who has picked up the sword in defense of some aspect of the lost past. The Paladin can only be a Rom'Myr human and of the State culture. The Occupations available to the Paladin are; Mercenary/Bodyguard, Minor Noble, Slave (Freed or Escaped), Soldier/Guard/Watchman.

2. Orders and Institutions:

Most of the PC Classes are bound to some type of esoteric religion or ageless cult which claim some form of legitimacy through ancient ideas lost to the unimaginable past eons of Rom’Myr. None of these confer any mechanical benefit for the new PC, but is used to embellish this dying earth with some of the player’s ideas. Of course the Game Master can decide to create orders and institutions which do confer mechanical benefits for the PC as they see fit.

There is a wide discrepancy in intent and capability of the organizations of men in the world of Rom'Myr. Whether battle hardened mercenary corp, horrid murder cult, or starving street thugs the one galvanizing feature of orders in Rom'Myr is the expectation of complete obedience.

Fir’Baxian Battle Cults; there is no better inspiration for your own barbarian battle cult than Red Moon Medican Show's Vacant Ritual Assembly Issue #4. Furious Gods (found on pgs 15-18) is a must read! These pages will be drawn on to demonstrate the magic system of the Druid as well as some of the “gifts” a Barbarian may receive from their Battle Cult.

Pagan Religions; below are names to spur the imagination when creating your worlds and player's religious orders.

Tix-ka-tix, The Returner, The Patient One, The Slumbering Pharoh (Petty Godsp.171).

Mespilus, god of medlar trees and their fruit (Petty Gods p.109).

Lubella the Transformative (Petty Gods p.96)

Esoteric Schools suitable for any character class;

Dlarafis, Augazor, Trani, Children of the Sacrificed, Sect of the Son, Chosen Ones of Tranquility, Band of the Studied, Followers of Vranis, Faith of Drysm, Congregation of Kousha.

3. Languages; Dun-Harad is the language of the Trackless Empire. Marude is the language the Fir'Bax speak. Sahrashin is spoken by the dark skinned Ahenti. Torbarel is the language of The Strangled.  The Other Language skill is limited at character creation to these four languages. As the PC's explore the world of Rom'Myr they may come across other languages and PC's may attempt to learn these through the regular rules for Training and Experience (pages 51-53).

4. Combat Skills: The only “House Rule” I like to add to the rules for Combat Skills is in regard to thrown weapons. Instead of committing an additional skill to the particular thrown weapon the PC can assign their Throw skill as their chance to hit with any thrown weapon. This makes putting points into Throw more valuable then having to split points between Throw and an additional Weapon Skill. I take that back, I have an additional house rule; boost the Base % for Crossbows to 35%. No one needs a skill in Crossbow to shoot these weapons at the Base %.

5. Combat: This piece of crunch only applies to PC's. If an attack throw results in a fumble roll a 1d20 on the following Confirm Fumble Roll table. This will either minimize or exaggerate the rolled fumble. Feel free to ignore this step if you don't like this rule.

1 : You really messed up this time! Roll twice on Fumble table.

2 – 10: Roll on Fumble table as normal.

11 – 19: Regular miss.

20: Recover! Reroll to hit.

6. Magic Rules: these will make up the body of the next post!

OSR games develop story better than Story Games

[Edit 7/29/18]: Patrick Stuart makes a far better case than I can, read his post here.

In short I feel Story Games spend much of their game time talking about what the story is about while the traditional rpg's I play and run story is happening because we are playing the game. A common refrain I hear about Story Games is “it's about the story”, that somehow without giving PC's valuable session time to bloviate on what their character is about, what they have done, what matters to them a role playing game is terrible and being played wrong. Oh, also no one else at the table (think GM) can say what happens to their PC. I find the structure of a Story Game obliterates the stand out features of traditional RPG's to the point of making them unrecognizable, so much so they have a name; Story Games.

My latest game session once again reinforced my opinion that a traditional RPG delivers story in so many levels that the fall down for folks who cannot get a “story” out of traditional mechanics can't rise to the challenge. Role playing games offer a unique medium with incredible artistic and creative depth. Underneath the term “game” lies a medium which has no bottom, no limits to the quality of experienced to be realized. Therefore, with any artistic exploit, it is not easy to be good at it. And when I mean good I don't mean enjoyment. As a kid I enjoyed RPG's to the exclusion of almost any other activity. Doesn't mean I was any good at it. In fact I was keenly aware that there was much more to the game than my gaming group could really achieve. The D&D, Stormbringer and Gamma World rule books would mention this thing called a campaign? Where the game really shined as over the course of adventuring a world would be built up and the PC's would be a significant part of this. A Final Word in the original Classic Traveller rulebook sums it up nicely; “The greatest burden, of course, falls on the referee, who must create entire worlds and societies thorugh which the players will roam… The players themselves have a burden almost equal to that of the referee: they must move, act, travel in search of their own goals… Above all, the players and the referees must work together.”

Story Games remove and or minimize the Game Master's/Referee's role in a traditional RPG thereby creating something different. Which is all well and good, play the game you want. But to say a Story Game is the solution for not having story in your RPG is rubbish. It's like saying you can't paint like Picasso because there is something wrong with paint, canvas and a stick, the tools you paint with. No, while it is easy to paint it is difficult to paint creatively.

Today's session went like this; some of the players felt they had a cash flow problem. One of them didn't. Some of the players thought they should pursue a dubious means of solving the problem, one of them didn't. On top of this one of the players had a problem with the relations and deals the party had made with dubious factions through play at the present time. One of the players turned to me and asked, “Do I have to role play this out or can I just roll and try and influence the other player?” In my game rolls for the results of social interaction (bluffing, fast talk, intimidation, etc.) are reserved for NPC's. The players have complete autonomy when it comes to deciding what choices their PC's will make. “Look, you guys have to work this out.” And I usually punctuate the moment by clicking off my mic. This is their time and I want the party to sink or swim on their own desires, needs, wants, abilities and investment. In fact, they had a similar situation just the previous session. One character was not hot on letting the party's surgeon remove his recently acquired kangaroo tail through amputation. They had to work this out among themselves. Arguing the risk of death or permanent disability against the complications such an enchantment would cause for the party at large in the campaign world. This was all on them. And it wasn't the first time the subject had been brought up. Anyways, the tail did come off and the PC survived, but this doesn't mean there was a kumbaya moment where they all came out of the barn holding hands. No, the game's story is being made in real time with their choices and decisions. No one used an “edge” or a “move to direct the tale. There were no mechanics to be forced to help them out of a complicated situation. They argued, decided, and hoped for the best. And the PC's character, their personality, their “story” was made before all out of everyone's own imaginative clay. Good, bad, or indifferent as far as quality of “play”, they got what they got not because they followed some structured method of resolution, but because they made it, together.

Now back to today's session; the dissenting PC (on the cash grab) felt so strongly about it he refused to participate in the action. Once again there was no “my character wouldn't do that”, or “my aspect says I will do this” he played his story in real time, played his character his way, and surprise, surprise, with high fidelity based on what has happened to the PC during the course of play within the overall campaign. Because he was invested, because like everyone else around the table they put some decent effort into their role. And this shit happens all the time with the players. No one at the table is shy about arguing over choice, action and consequence. And this is the story. Sure we have arch villains, and mind-bending horrors to battle. Blood soaked combat and PC death, but it is in the session to session PC on PC interaction which makes each one of them stand out and a distinct and unique story emerges every session.

Are the best sessions when they interact with each other for hours and no dice are thrown? No, not at all. We get the extra icing on the cake because the campaign world is dangerous and adventure abounds. Sooner than later the dice must be rolled and catastrophe breathes heavy over their shoulder. Just because you gamed your balls off doesn't mean your PC has plot immunity. That just sounds too much like a Story Game.

Jez Gordon Right Here Right Now

T-shirts will be available at North Texas Game Convention Saturday morning. How should I distribute them?

1. Arena Death Match
2. John Carpenter Fwy Car Jacker of the day
3. I have a helicopter
4. That guy is awesome, here is ten dollars.

Classic Traveller Random NPC Generator

I'm cobbling together some random generation tables for my Classic Traveller game. NPC's, like PC's are built on six attributes each created with a 2D6 throw. Pretty straight forward. Unless there is a mess of them. You could go with straight sevens across the board. That way you don't even need to write anything down until your NPC's start taking damage. That's because in combat damage is applied to the three physical stats of the character; Strength, Dexterity, and Endurance. But yeah, that's fucking boring. You've just made any random encounter the same dumb ass squib over and over. You know, like when you run into Goblins in a game of D&D they are all kinda the same. Unless you delve into some of the neat random tables littering the blogosphere to help crack that crap. Classic Traveller is old-school role playing. Like they did in '77! And that means you never know if the mook you just engaged in the bar is some drunk local, cyber enhanced gang banger or maybe even ex-military! 

One of the most important combat distinctions between Player Characters and NPC's is your game's PC's all start with a default Level Zero (0) skill in all weapons listed in the LBB's. This does not apply to your average NPC on the street. That means your average NPC on the street will be dealt a -5 to any combat rolls in combat. That is a serious distinction. But variety is the spice of life. If your gnarly space jocks get in a mix up with the local street toughs some of them may have some relevant weapon or hand to hand skills right? 

But I have no interest in stat'ing up ahead of time five, ten, twenty different types of NPC's for any given game session. To find out who is at the end of my player's upraised fist I want random results and I want them instantly! Fortunately we do not live in 1977 and we have mad gamers who know how to make random generators which we can all use from our desktop, tablet and phone. 

Bookmark this blog post. You are going to want to use it. Following are generators which give you all six character attributes accurately weighted and randomly generated. I've also broken the generators out in the chance of any one member of a group of NPC's having a level zero or level one (or both) in a relevant skill. 

I'm tacking on some career flavor tables to give some more specific flavor, but these tables, for me, are to give a detailed look at the combat effectiveness of any scum and villainy my PC's decide to get hot and personal with.

NPC's with a 1 in 5 chance of being Skilled

NPC's with a 1 in 10 chance of being Skilled

So now you got a bunch of space scum for your PC's to tussle with. Maybe they need some more flavor. Here I am going to use Paul Gallagher's Augmented Reality, The Holistic City Kit for Cyberpunk Games. I can import his tables into the random generator so with a click of the button you can give your home slice some local stank!

What does the Skilled NPC do?

So ideally this would work with one click. You could enter the number of mooks encountered and spit out a text report of all of them and if any are skilled what is their skilled career background. Well, I don't have those kind of skills. I am relying on The Last Gasp Grimoire to facilitate this tool. I guess to use this succor successfully you need to hit the link for the type of NPC you are interested in and record/copy & paste stats. If they happen to be skilled you can hit the other generator. Myself, I will most likely use this tool to figure out how many thugs in a crowd do not suffer the -5 penalty when attacking in combat.

The random career is a simple method of figuring out what the NPC is skilled at. If it is a medic or emergency technician than the skill would be Medical. A Mercenary you need to pick some combat skill. A Fixer is easy slap on Streetwise. Transport Worker? Evac, Steward, Drive ATV; these are all good choices. Remember Classic Traveller goes light on skills. The combination of place, attributes and maybe a skill or two is all you have to create the NPC on the spot. This is enough for skilled roleplayers. The skill list for Classic Traveller is 23 individual skills plus weapon and unarmed combat skills. Some of the skills are a header for a cascade list. So yeah just pick what makes sense. The more I play with Classic Traveller (which is admittedly not a lot) the more I appreciate its stone cold old school aesthetic.