Theory review #18

• https://www.rollspel.nu/threads/s%C3%A5ga-min-teoretiska-modell.77023/ presents a new model of roleplaying and then there is the inevitable discussion about what such are good for, in general, and if this one is useful in particular.
• http://adeptplay.com/actual-play/tales-recovering-ic-immersionist is the thoughts of someone who used to preconceive a full understanding of their player character and keep that and all the interesting issues to themselves, and how they see their former play now that they are trying a different approach.
• https://www.rollspel.nu/threads/olika-sorters-agens.77013/ names a few different types of possible agency, and how not all of them might be relevant for every player.
• https://www.rollspel.nu/threads/utmaningar-i-tradd%C3%A4ventyr.77014/ documents different types of challenges in a traditional game.
• https://www.rollspel.nu/threads/borde-man-spela-bordsrollspel-i-skolan.76971/ about using or not tabletop roleplaying in school teaching.
• https://rollespil.blog/2007/03/13/auto-de-fe-et-story-game/ discusses a Fastaval scenario, which seems to be in the Nordic freeform tradition, and how it differs from so-called story games. The text is from 2007.
• https://trollsmyth.blogspot.com/2021/07/neo-classical-gaming-revisited.html tells what neoclassical gaming is and gives a wizard’s school game as designed with the principles in mind.
• https://hjernespil.wordpress.com/2009/06/20/fra-br%c3%a6tspil-til-rollespil/, by Oliver, discusses some board game mechanics that could maybe be applied to roleplaying games, too.
• https://jannekemppi.wordpress.com/2016/08/19/thinking-about-game-design-part-3-formal-game-elements/, by Janne Kemppi, references formal game elements from Salen and Zimmerman’s book and briefly discusses traditional roleplaying in their light.
• https://d66kobolds.blogspot.com/2020/09/free-kriegsspiel-worlds-not-rules-etc.html summarizes the free kriegsspiel approach to roleplaying. They frame gaming as being all about problem solving.
• http://games.spaceanddeath.com/sin_aesthetics/5, by Moyra Turkington, is an actual play report of ”Breaking the ice”, with some reflection around immersion and sexy/romantic play.
• https://grognardia.blogspot.com/2021/07/random-roll-dmg-p-90.html, by James Maliszewski, comments on Gygax’s justification for the gold piece economy. I am suspicious about Gygax’s economical modelling.
• https://strangeworlder.medium.com/how-i-learned-to-accept-fate-core-3a578b29c77d, by Petri Leinonen, gives some basic description of Fate core and how to best approach it. Though I have to admit that his description of stress makes it precisely hit points: a buffer before you take actual serious injury and are taken out.
• https://www.terresetranges.net/forums/viewtopic.php?pid=19395#p19395, by Thomas Munier, describes playing for logical vertigo where different realities meet.

Vancian tunnels (maybe with trolls)

Stories of Jack Vance have magicians with a few potent adventurer spells and long-term magical projects and ambitions. The world is dying and every spell is a treasure of the past. The adventures are quick, dangerous and fantastic.

There are two obvious roleplaying inspirations to get from here.

The first is the fantastic adventure angle; something also Dunsany does, though often with less magical main characters, and something that can also be seen in some fairy tales. From the roleplaying side this is what old D&D and relatives are aiming at. Tunnels and trolls, too.

The second is the magician’s dollhousing project, Mazirian’s garden or Turjan’s vats, something exemplified by Ars magica, as far as roleplaying games go.

How to combine these two?

Basic structure of play

Characters can be mages or something else. Each player can have at most one mage character. They are the driving force of the game. The world is fantastic and dangerous, so there should be a reason to adventuring. Typically it is the magus who provides this, but other motivations are certainly possible.

In addition to adventuring the other modes of play are magical workings, which are long term arcane projects that delegate the wizard to downtime and thus have the player play some other character in their stable, and as a special case and requirement for further workings, establishing a safe seclusium for the sorcerer to work in.

Adventuring uses some kind of typical structure and procedures for dungeoneering, hex crawling, urban stuff, etc.

Magical workings take months to years. They require the warlock to have suitable skills, equipment and materials (all fine sources for adventures and trade). Interruptions are not good for such workings so the mage wants to secure that none come.

The seclusium can be that of a single magus, as is traditional, but why not show the tradition is wrong and have several magi share one? All with their own privacy, interests, ever-expanding needs for space and so on; what could go wrong? Among the first adventures I expect to be securing a seclusium; by construction, by social maneuvring, by dungeoncrawling, by magic; who knows?

The anatomy of a character

The core is that of Tunnels and trolls. Characters have a bunch of attributes (probably different ones than T&T has; physique, instinct, will, charisma, lore, luck) rolled with 3d6, triples add and roll over (if you roll a triple, roll 3d6 again and add until you no longer roll triples). So roll those. Decide if the character is a wizard or not. If not, that is okay; maybe you roll someone fit for wizardry for the next adventure while the current wizards are in downtime.

For a wizard, roll a number of random spells. The number is equal to your level plus one more for every five points of lore. Randomize the formulas from all the lists of spells you can find wherever or ask the referee to do this. Note that you can prepare a number of spells based on your attributes, one per ten points in each relevant attribute (lore, will) plus level, and each spell only once. The precise effects of the spell are to be figured out either before play or in play, as some mechanical conversion and decisions are necessary. In any case, releasing a prepared spell is always successful, though some magic may offer possibilities to resist. Preparing new spells takes on the order of a day per spell. A spell needs to be recorded somewhere for you to study and prepare it; a book, stone tablets, tattoos, whispered to you by your snake familiar, in the stars, …

For any character, decide their background. I encourage a word or two, like courtier, magician’s apprentice, baroness, alchemist. If you want, you can write down some skills they have and what equipment and property they have, but these are voluntary at this step. Also decide how old the character is.

Skills are heavily inspired by Eero Tuovinen’s Coup de main in Greyhawk ruleset. Skills live on a percent scale, with 100 % meaning a mastered skill that gives access to further, more specialized, skills. The skill system is organic; there are no points spend or slots to fill, but rather we figure out the skills and their values based on the character’s background and how much life they have seen.

The skill rules is that sometimes simply having or not having a skill suffices to determine whether a task succeeds and if there doubt, we roll an attribute check with 2d6, doubles add and roll, plus attribute, against a difficulty level. If a skill would be relevant and the character has only partially mastered it (skill value between 1 % and 99 % inclusive), we roll d100 to check if the character manages to benefit of the skill in this particular situation.

• Trivial skills: walking, speaking your native language, eating. Note that a very young child or a wolf transformed into a man would not have these skills, just like a human turned into a swan would have difficulty flying, eating and drinking. Typically we expect every character to have mastered trivial skills.
• Intuitive skills: climbing, punching, handling domesticated animals, cooking. These skills are typically absorbed, to various degrees, during the past of most characters, though a sheltered child emperor might miss many of them. A character usually has mastered the intuitive skills relevant for them and has partial mastery of the others. Rare would be one who is completely missing any, but certainly such happens.
• Expert skills: martial arts, picking locks, sciences, reading, foreign languages, magical skills. People don’t know these unless someone explicitly teaches them or under very particular conditions. An experiences character could start with some mastered and most characters would start with some expert skills at some levels.
• Even more expert skills: there is a ladder to expert skills; no learning library use before you have reading mastered, no boatbuilding before carpentry, and so on.

The typical starting values for skills are below, and specialists (see a bit down) should also add their level.

• Trivial skills: 100 % unless the character is very young.
• Intuitive skills without much exposure: 20 plus age plus attribute.
• Intuitive skills with exposure: 50 plus age plus attribute.
• Intuitive skills important to the character: 70 plus age plus attribute
• Expert skills with exposure and a tiny bit or practice or instruction: attribute
• Expert skills with incidental practice: half age plus attribute
• Expert skills with dedicated practice: age plus attribute and double the sum.
• Expert skills the character has dedicated their life to: age plus attribute and triple the sum.

Characters also select a single feat or dramatic archetype. Being a mage is one such; they do not get another. The three traditional archetypes are

• Mage: casts spells, as above. (Others can learn spellcasting, but they don’t benefit from their level.)
• Fighter: fights effectively, as described below in the fighter rules.
• Specialist: learns skills more effectively, as described in the character advancement rules.

Some other archetypes might be available; just suggest one. Maybe some monsters are archetypes?

An archetype tells what kind of extraordinary potential a character has. It need not reflect their current skills, although that is the most common and straightforward way to go.

One more voluntary thing. You can roll d20. If you roll higher than your highest attribute, feel free to choose a particularly special background. Maybe start with some rare skill (third level martial art or other very specialized stuff), a mutation, or some special ability. But if you roll less than your lowest attribute, choose a particularly miserable or wretched background. You are a slave from abroad with no equipment and language skills! Brain damage has made you forget all but trivial skills and the single expert skill of your choice; everything else is gone. There is a prize of 1000 gold pieces on your head. Etc.

Combat

The basic combat mechanic is from Tunnels and trolls: roll a number of d6, add any adds you might have. Enemy does the same. The losing side takes the difference in totals as damage. Any sixes rolled allow for stunting, or by default spite damage that hurts the enemy irrespective of who wins or loses.

The number of dice you roll is determined by the martial art you are using. Martial arts are skills. If you do not master the art, you need to roll, and on failure you default to the trivial skill of ineffective flailing.

• Ineffective flailing is a trivial skill that gives zero dice in combat; it is a zeroth level martial art. However, you do get to roll a single die, and in case of six, you get the usual benefits of stunting or spite damage. One recommended stunt: improve (or start learning) the first level martial art you really should be using right now; get an instant +1 % to such a skill and roll d100 to see if you manage to activate it right now.
• First level martial arts are the likes of swinging a weapon, throwing, punching, kicking, aiming a crossbow, tackling and wrestling. They are intuitive skills and any martial character has likely mastered most of them. They give a single die in combat.
• Second level martial arts deserve to be called such: archery, legionnaire training and mounted combat. They are expert skills. They give two dice in combat when they apply. A martial character has likely mastered at least one.
• Higher level martial arts are fancy and specialized combat techniques.

Fighters can always use their level as a martial art, even if they do not have a proper art of that level. So a fourth level fighter can roll four dice in combat, even if they have no martial arts. However, if they do use a martial and the dice it gives, they get to add their level as combat adds.

In addition to the dice, character have combat adds. Every martially relevant attribute (physique, instinct, luck) affects them; values below 9 apply a penalty equal to attribute value minus nine, while values above twelve apply a bonus equal to attribute value minus twelve. These are all added together and added to the total result of your combat dice.

Adds can also be modified by unequal conditions and equipment. This is an advanced rule. A minor modifier is plus or minus two, a major one is plus or minus five, an overwhelming one is plus or minus ten. A minor modifier would be a slightly shorter weapon or worse armour, or having to draw a blade while the other is already coming on to you. A major one would be a weapon ineffective against the enemy armour or otherwise clearly inferior conditions or equipment; a circumstance that could turn an underdog into a winner. An overwhelming modifier requires heroic effort to surpass; fighting unarmed and naked against an enemy in good armour and with a good weapon, or being stuck up to your waist in quicksand.

If using D&D enemies, assume they have combat dice equal to their hit dice or level, unless their martial arts skill level suggests otherwise.

Hit points equal your level in d6. Rerolled when you take a breather, but add a cumulative penalty die each time. The penalties go away when you have time to relax properly; typically between adventures. Hit points are your shield against taking damage. If they are not enough to absorb all the damage, the rest is taken to the attributes. This is a permanent loss and you might also be dying and in shock etc.

Damage is typically divided evenly among those who are clearly risking it, but stunting via spite damage allows assigning it in a more deadly manner.

Character change

Adventuring gives dramatic and quick changes. Experience is earned by adventuring based on pre-agreed goals and roughly scoped rewards for them. 2000 experience gives second level and this is doubled for every level thereafter. A poor character might get an experience point per gold piece. A wizard might get 1000 experience per major spell. Getting to know a dangerous location could be 100 experience (per dungeon level or equivalent). Experience is divided among the characters who participated in the successful adventure.

Attributes can increase by adventuring. After an adventurous session, choose one attribute. Roll 3d6 TARO and if you exceed your current attribute, increase it by one. If you do not, try another attribute until you do. Alternatively, you could try increasing a skill that played a major role in the adventure: roll d100, and if you exceed the skill rating, that is the new skill rating, and if you roll below, the skill increases by 1 anyway. Specialists get to add their level to both these tests.

All skills that were used (whether rolled or not) during a session increase by 1 %. A specialist gets their level in additional points to spread among these.

More dramatic change happens during downtime. Attributes and skills might change, but this depends on how the character spends their downtime.

The attributes the character is actively using might increase and concerned practice increases the odds further. The attributes the character is completely neglecting might decrease. The attributes that are in use, but not challenged, will remain as is. Determine these by 3d6 with TARO; if something might increase, a roll over it means it does increase (and matching it leads to increase if it was concerned practice); and likewise those under the threat of decrease do decrease if the roll is below the attribute value.

Young characters that are still growing up treat everything as one step higher activity. Old characters treat everything as one step lower activity.

As another issue, luck is very hard to change like this, while physique quite fast (maybe a month is enough for a roll). Lore takes a long time (maybe a year).

Practice also increases skills. The increases are as follows: If the character has been exposed to the skill, improve it by 1 %. If the character has been actively using the skill for an extended time, and has had varied learning possibilities corresponding to their current skill level, improve it by relevant attribute. Alternatively, consider the following table in case it gives better results. Add specialist level to the table values, but not the other increases.

• Very basics: attribute
• Some practice: ten plus attribute
• Significant practice: forty plus attribute
• Lots of varied practice: seventy plus attribute
• You should have learned it by now: ninety plus attribute
• Every year thereafter: +1 %

Learning a new spell takes about a month if you have a teacher and several months without one but with a written copy of the spell. Researching a new version of a spell, growing a magical garden, building an underwater palace and other such projects take years.

The world

A fantastic place. There are some safe regions, typically, though maybe secretly, the seclusiums or works of magicians, but venturing outside these is risky. There are not many mages and every spell is a unique one. Most mages hold their secrets tight, but might be willing to trade. Blackmailing and imprisoning them is, of course, a popular past-time among more cunning and ruthless mages.

There are fantastic creatures and places all over. Less of D&D race war with goblin tribes in them hills, more a tribe of purple toad-like creatures with orange feet that live here, a horrible were-platypus that they worship, but that might offer you its moist wisdom in exchange for sacrifices and further promises of such.

Starting characters make a lore check, lore plus 2d6 DARO, and on twenty or more they know a secret, plus one secret per additional five points. These secrets are adventure hooks: sources of spells, magical lore, potential seclusiums, who is really ruling over Barnazan, where to find the fountain of immortality, etc. The player can decide what the secret is and the referee should have a suitable adventure prepared reasonably quickly.

I suppose most mages should trivialize the issues of economy fairly quickly, but in the beginning, before they have a functional seclusium and useful spells, this is likely an issue. Better have trustworthy and useful companions while you develop your core sanctum and way of life. Or maybe ally, work together and trade spells with another warlock.

Character stable #23

I include some numbers that give an idea for the power level of the character.

• Gotfried, a very unfortunate pickpocket who was caught and pressed into service as a dungeon guide in Great kingdom, in the world of Greyhawk. Currently imprisoned by dwarves of Graymere. Level 1, experience 367, average attribute 9.
• Fridswid, a young witch travelling with elves in the world of Greyhawk. Level 2, experience 2517, average attribute 12.
• A dungeon badger in the dungeons of Castle Greyhawk. Hit dice 2, average attribute 11.
• Guinevere, the current queen of Camelot, but now adventuring in Greyhawk. Average attribute 12, level 1, experience 399.
• Pönk, level 4 wolf troll warrior in the empire of Khazan, near Saxon. Personal adds 41, total adventure points 624.
• Shahu, a human merchant (or maybe a naga wizard) working for the glory of his trade company (or maybe nest). Currently active in the empire of Khazan, near Saxon. Level 1, personal adds -1, total adventure points 358.
• Ælfstan, a psionic monk who lives in poverty and has opinions about organized religions. In Greyhawk, Yggsburg. Level 3, experience 551, average attribute 13.
• Senja, a commander and outdoorswoman who would rather not kill. Level 3, experience 3438, average attribute 11.
• athes, a cruel pseudo-mongol mounted archer. From Barren lands in Greyhawk and adventuring in Middle kingdoms. Level 2, experience 745, average attribute 11.

Graveyard

• Blarg, forest troll warrior died in the empire of Khazan, near Saxon, killed while simultaneously killing a horrid necrolyte and saving the village. Level 2, adventure points 1560.
• Pöö, a warrior in the empire of Khazan, died in the blood feud of Saxon. Level 1, adventure points 1483.
• Garkromm, a savage entertainer from Abbor-Alz in Greyhawk, died in the dungeons of Castle Greyhawk, eaten by a fire beetle. Level 1, experience 268.
• Rodaria, a seamstress from the city of Greyhawk, died in the dungeons of Castle Greyhawk, pierced by two spears to their gut, one ripped out by a (friendly?) barbarian. Level 1, experience 209.
• Wohoo the gargoyle warrior, level 1, killed by an orc at the exit of Buffalo castle in Khazan Empire. 42 adventure points.
• Möö the urook warrior, level 1, died in a pit in Buffalo castle, killed by an orc. Empire of Khazan in Trollworld. 5 adventure points.
• Ranrance, a first level thief of small stature, mauled by a magical owlbear statue in Greyhawk. Level 1, experience 0.

Nordic D&D with rails

This is a campaign idea. Not actual right now, as I have other games to run and play in. But maybe some day. The structure is inspired by a Chronicles of Prydain campaign by Eero Tuovinen for D&D 4.

• Setting: Pre-Christian Nordic countries, with lots of mythology and folklore included.
• Characters: Start at first level. Most are humans; at most one non-human, and you have to tell us which source that comes from. Some character classes are restricted and many have particular ties to the society; paladins are holy knights that from the Christian Europe, wizards have the same origin, no monks, a bard might be a skald or a tietäjä, a barbarian is probably a berserkr, and so on.
• Ruleset: Probably D&D 5 with light modifications.
• The game is railroaded: I offer a few adventures with their rough level and you choose one to play. The adventure is a preplanned sequence of a number of scenes with maybe four to six encounters (situations where players make decisions and which might turn out badly or well), with possible branching. An adventure can be successful or a failure.
• No involuntary character death: This is a rule. Your character can not be permanently removed from play without you, the player, explicitly asking for it. The stakes in the adventures will be something else than death. You might be stuck in Tuonela or Hel, or imprisoned by a mountain troll, but you won’t permanently lose the character. Liberating the character will be a possible adventure, as might escaping under their own power be.
• Voluntary character death: If you are in the middle of an encounter and decide that this is so important you are willing to risk the character, say so. You gain immediate short rest and inspiration, but now you can die, should you be reduced to zero hit points or affected by suitable monster abilities. The death will be permanent if it happens. If you declare it between encounters, you gain inspiration and the effects of a long rest, but now you can die during the rest of the adventure, and you can’t retreat from the adventure; you have to see it through. It is a strong statement.
• Resting: Short rests between encounters (exceptional difficulties might make them impossible). Long rest only between adventures.
• Character stable and new characters: You can have several characters, and it might be clever to do so. New characters start at first level, but of course bounded accuracy keeps you relevant, lack of character death removes the risk and the trivial experience cost of the first few levels allow you to earn them fairly quickly.
• Optional rules: Feats are not available under character advancement, but there are quests to learn them. Same with multiclassing.
• Backgrounds: Heavily customized and probably a work in progress throughout play.

The point in such a game would be to enjoy the mythology, folklore and culture, and the interaction of the colourful characters with them. Low level adventurers would involve trolls and other monsters, witches, travelling, neighbour hostilities, going viking and honour of women and men. Higher level adventurers would involve travelling to other worlds, meeting and maybe fighting gods and giants and deciding the fate of the world.

Character stable #22

I include some numbers that give an idea for the power level of the character.

• Gotfried, a very unfortunate pickpocket who was caught and pressed into service as a dungeon guide in Great kingdom, in the world of Greyhawk. Currently imprisoned by dwarves of Graymere. Level 1, experience 367, average attribute 9.
• Fridswid, a young witch travelling with elves in the world of Greyhawk. Level 2, experience 2517, average attribute 12.
• A dungeon badger in the dungeons of Castle Greyhawk. Hit dice 2, average attribute 11.
• Guinevere, the current queen of Camelot, but now adventuring in Greyhawk. Average attribute 12, level 1, experience 399.
• Pönk, level 4 wolf troll warrior in the empire of Khazan, near Saxon. Personal adds 41, total adventure points 624.
• Shahu, a human merchant (or maybe a naga wizard) working for the glory of his trade company (or maybe nest). Currently active in the empire of Khazan, near Saxon. Level 1, personal adds -1, total adventure points 358.
• Senja, a commander and outdoorswoman who would rather not kill. In the empire of Khazan, near Saxon. Level 3, adventure points 2148, personal adds +5.
• Ælfstan, a psionic monk who lives in poverty and has opinions about organized religions. In Greyhawk, Yggsburg. Level 3, experience 398, average attribute 13.
• athes, a cruel pseudo-mongol mounted archer. From Barren lands in Greyhawk and adventuring in Middle kingdoms. Level 1, experience 545, average attribute 11.

Graveyard

• Blarg, forest troll warrior died in the empire of Khazan, near Saxon, killed while simultaneously killing a horrid necrolyte and saving the village. Level 2, adventure points 1560.
• Pöö, a warrior in the empire of Khazan, died in the blood feud of Saxon. Level 1, adventure points 1483.
• Garkromm, a savage entertainer from Abbor-Alz in Greyhawk, died in the dungeons of Castle Greyhawk, eaten by a fire beetle. Level 1, experience 268.
• Rodaria, a seamstress from the city of Greyhawk, died in the dungeons of Castle Greyhawk, pierced by two spears to their gut, one ripped out by a (friendly?) barbarian. Level 1, experience 209.
• Wohoo the gargoyle warrior, level 1, killed by an orc at the exit of Buffalo castle in Khazan Empire. 42 adventure points.
• Möö the urook warrior, level 1, died in a pit in Buffalo castle, killed by an orc. Empire of Khazan in Trollworld. 5 adventure points.
• Ranrance, a first level thief of small stature, mauled by a magical owlbear statue in Greyhawk. Level 1, experience 0.

Character stable #21

I include some numbers that give an idea for the power level of the character.

• Shahu, a human merchant (or maybe a yuan-ti sorcerer) working for the glory of his trade company (or maybe nest). Currently active in Scorching wastes, in Mernua. Level 1, xp 120, average attribute 11.
• Gotfried, a very unfortunate pickpocket who was caught and pressed into service as a dungeon guide in Great kingdom, in the world of Greyhawk. Currently imprisoned by dwarves of Graymere. Level 1, experience 367, average attribute 9.
• Ælfstan, a psionic monk who lives in poverty and has opinions about organized religions. In Greyhawk, Yggsburg. Level 3, experience 355, average stat 13.
• Fridswid, a young witch travelling with elves in the world of Greyhawk. Level 2, experience 2517, average attribute 12.
• Senja, a commander and outdoorswoman who would rather not kill. In Middle kingdoms. Level 3, experience 1935, average attribute 12.
• A dungeon badger in the dungeons of Castle Greyhawk. Hit dice 2, average attribute 11.
• Guinevere, the current queen of Camelot, but now in adventuring in Greyhawk. Average attribute 12, level 1, experience 399.
• Pöö, a warrior in the empire of Khazan, near Buffalo castle. Level 1, adventure points 1449, average attribute 13.
• Blarg, forest troll warrior in the empire of Khazan, near Buffalo castle. Level 2, adventure points 287, average attribute 17.
• athes, a cruel pseudo-mongol mounted archer. From Barren lands in Greyhawk and adventuring in Middle kingdoms. Level 1, experience 145, average attribute 11.

Graveyard

• Garkromm, a savage entertainer from Abbor-Alz in Greyhawk, died in the dungeons of Castle Greyhawk, eaten by a fire beetle. Level 1, experience 268.
• Rodaria, a seamstress from the city of Greyhawk, died in the dungeons of Castle Greyhawk, pierced by two spears to their gut, one ripped out by a (friendly?) barbarian. Level 1, experience 209.
• Wohoo the gargoyle warrior, level 1, killed by an orc at the exit of Buffalo castle in Khazan Empire. 42 adventure points.
• Möö the urook warrior, level 1, died in a pit in Buffalo castle, killed by an orc. Empire of Khazan in Trollworld. 5 adventure points.
• Ranrance, a first level thief of small stature, mauled by a magical owlbear statue in Greyhawk. Level 1, experience 0.

Theory review #15

• http://adeptplay.com/seminar-hearts-minds/conversation-purposes-playing-name-no-thing, by Vincent Baker, Ron Edwards and others, gets into the weeds of purpose of play and creative agenda and whether simulationism as a creative agenda exists. More importantly, whether this should be talked about or not. Summary in the video at 54:30.
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d9Go2mAD8Hs, by Ron Edwards, about the relationship between object of game and purpose of play.
• https://www.rollspel.nu/threads/scens%C3%A4ttars%C3%A4tt.77282/ lists various non-standard methods of framing and playing out scenes.
• https://yle.fi/uutiset/3-11995783 a game that helps people tell about their life and experiences to new social service workers. Unfortunately there is little on the game itself.
• https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/15554120211027475, by Jasper V. Vught, applies Russian formalism to (electronic) games.
• https://adeptpress.files.wordpress.com/2020/06/skills-and-failures.pdf, by Ron Edwards, gives a brief history of traditional skill rules. http://adeptplay.com/comment/2328#comment-2328 and onward discusses the use and modification of the skill system in old Runequest, and an implied critique of setting stakes.
• https://scholarworks.sjsu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=4699&context=etd_theses, by Christopher Rudolph Consorte, sets AD&D Dungeon master’s guide and episodic TV writing guidelines side by side and compares them. Some of the comparisons are strange and clearly anything resembling one-to-one correspondence is not there to be found.
• http://adeptplay.com/actual-play/monster-hearts-whats-fun-anyway about a Monsterhearts game that did not go well, and, in the comments, some general discussion about Powered by the apocalypse and what it means and does not mean, and about its origin.
• http://adeptplay.com/actual-play/dungeon-world-some-my-best-rpg-moments, by FroggyC, gives a method for removing GM arbitrariness in Dungeon world play (in the comments to the post).
• http://adeptplay.com/actual-play/pink-play-doh-monsters-ax-dad, by Sean_RDP, reflects on roleplaying to experience particular characters via play with a child.
• https://www.tuni.fi/playlab/dungeons-and-dragons-as-the-first-gaming-platform/ summarizes an article on D&D as a gaming platform.
• http://lumpley.com/creatingtheme.html, by Vincent Baker, explains story now/narrativism.

Character stable #20

I include some numbers that give an idea for the power level of the character.

• Shahu, a human merchant (or maybe a yuan-ti sorcerer) working for the glory of his trade company (or maybe nest). Currently active in Scorching wastes, in Mernua. Level 1, xp 120, average stat 11.
• Guinevere, the current queen in England. Highest stat B5, skill G5 (others black and no higher).
• athes, a cruel pseudo-mongol mounted archer. From Barren lands in Greyhawk, and now in Wilderlands of high fantasy. Level 1, experience 145, average stat 11.
• Gotfried, a very unfortunate pickpocket who was caught and pressed into service as a dungeon guide in Great kingdom, in the world of Greyhawk. Currently imprisoned by dwarves of Graymere. Level 1, experience 367, average attribute 9.
• Ælfstan, a psionic monk who lives in poverty and has opinions about organized religions. In Greyhawk, Yggsburg. Level 3, experience 355, average stat 13.
• Fridswid, a young witch travelling with elves in the world of Greyhawk. Level 2, experience 2517, average attribute 12.
• Senja, a commander and outdoorswoman who would rather not kill. In Middle kingdoms. Level 3, experience 1935, average attribute 12.
• Pöö, a fighter in the empire of Khazan. Level 1, adventure points 136, average attribute 13.
• A dungeon badger in the dungeons of Castle Greyhawk. Hit dice 1 and growing, average attribute 11, does not gather experience.

Graveyard

• Rodaria, a seamstress from the city of Greyhawk, died in the dungeons of Castle Greyhawk, pierced by two spears to their gut, one ripped out by a (friendly?) barbarian. Level 1, experience 209, average stat 10.
• Garkromm, a savage entertainer from Abbor-Alz in Greyhawk, died in the dungeons of Castle Greyhawk, eaten by a fire beetle. Level 1, experience 268, average attribute 11.
• Ranrance, a first level thief of small stature, mauled by a magical owlbear statue in Greyhawk. Level 1, experience 0.

Core game

Characters have attributes in the D&D range: typically between 3 and 18 or maybe 1 and 20, with the average around 10 or 11. They might have special abilities or magic. Most spells can be used roughly once per adventure.

Task resolution is d20 plus attribute. If the character does not know what they are doing, we might use half attribute or +0 instead. The d20 explodes upwards (on a roll of 20) and downwards (on a roll of 1). Each task will have a particular difficulty, 20 for many adventurous tasks, to succeed at it.

A starting character has d6 hit points. A successful attack (as established by the task resolution rules) takes away d6 hit points. If the character does not have enough hit points to absorb the attack, they might be wounded.

The actual game is, of course, not these resolution rules, and not in the character advancement rules either, but rather in how these are used. I am not explaining that here.

Using a character

These rules are made specifically for one-shots and for players who bring their own characters, of any rules system with roughly the correct power level. If necessary, you can also make a new character.

When using a character, if their attributes are not at the correct scale, convert them to the D&D scale, so that average score is about 9-12, low score is about 1-5 and human optimum about 15-25.

The set of attributes you have is okay. If something is missing, we can always roll it in play with 3d6.

For the special abilities and spells, we’ll take them into account fiction first: you describe what they do in the fiction, we figure out how we take that into account, same as anything else in the fiction. Note that by default your spells are usable once per adventure; in case the adventure spans large amounts of time there are alternatives to get them back faster, and you can take risks to cast them again, but we’ll get to those as necessary.

We also need hit points and level for the character. If the character already has hit points or level, use those. If not, they are first level and have d6 hit points. You can roll now or when you take damage for the first time. Note that hit points are a floating concept; they recover by resting and are lost by stress and to avoid injury and other problems. There is no maximum hit points.

Advancing a character

You gather experience based on accomplishing adventurous goals you set up for yourself. The default is getting rich, one experience per gold piece with second level at about 2000 experience, but other alternatives are obviously possible and encouraged.

At the end of a session you get to try to improve one of your attributes, or perhaps learn or master a skill. If you have more level than special abilities, you might learn a new special ability.

More elaborate rules

The idea behind the system is that we build on, or maybe take away, the rules as we play longer and get used to the mechanical framework and philosophy of play. We are unlikely to see too much of this in a short game. The mechanical choices we have made are just that, while the fundament is the philosophy of play.

Attribution

This is heavily based on a house system of Eero Tuovinen.

Character stable #19

I include some numbers that give an idea for the power level of the character.

• Shahu, a human merchant (or maybe a yuan-ti sorcerer) working for the glory of his trade company (or maybe nest). Currently active in Scorching wastes, in Mernua. Level 1, xp 120, average stat 11.
• Guinevere, the current queen in England. Highest stat B5, skill G5 (others black and no higher).
• athes, a cruel pseudo-mongol mounted archer. From Barren lands in Greyhawk, and now in Wilderlands of high fantasy. Level 1, experience 145, average stat 11.
• Gotfried, a very unfortunate pickpocket who was caught and pressed into service as a dungeon guide in Great kingdom, in the world of Greyhawk. Currently imprisoned by dwarves of Graymere. Level 1, experience 367, average attribute 9.
• Ælfstan, a psionic monk who lives in poverty and has opinions about organized religions. In Greyhawk, Yggsburg. Level 3, experience 355, average stat 13.
• Fridswid, a young witch travelling with elves in the world of Greyhawk. Level 2, experience 2517, average attribute 12.
• Senja, a commander and outdoorswoman who would rather not kill. In Middle kingdoms. Level 3, experience 1935, average attribute 12.
• Pöö, a fighter in the empire of Khazan. Level 1, adventure points 136, average attribute 13.

Graveyard

• Rodaria, a seamstress from the city of Greyhawk, died in the dungeons of Castle Greyhawk, pierced by two spears to their gut, one ripped out by a (friendly?) barbarian. Level 1, experience 209, average stat 10.
• Garkromm, a savage entertainer from Abbor-Alz in Greyhawk, died in the dungeons of Castle Greyhawk, eaten by a fire beetle. Level 1, experience 268, average attribute 11.
• Ranrance, a first level thief of small stature, mauled by a magical owlbear statue in Greyhawk. Level 1, experience 0.