/osrg/ - Old School Renaissance General

Not the original maker of this table, but I added a few extra nouns to make it 2d20 roll and some extra spice. Hope the original writer enjoys it too.

Orcs of the...

[ADJECTIVE]
1 Evil
2 Iron
3 Vile
4 Red
5 Dark
6 Grey
7 Black
8 White
9 Yellow
10 Bloody
11 Bronze
12 Hateful
13 Brazen
14 Copper
15 Deathly
16 Leprous
17 Hideous
18 Crooked
19 Obscene
20 Loathsome

[NOUN]
1 Eye
2 Jaw
3 Horn
4 Claw
5 Skull
6 Head
7 Blade
8 Axe
9 Spear
10 Cave
11 Mane
12 Hand
13 Fang
14 Snake
15 Rune
16 Moon
17 Flame
18 Worm
19 Toungue
20 Drake

I feel so sorry for anons with OCD.

Speaking of new magic systems;

I wanted to give my Wizards a new feel and look by making them closer to scholars; essentially divorcing them from magical powers innately. They don't really "cast spells" anymore. Instead, they can brew the best potions to cure sicknesses and grant buffs; other people have weaker potions and on't know what the ingredients do half the time. They can identify items and monsters, and they can help in combat by using magic rods as medium ranged elemental damage weapons. (Anyone can use these, they are just the best at it)

My question is, what else can I give them? I want to make them the best "magic" class without creating an arbitrary divide between them and "non-magical" classes. Preferably keeping them as a support role, since they're Sages

I've changed enough things that I got to the 2000 character limit well before I finished listing things. Still mostly Vancian, though, because I like Vancian.

That said, there's a couple things I'm still working on.

First, Clerics.

I want to have Clerics. Clerics allow access to the 1st Estate, Church intrigue, etc. That all appeals to me. However, I don't like how the Cleric is currently implemented. I don't like Clerics as frontline fighters, particularly since I don't want to have to deal with remembering two combat progressions. So I've taken that out. I like the idea of having Clerics seem more "divine", so I want them to have magic that's different from Wizards. As such I've removed their spellcasting, and am currently looking at using a combination of these:
9and30kingdoms.blogspot.com/2011/05/clerics-without-spells.html
whatwouldconando.blogspot.ca/2016/02/an-infinity-of-gods.html
blog.d4caltrops.com/2015/09/spending-clerics-shrine-preamble.html
However, there are a few problems with this. One, they don't really fit together without work. Two, if I just have a cleric with the abilities in the WWCD article and nothing else, they're useless most of the time. Three, as much as I like the idea of the shrines, I'm not sure what magic should be possible only there as opposed to in the field. Four, the end system needs to have something that you get for levelling up, which the WWCD version doesn't have. The 9and30 version is a little better in that regard, though.

The second thing is wands and staves and rods.

Let's be honest here. I don't like how wands and staves work. They're essentially mana batteries for wizards. Once they get a wand, it shatters resource management. And fictionally, wizards often use wands or staves to cast magic, but they don't have the spells themselves. Wizards shouldn't have too many of them, but I'd like if they sometimes used them and sometimes didn't.

>What changes have you made to your game's magic system?
Next week i'll be starting a campaign using Magic Words
paperspencils.com/2015/09/08/spell-lists-stuck-here-are-some-magic-words/

tl;dr I want to encourage Spell Research. An M-U who knows spells “Unseen Servant” and “Fairy Fire” has four magical words at their disposal: Fire, Fairy, Servant, and Unseen. As a downtime action/level up they can then mix and match these options in various ways to get spells like “Fairy Servant,” or “Unseen Fire,” or “Fire Servant,” or “Servant of Fire.”

OSR Ghost Tracker link

>docs.google.com/document/d/17e1ltFE_rjXfBHI1HRXiU5GIngrO35BlqHMD9s3M578/edit?usp=sharing

Not entirely on topic but; I am a newbie DM who would like to run one of the games from here. Where is the best place to search for players, aside from gamefinder thread.

Probably just a LFP listing in roll20 if you don't mind a group of randos

It's fine that you don't like clerics as frontline fighters, because they aren't, really. They're the rear guard that you call to the front when things get way too hot for the fighters.
Though I think if you remove the martial aspect of clerics, you're going to miss a very important and oft-overlooked role clerics play in a society where magic and gods actually exist. Your ideas about the First Estate applied in a world where they don't (or at least not that we've observed).

That role (if they're lawful good clerics as the basic cleric is by default) is to protect society from evil wizards. Hear me out on this.

Look at a medieval castle or a fortified, walled city. Notice anything about its design? The castle is defensible from normal, non-magical ground troops employing normal siege weaponry and tactics. Now tell me how exactly castle walls are going to defend you from flying magical creatures like dragons? From wizards casting a rock-to-mud spell on your ramparts? From one wizard casting Charm Person on one of the king's generals? Short answer is, they don't. The kings and architects who saw these walls built were not preparing for conflict with magic in the equation... not on the surface anyway.

The reason clerics are armored, able to detect magic, able to use protection from evil, able to turn undead, ABLE TO DETECT FOR MAGICAL MENTAL INFLUENCE, able to beat others senseless is, yes, to seek and destroy evil, but it's MAINLY to defend good people.
The clerics are not like the medieval first estate at all. They serve a very specific function in being the lawful good society's counter to the chaos and unpredictability of arcane magic. They fight the magical war, and the kings and soldiers fight the physical one.

Nice! I'm glad you liked my table enough to modify it.

Your friends! Seriously, if you grab B/X or a preferred modern clone (labyrinth lord, LotFP, what have you), a few beers, and some snacks, you'll have a grand old time (:

He hasn't got any.

This, no friends interested in this sort of thing.

You can always beg for players here.

>fairy
>not faerie
FOE, GYG

Could you name those books?

>interested in this sort of thing
If you have friends who aren't interested, you just need to sell them on it.

>What changes have you made to your game's magic system?
The Fighting Man is the only class, and can use any magic item (including scrolls and wands and whatnot). NPC Magic-Users and Clerics might still exist, I'm not sure, but if they do then they generally do not adventure - the former is too busy with research, and the latter are too busy with religious matters.

If you want to be a "wizard", you'll need to find magical items that let you act as one. This might be difficult, but rewarding - using OD&D rules, a Wand of Fireballs would have 100 charges.
Potions, once found, can be duplicated by a hired Alchemist. You'll generally just get one potion per alchemist per week, and it'll cost a fair bit, but it's an option.

>naming the Fair Folk

Drunk rant incoming:

So, for you, in a broad procedural sense, what is important for a functioning campaign? I don't mean in terms of character options, or in terms of specific magic systems or what-ever, but in terms of high level campaign game-play loops.

I'm asking this cause I finally have the time to DM on a regular basis for some friends, and I'm outlining my campaign now. Still deciding between which system to use (B/X, AD&D 1e, 5e maybe), but I want to figure out how I want my campaign to look in an abstract sense.

Do you think that the magic of OSR games is captured in the idea of a sprawling hexcrawl, containing dungeons (or analogous smaller-scale sites), containing encounters. And that transitioning between these levels whiles't accurately tracking world-progression (through time in terms of rounds, turns, hours and days) is what gives that sandbox appeal of the old-school? Or do you run your campaign totally different? How do you do it guys. How do you deliver that authentic, immersive, swords & sorcery, the world is your oyster if only you are willing to take it from those evil goblins by force and wits feeling that the AD&D 1e PHB refers to in its introduction?

>using boring Celtic fanfic
Honestly, at this point the "alien and unpredictable fair folk" are as cliche as hippy elves, Scottish dwarves, and noble savage orcs.

>what is important for a functioning campaign?

Since you're specifically asking for broad sense I would say: good players, usable prep, and a system that helps me achieve the style of game play we're looking to experience.

>as cliche as
Where do you think you are?

"Double-crossing cowards" is still classy.

But I can get behind, "naming them forces you to deal with them."
Maybe handle them ambiguous until a PC gives them a name, to fit with the whole 'unspeakable' motif?

>"alien and unpredictable fair folk"
Less "alien and unpredictable", more "speak of the devil and he shall appear". The walls have ears.

The world moves without the PCs. Draw up a timeline of what will happen in the next year. Make notes on how the PCs might facilitate, hinder, or prevent those events. Hexcrawls only work well if you're in truly "undiscovered" country.

You're welcome to keep piling garbage up in your setting but I'm still going to call it garbage.

Any have and good supplement recommendations for a Swords & Wizardry or compatible game that adds like new races, classes, spells ect ect...just more content essentially.

Garbage is good, though. Faggot.

Who's ran "Fuck For Satan" for LotFP?

I wouldn't include it in a campaign, but I was thinking about running it as a one-shot meatgrinder over the weekend. Anyone have experience with it?

There's a PWYW version of B/X Advanced now
rpgnow.com/product/232920/BX-Advanced-No-Art

rpgnow.com/browse.php?keywords=race swords & wizardry&x=0&y=0&author=&artist=&pfrom=&pto=

I guess you could say I'm not your kind of people

As has already been mentioned, a way to keep track of what factions/monsters/whatever is moving and doing things in the campaign world. I basically use fronts from apocalypse world for this

I found a solid session zero where everyone makes characters and the initial map together worked really well. Beyond the Wall/Further Afield is where that came from. Keeping the scale small enough for events in the world to have noticeable effect and a scale players can easily imagine. imo anything further than a weeks travel can go on a new map ymmv.

Sorting out your own shorthand, and organizing your notes so you can come up with random tables and encounters quickly. Having tables for weather, land marks, etc. but not turning it into a chore. I cheat and ask players what they see sometimes, or to add details to a new place.

Keeping things on the map that come up and referring to them at other places/times.

How do you feel about contested rolls?

I'm not above begging but I haven't seen anybody looking for a group in OSR threads so I assumed that would be impolite. The campaign I want to run is 'Wolf-Packs and Winter Snow' based, and I imagine that the experienced players from here will not have fun with inexperienced GM such as myself. I will try as was suggested above in roll20 LFP, thou'

Looking through BX Advanced and pretty disappointed so far.
In the ~30 pages of skimmed only about 2 of them are stuff that isn't in the LL AEC. I'm hoping Psionics are at least good.

>I imagine that the experienced players from here will not have fun with inexperienced GM such as myself
Having turbonerds challenge you will sharpen your skills.

The game essentially needs to work like this.
>you start out weak. The world is stronger than you, so you will die easily.
>if you want to die less, you need to gain levels, which means gaining xp.
>gaining xp requires you to extract value from your environment (treasure in D&D, exploring caves and hunting in wolfpacks, etc)
>extracting treasure from your environment requires you to put yourself at risk to test the character. failure means death or nerfs.
>the environment has finite treasure in the immediate area: in order to continue leveling, you need to explore new areas.
>as you gain levels, your initial weakness is lessened and you unlock new abilities to extract value from the environment. however, you also accumulate complications which need to be compensated for.
>new places to extract treasure from are probably even more dangerous, so you need to have gained levels to be able to even cope: thus the game stays challenging, but changes in scope.
That's your loop. In order to level up, go to a place, put yourself in danger, harvest XP from the place, and gain levels and problems. Find a new place, repeat.
Fundamentally, the game's about exploration. PCs should want to be constantly wanting to explore new places because they should always feel fragile and that gaining levels is urgent.

Hey, I'd sign up for that if the timezones and stuff are right.

Remember how last thread someone (me) pointed out that the AEC didn't include dungeon, exploration, or reaction rules and combat matrices? Well, they're in BX Advanced, copypasted straight from LL. Bestiary combines AEC & LL listings.

I'd play.
GMing's fairly easy to pick up. So long as you can improvise stuff on the fly and understand your job (which is to provide the party with challenges and oppertunities to make meaningful in-game choices), you'll be fine.

There's a random insanity table. There are 6 pages of domain rules which I'm guessing might be from ACKS. There's an attempt at a feat/flaw optional ruleset that penalize (feat) or augment (flaw) XP gain.

Psionics are an octopus of a thing. IT's clearly copypasted from Microlite20 Psionics ("Successful use requires a 1d20 + MIND Bonus + Level/2 versus the target number (TN)" ) and costs HP (just like in Microlite20 Psionics).

There's a sample setting/hexmap which is literally copied from Blackmarsh.

>GYG
...ax? Are you saying you're a foe of Gygax? That sounds like you're not a real OSR enthusiast at all! You should leave.

Gygax was nothing more that a false prophet. Spit upon his name! In Arneson we trust, for he will deliver us to the holy land of Blackmoor.

>Could you name those books?
The "grey" 2e books are Greyhawk: The Adventure Begins and Greyhawk Player's Guide.

Should fighter have a d8 or d10 hit die if monster hd are d8s and longsword does d8, greatsword deals d10?

They're asking actual money for this pasta?

Just a d6, like everyone else.

Alright, OGL comments. Everything in the no-art version is Open Game Content. ACKS is cited here, so my suspicions about the domain rules seem confirmed. There are also a lot of Microlite games and derivatives listed.

tl;dr BX Advanced = LL + AEC + ACKS Domains + Bards + Blackmarsh

>What changes have you made to your game's magic system?

Yes, $9.99 for the art version and PWYW for the no-art version. Granted, the guy does it to pay for his wife's cancer bills but still.

Now this makes me nervous
Well, if you are interested further here's more info:

>Now this makes me nervous
She doesn't seem the type, but if she tries to call you on a rule talk her down

>If you want to do anything plot-driven I'd recommend those.
I'm genuinely not trying to be a dick but why use D&D for something story-focused like that? I generally use D&D for sandbox style play and/or "you're stuck in a megadungeon so try not to fucking die" and storygames for the style of thing they're made for.

To me, using D&D for some kind of character-driven literary stuff or intrigue-filled epic fantasy or whatever is only slightly more comprehensible than busting out Fiasco when you want something focused on exploration and player skill.

Has anyone ever created a document, pdf, blogpost, book, or whatever that contains monster families?

Such as all the types of orcs and their cousins; goblins, orcs, great orcs, orc warbeasts that are actually just heavily mutated orcs, etc.? The "family" of the monsters are organized by HD?

Giantcraft, Draconomicon, etc.

What system would you use to run Yoon-Suin?

>Has anyone ever created a document, pdf, blogpost, book, or whatever that contains monster families?
I did kind of a similar thing for undead: coinsandscrolls.blogspot.ca/2017/10/osr-12-new-undead-creatures-of-varying.html

But that's about it. Haven't seen a bestiary like that though, but I'd like to see one, provided it was interesting.
Fun idea. Added my recent groups.
>what is important for a functioning campaign?
A sense of progress. Goals and challenges. A real, living world with people in it who aren't just NPCs in a video game.

I don't pre-plan or worldbuild much. I try to design tools that help me worldbuild and plan on the fly. I think the true magic of OSR is easiest to implement in dungeons.

>How do you deliver that authentic, immersive, swords & sorcery, the world is your oyster if only you are willing to take it from those evil goblins by force and wits feeling that the AD&D 1e PHB refers to in its introduction?
Believe in yourself. Use the rules as tools, not as gospel. Never forget your goals.

> Rules are hard to remember and details are easy to forget under stress. Intent is not. Intent is easy to recall and unlike detail it actually grows more powerful under stress. You remember who hates you. The more stressed you are, the more you remember it.

DW

Whatever homebrewed hacked together nonsense I find easiest to run.
> One, they don't really fit together without work.
Then you must work!

What from the AD&D DM's guide do you use in your Basic, or your other games?

What's with Orcus the fat fuck he is being such a ladies man? He's a gross fat brooding nihilist demon that sits on his throne all day.

I mean he canonically has an incestual half-demon dynasty.

Is the dick that good?

>using a community googledoc to shill your shit
>listing your unpublished homebrew dungeon
You're such a shitheel.

The random generators.

a modified The Nightmares Underneath would probably work pretty well for it

B/X, LL, or LotFP.

>using a community googledoc to shill your shit
Figured it's only polite to link to the adventures.
>You're such a shitheel.
Wasn't aware they had to be published accredited adventures.

>shitheel
Better tensile strength than a pissheel.

It's for nodding to dead adventurers when you run the campaign.

A head of a spear here, a ghostly trick of the light there, a clean silhouette on the soot-stained wall...

There's no fuckin' point to it if it's not an adventure they can run, now is there?

>There's no fuckin' point to it if it's not an adventure they can run, now is there?
I'll probably end up publishing Steam Hill eventually, and KtA is 99.9% done.
Plus, I figured it was more of a "cautionary tale" document or a general roster of the usual ridiculous causes of death.

I need hot opinions on my OSR homebrew as fast as possible. Seriously if you are reading this Please give me a (you). You don't even have to read it, just as many opinions as possible.

I want to make an OSR game that is a bit easier to people who haven't played them. So fewer tables, etc. I want to mostly eliminate skill checks. Stealth v. Perception is okay but I don't know how to handle it. Maybe 2 in 6, 1 in 6 in heavy armor and 3 or 4 in 6 if you're a rogue? Also:
>one save or several? Will saves are too important to dump for any class, learned that from 3.5. I don't really like BX or five saves system. Also should it be a bonus or a "15+" type thing? The former allows for escalating difficulty of spell saves from higher level magic users.
>what rate should fighter attack bonus increase, assuming a 1 to 20 leveling system?
>should I keep descending A.C. and just say "add a.c. to attack roll vs 20" or should I just keep ascending A.C. and include a conversion guide I'm the back of the pdf? Remember this is meant for 3.5 fags.
>spells: should I keep them as is or play with them to "balance" them a bit better? Like magic missile shooting 3 missiles but sleep only affecting one creature?
>magic users only get one spell per day and it "fills in" as they get a new spell level every other level. So a 3rd level magic user has 2/1 spells per day, a 4th level magic user has 2/2 spells per day, a 5th level has 2/2/1 per day, and so on. Thoughts on this?

>Silver Standard
>"A character whose scores total to less than 60 may be rerolled; such a character is unsuited to adventuring."
>Saving throw descriptions cut off
>20th level casters can only cast three 1st-level spells per day
wew

>You don't even have to read it, just as many opinions as possible.
wat
>A character whose scores total to less than 60 may be
rerolled; such a character is unsuited to adventuring.
Naaah. Perfectly suitable for adventuring. Someone's got to find out how deep that pit is.

Formatting is very nice throughout.
>Alignment
Eech

The rules seem to cover all the obvious things. It looks workable. Very readable.
>one save or several?
Roll under stats? Otherwise, one Save.
>and include a conversion guide I'm the back of the pdf?
I wouldn't even bother with that unless you think you'll need it.
>>spells: should I keep them as is or play with them to "balance" them a bit better? Like magic missile shooting 3 missiles but sleep only affecting one creature?
One of those things that requires playtesting.

>no relations between movement and wandering monsters

>using a community googledoc to shill your shit
>listing your unpublished homebrew dungeon
You're such a shitheel.

The random generators.

...You're a 3aboo, aren't you. Or a Nextbeard, but I'm not really familiar enough with 5e to know what changed and what didn't.

>20th level
>A character whose scores total to less than 60 may be rerolled; such a character is unsuited to adventuring.
>half-orcs
>half-elves
>racial ability score modifiers
>humans are "adaptable" and "varied"
>XP reqs that are literally 3e's but divided by 10

...

...

I would like it a whole lot more if you didn't pick the most braindead races.

Christ, at least put a unique animal person race. Narwhal people with magic resistance or something, please. PLEASE GOD no more elves and dwarves. At least put in a bare minimum of creative effort.

>racial ability score modifiers
These were in 1e. And yeah I haven't really thought through the XP yet. The gold / monster xp section is even worse. What is wrong with a half elf or half orc?

He is taller than 5'11' so he can have all the pussy he wants.
they never learn, do they?

If this is an intro you're not going to be playing it very long. so i'd stop detailing anything past level 10. by that point the core game play loop can easily fall apart.

>at least put a unique animal person race
>no more elves and dwarves
Maybe Pathfinder and Fursona would be more your speed.

Uhh part of my hope with this system is to get away from 3.pf hordes of furry races and bird races and other stupid shit. New races are retarded imo. Sorry. Thanks for the feedback though.

I mean look at this shit. Looks like the cover of a romance novel.

Yeah, people want their elves and dwarves, it's the gold standard at this point. If you don't have rules for them, people will either find or make some, or just move on to something where they don't have to find or make rules for them.

You clearly don't want to play OSORNC, so why come here? Just play 3e or 5e.

Thanks user. I kept alignment because of paladin but maybe I should just delete it? It's useful for spells like blasphemy and the paladin smite evil ability (which I know is a 3.x thing, unless it came in in 2e, I only know 1e 3e and 5e but I am sick to death of these games and I've tried and failed to teach my group 1e so maybe if I simplify things they'll be more into it).

Some people are into that.

The issue is the number of axes.

Delete it, I say. Smite Evil on a case-by-case basis if you have to. It's just one more thing to complicate your life.

Roman

de

Because 3e and 5e both suck. I'm sick of skill check spamming and such a glut of healing options that no one ever dies or even gets hurt. Why do standard fantasy races, and a few bones thrown in to keep things simple for the 3.x players this is intended to transition into OSR, disqualify me from that? The game style will still be the same.