/osrg/ OSR General Stick of Danger Edition

Welcome to the Old School Renaissance General thread.

>Trove:
pastebin.com/QWyBuJxd (embed)
>Online Tools:
pastebin.com/KKeE3etp (embed)
>Blogosphere:
pastebin.com/ZwUBVq8L (embed)

Previous thread: What's your favorite magic item?

Other urls found in this thread:

themansegaming.blogspot.com
twitter.com/AnonBabble

>What's your favorite magic item?
Machine of Lum the Mad.

>favorite magic item
Apparatus of Kwalish

>What's your favorite magic item?
Cubic Gate. I hand 1st level parties Cubic Gates.

Dropping some OC and shiiling my blog.
>2 pages of open game content
>5 sample tribes
>1 page for the OGL

The Elemental summoning doodads.

>d12 clown-based adversaries

1. A gnomish illusionist that's been posing as the imaginary friend of some local toddler. Has researched a spell called Invisibility to Adults to help him in this. Loves children in all the wrong ways.
Stats as illusionist two levels higher than the party average.

2. This clown got caught by a ghoul and never realized he died. He hunts the night and paralyzes those he catches, drags them to his lair, and forces them to be an audience to his act. In the end his hunger for flesh takes over and he devours his victims, but is so steeped in denial that he doesn't realize it. Can come in troupes of up to 6 clowns, led by a ghast: none of them are in on the joke.
Stats as ghoul or ghast

3. A band of ogres, one of whom is dressed as a clown. His brand of humor involves physical harm inflicted upon the smaller races. The other ogres find his slapstick hilarious.
Stats as ogre

4. 2d8 sad clowns. They will hunt the party in order to claim their joy and happiness by means of physical touch: a successful hit deals 1d4 damage (buzzer palms), along with energy drain and loss of positive emotion. For each such attack, the clown becomes happier for a while. Any characters hit will be depressed until Restoration is cast. Any characters killed by a sad clown raise from the dead as one.
Stats as wights

5. A troupe of 2d6 kabuki actors in fully black suits, blending perfectly against any dark background. Always encountered with a group of other intelligent enemies, as being hired by them: they will move around the shadows to provide special effects, help guide missiles, improve their employers' morale, and otherwise fuck the party over. If the employers start to lose and they pass a morale check, they will all jump out at the same time to backstab the party and join the fray.
Stats as thieves of up to 6 levels

6. A mime makes a silent play about the party surrendering and agreeing to his demands: if they refuse (or, more likely, just don't get it), he attacks. Apparently unarmed and unarmored but mimes sword strokes, shield blocks, armor, bow if needed, any magic items you think he might require: if he can conceivably mime the effect of a magic item, then he can have its benefits on him. Never makes a sound, not even when he dies.
Stats as a fighter three levels higher than the party average. Carries no treasure: everything he mimed ceases being real upon death.

7. A wrecked, yet horrifically haunted, clown car. Its engine is busted beyond repair and it shouldn't be moving at all, yet it does. Creepy car lights, haunting honking, windows too dark to see inside. Attacks by running the party over. If forced to stop, it can unload 1d4 clowns per round and continues to do so until destroyed.
AC as plate mail, 50 hit points, can only be damaged by bludgeoning or magic weapons.
Clowns are basically zombies (equal stats) in ragged clown outfits.

8. A genie in a bottle, dressed up as a clown. Will grant a wish, but only if it's the asker's birthday. Otherwise tells them to wait till then and returns to the bottle. If it is in fact someone's birthday, this someone should be granted their wish straight and without any tricks - unless the genie-clown is actually an efreeti (1-2 in 6)
Stats as djinni or efreeti

9. An ancient entertainment unit made out of stone, with the clown clothes painted on it. It dispenses one tired joke or gag per round while beating the shit out of the party.
Stats as stone golem

10. This Lich still wears its immaculate facepaint, wig, and surprisingly well-kept large pants and big shoes. He jealously guards his ancient library of jokes, practical tricks, and clown implement artifacts. If vanguished, turns out that most of his collection has become overplayed and cliched over the millennia since he was alive, but a careful search has 2 in 6 odds of yielding 2d4 books' worth of genuinely hilarious stuff that the world has forgotten.
Stats as Lich

11. A devil in the guise of a clown, taking advantage of an ancient and obscure clause that allows him to claim the souls of any that laugh in his presence. Doesn't realize that no one is going to laugh at a clown in the dungeon: if informed of the fact, he will attack the party and, unless defeated, move his activities to the nearest town instead.
Stats as pit fiend

12. This perfectly normal clown took a disastrously wrong turn on the way to work. He's confused, scared, and just wants to get back, but has no money to hire the party with an absolutely no applicable skills beyond torchbearing.
Stats as a regular human with 1d6 hit points
Roll again to see what turned up in that children's birthday party instead.

More tech than magic, but probably that alien cylinder from "World of the Lost" that replaces our sun with a green one from some distant galaxy.

3 stooges ogres are now a thing I want in my life/campaign. Also a band of butoh dancing ghouls. I'm in deep shit for 11. though, I actually think clowns are funny.

>I actually think clowns are funny.
I mean that's all very well, but are you really going to laugh at one if you encounter him deep in a dark cold dungeon, just staring at you right outside torchlight's edge?

I hope not but its on the table. Laughter as nervous response has happened at inappropriate times before. Its a huge red monster from hell with a honk nose. Its messed up, but I'm probably going to laugh too.

OC, for you.

Take the clown posts from above and gives us 38 more of them.

Nuromen GM here. Game ended a while ago, it's 1am now. We played 4pm to about 11pm. I don't think I enjoyed it, nor did the players. They all insisted otherwise but that gnawing doubt that is bosom buddies with depression hit immediately after the game was over for the night.
Inventory and char setup went about 2 hours. It wouldn't be until near the end of the game when players were still asking about ability score modifiers and such.
Party went by the right-hand-rule, discovered the old man in the gallows is an illusion but only after physically trying to touch him. After gallows and meeting the talking door they broke the rule and went for the armory, 3 of the 4 doors to the barracks were stuck and they got stuck on the last one, so they flipped around, perusing the feast hall and kitchen separated, harpies did their song and got all three dudes charmed, the female characters I guess were spared and then the spellcaster cast charm on the alpha harpy. I guess that bit was pretty ingenious. 1/?

The party gave the harpies an IOU for the males, went to the pantry, one player had the ghost wine and turned albino, that bit I enjoyed, then they turned with newfound axes to break down the door to the barracks, there the dice decided wandering goblins ambush them, first trapping them in the corridor, then getting taunted into removing the barricade in front of the door and fighting fair (and dying, one hid and got conscripted to carry the torch after the party realized nobody had been carrying one EVEN THOUGH ONE OF THE MAIN POINTS OF PLAYING AN OLDSCHOOL D&D IS RESOURCE MANAGEMENT AND ARMS ARE A RESOURCE) they went to the rax, two players hit death's door, both got CPR'd back to life, finished there.

I think me and one guy were the only people that genuinely gave a shit about the game or their own character. Dwarf player was playing first time and insisted his dorf likes to eat shit, not for sustenance, but pleasure. One person familiar with RPG's who knew this was going to be dungeoncrawling went with a pacifist character.

Maybe I should just hang up my GM hat and accept I was born on the wrong continent for this kind of game.
2/?

>Stick of Danger

How does that compare to an overpowered stone rock?

I'm glad someone took off the discord link. I wanted to, but I didn't know if someone would complain so I just kept making the lame jokes

Don't worry about it too much, sounds like people were having fun and learning how to play a game, hang out with each other, etc. Its usually a bit messy at first, both as players and gms. Ask them what they thought in a few days, it'll give them more time to think about it and get back to you. Sounds fine fwiw though.

Or like, sounds like someone wants a dwarf to eat shit, but hopefully they'll get over it.

user has some good advice. See what they thought first and then use that as feedback for the future. Based on that you can find or write a dungeon that integrates what they found to be fun and you can spend some time researching your next move as a DM. It may not be as bad as you think it was, so hang in there.

Ignore me if this is too far off-topic, but what are some OSRG approved video games, and more importantly what makes the game comparable?

Oh wow, are you the encounter user who made the dark woodl encounters, great wall encounters, and 50 extra OSR classes? I love that stuff.

Of course. I try to post something new in every thread.

The Infinity Engine games (e.g. Baldur's Gate, Icewind Dale, Planescape Torment) helped rejuvenate CRPGs after the genre reached a low-point in the early to mid 90's.

That's rad. I don't lurk these threads as much as I used to but I just scoured some archived threads trying to pick out the other stuff you made. Am I missing anything? The files marked with am M dash are one's I'm not sure are yours or PDFs that happen to look like yours.

I'm sure you've gotten this before, but would be cool if you have a single, updated place to find these like a google drive or blog or something.

Wizardry series and the first three Ultima games.
NES Final Fantasy as well as the SaGa series (I throw SaGa in because it has that DIY DND LMAOOO aspect to it it always felt)

I already do. All of those are mine except for the witch covens.

themansegaming.blogspot.com

I am going to soon recover the older documents I made on my old computer so I'll have the complete collection.

Sorcerian

>MSpaint guy is the 50 things guy

N-NANI?!

Oh yeah, do any of Falcom's "Dragon Slayer" series. Each entry is a very distinctive take on roleplaying games

Alright, I want some feedback on some Cleric and Wizard changes for my shitbrew/house rules

Clerics
>must have Wis 10+ to enter class
>can cast spontaneously
>know all spells of levels they could cast
>new spells are learned when they level up
>outside of leveling, they cannot learn new spells
>they can't create spells either
>spell progression is as BFRPG

>Wizards
>must have Int 10+ to enter class
>prepares spells
>can wear light armor (leather) and use one-handed melee weapons
>begins play knowing two random spells
>when a higher level of spell slot is unlocked they learn one random spell of that level (fruits of independent research)
>can learn new spells at any time
>can create new spells

Added yours, and a handful of other recently mentioned blogs to the pastebin.

Speaking of adding, anything new being thrown to the trove lately?

>didn't add me
i-it's not like I wanted you to notice me o-or anything! anta baka!

If you want to get stuff in the trove it's easier to find if you reply to the thread OP.

That being said, I did see the Bookmarked OD&D pdf posted in the last thread.

Well that's not helpful if you don't then give me a link to it.

I hid the link in here buzzclaw.blogspot.com
It's been a while since I last posted though.

Legend of Grimrock I & II

The first is a straight-up dungeon crawl requiring resource use and being clever. The second is more of the same, but now has outdoor exploration. Super, super good games.

Oh, I did see this one. I saw it a really long time ago too, when I made that list. It didn't look focused on OSR, and I believe way back in the day you said as much.
It's added now.

What should I call the heaviest armor if I don't want my setting to be 'advanced' enough to have platemail?

Splint or Banded.

>What's your favorite magic item?
Hewards Handy Haversack from the original Unearthed Arcana.
It's not flashy, it's utilitarian af

Reinforced Armor

Splint and banded mail, like ring mail, are misconceptions caused by Victorians taking illustrations too literally

I would say that in such a setting, you should just forget about having a readily-available plate equivalent, both mechanically and fluff-wise. If your players want something like that, they'll have to take the magical. semi-metallic hide of a turbobear to be made into armor by the elven smiths of Mount Fuckwad.

Or just some +x chain mail

>they'll have to take the magical. semi-metallic hide of a turbobear to be made into armor by the elven smiths of Mount Fuckwad.
I just woke up the wife laughing

Welp, time to make a dungeon module about the magical eleven smiths who lived in Mount Fuckwad

It has to have turbobears. Lots of turbobears

Oh, It'll have oodles of turbobears. Now I just have to figure out how to combine "turbine-driven forced induction device that increases an internal combustion engine's efficiency and power output by forcing extra air into the combustion chamber" and "carnivoran mammals" into something decently coherent.

The Ancient Goat-king Yaktus McGroof set the magical eleven smiths upon a road to damnation. Their legacy...

...The Turbobears of Fuckwad

I fail to see how you could fail to combine this. It is a bear, it has a turbo. Enjoy your terrifying Mad Max bears.

Like bears that wiz by at 60mph?

It could be a turbojet, actually. Flying jet-propelled bears.

Nah, that's too terrifying to contemplate.

What else calls lurks in Mount Fuckwad? Why would you want go there?

>The Turbobears of Fuckwad
That is now my dwarves adventuring companys name

>It didn't look focused on OSR
Well, I suppose it's not exactly OSR-focused although I think most of posts are actually OSR-related. I'll understand if it gets removed.

captcha: warning advice

I mean, elven smiths that ride turbobears as mounts is enough for me

Turbobear
Freq: V. Rare
Size: L
HD: 5+5
AC: 0
Move: 24
#att: 6
Dam: 1-8 x4 (claw) 1-12 x2 bite

That's kinda a start I guess.... a cave bear with double movement and attacks is what I'm thinking.

>4 claws, 2 bites

That's a TPK waiting to happen.

>turbobear
>not TPK nightmare fuel
That's the point. You don't fuck around on Mount Fuckwad. They'll send turbobears to kill you and of you run, they make a sport out of it, running you down

You crazy bastards are making me want to do a Brutal Legend inspired game with these turbobears and Mount Fuckwad.

>"turbo"bears
>no at-will haste ability

shaking my heads to be honest

Do you guys think OSR stuff would be approachable as somebody new to RPGs? I've played wargames before and have a bunch of miniatures so I'd like to use them with terrain and shit too. Would AD&D be difficult for a noob? Should I start with something more streamlined like 5E or Pathfinder?

>More streamlined
>Like 5e or Pathfinder

???

>Do you guys think OSR stuff would be approachable as somebody new to RPGs?
>Should I start with something more streamlined like 5E or Pathfinder?

Not sure if b8 or hilarious ignorance.

OSR games are literally the easiest to learn and play. 5e and Pathfinder have character creation that takes an hour even with GM guidance.

Are they not more streamlined or something? This isn't a very informative response, now, is it?
Yeah but don't newer games like 5E have a lot more "handholding" for new players? Why is this hilarious? Seems like a pretty simple question.

>Yeah but don't newer games like 5E have a lot more "handholding" for new players? Why is this hilarious? Seems like a pretty simple question.

You're ignorant of the subject. It is not like that.

The game may be 'easier' compared to older games but it is not more handhold-y. By having more rules and character options the game takes much longer to learn and set up to play. You have to write down multiple feats, multiple racial and class abilities, calculate a bunch of skills, choose backgrounds and learn about the in game systems.

This is NOT how OSR games do it, and they ARE much easier for beginners. You know what you do in 99% of OSR games? You roll 3d6, once for each stat, write the numbers down, pick a class, boom that's it. If you're a Wizard you might have to roll for starting spells and what they do, and you're done.

Pathfinder has races, feats, special powers, so much more shit and options that you will never understand on your first game. There's like 6 classes in B/X compared to like 8 + 6 races with multiple progression paths in D&D 5e. Not to mention Pathfinder, which has even more inane classes AND unique racial bonuses for each class you have to remember.

I'm not joking, and I'm not pulling your leg. These are the best games to play as a beginner, and hell a lot easier to run as a GM too. OSR games are not bloated with huge numbers of skills and feats and magic spells. Their lightweight nature is what attracts people, myself included, to them.

There you go, I've answered your question.

>OSR games are not bloated with huge numbers of magic spells.
Ha.

Just look at the size of the rulebooks.

>Basic: 120 pages
>5e PHB only: 320 pages

>5e or Pathfinder
>"""""streamlined"""""

I cast Detect b8

>Pathfinder have character creation that takes an hour
You must play with savants because every PF chargen session I've been takes 2+ hours.

>You're ignorant of the subject. It is not like that.
That's why I asked. That's usually how questions work; you don't know a thing, so you ask about that thing. You know?
As for the rest of your post, I see what you're saying. I was under the impression that while newer games were more bloated, it was mostly due to them having to explain everything that much more clearly to new players. Like, isn't the main reason people hate D&D nowadays because it favors newer players instead of returning ones? I don't know, everything I know about TRPGs is stuff I've heard here.
I actually have a copy of the AD&D Player's Handbook and there's a couple things I can't wrap my head around probably because of the ADD, like the descending AC. Most of the book seems fine but stuff like the descending AC just doesn't make sense to me. Is there a reason it was made that way? I think I heard it was changed in newer editions to ascending AC (which, personally, makes a lot more sense to me).
Wow you got me mate! This has all been a clever ruse! But you found me out. Grats bud!

Maybe just pick something like Swords & Wizardry with ascending AC.

Yeah, the stuff about being streamlined kinda breaks down in AD&D, that's why everyone in the OSR plays Basic or Basic-based retroclones.

BFRPG and Lamentations of the Flame Princess are both B/X retroclones that have ascending AC

Yeah I was looking at different OSR games like DCC, would that be better maybe? I like to have a physical rulebook when playing tabletop games. Is 2nd Edition D&D considered OSR? What's the consensus on that?

Cool thanks mate, I've actually heard of LotFP and what I heard was very positive, so I'll check it out.

Sure, just read through one until you understand it well enough to teach to people.

It's why I gave them double attacks and movement.

>isn't the main reason people hate D&D nowadays because it favors newer players instead of returning ones?
You are so wrong on so many levels that I don't even know where you got these ideas from. WOTC D&D/PF is hated because it's all about munchkinism and powergaming. 4e was a brief break in the autism which attracted new players and was the most balanced WOTC edition but the WOTC buckled and introduced 5e aka 3e lite. 5e drove away 4rries from the franchise but brought back the scourge of 3eaboos.

>What's the consensus on that?
Do you like roll-under ability checks and a shitload of splats? If so, you'll like 2e.

Despite being well-intentioned, I just want you to know you've unknowingly created some truly beautiful bait.

DCC is usually not considered OSR because it has no mechanical basis on some TSR version of D&D. It's "OSR-adjacent". It's based off the 3.5 OGL, and while not as complex as actual 3e, it has some fiddly rules and a million charts to take track of the game's RNG, which makes it far less intuitive than something like B/X

I play almost exclusively 2e AD&D. It might not be 'osr approved' but... well... I run it as such and after running the same campaign in greyhawk for 27 years or so with the system, I feel no need to switch back to its Basic roots.

What would you guys recommend then that has a physical rulebook? LotFP?

Fuck it, I refuse to believe that anyone has somehow learned the opposite of everything that is true about the OSR genre.

>Do you like roll-under ability checks and a shitload of splats? If so, you'll like 2e
I'm this douche: and I'll admit that I've never used ANY of that crap, and they are to be avoided at all costs. All of them. I don't even use the P.O. books. I mean, I never felt I needed to constantly spend $ to keep playing a game that I already houseruled the shit out of

Yeah, LotFP is good. It has a neat d6-based skill system and sensible gun rules, which some people like too. Just take in mind it's basically a heavily houseruled B/X, so if you feel like something's too complicated (like the infamous summon spell) it's likely it wasn't like that in the original game and that you won't change much by ignoring it.

not to be a prat, but any pdf you can print is a physical rulebook.

B/X or Labyrinth Lord, ACKS or LotFP are all good places to start,l.

Which of those has ascending AC? Am I autistic for not understanding descending AC?

>Arcane Age
>The Complete Psionics Handbook
>all the MC Appendices
>The Complete Priest's Handbook
>Dark Sun Box Set
>Al-Qadim Box Set
>"""crap"""

LotFP is edgy garbage full of useless purple prose.

>Which of those has ascending AC?
Basic Fantasy RPG

>Am I autistic for not understanding descending AC?
Probably but we're all autismos here.

House roll for descending AC.Use different dice ranging from d18,d16,d15,d14,d13,d12,d11 for attack rolls.That way your roll corresponds to what AC you have hit.I use d18 for 1/2 HD monsters,d16 for less than 1,and d15/d14/d13/d12/d11 for monster HD ranging from 1 to 5.Lowest AC possible is 2,similar to OD&D.PCs are limited to levels 1 to 5.Thoughts?

If I wanted to get B/X, which book would I get? I'm looking at eBay right now and I'm seeing a few different ones with different printings and covers and shit.

I think just LotFP.

B/X is the original 2 rulebooks, Basic and Expert.

ACKS is B/X with detailed rules for domain-level play and a shitload of classes.

Labyrinth Lord is a fairly faithful B/X clone with some (rather arbitrary, pic related) changes.

LotFP is B/X with ascending AC, "weird fiction" and punk culture influences, an early-modern assumed setting, guns, d6 thief skills, no attack bonus scaling for classes other than fighters, a slot-based encumbrance system and some other stuff.

The Moldvay Basic and Cook Expert books.

>LotFP is edgy garbage full of useless purple prose.
The mechanics are good, though.

Thanks

>d18,d16,d15,d14,d13,d12,d11
Nice meme, Sean.

>The mechanics are good, though.
Post the cap of the summon spell and say that again.

Everyone knows about the summon spell. If everything ELSE was like that I wouldn't be saying that its mechanics are good.

>Everyone knows about the summon spell.
Except for the guy you're shilling LotFP to, who thought that 5e and PF were streamlined.

Yeah, that's why I specifically mentioned the summon spell as something he could ignore
Also
>shilling
You only have to pay if you want the illustrated version, don't want to pirate it, and don't have a printer

Alright so I'm taking a look at BFRPG and it seems to have ascending AC so my autism is satiated. Would it work well with miniatures though? About to buy it since the rulebook is like $6 on Amazon

It will, but it's not a key part of the game. People generally didn't count squares on graph paper or anything back in the day, if they were using it. You should also read the sections about out-of-combat exploration and mapping, which throws off a lot of people coming in from other games.

Cool thanks mate. Should I grab the Field Guide while I'm at it or should I play a few games first?

You can go without, easily. There's a decently sized monster section if you don't feel like making your own statblocks. All the BFRPG stuff you can grab for free on their page, as pdfs.

Alright thanks man. Cheers!

...what's changed?