/osrg/ - Old School Renaissance General

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Which high level adventures allow for a good OSR play? What are your ideas for one?

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>Self-proclaimed FOE removes the topic explanation

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An accident, really. Too tired after finally setting stuff up.

Remake the thread, dingus.

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I want to get into OSR, but this fag basically outlines my problems

youtube.com/watch?v=mdo5ErnXH3E

How do you fix these problems?

Do what he did and play Runequest? Hell, pick up Mythras and use the Classic Fantasy supplement to get some D&D back into your Runequest.

Play with a good referee. Appreciate that >muh realism leads to the cobra problem.

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They don't publish Runequest anymore though

The cobra problem?

Mythras. It's available on DrivethruRPG, has a supplement called Classic Fantasy meant to inject D&D back into the game.

*effect

>puny characters
As intended. Max level at 1st, increased hit dice, not a problem to fix if you consider it one.

>monsters are lethal
Again, as intended.

>description of a shitty play
Thankfully, with all the wealth of the OSR advice available you won't be spending your time kicking doors and mindlessly dying to orcs in empty rooms.

>weird dungeon layouts
It's fucking boring to explore what an actually rational being would build most of the time.

>specific OD&D rules concerns
OSR games are wildly different in the exact implementation, just choose anything to your liking.

Oh, I feel dumb for not googling that first off. I just assumed this was some gaming specific thing.

I find those complaints pretty strange considering at least a few of them apply to the game he professed favoring. I recall Runequest characters are pretty fragile, and almost always outclassed by monsters (without the odd jumps in power that come with leveling up to even the gap).

What is mythras though? Seems like a seperate game

For AD&D 1e. the players handbook was released in 78 while the DM's guide was released in 79. The DM's handbook contained all info on rolling stats and attack tables

What the hell were you supposed to do with your new players guide in the meanwhile? Wipe your ass with it?

So, this company, the Design Mechanism, had the license to Runequest for a while, and made their own version of it that's apparently a pretty solid game (though very unlike OSR, I normally wouldn't discuss it here if it weren't for the fact that Lindy went to Runequest specifically because he feels it largely fixed his complaints with D&D), but when they lost the license, they had to call it something else and went with Mythras after further cleaning up its design a bit.

Use older stuff,and kind of wing it when it didn't make sense

AD&D PHB + Holmes and/or OD&D rules to fill in the gaps

>They don't publish Runequest anymore though
they actually do, Chaosium republished the 2nd edition a while ago(which while not OSR proper is definitely Old School), and a new edition is coming in the future

Why do I have to use a separate product for my shiny new book?

I definitely know your opinions on 3.5/PF, but what do you guys think about D&D 4e?

Because the other shiny new book isn't out yet.
This happened with literally every edition of TSR D&D, get over it.

>what do you guys think about D&D 4e?
The only edition of WOTC D&D that was honest about itself, and for that reason it was hated. Gamma World and Fourthcore are interesting.

I'm not going to respond point-by-point to that idiot, so what, in specific, are your issues?

I think even the WotC editions were released like that as well. With the exception of 4e.

I would contend it's just an innate flaw of releasing a complete game as three separate books, but considering my own experience with fuck-huge RPG books, I suspect it's better that they release them as three separate books since fuck-huge books are rarely as durable unless they're some ungodly expensive academic books.

Max hp at 1st*, duh.

Frostbitten and Mutilated is up on Nergal's Vola. (Check the PDF share thread if you don't know what this is). It's a Zak S. work, and you probably already know where you stand on those. Personally, I find it useful and I'm disassembling it wholesale for use in Godbound. It turns out the Frozen Viking North with Amazons maps exactly in Godbound's default setting.

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>Runequest talk
Probably the only time I can get to ask this. Is there are a version of Runequest that overhauls Strike Ranks? The rest I can understand, but my eyes just glazed over when reading about that in RQ2.

I've been thinking about ability scores and roll-under checks. I know a lot of people object to them under the banner of "putting too much emphasis on stats that don't increase." I know there's /something/ wrong with increasing stats as you level, but I can't put my finger on it and no one here has really discussed it, unlike the 5 saves vs 1 save vs 3 saves. Would making it not guaranteed or not getting to pick which one help?

Holy shit Skerples, did Zak S really try to Veeky Forums shame you because you wanted use at table in RPG books!?!?

There are people who object to roll under ability checks? What the hell. That's my favorite optional rule from B/X.

It was extensively covered last thread, but thanks for the download info.

Waiting on my copy to get here.

>I know there's /something/ wrong with increasing stats as you level, but I can't put my finger on it
Stats increasing with level are only problem if your attribute bonuses are huge like 3e's and you let scores exceed 18 without magic. But it also opens the "what if I train my attribute score" can of worms as well.

I'm reading FB&M right now, and I'm kind of confused about the to-hit bonuses. I was under the unspoken impression that LotFP monsters had to-hit bonuses equal to their HD, but that doesn't seem to be the case. Is there any rhyme or reason to it?

Troveanon, you should put the account pass up so we can start uploading shit

>Skerples being involved in drama
I find this hard to believe.

>monsters had to-hit bonuses equal to their HD
I think this is more like general guideline you can fall back on when designing OSR monsters. You can fiddle with it to make things more interesting.

how much of it is usable for other systems? my groups are newbies that don't want to try stuff that isn't 5E

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Unless you've got screencaps or a link then fuck off.

When is false patrick putting out a new book

Nearly all of it really as long as you're well versed in OSR. The stats are simple enough that you can eyeball them and think, yeah this monster is big and strong etc and then convert to the system of choice from there.

Pretty much all of it. There's not much that's system specific, even less that's impossible to convert.

plus.google.com/117530730718880672228/posts/DaD4u9RDx58
Here's your link. It's typical Zak drama shit and Skerples demonstrating all the training he's gotten from frequenting Veeky Forums.

>I know there's /something/ wrong with increasing stats as you level
My only concern would be shit getting out of hand. A +3 strength roughly doubles your melee damage output, so it's serious business, especially if you can decide where your points go. But then initial stat generation methods vary, and you don't need to give people points at each level, so I think it's like anything else: you just need to get your math right.

I've actually done it so you get +1 to a stat at each level-up (roll randomly twice to determine two stats and pick the one you prefer), but I also changed a lot of other things in that system, or I don't think it would've worked particularly well. With regular stat increases, I think it's a good idea to standardize the modifier ranges, like new school D&D does. (If you use the old school 9-12 = 0,13-15 = +1, 16-17 = +2, 18 = +3, then why would you ever add to a 9 if you've got a 16?)

Honestly, I think periodic ability increases make for an interesting progression. Of course, if you're just looking for a way to have ability checks progress, you can just have some kind of "skill" stat or something that increases with level and that is modified by the appropriate ability modifier.

>you can just have some kind of "skill" stat or something that increases with level and that is modified by the appropriate ability modifier.
Blech. I kid, I kid. Yeah, I'm revising the ability mods as well, stat/3-3 rounding up (or technically down for negative numbers) because I'm using 4d4 for a tighter curve. That way there's an increase in a stat every three levels or so.

>Skerples needling Zak
Skerples you silly motherfucker.

No, it's Raggi we begrudgingly respect

>Skerp btfoing Crap Princess and Zak (((Smith)))
Is Skerp, dare I say it, /ourfalseosrenthusiast/?

>There are ways to use obscure words wrong but I've never seen it pointed out for legit reasons in games. It's usually part of a "this person is smarter than me, me hate" kind of Veeky Forums critique.
hmn really makes you think

And to think, I was here to see Skerples take his first floundering steps in osrg and gain the ire of anons for existing. And here's our boy all grown up. What a day to be alive.

>btfoing Crap Princess
Funny way of spelling "saw eye to eye with"

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>I was here to see Skerples take his first floundering steps in osrg
He's ANCIENT. You saw him sharpie a dick onto his own face and jump up and down on his desk.

>escalates the argument
>while telling you to shut up

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Bismuth seller status must have gotten to his head.

>Blech.
You needn't be all fancy and shit. It could be something simple like in the pic. Not saying you have to be into something like that though. Just saying it doesn't have to be some complicated, big system.

>That way there's an increase in a stat every three levels or so.
Not initially, especially if you get to put the increase where you want it. Any given ability is going to be from 1 to 3 points away from a modifier increase, and is going to average 2.* And if you get to choose where to put your points, you're likely going to prioritize stats where you can get an immediate (or at least sooner) modifier increase. That means there's a pretty good chance your first to ability increases will also up your modifier.

*Not calculating for precisely where the bell curve peaks and everything, but close enough.

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Admittedly, it was for the start of his blog and the posting of the various iterations on his teaching dungeon. So I might have missed the toddler stage, yes.

>So I might have missed the toddler stage, yes.
I'm like 40% sure he's been here since 2003.

>knows better than to use a trip
>doesn't take Veeky Forums seriously
It's possible.

Oh, I forgot to mention. You try to increase three stats at each level up, one is randomly determined, one is picked by the GM, and one is picked by the player. The player picks after the GM but before the random stat. But you have to roll over the stat in order to improve it. How's that sound math-wise?

Thanks for that skill system though, I might just try it out on my second group which hasn't met yet so I can muck around with theorycrafting and mechanics as much as I waaaaaaant!

>Check the PDF share thread if you don't know what this is
I checked the pdf thread and remain very confused. What am I looking for?

Roll under user, you might find this interesting. It's an OSR game where roll under is used for everything and there are stat increases to accommodate for that.

Attached: taac.pdf (PDF, 669K)

volafile dot org /r/nergal-underworld

Thanks boss. Waiting for my physical copy.

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>Stats increasing with level are only problem if your attribute bonuses are huge like 3e's

I have never understood this criticism. In the standard range, they were only 1 higher than B/X's.

>But it also opens the "what if I train my attribute score" can of worms as well

To be fair, not touching them opens this as well.

Not to disrupt the lovely G+ drama here but I've got a topic to make your noggin go joggin for a bit.

There's probably a market for commercial add-ons to TSR modules (like that collapsed tunnel in G1). I say this because there's a Pathfinder publisher that specializes in "Adventure Path Plug-ins" that add to APs. The only question is how to obliquely refer to the original modules without actually explicitly saying it.

"This module was designed as expansion to the classic Hill Giant module and connects to room XX in that product but can also used in other dungeons or as a standalone structure." ?

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You guys are the silliest people around, you know that?
And you think /you/ trained /me?/ I've been around since well before this site. I've seen flamewars you wouldn't believe. Attack bots on fire off the shoulder of IRC...

Anyway... don't worry about it. It's non-content silliness. It's not even really an argument.
>The cobra problem?
See, a cobra is very long and flared at the end, much like most D&D campaigns. Starts of small, ends up wide and venemous.
What you want is a chicken. Starts off with a soft comb, gets nice and soft and fat in the middle, ends with hard crunchy sharp feet.

True facts.

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It's when you solve a problem so poorly that it gets worse.

Take a page out of McDonald's book when they were marketing szechuan sauce, refer to it really vaguely a whole bunch of times but eventually people will pick up on the hints.

To be more specific, when the british were in charge of colonial India, they issued a bounty on cobras to get people to kill them. Only people started breeding them for bounties instead of hunting them. The brits figured this out and withdrew the bounty, leaving them with even more cobras than before. But I'm pretty sure skerps knew that already.

>Nearly all of it really
neat
>as long as you're well versed in OSR
fuck

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>Campaign Chickens

Now I want to see a campaign outline tat emphasizes the Chicken school of thought. Preferably using Jo-ha-kyū pacing.

I think it's a good idea. I also think rewriting or updating classic dungeons to a modern standard is great (and completely fine if you do it non-commercially and don't re-use the art).

There are a lot of great ideas buried under thick layers of TSR text. Set them free, user.
D&D 4E is great for running mecha games. OSR for the humans, 4E for the mechas.
That's still very sweet of them to make a cake. It's a nice gesture. Mary Berry would not be impressed with that texture though. Looks very close.

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Okay, this is still a salvageable situation. How much of an osr newbie are you? What don't you understand.

>I have never understood this criticism. In the standard range, they were only 1 higher than B/X's.
I think it's a combination of a quicker modifier progression combined with a more forgiving method of stat generation combined with periodic stat increases. Your average stat in B/X is 10.5, which is 2.5 points away from giving you a +1 modifier. Your average stat in 3e is 12.24, which is a +1 modifier as it is, and less than 2 points away from a +2 modifer.

Without doing the math, I'd guess that if you added up the modifiers for your average 3e character, they'd end up somewhere around 4 or 5 (considering that you can toss out any characters who don't have at least a +1 modifier total). In B/X, they'd be 0. That's a significant difference.

That I did.
>Rats had featured largely in the history of Ankh-Morpork. Shortly before the Patrician came to power there was a terrible plague of rats. The city council countered it by offering twenty pence for every rat tail. This did, for a week or two, reduce the number of rats - and then people were suddenly queuing up with tails, the city treasury was being drained, and no one seemed to be doing much work. And there still seemed to be a lot of rats around. Lord Vetinari had listened carefully while the problem was explained, and had solved the thing with one memorable phrase which said a lot about him, about the folly of bounty offers, and about the natural instinct of Ankh Morporkians in any situation involving money: ‘Tax the rat farms.’

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>To be more specific,
You cannot get any more specific. You gave an example of it. The codifying example, sure, but an example.

Yeah, fair enough. I guess I was making a mistake by just looking at the stats themselves in a vacuum.

pretty much limited to reading LoTFP

probably the power differences

I know a 4 man group in 5e is a lot tougher a 4 man group in OSR (Gygax used to run tables with 10+ players didn't he?)

Huh, well you're not screwed. And yeah, the anecdote about Gygax is true, but he also had some fairly forgiving house rules, so...take it with a grain of salt. Basically LotFP is predicated on the assumption that everything has a shit AC because only the fighter increases in armor class. So 5e PCs will absolutely murder everything. Okay, fine, that's an exaggeration, they'll kill things at their power level faster and safer than LotFP going against their counterparts. You miiiiight want to try running a 5e-ified LotFP for them rather than an osr-ified 5e (if you were even osr-ing it, which would be fine either way). Check out this pdf and tinker with it until it's to your liking.

As a rule of thumb, I'd try running or playing in a system before monkeying with it or its modules.

Attached: LotFP:5e.pdf (PDF, 1.49M)

>increases in armor class
*to-hit bonus, oops

>lords offer bounties for orcs/goblins/etc
>murderhobos set up humanoid breeding farms
This more as both a joke, a magical realm, and a serious horror scenario.

Pretty much every group that encounters a troll tries to set up some sort of troll farm.
It never ends well.

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Oh my god, that's fantastic. I know what screwy subplot I'm shoving in the county a few miles over.

On a completely unrelated note, does anyone know what the opposite/counter of the AD&D classes would be? The party is being tracked down by their evil opposites from another dimension, and I wanted to spice it up beyond just reversing their personalities and making them evil.

Some power guidelines. Anything with double digit HD is scary. Anything that forces the PCs to save is scary. Very low/high AC is scary depending on the system. Monsters with double digit attack bonuses are scary. Ranged attackers in a mixed group will fuck you up if the DM decides to play them smart. Monsters with multiple attacks/actions are scary. Monsters with spell lists are scary.

Poison, level and attribute drain are fucking terrifying.

>does anyone know what the opposite/counter of the AD&D classes would be?
What classes specifically, because I don't feel like typing a lot.

*hits you with ten attacks before initiative is rolled*
You forgot psionics

Fighter, Barbarian, Wizard, Druid, Cleric, Paladin
Paladin is obviously anti-paladin.

The only one I can come up with off-hand is Magic-User -> Magic-Receiver

Maybe the anti-fighter destroys the fighter's armor, steadily increases their AC, and impairs the fighter's coordination somehow, decreasing the fighter's attack bonus.

Dragon magazine had some charts, Others used the Combat Charts from OD&D.

Thanks for the advice.

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>Paladin is obviously anti-paladin.
Tavern Brawler seems more obvious and less hamfisted.

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>Barbarian
Orator

fighter>lover
barbarian>barbarian from two villages over who uses slightly different woad patterns the total scum
druid>those darksun spellcasters that killed plants
cleric>super fedora

>goblin breeding farm
I think this is the wrong thread for that, user.
Wrong board too.
Good guidelines.
The more the PCs have to roll, the scarier the threat.

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>Fighter
All about weapons so opposite would be a monk? (all about the body)

>Barbarian
Wizard, possibly a summoner or necromancer

>Wizard
Is he a specialist or generalist?

>Druid
Some sort of machine-focused spellcaster, Al-Qadim and maybe Ravenloft have kits to that effect. Or Defilers as suggests.

>Cleric
In 3e terms, an Ur-Priest. Mechanically the same.

>Paladin is obviously anti-paladin.
Eh, that's a bit too on-the-nose.

>Fighter
Pacifist

>Barbarian
Sophisticate

>Cleric
Secularist

2nd this.
It jabs at barbar-ian's etymology while clearly establishing the opposite as a Roman.

>Pacifist
>Sophisticate
>Secularist
Your party meets a group of hip young atheist university professors. They are their complete opposite in every way.

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>Druid
A magical guy in the woods who knows about animal shit.

So what you want is a nonmagical guy as far away from nature as possible. A Machinist or engineer of some sort?

I love it.