/osr/ - Old School Renaissance

Welcome to the Old School Renaissance general discussion thread.

>Trove:
pastebin.com/raw/QWyBuJxd
>Tools & Resources:
pastebin.com/raw/KKeE3etp
>Old School Blogs:
pastebin.com/raw/ZwUBVq8L

>Previous thread:
DM Question: What's the best monster you've made for a game?
Player Question: What's best homebrew monster you've encountered in a game?

Other urls found in this thread:

buzzclaw.blogspot.com/2017/02/social-standing-sub-system.html
elfmaidsandoctopi.blogspot.ca/2013/08/curses-d1000-curses.html
elfmaidsandoctopi.blogspot.ca/2015/12/d100-unwanted-things-from-back-of-magic.html
coinsandscrolls.blogspot.ca/2017/10/medieval-cooking-small-feast.html
youtube.com/watch?v=7cv4QkaWEYU
coinsandscrolls.blogspot.ca/2018/01/osr-cholerids-and-fever-city.html
twitter.com/AnonBabble

>What's the best monster you've made for a game?

>What's the best monster you've made for a game?
Do ones made for modules that I haven't run yet count?

>What's the best monster you've made for a game?

Pseudo-dragon Dragon that was a boss of a wizards mental dungeon prison. The familiar was the second after the wizard to be imprisoned, and it's thoughts warped it's part of the dungeon into a warped perspective. The players became so tiny that the pseudo-dragon familiar was the size of a regular dragon. The lair was a giant version of the wizard's study. It's attacked were projected emotions and physical dragon attacks.

Did you make the module?

Yes.

So I'm thinking of making a setting for my players to play in where almost all of the classic D&D modules (and numerous modern ones for OSR) exist in a semi-post-fantasy-apocalyptic setting.

Would the world be too crazy?

Mad Max type post-apoc, stealth post-apoc where they wouldn't notice unless they're paying attention or Dying Earth?

So basically, a Points of Light type of world with more gonzo?

I'm rather fond of the Legion of the Damned. It's a blatant ripoff of the Evil Dead, but it's fun as hell to use when fucking around with PCs.

>Mad Max type post-apoc
>not Mad Max type mid-apoc

That's basically the setting I run; a mix of fantasy and post-apoc.

There is nothing cooler than a Wizard using a maglight as his wand or our fighter, King Shred, who hones a battleaxe that is basically a sharpened stop sign.

Other points of fun were the Halfling Raider negotiations gone wrong with a submarine torpedo and a sledgehammer or the Cleric worshiping about 60 CRT televisions playing a VHS copy of Snow Dogs 2.

I guess?
Hints, rumors and artifacts lend credence to a former "golden age" but then everything collapsed so that all the remains now (so many years later) are ruins, dungeons and such.

quick i need d100 cursed scrolls

Skerples need not apply

What's your setting like? What sort of things are no go? How screwy do you want the scroll to be? Do you want descriptions of how the scrolls activate as well/variants on scrolls?

1 - spell works but you piss yourself
2 - spell works but all sounds you make have their volume increased by 300% for 1d4 hours
3 - spell works but you smell like delicious bacon for 1d4 hours
4 - spell works but you can't cast spells 1d4 hours
5 - spell works but it affects a random target

what did you draw this with?

6 - spell works but a disembodied voice tells you to drop these obsolete rules and go play Pathfinder instead

>Bah, I'll never finish mine in time, I'll toss in my lot

7 - The scroll explodes once you read it, 3d6 damage in a 20’ radius.
8 - You can decipher the scroll just fine, but casting it will always cast it on yourself, attempting to transcribe it will also cast it on yourself.
9 - The scroll grows a mouth, save or it bites 2d6 fingers off.
10 - Clears all memorized spells out of your head. If you don’t have any spells, you lose d6 Int, permanently. Spell casters are allowed a save to avoid the Int loss.
11 - You now believe the scroll contains an infectious idea and you must prevent anyone from reading it. You can’t let anyone know this.

Time and MSpaint

Need some good modules that will last 2-3 sessions tops. Preferably not just a dungeon crawl.

12 - the scroll has no effect but screams "HEY THERE'S AN ENEMY HERE!" ; GM makes an encounter check

Night of the Walking Dead
The Awakening

12 - Summons a giant, magic resistant eagle that will harass the spellcaster at every long rest until dealt with
13 - Spell gradually mutates the wizard into a kobold with every casting on a failed save
14 - Discard your spell list and roll up a new one
15 - Scroll can only be read by non-spellcasters
16 - Scroll causes the character to hear the begging of every enemy as they die. Madness ensues.

broh. link your blogspot

can I see the statblock

Sure.

>The Unconquerable Ulazoo (5 HD, 1d4 peck attack, can grow arms)
>AC: 12
>Number Appearing: 1 in 10 chance of breeding pair, otherwise just 1
>Morale: 14

Extremely protective of its nest, the flightless Ulazoo's territorial nature means it commonly fights dangerous creatures like adventurers, ogres, gnolls, and so on. Naturalistic scholars believe it developed its incredible abilities so it can survive in a dungeon environment.

The first time it is struck, it grows two arms. By giving up its peck attack for a round, it can grow another arm. By not moving it can grow two arms. Every arm grows with a fully formed weapon and can be used to make an attack or to grant +1 AC to the Ulazoo for a round by parrying attacks. If you're using an axe, you can target its arms with a +1 attack roll, on a hit destroy one arm. The Ulazoo does not feel pain or take damge from its arms being destroyed.

Its arms, despite appearing totally human and fleshy, provide seemingly no nutritional value and rot three times as quickly as normal meat. The weapons they drop rot at the same rate as the meat, quickly rusting away and crumbling to dust, but can be used as normal weapons until then.

17 - Scroll works but if the spellcaster already knew the spell they forget it. If it's a divine caster, they may never gain access to the spell again for 1 year.

13. - 17.
18.

19. All matter, solid or liquid, that the caster can currently see becomes invisible for 1d12 hours.

Why though?

20 - a reversed time stop is cast on the caster for 1d4 rounds

I'm trying to think of various modifiers for reaction checks. Racism against/in favor of a party member, good offers versus bad offers, clashing alignment, initial player impressions/dispositions, PC reputations, what other factors could be considered when making a reaction check?

This doesn't need to be a whole list.

Just have the caster roll a 1d100 and go to a corresponding spell effect and reverse it or fluff it as being negative for them.

ie; Sleep cast on the caster, or Floating Disc picking up their rations and floating down a pit

I just always do this
>If you're a racial enemy (dwarfs and orcs) then you treat your Charisma modifier as negative.
Yes this means that unlikeable dwarfs can get along better with orcs than likeable, but it makes sense in my head. You hate them for being dwarf. If you're an unlikeable dwarf, you're less like a dwarf, and thus, more likeable to traditional dwarfish enemies.

so... domesticate one as a mobile armory for an adventuring group?

20. Spell doesn't function, instead subtracts 1 year from the countdown to the next Modron March

You have to wack it in order to start the arm growing so I'd figure that's going to be very difficult at best. Plus, its weapons are only really good for a couple of hours, making it only that useful if you need to arm a lot of people really quickly for a short skirmish, unless you're going to be hitting the bird and then cutting its arms so it grows more a few times per day

Good luck.

>I don't know that they do suck at fighting. The referee book says to cap AC at 18, so the toughest enemies and monsters will never be more than 18 AC
Yay! A 20% chance to hit your target! Because nothing says "I don't suck" like having a greater than 50% chance to miss three times in a row.

Social classes
Class in general
I wrote some stuff about it here buzzclaw.blogspot.com/2017/02/social-standing-sub-system.html though I'm not sure if I'd use them now.

Here it is.

>reads blogpost
I...can see why you wouldn't use them now.

>Skerples need not apply
No application needed because of awesomeness, I assume.

Anyway, important guide. Before writing a table, check to see if there's already one on elfmaidsandoctopi.
elfmaidsandoctopi.blogspot.ca/2013/08/curses-d1000-curses.html

Oh and also this table is good too.
elfmaidsandoctopi.blogspot.ca/2015/12/d100-unwanted-things-from-back-of-magic.html

apparent social status. hygiene/cleanliness, being covered in sewage or blood isn't conducive to diplomacy. anything that might inspire awe or fear. relative size of the group; you're not going to bother talking with a single bandit, but when 2 dozen bandits show up, you might reconsider. Could tie that into a 'social rank' I suppose.

That's fundamentally the problem with trying to expand OSR systems. The reaction table as presented in most OSR games is literally just a table and a few lines of text. What suggests adds 2-5 extra tables or more depending how serious he is about the racism bits. I know I wouldn't consult 3-5 tables mid-session to determine one reaction, so the whole point is kind of moot.

It's the double-edged sword of OSR stuff; it's very easy to expand but very hard to compress. You've got to stop and say "what do I NEED" when you're expanding reactions, or initiative, or what-have-you, otherwise you end with those shitty Imagine articles that only have 1/2 a page of game material stretched out to 7 pages.

So for reactions, the question isn't necessarily "what can I add" but rather "what's important to my game/setting and that I can easily collate for myself in a page or less"

I have so many questions about this.
Why that map shape?
If it's a dungeon planet, where do the stairs up from level 1 lead?
Isn't it a huge asspain to draw your maps in MSPaint, to the point where actually coding a mapper that produces the exact same look would be faster and easier?

>but fear ain't one of them
Not true at all!
Fear isn't a thing creatures have, like some sort of stupid aura effect. It's not supernatural. If you see a wailing soul-draining spectre you might be afraid not because it's generating a negative energy field but because it's /frightening/. So roll under your Save or be afraid of the thing. Save vs Fear.

So maybe it's storygaming bullshit to tell your players "you are afraid" because it reduces some magical thing called agency, but I don't have trouble rolling the dice to tell them that they are dead. Sure, ideally, the descriptions and context induces fear, but that's not always going to work.
>" Isn't the whole point of OSR and morale systems that PCs are either brave or deranged (or both) because they're controlled by the players, not the GM?
I've never seen that as one of the core components of OSR games. People might disagree. I don't think of characters are murderous wargame automatons. They're people, with real fears and real goals.

As for fear, there's degrees of severity or likelihood of tests. If the players are fighting a dragon and they know there's a dragon present, they've scouted, and they are prepared... no test.

If they stumble across a dragon while in formation, torches up, ready for a fight, at full HP... probably no test.

If they stumble across a dragon while scattered, in near darkness, while injured and paranoid and jittery... test.

And I usually leave the result of the test fairly open. PCs can run or cower or do whatever the player thinks their character would do when they were afraid.

It's just another tool to make the game feel more "real" and less like a board game. It helps "illustrate the shared mindspace", to spew some hipster nonsense.

>magical thing called agency
Sounds like it's time for someone to read Courtney's agency article series.

May as well post the PDF now

>Why that map shape?
Each level is shaped like a die; Level 1 is d20 with twenty triangular faces, Level 2 is (probably) a d12 with twelve pentagonal faces, etc.

>If it's a dungeon planet, where do the stairs up from level 1 lead?
There's a surface. It's mostly featureless and quite lethal though.

>Isn't it a huge asspain to draw your maps in MSPaint, to the point where actually coding a mapper that produces the exact same look would be faster and easier?
Eh, I'm used to it and I have no patience for coding. I do make my concept map using pen and paper first then copy it.

I'm also not afraid to tell players what their characters think, sometimes. This is a bit of a leery and controversial thing, so I should point out that it needs to be done carefully and wisely and rarely. It's providing information about the world, same as describing a painting the players see or the walls they are climbing. I'll only do it when description and context, for reasons of time or complexity or whatever, can't get the job done.

So I might say, "You think you can trust this person," or, "You're feeling a little hot under the collar. She beckons you upstairs," or "This peasant's attitude really rubs you the wrong way, as a knight," or "As an experimental wizard, you think the Thief's scheme is totally feasible."

And the player can go, "Wait, no it doesn't, because X". Maybe I've misread how they think their character thinks. But 99.9% of the time we're on the same page, and I've just provided a little bit of inconsequential clarification to a scene.

And just for the hell of it here's a badly "corrected" scan of the L1-Z1 map. Original the content, donut steal

Fuckin' cool actually. I'll take a look at that PDF now.

I have. It's just... a really tricky concept. Probably the trickiest concept at the core of RPGs. And I really dislike Courtney's writing style, but that's neither here or there. It's like "balance" in a competitive game.

So maybe I'm committing abominable heresies to some people, but it works. don't think there's an absolutely hard line between the GM's role as world-creator and set-dresser and the player's roles as actors and motivators. There's overlap. Players can tell me things about the setting; I can tell players things about their characters. We share the conceptual space in which this thing called a game exists.

('course that doesn't work in a purely competitive/board-game-like OSR experience, where narratives are generated entirely mechanically, often outside the control of the GM, purely using tables or tools.)

Actually, I'm not so much adding any tables as I am adding a single chart of small modifiers. The reaction roll chart is more or less the same as the one in AD&D, so it stays incredibly simplistic. What's important to my game (outside the dungeon) is politics, reputation, and cultural attitudes. I'm not looking for anything deep and involved, but I do want the players to consider the company they keep and the decisions that they make when dealing with persons of interest, among other things.

>spoiler
To be honest, I agree.
After reading your followup posts, I can actually see how they'd work with agency. You'd have to have player buy-in, which I don't always have, hence the "abominable heresy" reaction. I've also not had that much luck with integrating players into the setting creation role.

>Actually, I'm not so much adding any tables as I am adding a single chart of small modifiers. The reaction roll chart is more or less the same as the one in AD&D, so it stays incredibly simplistic. >What's important to my game (outside the dungeon) is politics, reputation, and cultural attitudes.
That's good. You sound like you have a solid focus.
The only other advice is to write only what can think of easily (don't spend hours deliberating or trying to brute-force it an idea) and once you're done, look over any spots that are open to ambiguity or if there are things the PCs will probably try to do that need to be accounted for in the rules.

Not that guy but I've had good luck with using Beyond The Wall's campaign generation for session zero and I took a cue from apocalypse world and have some questions I think are interesting for random encounters to ask the players when they end up drawing one. I keep notes on their responses and work them into other things that come up game wise later. Like I asked them what they found in a cave other than the treasure and someone said cave painting, I asked of what, someone else said crude representations of the setting's orc equivalent, now there's a wandering nomad group of them in the random encounter pile.Its not much but it helps me think of stuff and gives them more tangible reference points.

It depends on your players. Players who have played for years, but who've never run a game, let alone a different system (or system family) are awful for that kind of thing.
New players and experienced players are great.
I don't even have explicit buy-in, really. It's just a natural part of how I run games.

But going back, I think it's useful to make fear a part of the world and not just a mechanical thing.

>simultaneously, a few threads over, anons are sperging out about MUH MEN and MUH WOMEN in a thread about sex dolls
>That Guy thread is racebaiting yet again
>Jumpchain
>/pfg/

I foolishly looked at the catalog. Don't change, /osrg/ bros. This truly is the best general.

>Jumpchain
I just can't understand what that general is even about. Is it a quest? Only it doesn't even make sense.

So at the local FNM gathering tonight, I got to talking with my buddy and a few other magic players about the various different D&D games we've each played over the years, and the topic of props came up.

Now, my mother found a huge roll of newsprint I plan on commandeering for making maps, various scrolls, bounties and whatnot, and pretty much everyone listening in said that while that would be a cool idea, not a one of them have really had a DM that did stuff like that.

To me, just the tactile feel of actually having to crack open a wax seal on an important document, or unfurling a map to try and plan out the next adventure, or even just sitting down for dinner and finding that the DM made food similar to what our characters would be eating at the local inn is as much of a part of a good D&D game as a decent story and group.

Have you had props in your game, whether as a DM or a player, and have they helped with the immersion for you and your group?

It's an autism singularity.

I've never gotten to use props but they do sound pretty useful/fun.

Closest to that I've done is having tiny paper miniatures of my players' Troubleshooters for Paranoia. IT was really fun to smash, tear and munch on them.

I don't tend to use a lot of props, but I do like using food. I actually made a medieval fest from the original recipes for my players: coinsandscrolls.blogspot.ca/2017/10/medieval-cooking-small-feast.html
It was very good.
I try to create immersion from the story, but I'm a sucker for garlec ygrounde.

You know how normies see us RPG people?
That's how we view Jumpchain.
It's a convenient reference point. I don't understand what it is, but it's been going on for ages, it seems, and it vaguely worries me. I hope they're having fun.

I think it's a specific genre of CYOA. Heavy on the power trip.

If Wizards use magic by drawing power from planes of existence, how do you flavor in the standard MU spells list?

That's broad enough to not require reflavoring in my opinion

I'd edit the miscast or disaster list to include accidentally opening portals to other planes. A pinprick portal to the Elemental Plane of Fire, even if it lasts for just a few seconds, is very dangerous.

How silly are your planes? Elemental Plane of Tentacles? Bees? Elemental Plane of Men Named Cuthbert Horatio Bartlby the Second?

Also, have famous planes with famous summons, if you've got summoning spells. Air Servants come from X plane. Tenser's Floating Discs are manta rays from Y plane. Etc. Backform the biology of these planes.

>miscast or disaster
We're not all playing DCC, user.

BUT MAGIC MUST HAVE CONSEQUENCES TO CURTAIL CASTER SUPREMACY REEEEEEE

Never said you were. I assume you're playing the GLOG.

I mean the more utility-type spells that don't have an obvious source of power:
Charm, Sleep, Grease, etc.
I was considering adding an ambiguous "plane" that is the easiest to control: Tides of Chaos.
Anything that doesn't fit neatly into an elemental plane comes from Chaos.

>Tenser's Floating Discs are manta rays from Y plane
Love this, maybe I'm just overthinking things. I could see floating manta rays coming from the Plane of Air.

>miscast or disaster
Next up is creating charts for each type of plane drawn from...

>he doesn't use the Elemental Chaos/Twilight Forest
pleb

Has anyone seen a good way to implement this without being obnoxious? DCC's endless tables and the GLoG's Mishap->doom setup (it's nice thematically, but, mechanically, eh) are what I would consider obnoxious. Last Gasp's Maleficar system is even more obnoxious that I'd rather port in GLoG Mishaps and Dooms than use it.

Funny story. Most of the time, my players are casting spells with 1 or maybe 2 MD, even if they've got access to more. Mishaps are very rare. Haven't got a single doom yet.

So if you want regular mishaps, this might not be the route. In theory, yes. In practice, they seem to prefer more low-power spells to big flashy explosions. So far, at least. We'll see if the latest crop of wizards to hit level 4 keep up the tradition.

Oh, yeah, I'm aware of the low probabilities. I made that chart. I had insomnia that night and doing repetitive math problems helps. I'd just read over the magic system the other day and wanted to stress test it. It's just very hard to integrate into a traditional rpg class/leveling system and lacks the granularity I'd prefer. It goes straight from "wacky inconveniences" to "your career is over."

>. I made that chart.
Heh.
Also, I'm fairly sure my players will go on hilarious Doom-solving quests, should the need arise. Or just sacrifice the wizards; nobody wants an undead apocalypse.

youtube.com/watch?v=7cv4QkaWEYU

I made a eldritch abomination that posed as a human and followed the party, it really gave em the creeps. Then its eyes exploded and it tried to eat them

...

>In their castles, the magic-users will use Geas to send the player characters on some quest
after treasure, claiming half and preferring the magic items. This is an obvious and easy
way to send player characters on a perilous quest of the referee's choosing, and to make
sure that the treasure thus gained does not enrich the PCs too heavily. The alternative of
giving up a magic item as a toll is a good way to strip out any excess items from the
party. All told, a very convenient and simple encounter type.

How come the fee for the adventurers is so low? Do you use a silver standard normally? 200gp plus a *cut* of your own loot seems harsh.

I mean, it's not like it would be hard for me or anybody to replace this with "nothing upfront but if you make it back we expect 10% for transport services, plus first purchase of anything you want to sell", I'm just curious what your reasoning is.

Another article on an underground race.

This one's not really a race though. Not quite a monster either. Closer to terrain.
coinsandscrolls.blogspot.ca/2018/01/osr-cholerids-and-fever-city.html

231- scroll instantly destroys the universe, and remakes it again instantly leaving only the reader intact. May be an illusory effect, but interdimensional police start showing up looking for the perpetrator of an ultra-death-crime

902- scroll creates a potion which causes one of the other random effects on this table when drunk.

431- scroll affects your magical and psychic signature. To anyone who can see magical auras, and knows a lot about demonic or arcane history, you now appear to be a specific famous demon wearing a flimsy disguise.

3838- for the next x amount of time, your viewpoint is moved about a foot above your head, like if you were wearing an invisible periscope.

I’m a visual thinker, and I find props and miniatures actually take me out of the game a bit. Because when I start using my actual eyes to look at physical objects, I’m no longer using my mind’s eye to see the fictional scene. But it’s probably highly personal.

Tastes, smells and sounds are far less distracting, because they’re only complementing the visual imagination, not overriding it.

Perhaps this will be of help.

How often do you actually get to play tabletop rpgs?

Would converting the game "Order of the Griffon" directly over to an actual module (with the serials filed off and some things changed up some) a good idea?

Well, I have a regular group irl that meets every Saturday or Sunday and I'm starting up a game using Discord/Roll20 here soon for Tuesdays. Pretty often I would say.

Two or three times a month. I run an OSR adjacent game for some friends. My room-mate has been running a solo 5e game for me but it hasn't found it's legs yet.

I'm going a bit easy on them right now. None of the characters are very combat capable and most of the players are pretty novice.
I'm encouraging them to form allegiances and hire some lackeys at the earliest opportunity. To that end I gave them some wealth as reward for rescuing a kidnapped youth and once the ship they're on reaches port they have the opportunity to discover...

The Secret of Bone Hill

I kind of want to include the missing content and Chainmail combat to pic related: does anyone know if the actual source is available somewhere?

Some fresh, hot revamped OC for you folks that could really use some critical eyes.

In Old Souls Rekindled: the Insight system needs both suggestions and some consideration.

In One Sovereign Ring: class abilities need a brief eye, particularly Elf (Fading Light), Hobbit (Comfy Cooking), and Orc (Elf-Kin). Secrets also need a critical look, but at the moment I'm reasonably happy with how they work without compelling arguments otherwise.

I feel like the lower planes creatures tables are kind of cheating, but then that just leaves me with the blasting gel slimes.

And I immediately noticed that I fucked up Insight by forgetting Saves.

You pick which class you save as (Fighting-Man, Thief, Magic-User, Cleric) when you start your Insight track. It goes up at the same time your HD does, since that's roughly when you complete a "level-up."

There's a bunch of this stuff in the Ready Ref Sheets unless I'm mistaken.

Any of you know a good OSR podcast/show ? Getting tired of listening to shows with plot armor characters, i need some lethal traps and tense fights.

Is there an OD&D clone with variable weapon damage and expanded stats?

S&W Core is OD&D + Greyhawk, isn't it?

I want to run an osr game for a bunch of friends that have little experience in rpgs. What osr system would you recommend? Also, what's your opinion about "Blood and Treasure" system?

Basic Fantasy is free, is easy to understand, and has a curated community of modifications if you want to add in classes beyond Fighter/Thief/Cleric/Magic-User. It also has ersatz versions of classic modules like Keep on the Borderlands if you don't mind that, also free.

>How come the fee for the adventurers is so low?
The assumption was that the adventurers would be desperate gaijin/outcasts with no other prospects plus it's being funded by two has-been nobles with dubious reputations. It's a bit like Columbus' first voyage but sketchier.

>Do you use a silver standard normally?
No, I use the gold standard.

>200gp plus a *cut* of your own loot seems harsh.
You don't have to pay a cut if your employers never make it back :^)

>Black Hack-style combat
Do not want

So how long do the bonuses from Comfortable Cookery last?