/osr/ - The Old School Renaissance

If you show me your OP, I'll use it (assuming I make the next thread).

What does osrg think of myth and magic, mechanically?
I know the guy is proof of buyer beware with kickstarter, but what do you guys think of the mechanics?

boards.fireden.net/tg/thread/54234523

Here's my "ideas for running a giant mecha OSR game" post.

coinsandscrolls.blogspot.ca/2017/07/osr-flame-pomerium-how-to-run-giant.html

Mechanics were covered in previous posts. This one is all about story seeds, scale, and game structure. It also has art and monsters.

He CAN'T keep getting away with it.

Question for Basic Fantasy players & DMs: How do I make a lich player character in Basic Fantasy? Can the method in the picture be used well enough or is BF too different for that to work?

Bet you a dollar.
Admittedly, it's your dollar...
Seriously though, it's not like my blog is monetized. I make no money from this. Also, Veeky Forums contributes ~1/100th of my total views. What do you think I'm getting out of this, exactly?

>a lich player character
The method there works fine (even if it's kind of boring an dry). But I do have to ask... why? What's the end goal.

Alternatively, just declare it, and then list weakness and strengths. No need to use an in-rules explanation. Were all the windmills in your setting built using the crafting system?

Sexual pleasure

Looking at old woodcuts and 15-17th century art. Shit's bananas.

>Aha! My foot mace will surely defeat this demon!
>Oh no! He's sodomizing me again!

Got any more?

Is that a boner

I want to do something with devil testicles, but I'm not sure if that's actually a good idea.

Going to have a HUGE fish and some idiot with a giant's knife trying to work it on the next coastal encounter table for sure though. Also the idea of trying to sell regular household items that are from a giant, so they're... giant could be neat.

Yes on both accounts. I got distracted and found a bunch.

Graf was a soldier/wood art guy so some of his stuff has more weirdly human aspects to it.

Giblets and various torture sticks on the roadside seem like a good excuse to use Broken System's cage table.

>What do you think I'm getting out of this,
You steal freely given inspiration.

Don't use those wheel though. It never ends well.

Like, he added the butt grabbing in peasant dances. Makes it seem believable. Might have gotten them killed by puritans though.

>You steal freely given inspiration.
And this is somehow a sin? Really? In the OSR thread?
REALLY?

>Were all the windmills in your setting built using the crafting system?
Were all the windmills in your setting worth questing to attain?

⇔ so, please tell me more about your setting.

>juggernautstarsparetire.gif

Adding the downside of carousing so hard you puke on a cross.

that'sthejoke.jpg

>But I do have to ask... why? What's the end goal.

One basic reason is that liches are my favorite thing in fantasy. The other is that it would be fun to role playing a lich who disguises himself as a human so he can keep interacting with them while also interacting with other monsters in his true form (the anime "Overlord" being a good example). Said character would be a Magic user whose hunger for knowledge lead to him eventually an undead state.
>Alternatively, just declare it, and then list weakness and strengths. No need to use an in-rules explanation. Were all the windmills in your setting built using the crafting system?

Good point, I'll look into making a different ritual; perhaps involving some kind of purification ritual preformed by servants which ends in a full submersion style ritual bath that binds the soul to a place (said ritual chamber) than an object.

Cheer up, I'm going to add to my blog's sidebar so we can both be unread together.

I haven't run it but I'd like to use All Flesh Must Be Eaten/Terra Primate to do a dungeon crawl one day.

>[...]run games with the OSR philosophy in non-OSR systems[...]

I try to do this with GURPS.

Most everyone here is a sinner.
There's shame in that, but it's best not to mention it.

It's the sort of thing we hide from by coming here.
One of the ways we lie to ourselves is forsaking names.
And you. Keep a name.

You aren't one of Us, you're one of Them.

Also bitching is the lowest form of post and

>that'sthejoke.jpg
Sorry man, all the negativity is kind of getting to me. I'm not leaving, because I feed on rage, but it has made me a little less charitable in how I read posts. Ah well. My bad.

>Adding the downside of carousing so hard you puke on a cross.
Please write a Woodcut Carousing Table, with pictures.
2. Grabbed Someone's Bottom At A Dance
3. Threw Up On A Cross
etc.
>Were all the windmills in your setting worth questing to attain?
Actually, yes. Unrelated, but yes. To get a windmill to work (and not, say, be torn apart by an angry wind), you basically need to ally with the local wind. This usually involves marrying your daughter or son to it. Windmills are therefore symbolically important, sometimes fortified, and usually protected by a wind spirit (or a host of infant winds).

Gustave Doré is dope too.

Thinking of either looking for or just making a table of over the top new fashion to roll on for what everyone with coin is wearing. Every time the party makes it back to basically home burg, they're behind because they've been in a murder hole for the last two weeks getting their fine threads covered in shit.

There we go. Actually a good idea. I'll work on that tomorrow and post it.

What you're describing is interesting, but I think it would lend itself more to a story or comic than an RPG.

You don't want an entire group of people with a "hilarious secret", right? You know, the Orc is three goblins in a trenchcoat, the Knight is Sir Bearington, etc. Unless you do. Then carry on.

But focusing all the "I'm special" powers onto one character, via what they are (and not what they do, in the game) is a recipe for disaster, in my opinion.
>Good point, I'll look into making a different ritual
Nah man, no need to go so deep, if you're doing this. Focus on the meaningful effects. Nobody else in the game will give two hoots how you got to where you are; they care about what you are now. You could just say "a ritual" and be done with it.

Woodcut party is a good one too. I'm going to sleep on it.

Gotta watch out marrying your daughter to the east wind though. West wind is going to try and fuck your mill. An orientalist windmill farm area with long prayers to the winds written on the fabric and festivals where different wind direction priests tilt at rival mills could be interesting.

The first issue will be of no concern since this is a solo game. As for the second, the character's personality, drives, goals, character flaws, and other relevant data-sets will be fleshed out in the process of character creation (i.e. I don't plan on an annoying cardboard cutout saying "hey I'm a lich").

I know OSR games aren't really about 'balance', but what about conceptual balance?

What I mean by this is; Rogues and Fighters tend to have short lists of things they can do, simple linear bonuses. But Magic users have a lot more complexity including spells, spell slots, item research rules and so on.

How would you balance the amount of conceptual shit the classes get? Giving Fighters more abilities or combat skills? Thieves getting a resource of some kind to go with their luckiness? What?

What sort of dungeon crawl with you do in those systems? Are they good for OSR-style play?

How has that been going?

Rogues and Fighters don't have a daily limit on how many walls they can climbs or attacks they can make.

Wizards do.

>What sort of dungeon crawl with you do in those systems?
Well I converted a level of Palace of the Silver Princess (PDF related) and the Dungeons & Zombies splat has a Tomb of Horrors knock-off as a setting.

>How has that been going?

Depends on the players, unless you have ones that like OSR the new system rule lawyers will insist on using GURPS (often over detailed and hard to keep organized) library of rules.

In practice though, wizards only have a handful of spells, and in some games, the spells are picked randomly. New ones can only be learned from a captured spellbook. They can only be used once per day.

By the time the wizard has a decent library of spells, the rogues and fighters (of equal experience) should have followers and domains that give them lots of interesting things to do (stage a coup? start a war? breed pterodactyl mounts and rule the sky?).

>question for anons
Does anyone know of a printer friendly retroclone/reformatting of B/X? Just something simple I can use as a reference.

I have single volume D&D, but that seems to be 0e

Spells are finicky at best in combat, with how hard they are to get off.
They're more of an out-of-combat deal. [Sleep]* from ambush, etc.
*or [Hold Portal] because all your rolls are bad
you probably got [Wizard Lock] at lv.2, just to rub it in

But even then, spells tend to be worse than what other classes get.
It takes a solid minute to throw a [Knock], and it sounds like dropping all the pans you can carry.
Wanderingmonsterswanderingmonstersthievesarebetterwithdoorswanderingmonsters.
Speaking of carry, a lv.2 MU can only carry 1 [Knock]. They have to fetch more from town.
A level 10 MU can carry 14 spells. No more than 3 of which can be [Knock]s.
Mean while, Thieves can try to open as many doors as the find each day.

Not that lv.2 spell slots are particularly valuable, mind you. Oddly enough, lv.1 slots are better
Lv.4 spells also tend to be pretty shit..

The way you wrote the links are complete shit

Look at this:
>Trove: pastebin.com/QWyBuJxd

You can't just double click to get the link. The way this OP did:

>etc
pastebin.com/QWyBuJxd

Is totally better.

Now, why did the most important pastebin, the one with the trove, is called "etc" and is the LAST one on the OP?

I don't know of or aprticularly care about what half-ass magic is hidden behind your use case.

NEITHER of those are links to me unless I poke the setting menu in Veeky Forums, in which case BOTH become links.

>double click
Which, incidentally, require only one click.

Absolutely. Getting a wind to mill your grain is like getting a lightning bolt to cook your ham, in terms of danger, in a way. Your wind-spouse had better not cheat or run off.

Winds do like to touch things, so hanging ribbons and bells is always welcome. They're like cat toys.

>The first issue will be of no concern since this is a solo game
Ah, well, in that case, go nuts!

>I don't know of or aprticularly care about what half-ass magic is hidden behind your use case.
Too bad, I'm telling you anyway. Double-clicking (or triple-clicking, in my case) highlights the whole line. Then you can left-click, and hit 'Go to [link]' on the menu that pops up.

I've been thinking about how to handle taxes in an OSR game and have been sifting through various ways to handle the subject. I like the suggestion of trying to make it more "feudal" - that is, use taxation to start PCs thinking about the domain game early by giving them relationships with local patrons and lords; it feels very appropriately "high medieval".

However, I can't help but think that a lot of OSR campaigns often take place in regions that aren't "civilized", or at least don't have the extensive feudal chains of ownership nearly as solidified (ex. disputed borderlands, unexplored reaches, and so forth). How would you work that feudal sense in there? My initial thought would be that the "tax game" (seeking patrons and so forth) would really only start after the PCs get back to civilization with the treasure.

OSR is already to some extent conceptually balanced. Fundamentally, D&D is about expending resources to overcome obstacles, and all the core four classes approach "overcoming obstacles" in different ways:

The Fighter's main resource expenditure is HP. If an orc is in your way, you bash him. If there's a trap on the chest, you bash it open and tank the hit. He gets the biggest HD, and also gets toys and class abilities that improve his chances in HP wagers (combat bonuses, armour, saving throws).

The Wizard's main resource is spell slots. He expends spells to effortlessly solve obstacles without losing any HP. Sleep destroys a pack of orcs. Spider Climb gets you over a pit. Knock opens a locked door. His chances in direct HP wagers are terrible, however.

The Thief's main resource is HP as well, but he gets a different type of wager - percentile rolls that allow him to bypass obstacles by hiding (and/or backstabbing them), climbing sheer walls, listening ahead for danger, and so forth. I think the B/X Thief is a bit on the weak side, but conceptually this does represent something different.

The Cleric manages both HP and spells. He doesn't have quite as good an HP pool, saving throws, and combat ability for direct HP wagers, but his spell slots can be spent to boost that probability or restore HP.

The main thing to consider is that D&D's "wilderness" and "generic fantasy medieval europe" are kind of incompatible.

All land is owned by someone lord. The chain might be disputed or tenuous, but someone has claim. And if they find out that you are making money from their land, they'll want a slice.

So:
1. Preempt the Problem "Lord, by your leave, I'm going to go explore this bit here and see if there's anything valuable. I will report back."
2. Politics. "Lord A, I will explore this area." "Lord B, I have found a great treasure on the lands you dispute with Lord A. That greedy pig wants it all for himself. He would tax the air I breathe if he could. If you would accept me into your service, I could give you 80%...."
3. Royal Charter "Oh King, I wish to go to Foreign Parts and loot them for your glory."

You can start the tax game after the PCs return, but you can also introduce the idea, if not the reality, up front.

That's 4 clicks, not 2 and
>left-click
are you left handed?

No, my brain stopped working for a second. I meant right-click.

There's no dispute. By all rights, that land belonged to the Orcs.
No tax on you either. The local lord will milk it off the merchants.

An open wilderness might be claimed as the territory of a lord. Setting up a fortress might be possible if it's really remote, but once the powers that be catch wind of it, they'll consider it an act of war. They'll feel obliged to toss you out, lest their lands be filled with squatters.

Existing governments may lay claim to whole unexplored continents, and only recognize the right of chartered colonies to settle there. PC's could get a charter to settle a given stretch of wilderness, and more or less have free reign (at least until the king dies, and his heir decides your nice new barony should be given to someone else).

If it's a really violent frontier, maybe it's full of reiver clans, like the border between Scotland and England once was. Existing powers have the mindset of "let them have it". The nearest nobility leaves you be, unless they want to hire you as mercenaries (or try to steal all your shit after you've tamed a piece of wilderness for them).

Remote settlements may have a hard time attracting productive emigres.

>By all rights, that land belonged to the Orcs.
Yeah, but then you're just running into another system. The Orcs will tax you too, if they can.
That tax might be "an arm and a leg and all your wealth" so... be cautious.

Wasn't your gimmick supposed to be usability?

Quick OSR!

I'm going to be running a game in 4 days or so, it's my first time running an OSR game. Any advice or ideas? I'm using a homebrew ruleset, and prefer to make my own dungeon and not using any published stuff, by the way.

Imagine you're Gary Gygax, all the way back in 1973 or whatever. There's no nostalgia or tradition to concern you.

What four classes would you choose to represent your idea of the most essential archetypes for fantasy adventure stories?

>using a homebrew ruleset
>not using any published stuff
You're off to a terrible start.
May things unfold as they should.

Superman, Conan, Herakles

>four
mid-kek

Why run homebrew? might be informative to run Swords and Wizardry light or Basic Fantasy for your first game and see how it plays.

Anyways, make an interesting and dangerous environment to explore.

>Wasn't your gimmick supposed to be usability?
Well, yeah, but I don't have orc warlords or wilderness areas in my system either.

But the orc warlord might also:
-tax you in cattle, not gold. What use is gold? Go get him cows. A lot of cows
-or swords
-or he might demand you fight something, arbitrarily, and be amused if you win
-or he might have a damn good idea about what to use gold for. He demands a mere 20%, but spends it all to recruit a huge army. See, he knows that the rest of the gold is in the City. He's going to take it back.
Go on a blog binge, bookmark all kinds of stuff, print off random tables, and get a good night's sleep.

Dwarf, Elf, Hobbit and Human

The fighting-man (straightforward violence), the thief (stealth and backstabbery), the bard/con-man (diplomacy and lies), and perhaps the wizard (weird shit).

Every foreign ethnic group is considered to be a monster.
Loose, vague descriptions hide that they're actually human.

>if they can.
Of course they can't.

But they're happy to kill you and take your stuff.
They were going to do that anyways!

Then it's still a tax.

I don't really give a shit about Gygax or having 4 classes.

Fighter, Rogue, Wizard. That's where it's at. Anything else is extra tacked on shit, THIS trinity is the purest and best class basis for any game.

>If it's a really violent frontier, maybe it's full of reiver clans, like the border between Scotland and England once was. Existing powers have the mindset of "let them have it".

These are the sorts of scenarios I'm trying to think about. Basically, I'm trying to figure out different shapes that a "tax free" or "tax lax" zones could take - places that an enterprising PC group might discover or decide to escape to. So far the ideas are:

-really violent border regions filled with beastmen/marauders/etc.
-really remote regions not suitable for agricultural purposes and that (but maybe have forgotten wealth/resources hidden under the sand/tundra/swamp)
-"accursed" lands (blight-lands, undead lands, etc.)
-undiscovered islands/continents

Post-apocalypse ought to be a gimme!

-Use reaction rolls for random encounters, and make sure if you're using sapient antagonists they can communicate with the PCs if the roll comes up neutral or friendly (and establish behaviours for animalistic foes in case of a neutral or friendly roll). This changes the game a lot.

-Try to be consistent and fair in your rulings. Even if you don't roll dice in the open, consider trying to run fudge-free.

-Use a good dungeon module. Don't use Keep on the Borderlands - although it's fondly remembered, each individual cave does not really have a layout that really rewards exploration and careful maneuvering. Village of Hommlet is my preferred TSR classic, but you could even use any one-pager.

-Bring props or sheets to help you and the players track things. OSR play usually has a bunch of book-keeping. Toothpicks can track arrows; a set of checks on a sheet can represent the passage of time (and indicate when torches expire and so forth). Simple little trackers like this allow you to focus on running the game in a smoother fashion.

Man, if you're going to have taxes, and then invent all sorts of way to avoid them, why bother having them be a feature worth considering at all?

All your ideas are good though. You could also add
-legally disputed areas (nobody is sure who owns it, the dispute is in court, people aren't violent about it but the entire area is in a legal quagmire)
-a really eccentric faction (orcs, elves, wizards) owns it and they don't care about treasure. They do care about other stuff though
-it floods half the year, snows the other half, is hit by lightning, tornadoes, and rains of glass beetles. But for two weeks every summer, it's completely clear. Make your move then.

>mfw I managed to become a hero in the end

Fedora: the post

c

Guy who uses magic.
Guy who doesn't use magic.

When is The Driftwood Verses coming out, or has it sunk like most kickstarters?

Not this again. I thought we talked about this a couple months back.

Yeah I do this with 5E and it works fine.

When I think about Wizard characters getting bonus spells or bonus to magic damage or something from intelligence, it feels kind of wrong or weird in a way.

But at the same time; I can't justify this making sense when Fighters get bonuses to hit and AC, which are stats they use all the time.

What bonuses do you think Intelligence and Wisdom should grant? And how class intense should they be?

Any good fanzines that you guys enjoy?

Wisdom should give bonus to-hit for ranged attacks and raise save DC. Intelligence should give bonus to learn new spells from study material.

>Wisdom should give bonus to-hit for ranged attacks
How?

hey teej-oh-ess-arr, is pic related Weird enough to fit in a Weird OSR game??

Turnover rate.

It's mainly for variety and to make the idea that "taxes can be subverted" more apparent to players.

Fight On. Knockspell. Vacant Ritual Assembly.

All others are irrelevant.

I can't tell if the second part was a part of the dream or not.

You can spend more than 4 days just creating a good adventure with no time to play-test your home brew for any balance issues.

Hope you are good with improv and winging it. You can always create a small cave or dungeon for them adventure into and just drop them off in front of the adventure location.

>or

You could get hold of an established retroclone that is freely available and run a game off that. You can do far worse than LL/BFRPG/S&W.

'Fight On' for general RPG things.

'Threshold' for all things Mystara/Known World.

OC

>Sorry man, all the negativity is kind of getting to me.
Bruh, just don't feed the trolls. You're just making it worse (and helping shit up the thread to boot) by responding to them. How can you not know this already? They feed on (You)s.

You know how I know you (and a bunch of the guys replying to you) have never played any D&D campaign of any notable length?

As they level up, Fighters and Thieves get spellcaster-like traits and abilities through obtaining magic items. Many of these are restricted to fighting-types, and those restricted to magic types mainly just increase the amount of spells they can use; thus, magic items serve to flesh out the Fighter's traits and abilities.

In other words your concern is a desktop problem. It doesn't really exist or come up in play. The only reason you believe this is an issue is because you just compare the classes in isolation, on paper.

I can't stress this enough: PLAY THE GAME FIRST. *Then* add house rules as situations come up during play. It's fine to want your own thing, it's fine to want to exercise your creativity, but don't do it instead of actually playing the game.

>PLAY THE GAME FIRST
This needs to be said more often, OSR has a real problem with armchair game designers

I feel like this advice should apply a lot more to WotC as well. A lot of 5e designers clearly have never actually played the game.

Ctrl + f castle
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THANK FUCK