Too Many Systems, Too Many Settings

I'm back today to re-read my New Year's resolutions. It seems I've strayed from the path.

The big two projects of the past couple months (aside from working on my dissertation implementation more than in the past) has been zilch and Caligo.

zilch (which deserves a better name, but stands for "Zach's Implementation Lies Cold & Hoary") is what the domino die mechanic idea turned into. It's a sort of board-game-style dungeon crawling RPG. It's actually pretty sweet. You represent characters with 4 playing cards (one of each suit), roll d6s for skills, use dominoes for an exchange/stance-based combat, track details with poker chips, and use Scrabble tiles to track and cast magic spells.

Yes, I finally have a decent Scrabble-based magic system! This time I started with the ~600 D&D spells and distilled them down to 26 schools/tiles, rather than starting with the noun/verb approach of most rune-based system. Tiles are often still combined to produce the more powerful spells, though.

Anyway, the intention of zilch is to have a lite, "paperless" play style for one-off dungeon crawls or short campaigns.

Caligo (the Latin word for misty darkness) started a week or so ago when I got a free PDF version of World of Darkness from a DriveThruRPG sale. While overall I found WoD to be yet another standard, solid, reliable table-top RPG system, there were a few little rule nuggets that intrigued me. I started putting together ideas from DRYH, QAGS, etc, pulling together a very lite, narrative-focused system for descents into darkness.

As you can see, I've drifted from my goal of "no new threads."


In other news, today I bought a Warhammer Fantasy Grotek and Felix omnibus. These stories are good fun! As I've mentioned before, I often get overwhelmed in the bookstore: so many great stories, so many worlds! How do I play them all? How do I build something better myself?

Upon waking from my nap, I realized I don't have to. As GM, we often rely on pre-packaged adventure scenarios. Why don't I allow myself to expand the use of such aids to include other creative works? There's all these great adventure short stories out there--recently Conan, Elric, and Grotek & Felix for me. What's wrong with "borrowing" those? Or maybe blending a couple together? Roleplaying is not a public presentation; it's a private, intimate sharing of tales. If my player's haven't read the stories themselves, the ideas are new to them.

I know this is certainly not a new insight. In fact, I'm sure I've read it a number of times in DM advice chapters: take ideas from your favorite shows or books! But I guess today I was ready for it, open to the idea that I am really only obligated to provide a fun afternoon for myself and my player(s), not produce a whole new creative vision for the world.

And this insight spills over into the rule design too. I'm getting overwhelmed here too. There are so many systems out there when you look past the handful of large publishers. And each one has some novel, intriguing aspect to offer. Yet there is no way to combine all these little gems, because each works because of it's home system. Lately I've been coming to appreciate even the advantages of different die mechanics. So many cool things are possible with only certain die mechanics; yet, each also has its drawbacks. But, in the end, you have to pick only one of them and play it.

It seems we all want, to some varying extent, to produce our own system: to tweak, to touch, to make the rules we play by our own. But, taken to excess (as I am always wont to do), this becomes divisive, producing a babel of systems so that players cannot move from game to game because each requires its own system. Obviously, there is a balance here. There must always be a bazaar of ideas and system options available; but it can be hard to decide to work towards system harmony and synthesis, rather than just throwing out one more discordant voice.

So, once more, I come here to put in writing: I need to focus my efforts on what I already have going!

Domino-based Combat Mechanic

I currently own two sets of dominoes. Every time I reach over them to get to some of my other gaming supplies, I think, "Surely I could use these for some RPG-related purpose!" Well, today I woke up from a nap with just such an idea: using dominoes as combat rolls.

This mechanic would work best for a simple exchange-based combat system. Each player draws a domino, orients it horizontally, and then flips it face-up. Just like a Magic: The Gathering creature card, the value on the left side is the offensive attack modifier (power) and the value on the right is the defensive or armor modifier (toughness).

As a further option, each player can declare an offensive or defensive stance before flipping the domino over. If offensive, they rotate the domino so the higher of the two values is on the left/attack side. Similarly, for a defensive stance the larger value should be moved to the right. (Actually, this should perhaps be the standard procedure so as to avoid any questions about some players' flipping technique, since the pips on a domino can sometimes be felt while the domino is still face down.)

Of course, each domino end gives a +0 to +6 modifier. Or, at the expense of a little -3 math, a linear progression from -3 to +3 (including 0). Doubles could perhaps allow for some special effect--such as the option to use a certain feat or combat stunt.

I'm not quite sure where I want to use this mechanic yet, but I quite like it--especially for an exchange-based combat system where each character is supposed to "roll" only once per round/exchange. For melee combat, this works pretty well using a single die roll--the higher roll between two combatants deals damage to the lower. However, things can get a bit fuzzier with ranged combat, multiple combatants, or when you'd like the option of two combatants injuring each other in the same round. This domino approach still means only one "roll", but you conveniently get two values. Very slick! Can't wait to try it somewhere...

Omri: Myrksog

In the spirit of getting back into the game, S. and I played a bit of my new d20house form of D&D today. It had been 1 week short of a year since our last session!

For session details, check out the "Myrksog" section of The Amazing Escapades of Omri Buckle & Co.


It went well mechanically. The new damage mechanic (the most obvious d20house change) was pretty smooth. My new DM screen worked well, especially when combined with more intelligent use of the SRD's spell index and monster index pages. Chess pieces still make great cheap miniatures.

Story-wise, there were a couple minor snags--mainly, how to balance the power of social manipulation with combat? For example, Jack charmed the lead hobgoblin and told a good story about having an important prisoner... but I couldn't decide whether this should be enough to let the party pass the whole encounter. (Of course, this still may have worked out interestingly since they would have had to come back this way later.) But, if I wasn't going to let them bypass all the guards with it, it seemed something useful still should come of it so that there's at least some value to trying tact before steel.

First, I rolled a contest between the charmed hobgoblin and the orc to see if the orc could talk some sense into his companion: that this rabble shouldn't be allowed into the inner sanctum without Myrksog's express approval. Turns out the orc won. But even in this case, there was some benefit to the charm: it got rid of the hobgoblin. Sadly, this backfired slightly, since this logically left the party locked outside without any lock-picking skills! Turns out the standard DC of 25 to break down a barred door was just barely in range (with a bit of magical aid), so it all worked out decently enough.

So, in retrospect, I think I played it pretty well. And, as a personal note for the future, a spell and a successful skill check should be enough to bypass an encounter, especially if those creatures are still available to serve later as monster re-enforcements (and now behind the party besides!).

D&D: Omri

Omri (S.) tried the assault on the goblin holdout again. It went very well, partly because the goblins couldn't roll worth a damn. (I don't usually use my yellow d20 for this reason, but it needed some love.) Omri was also well shielded and buffed with spells--she took out each foe with a single blow and wasn't even scratched in return! I remembered to consider NPC morale, and had a couple goblins surrender after witnessing the wholesale slaughter of their comrades by this suddenly-appearing avenging goddess. This turned out nicely, as the party was able to pump them for info but then had to spend a sleep spell and some rope to tie them up when they were done. (My original idea had been to use speak with dead if necessary.)

On gaming tools, that "battlegrid" overlay and chess pieces combo is working great. Beer and nuts made for nice DMing companions! I also didn't have my computer this time, which freed up some table space and made things a little more casual. It just meant I needed to copy down all the pertinent notes in the corner of the whiteboard before we started. I might try to do that again, though I have more info necessary for our next encounter: NPCs spell-lists and such.

D&D: Omri, Cheap Battlegirds, and Player Caution

S. and I played a bit of D&D this weekend. We overlaid some clear Omnigrid quilting rulers over the white board for a quick battle grid, and then used some old chess pieces for miniatures. Worked out quite nicely! Normally I just use the white board, but it always takes an extra minute drawing the grid before each combat, and then I have to erase each character's mark before moving them to another square. There's just something quick and satisfying about miniatures... but also something a bit pricey when doing it right! The chess pieces were a nice compromise.

I was also reminded what a cautious player S. is. While taking out a goblin army outpost that had her party pinned down with crossbow fire, her character, Omri, burst out of invisibility within the enemy dugout and immediately decapitated an orc and a goblin. Half the remaining seven goblins in the room were still flatfooted, and the rest of her party was about 3 rounds away. Omri had both Shield and Sheild Other in effect, and I was envisioning an awesome cinematic bloodbath as Omri tore through the remaining goblins while her friends dashed in, their own crossbows and spells blazing. But S. chose to retreat rather than press her advantage! So now the entire scattered goblin army--not just this one outpost--knows they're coming.

But upon reflection, I think this retreat is not so surprising. For one, Omri--who had never seen either orc or bugbear before and failed her Knowledge check to identify the orc before her--thought that she may have killed the commander bugbear they were coming for. (And S. did a great job of staying in character even after I accidentally let slip that it was an orc.) Secondly, I may not have been clear as GM that the army had little outposts scattered around these mountain valleys, watching all the passes, that this was just one such outpost that could alert the others given a bit of time.

But most importantly, it's just a (nice) surprise to have a player that isn't unconsciously meta-gaming the whole time, that doesn't have a good idea of the challenge rating of the current encounter, and who's worried more about avoiding unnecessary combat than just killing everything that moves and nicking all its stuff. And, I must say, if it were me in Omri's place, I don't know if I'd stand my ground in a cramped dugout when seven armed and outraged goblins turned to stare at me! Overall, it was still an impressive hit-and-fade attack... marred slightly only the by the 3 crossbow bolts the party took in the back as they fled into the surrounding hills.

Anyway, it was just another lesson in that constant GM balancing-act: providing enough challenge that players have to be cautious, but not so much that they're afraid to just rush in--swords swinging--when the situation calls for it. I guess that's the trick: successfully conveying whether or not the situation calls for it.

Making cheap dice

Don't Rest Your Head requires about 30d6 to play with only one player (and about 17d6 for each additional player, if everyone has their own dice), divided into four different colors. So I had to figure out how to make some cheap dice. When I made my first set of Fudge dice, I bought some blank black dice at 75¢ each--which wasn't going to cut to here. (Those didn't turn out all that well either. Sorry, I forgot to include them in the picture though.)

So a couple weekends ago S. and I went to the educational supply store that I knew had a mix of odd dice. I didn't find anything pre-made there that was affordable enough, but we did find a bag of wooden counting units. Remember those from elementary school--the 1s, the 10s, and the 100s? This bag of 100 little wooden cubes was normally $3.95, but it was 30% off, so I got out of there for less than $3 (meaning less than 3¢ per die)!

I didn't have any permanent markers, so I had to buy some of those too. (Doh! Another $5.) I bought the kind with fine tips on one end and ultra-fine on the other. I ended up using ultra-fine for the dice pictured here. (The lone black die in the foreground is an example of fine.)


Due to the wood, 4 of the 6 sides tend to cause the ink to weep a little along the grain. The other 2 sides really suck the ink in, making those numbers seem darker. I was consistent in how I arranged the numbers in relation to each other on the die, but I tried to vary the side and grain orientation I started with on each die. I'm not guaranteeing that these dice are completely random and unweighted, but I figured if I varied each one, the individual differences shouldn't matter much.

Although the different colored numbers are clear in daylight, it was hard to tell the blue and green (and black) apart in dim indoor lighting. To differentiate them, I tried outlining the edges of the green dice (which we use for DRYH's Discipline pool). This was still a little too subtle. S. suggested using a green highlighter, and that worked out quite nicely. I haven't noticed any staining on my hands using these dice.

The picture above shows the finished product, with a penny for scale. The dice are quite small, which is handy when you're trying to roll 10 or 15 at once. They're also very quiet on the table, which is a nice feature. The medicine bottle containing 3 Fudge dice is what we've been using for Huffy rolls. And, as you can see, I still have half a bag of blanks left!