Fossil Forward...

Reviewing the mad fat stack of Car Wars material I have accumulated, I am always amazed at how simple it was to create your character in Car Wars:

you have 3 Damage points (DP)
You select 2 skills, one of them at +1
You have to roll 7+ on 2d6 to succeed.
you can carry up to 6 grenades worth of equipment.
Armor adds to you DP and is crossed off first (destroyed) when you take damage
No DP left means you are roadkill.

looking in an AADA guide they would list the two stats for NPC's the first would be GURPS which ended up being 9 compact lines of stats and skills, the Car Wars Equivalent of this same fellow is one compact line: Damage points, skill(s) and weapon/equip.

I like the quick clean method of this, but I wrestle a bit with going stats free.  I have Car Wars stats for everything from vampires, to mutants, zombies, to mountain men, and honestly, I really like the clean attribute free manner in which they handle people.  Part of this is due to the vehicles being the star of the show, but as the game went on they really fleshed out characters and NPC's not with stats, but with description.  Characters and NPC's were distinctive  based upon their descriptions, not on stat blocks.  The stats were secondary.  This is interesting grist for the gaming mill...

What came before...

Going through my RPG horde I found the following Apocalypse RPG's:

Gamma World (1st,2nd,d20)
Car Wars
Aftermath!
Morrow Project
After the Bomb

Gamma World was the first one we ever played, and its mixture of mutant animals, mutant plants, and mutant humans was a hodgepodge of science fantasy. Great if you like that over the top sort of gaming, but it never quite satisfied us.

Car Wars was (and still is) one of my all time favorite Post-Apoc games. Yes it is a bit of a crunchy war game, but when combined with the AADA region guides, you actually have a hell of an RPG setting. Characters (as they were) were simple constructs. Driving around Mad Max style and getting into all sorts of trouble was a blast. Sure it focused mainly on the wheels, but we played for quite some time borrowing from other RPG's to flesh out the non-wheeled parts of the game. You can get an updated pdf collecting all of the various vehicle types and rules in one book from SJG. Hopefully the AADA guides get combined as well.

Aftermath! was our next purchase. The print ads in Dragon Magazine showing a Road Warrior-esque Mel Gibson character was a slam dunk. I could (and still can) quote most of that movie. This was an astounding $25 back in the day (when other boxed games were $12)and so it was a holy grail of gaming for me. Eventually I purchased it...and was overwhelmed. Buried in 3 different manuals was a game, but one so convoluted and overly detailed that we ended up not playing it much. It suffered from gun-porn rules.

Gun Porn: Top Secret was the first game I played that had this odd affliction. By gun porn means a fetishistic rules creation with trying to accurately (obsessively) model the physical power of a specific gun, ammo round, and environment as well as the shooters individual disposition when firing. Top Secret was the first time I saw this, and Aftermath! took this Soldier of Fiction obsession to a whole new level.

Well, that is until I got the Morrow Project. Somewhere between a survival manual, and a Soldier of Fiction book with rules in it came the Morrow Project. While I liked the ideas behind trying to help rebuild civilization, and the gritty manner the world is presented, some of it seemed odd or out of place. Your team wakes up 100+ years later and it always seemed like it might have only been 2 weeks. 80's military hardware is still rolling around everywhere, everyone is armed (heavily) with modern guns and explosives. It just never rang true as a 100+ years after the bomb setting. Its rules were also a bit too simulation/ gun porn focused. When your modules talk about giving you blue prints for military vehicles as a highlight? That screams GUN PORN baby!

After the Bomb from Palladium was an offshoot of their TMNT system. Say what you will regarding the Palladium system, I very much enjoyed the ideas and presentation of TMNT. After the Bomb was simply setting the TMNT mutant stuff into a post apocalypse setting. Nothing fancy, it all worked and was sort of a Gamma World update in my mind. Different spin on the same genre idea. In fact I'd even say After the bomb/TMNT trumped Gamma World with its Road Hogs books. It sort of Mashed up TMNT and Car Wars into an RPG.

Good memories and lots of fun, but at this stage in my life I am looking for rules lite fast playing fun.  That's what I am working on providing other time crunched RPG fans.  More gaming, less rules grinding.

Notes from the blast zone

In the History Channel show I discussed yesterday here are some interesting bits of flotsam and jetsam:

The most recent crisis event illustrative of a collapse event in the U.S. was Hurricane Katrina and its effect on new Orleans. From that disaster we saw:

* Most households ran out of food after 3 days
* Unprotected stores were looted and emptied of all items (including toys, clothes, basically anything that could be carried out) within 5 days
* Rioting, looting, and the break down of law & order occurred within 4 days after Katrina.
* The sound (and thus use)of weapons being fired was commonplace as a background noise within 4 days of the event.

I guess I was shocked that within 4 days of some sort of catastrophic event, we revert back to the wild west or worse, our basest survival mode instincts kick in. I know that help was very slow in coming, but the resources of a nation were able to be mobilized to help. Suppose there was no help coming...ever again?

Apparently the thin veneer of civilization is quite a bit thinner than I had expected.

Coincidence?

Blame it on…well no one really, quirk of fate possibly? Turns out the History *cough* channel is airing some sort of Doom & Gloom week dealing what happens if (insert an earth shaking apocalypse scenario here). What a great way to start a happy fraking New Year!
Anyway, they had a 2 hour “what if” civilization breaks down scenario last night illustrating the entire breakdown through the eyes of a 3 person family from suburban L.A. I watched it with my wife, and needless to say she thought it was scarier than any horror movie she’s ever seen. Part of it was because it focused on dramatic crisis points and then illustrated them: Looters break down of food supply, sanitation, law and order, and the reversions from get along to going it alone. I recorded and took copious notes while watching because it was quite intriguing. They even had a show after that where a “survival expert” (akin to Man vs. Wild’s Bear Grylls) gave tips on how and what you would have to do to survive. While I have not seen it yet, that too is recorded as grist for the gaming mill.
So given the current rich resource to draw from, it looks like Roguish is on the back burner while I listen to this darker gaming muse for a bit

The Collapse...

Below is the intro to my Post-Apoc game world...

Sometimes a debt has to be paid in blood.  As the global financial system continued to spiral downwards, riots flared up all over the world.  Governments printing and spending with abandon caused a reckoning in which money became worthless.  As one government after another collapsed it took down faith in the financial system globally.  Attempts to create a global currency also failed as it stalled in endless debates over exchange rates for each country.  Even more divisive, debate and threats swirled over which countries could be a part of this currency and which would be left out.  These endless debates, accusations, and threats between nations combined with the average citizens of any country no longer having any belief in printed currency any longer led to the collapse.  In the end, the global economic system failed, and with it entire nations collapsed.

 In this turmoil as neighboring countries, regions, and even cities destabilized, some attempted to take advantage of the collapse through force of arms.  Man descended back to his natural, self interested state of pure survival.  Order fractured globally as armies were left to defend themselves and some create pockets of civilization wherever they were based. Those were the lucky areas; many army groups went rogue becoming regional warlords.  People used to the “on demand” lifestyle of the West were shocked at how rapid the collapse came and were swept away in the rising tide of violence.  Unable to defend themselves, fend for themselves, or to offer anything more than tie-dyed platitudes of peace, they were the first wave of population lost to the collapse.  Then plagues broke out as sanitation failed, bodies piled up, and use of biological weapons took place.  No one knows where or who dropped the first bombs but mushroom clouds were reported intermittently all over the globe. 

In the midst of this chaos and destruction something unexpected happened.  At first it was thought to be rumor or simply the panicked stories of some traumatized survivors until more and more people reported seeing the same thing: shambling husks of humanity risen from the dead and hungry for living flesh.  Whether it is divine judgment, Mother Nature’s revenge, or the product of some combination of radiation and disease is unknown.   Pockets of civilization still exist but they are bought and paid for with blood, sweat, and tears.  Most survive by a combination of wits, barter, and force.  This is the brave new world you now inhabit. You are one light in a growing darkness as humanity tries to survive the collapse.

Alive and kickin'

Nope I have not dropped off the face of the earth!  Winding up the day to day job year end stuff and planning  for 2010 conquests meant a lot of work and no play. 

Of note for zombie fans I highly recommend a new "survival guide" from our cousins across the pond.  Entitled ZOMPOC How to survive a Zombie Apocalypse, it is a bit more "serious" in tackling the subject and a bit less tongue in cheek than the Max Brooks survival guide.  A good read and for any gamer, a huge idea generator 5000.

In fact its had me dust off my home brew post apocalypse rules and fret about putting that together into a useable game rule set rather than a hodge podge of scribbled notes.  A lot of travel coming up so maybe all those hours on the plane can be put to good use.  Hopefully I will have time to actually focus on writing and creating stuff instead of the on going daily grind.  Lucky to have a good job I enjoy though so I guess I can't really complain at all.

Happy New Year to you and yours, I sincerely  hope 2010 is your best year yet!

Roguish RPG sample PDF released!!

Well I am pleased to say I made my goal of creating a sample PDF  of my Roguish RPG available before the end of November!  You are now able to down load the 8 pg pdf from Geekdo!   
In 6 pages of rules you will get a feel for the basics of the system, and a short intro adventure is included and will let you try the game play out.  I look forward to your feedback.
Happy Thanksgiving!

Exeprience System In Roguish RPG

When you reward an action, it will cause people to do that action more.  Traditionally in the early years of "roll" playing, looting and slaying were the primary methods of leveling up your character.  I like looting and slaying, in games mind you, quite a bit, the difficulty arises when these are the core ways one levels up their character, this becomes the paradigm for all adventure creation.  So developing a story line and rewarding people for advancing plot elements with something other than a blade's edge are not tangible rewarding to players. I kill creature X, to get experience reward Y.  I loot treasure A I get experience B.  Basic, but honestly kind of boring and it can get quite convoluted in trying to compute it.  Worse crunching numbers after a battle to reward XP can take players right of the game and slows adventure momentum as well as game play.

As gaming advanced the emphasis in many games shifted to "role" playing.  Epic plots, intrigues, and multiple sessions where combat might never occur.  Rewarding a player for good "role" playing though is somewhat subjective and in my own experience, can lead to internal party or group friction.  This is also a difficult method of play for those who dislike theatrical pontification in strange not quite right accents.  Does the showiest most theatrical person deserve a bigger award than the quiet guy who just wants some thing to slay and loot? If you reward "role" playing than those who dislike showmanship will be turned off from playing.


Lastly, I never like the XP division by class to artificially limit and make advancement more difficult for some and quicker for others.  It is an artificial social leveling to insure some character classes who are seen as too powerful within the game are held back.

Okay, in that brief overview you know what I don't like and why.  So how do I have it set up in Roguish?

At the end of an adventure you are awarded a combination of 1,2, or 3 XP.  Any class needs 10 XP to raise to the next level. Maximum reward is 5XP at the end of any adventure.

You get 1 XP for surviving the adventure
You get 2 XP if you survived, and did something clever, tricky, or brave in the adventure.
You get 3 XP if you survived and were an instrumental participant in completing the adventure.

Yes it is a little vague on purpose.  Generally most folks will get 3-5 pts.  Some who helped, but were also a bit of a drag on the adventure will get a 2, and the participant award player who generally was a pain in the ass probably gets 1.

So it will take 2-3 adventures in general to raise a level for most players.  I don't know about you, but finding time to complete 1 adventure a month is difficult.  and this XP system I think will help foster return play because you can level up quickly.  Second, the level grind issue goes away and the game becomes more concerned with participating in the adventure.  Treasure is its own reward so is not counted in as an XP reward. This system should take advantage of any players particular ability without giving a specific reward for slaying the dragon, or out smarting the troll at the bridge.  Both, in this system, are equally valuable.

The Referee and the players are ( I hope) freed by this reward system to focus on playing the game, not on tracking who killed what or who role played the best.  It also mean stopping to figure out XP after a battle goes away, increasing immersion in the game and speeding play.  It is simple and easy to pick up for new referees and expert referees can change and use what ever system they like.

CLASSIC!

Sure I just passed my 40th spin around the block in our solar system, but just as awesome (maybe more so)-my favorite vehicle of all time the Jeep hit 69 today.  God bless you Jeep, 69 years later and you are just as bad ass as ever.  The Jeep is just a classic vehicle and no matter what they do, they just can't  frak  the original up.  Whether its the original, or one off the line in 2009, its just as kick ass as ever.  Somethings are done right the first time and overtime only modernizing tweaks add to what's great but can't really improve it.   

Sure, but what does that have to do with gaming?  A lot I say.  I want my Roguish RPG to be Jeep like.  Simple, solid, relaible, and flexible to get you wherever it is your imagination wants to go.  The jeep isn't flashy, it won;t stop traffic, and it won't win any beauty contests.  It does have thousnads of optional parts you can buy to customize it and make it your own.    You get the base Jeep, and then you can jack it up, lower it, add fog lights, a hard top, safari top, roof rack,  or do whatever you want to it.  No matter how many options your throw into personalizing your Jeep, everyone still recognizes it instantly as a Jeep.

So with Roguish the RPG that's what I want to deliver, a Jeep of a fantasy game.  Simple to start, easy to play, take you anywhere and room to make it the game you want it to be. 

No Clerics

So in expectation of an upcoming play test of Roguish, I have decided to make clerics in the game NPC's and not a playable class. Here are a few reasons for this:

1) I really dislike the over abundance and focus in RPG's on deities & demigods. I realize I may be alone in this but as a function of the game world it simply never interested nor entered into our game play. Creating weird pantheons or cults as a foil to the characters was fun but worrying about when the cleric is going to find time to sacrifice goats to Thor? Not so much...

2) Clerics as NPC's serve as excellent foils or hirelings for the referee to use to progress, start, or create plot twists in a story.

3) I never liked the cleric as spell caster. Any boon or miracle granted by a god I believe would have more to do with the faithfulness of the clerics service then simply, you are level 2 now you cure wounds twice daily sort of thing.

4) Clerics are traditionally more often stationary than wandering. Not strictly true in all cases of course, but more often than not, it is true. Why does a the priestess of Isis want to battle the Hill Giant in the caves of doom? Yeah I am not sure either. But the players hiring a priestess of Isis to transalte for them in a foreign land provides all sorts of interesting plot twists for a clever referee to use.

5) Lastly, I think breaking up traditional cleric type spells and abilities into different classes makes for more interesting options for players long term. So a healer as a separate class makes sense, as does a witch hunter with the secrets of vanquishing evil and turning the undead.

The good news as with any game, if you want to create a cleric class when playing Roguish, feel free!

New Art and a major hurdle ahead

A big test of my Roguish RPG is upcoming as two of the most brutally honest critics I have try out the latest version of the game this weekend. Those critics are my younger brothers. Although with my 40th approaching next week and my brothers and I within a few years of each other, I am unsure young fits anymore. It's fun to think we have been gaming together for 30 years now. Damn, that does not make me feel old, just blessed!

Anyway we grew up playing RPG's together and they both have enough experience and interest to let me know the truth, and if it stinks on ice, they will happily let me know. Barring disaster, my goal is to have a micro 8 page sample version of the rules available as a free download in November. My expectation is of the full game releasing in January of next year.

Also some fantastic new illustrations were completed this week for Roguish. I am very happy and honored to have a terrific number of illustrations from Mr. Richard Luschek. I specifically requested the illustrations be of scenes in silhouette. His illustrations bring a scene to life, and leave a lot of the details to your imagination to fill in which is the aspect of gaming I enjoy the most. Richard's illustrations are a perfect mirror of that sense of wonder.

You can catch a sneak peek of some of the recently finished illustrations on Mr. Luschek's blog.

Freedom of choice, is what you got

The notion of freedom of choice is a dear one to me. Beyond simply being core to my belief system as an American and responsible for our success as a nation, it is core to my beliefs as a Christian. Anything that seeks to stifle that innate spark I consider anathema to anyone's potential happiness and success in life.

I was inspired by a post over at http://bloodofprokopius.blogspot.com/

The (as usual) thoughtful post was primarily about how he uses monster stat blocks.

This particular part though sparked my response:

Challenge Level — Frankly, I've never used this. The players know quite well that I don't dumb down or weaken the monsters in places they have no business being. Characters have been killed for not running away when they should have. The game is about choices. When I present to them a monster, it is what it is. The characters are then free to try their luck and skill or to run away and then face the consequences of their choice.


The notion of choice and how one exercises it is core not only to the success of the game, but to every life, and most importantly was given to us as a gift from God. When a game (or more recently our own government) endeavors to make everything equal and fair, the first thing removed is freedom of choice. In the case of Challenge Level, I too have loathed this mollycoddling stat.

There are some beasts the characters should run away from and if they choose not to then they suffer the consequences...and they LEARN! Part of the the freedom to choose is the notion and experience of exploration. In the game exploration is not limited to simply roaming of ancient halls and dusty crypts, it is the exploration of the boundaries of heroism, cowardice, friendship, and exploring the limits of a persons abilities through a paper avatar and some dice. The game in essence is a vehicle to explore your own personality in fantastic situations exploring all sorts of choices that you may never make in real life with the only victim being a sheet of paper if the choices are bad.

The challenge level stat is a reflection of socialized system game play: Provide a system of regulated choice to try and insure the characters always have a better than average chance to succeed at the expense of choice.

This system regulates and controls the level of danger, challenge, and uncertainty to maximize character success if you used "properly."

By adhering to challenge level you remove the most critical element of exploration: freedom of choice. The Referee is then limited artificially as to what they should use in created challenges, and the players choice to fight or not is also removed. When you know you have a better than average chance to beat any encounter, then you always fight.

Choice is about risk, and with risk comes the chance to succeed spectacularly or to fail miserably. Both ends lead to some of the greatest experiences in both gaming and life. Rags to Riches...and Riches to rags. Any system that seeks to Remove or unnaturally limit that essential part of the human experience given to us by God seems as if it must be a sin of some kind.

Does size matter?

Way back in the 80's a friend of mine had these tiny little RPG books. I mean so small they were dinky! A small booklet roughly the size of a playing card and sold in a resealable bag. It was Dinky Dungeons! There were a couple adventures and a Dinky Kingdoms supplement as well. With 2 stats and 3 classes (one class was my most hated the bard) it turned out to be a hell of a lot of fun! Don't remember it? Check out a good review here.

In fact part of the inspiration for making the modules and supplements for my own game in a small pocketmod format comes from my fondness of the Dinky Dungeons unique packaging and presentation.

So after the flash back, let's flash forward A gentleman named Chris Nail is revising and reinventing Dinky Dungeons...I believe he is going to call it Dinky Dragons! The site is up and you can check out all sorts of cool stuff including a random character generator!

He has the beta version of his rules available if you contact him. Due to travel and work on my own game, I have not had the pleasure of playing his updated version yet, but the rules are as simple and far more interesting than the original! Definitely a great set of rules to get new people or young people playing, or just a fun night storming the castle.

Check out Chris' site, if for no other reason than to support another DIY gamer making his RPG a wonder of simplicity and creativity.

Best of the Best: 80's scifi-& fantasy movies

With the wife out of town visiting her dad, I have time to write and revel in my own top 10 list of 80's scifi/ fantasy films. You may disagree, and that's fine, you are wrong. Note, I am not including any films from the major series of the era Star Wars or Star Trek. My plan is to watch every single one over the extended holiday, and wallow in some classic films. Without further yammering, here it is:

#10 BEAST MASTER -The two ferrets were really cool
#9 TRON- Killer light cycle races and the tanks are still kick ass
#8 EXCALIBUR-Unforgetable armor and the music Carmina Burana is EPIC
#7 DRAGONSLAYER-Still one of the best and I'd like to see it remade
#6 FLASH GORDON-Absolutely love it and I know you just heard in your mind "FLASH...AAAAAHHHAAAAAAAH....king of the IMPOSSIBLE!" I had high hopes for the TV series, man that was a pile of crap
#5 THE LAST STAR FIGHTER- completely over looked classic that really deserves a lot more love than it gets. Grig is one of the best sidekick characters ever!
#4 RED DAWN - I am still awaiting my chance to hold aloft an AK-47 and shout WOLVERINES! over the burn out hulk of a Russian APC.
#3 BLADE RUNNER- Rutger Hauer wrote the last lines of the film his character Roy Batty says when he dies. How fraking cool is that?!
#2 ALIENS- Hands down the best scifi military adventures EVER, I can't think of a film that beats it.
#1 CONAN THE BARBARIAN - Let me tell you of the days of High Adventure...

Honorable mention that just missed the cut:
Clash of the Titans, Enemy Mine, Terminator, Legend, Ghost Busters