De-Based Units of Currency

I love ConstantCon and FLAILSNAILS. However moving between silver standard and gold standard worlds is seriously handicapping poor Zaunn, as all his G.P. become S.P. but don't convert back again. This is particularly on my mind as I work on my Fort Flaime 'megadungeon' that I hope to run as a FLAILSNAILS game and I find that I can't decide between the two standards.

The problem appears to me to be, as with the conversion of currency in the real world, the perceived value. In OSR games value is short-handed into the metal each coin is made from. But this seems faintly ludicrous for the purpose of FLAILSNAILS. I feel that the inherent value of the coins should remain roughly the same when moving between FLAILSNAILS worlds. Inherent value is measured in buying power, that is how much you can buy with them. In Jeff Rient's Wessex, a Gold Standard setting, a single gold coin buys exactly the same as a single silver coin does in Evan Elkins's Dark Country, a Silver Standard setting.

Where I am going with this is to suggest that perhaps what we should to do is separate the coins from the pre-defined value, what they're made from, and instead define the coins by what they're worth. The easiest way I can see to do this is to remove the metals from the names of the coins and instead name the coins as something other than "pieces".

Here's the coinage I intend to use in Fort Flaime:

• Sovereign: Bars of precious or semi-precious metals that are used to store wealth or trade between nations. Could literally be a pound of silver. They are mostly found in the hands of monarchs and the super-rich. Hence their name.
  = Platinum Pieces under a Silver Standard
  = Multiple Platinum Pieces under a Gold Standard
• Crown: Large denomination coins typically only used by nobles and merchants amongst themselves. This association with the aristocracy gives the coins their name.
  = Gold Pieces under a Silver Standard
  = Platinum Pieces under a Gold Standard
• Standard: These are amongst the most common coins used.At least by Adventurers. Weapons and armour typically cost multiple Standards but not quite a Crown and the association with military equipment gives rise to the name "standard".
  = Silver Pieces under a Silver Standard
  = Gold Pieces under a Gold Standard
• Groat: The groat is the most common coin in circulation. It is said that "a man can eat but for the want of a groat"; a day's worth of food for a person typically costs them about a groat. Indeed the groat is also a generic term for hulled grain that is used as the foundation of many meals. Perhaps this is the source of the name.
  = Copper Pieces under a Silver Standard
  = Silver Pieces under a Gold Standard
• Bit: These are the coins used for smallest of purchases. They're called bits because they are literally fragments of other coins. If something is "not worth a groat" then it is probably worth a bit, at least to someone.
  = Fragments of Copper Pieces under a Silver Standard
  = Copper Pieces under a Gold Standard

The thing that struck me as I wrote this, even though I'm pretty sure flies in the face of economic wisdom, is that Silver Standard settings are fundamentally better off. It seems to me that Gold Standard settings must be fairly resource-poor for common items to cost ten to twenty times more (going by the common OSR conversions between gold and silver pieces) than in a Silver Standard setting.
Feel free to comment, hurl criticisms or rotten fruit.

The Dark Priest Optional Class

I created this class after being inspired by the Black Priest class in an early edition of White Dwarf. Edit: Issue 22, page 16 for those keeping score.

Dark Priest

The Dark Priest is an Unholy Man of malign intent who is far closer to their dark gods than any evil theurge.
Requirements: DEX 13+, WIS 13+, CHA 13+
Prime Requisites: WIS
Hit Dice: 1d6, +1 hit point per level of experience past 9th.
The Dark Priest has a maximum Base Defence Bonus of +4.

The abilities of a Dark Priest are as follows:

• Aid of the Dark Ones: The Dark Priest may call upon the powers of their gods. The dark gods may or may not grant these powers at their whim. The effect of this is that the Dark Priest may request the casting of any spell, divine, arcane or otherwise. The player adds their Dark Priest’s experience level, Charisma modifier and any relevant bonuses (see below) together and subtracts the level of the spell as well as the number of times in the past game week that the Dark Priest has successfully called upon the Aid of the Dark Ones. The total is added to a d20 roll. If the this equal or exceeds 10 then the Dark Priest’s request has been granted.
• Every 200sp work of material goods (including the coins themselves) sacrificed to the Dark Ones adds +1.
• Every HD of living creature slain by the Dark Priest in the name of the dark gods adds +1. The slain creature must be verbally, and clearly, dedicated to the dark gods during battle or immediately after they die. The Dark Priest must have struck the victim at least once, if only to deliver a coup-de-grace.
• A further +1 is added if the victim is intelligent.
• A further +1 is added if the victim is ‘innocent’ or ‘good’.
• A further +1 is added if the victim slain ritually.
• A further +1 is added if the victim is slain in an area Consecrated to the dark gods in question.
• +1 is added if the spell is being cast within an area Consecrated to the dark gods in question. +2 if it is being cast in defence of that place.
• Assassin’s Cord: The Dark Priest can use a garrot to silently kill his victims. The garrot does 1d6 per round in the hands of the Dark Priest. Attacking from behind or surprise a dark priest rolls two dice for damage and uses the highest. At the 5th level of experience they roll three dice and use the highest two. At the 10th level of experience, and greater, they roll four dice and use the highest three.
  Because of their dedication to using the cord Dark Priests never use missile weapons.
• Dark Familiar: A Dark Priest may summon a familiar as if casting a 6th level spell. The summoned familiar is typically some creature or animal sometimes of monstrous size or form suitable to the dark gods the dark priest serves. The familiar remains with the dark priest until one of them dies. It takes a week for the dark priest and a new familiar to bond completely. They can do nothing but acquaint themselves with each other. The familiar and the dark priest remain in constant telepathic communication irrespective of distance. The familiar can assume human form at will, always as an attractive member of the opposite sex of the dark priest however the familiar will only change form when alone, alone with the dark priest or with the dark priest’s most trusted allies and/or servants. As well as any attacks based upon their form the familiar has an unique attack that causes the victim to save vs Toxin or sleep for 1 hour for each point save was failed by. If the familair is slain within line of sight of the dark priest the dark priest will be stunned for 1d6 rounds. However the dark priest suffers no further penalties upon the death of their familiar and can summon another whenever they wish but they can only have one at any time. When they have a familiar dark priests can only be surprised on a roll of 1 on 1D6.
• Dark Prayers: The Dark Priest can cast Divine spells as any (un)Holy Man. Their spell memorisation chart is given below. As can be seen they progress in memorised spells far slower than a theurge or slayer but can memorise twice as many spells as is typical for a Holy Man. Likewise their spell points are twice their experience level plus their wisdom modifier.
• Extraordinary Climbing: A Dark Priest can climb sheer surfaces without the need for special equipment. His chances of success are +5 on 2d6. This chance increases to +4 at 5th level of experience and +3 at the 9th level.

• Sneaky: Beginning at the first level or experience, a Dark Priest gains a +1 bonus to surprise when alone or operating with rogues of similar experience. Otherwise, a Dark Priest's surprise chance is equal to that of the least sneaky character in the group. This bonus increases to +2 at the 5th level of experience, and +3 at the 9th level.
  Dark Priest Spell Memorisation by Experience Level.
  

  Level	1st	2nd	3rd	4th
  1-2	2
  3-4	4
  4-6	4	2
  7-8	6	4
  9-10	6	4	2
  11-12	6	6	4
  13+	8	6	4	2

Mapping Flaimehaven

So I generated a rough description of Flaimehaven using Abulafia and tried to sit down to map out the place. My first attempts using Vornheim to create a street map failed. Alphabet roads, although they've worked for Portherion (in the Great Campaign) and the ruined city in the Celestial Door setting, just wouldn't gel for Flaimehaven.

Flaimehaven felt like a planned town so I sat back and did the most "planned" map I could think of and placed the locations Abulafia had provided.

I hate it. The grid and the scale. I reckon each block is about 200' to a side which makes the whole place roughly a mile to a side. It's a small city and not a town. I put it to one side and let my thoughts percolate.

This afternoon I sat down and made a second attempt. Same locations but instead of a lazy grid I thought things through. Here's what I came up with:

There's still a grid but it's less formal. The scale is better too. I reckon it could be 5 foot to the pixel and I could probably map it on a much grander size but probably don't need to.

Only there's still a problem. As Terry Pratchett says the first priority with any town and city is how the water gets in and the waste gets out. So unless I make a third attempt and remember to put a river through the town there's a spring that rises up under the plaza. The resulting stream flushes out the sewers and exits from under the northwest corner of town. Possibly accounting for all those disused houses.

Gaming ADD Strikes!

So I've been playing ConstantCon games, firstly with Evan Elkins from In Places Deep and then when Evan had technical trouble Jeff Rients from Jeff's Gameblog did an emergency pick-up game.

Yes I felt the urge to run my own game. Of course I couldn't use DaD's RPG for it, nor the Great Campaign Setting. So I went through my notes for something I could recycle. First off I found some rare paper-based notes for Port Manteau, or as my notes refered to it Port Marion.

Port Manteau was a setting I constructed around the rambling chat-rp threads from the Fortean Times message board back in the day I moderated them. It was a town based off of the famous Port Merion and the general backstory was inspired by the plot of the classic TV series The Prisoner. The inhabitants had all been imprisoned there by the Powers That Be because they were all digging too deeply into the real nature of the world. Of course it wasn't just the people who investigated the world's mysteries that were winding up there, the mysteries themselves were winding up on the Island of Forteana. After all the best way to keep those who love to investigate mysteries from escaping is to give them mysteries to investigate. Thus the sewers were full of Reptoids battling the local Bog Pygmies (or Lizard Men v. Goblins) and numerous other cryptoids, cryptids and crypts dotted the island. The God of Gambles ran the local casino and Chinese restaurant "Master Chow's"; the local Tailor was Sidney Stratton and Rodney the BarThing, the elder god of bar stewards, worked the bar at JW's and simultaneously the Trolls Head pub across the road. The town was 'ruled' by the Moderators, the wardens of the prison who were themselves prisoners, only prisoners powerful enough to leave under their own power and so were kept contained by the duty to police the island. They ruled from the Fortress of Fort high above the town upon the slopes of the Black Mountains. The Interdimnesional Moorland was desolate, marked only by the exposed fossils of dragons and giant; the lonely henge and the mysterious crater known only as Buttock's Hole. There was the deadly and impassable fire swamp, filled with Rodents of Unusual Size. The Fnord Fjord with Bog End, where lives civilised Bog Pygmies (or Halflings). The Templar Wood, dark, mysterious, wild and filled with ruins. Lastly lake Clovis, deep and foreboding with at least one lake monster, possibly more.

While Port Manteau would make a lovely living sandbox setting I don't think I could do it justice. I also don't think it's OSR material unless, by OSR you mean Chill or the strange hybrid that the Chaosium system keeps wanting to collapse into. My notes suggest that my first choice was GURPS closely followed by an obscure system called Cosmic Syncronicity.

Then I found two little used locations for D&D. Firstly was Fort Flaime, a ruined fortress with a village within it's walls, no key and only the village was mapped. The players had rejected it as an adventure location, twice, and so I hadn't gone any further with it. Then there was the Ogre's Cairn. It was the first 3.x location I had created. It had its moments when I ran it through one time. The PC's had recruited it's signature monster, a Dragonne called "I" and I'd never felt like revisiting it.

It struck me that if I put Fort Flaime on top of the Ogre's Cairn and connected the two locations directly I could build a modest Megadungeon with very little work. Of course I need to create a nearby town, Flaimehaven, but that was the work of about an hour (still need to work mapping it and Vornheim is not helping me as it did for the mapping the city for the Celestial Door and the southern city in the Great Campaign. Meh).

I'm nuts, are't I.

What am I? I am a...

True Neutral Human Wizard (5th Level)

Ability Scores:

Strength-12
Dexterity-12
Constitution-15
Intelligence-12
Wisdom-15
Charisma-11

Alignment:
True Neutral A true neutral character does what seems to be a good idea. He doesn't feel strongly one way or the other when it comes to good vs. evil or law vs. chaos. Most true neutral characters exhibit a lack of conviction or bias rather than a commitment to neutrality. Such a character thinks of good as better than evil after all, he would rather have good neighbors and rulers than evil ones. Still, he's not personally committed to upholding good in any abstract or universal way. Some true neutral characters, on the other hand, commit themselves philosophically to neutrality. They see good, evil, law, and chaos as prejudices and dangerous extremes. They advocate the middle way of neutrality as the best, most balanced road in the long run. True neutral is the best alignment you can be because it means you act naturally, without prejudice or compulsion. However, true neutral can be a dangerous alignment when it represents apathy, indifference, and a lack of conviction.

Race:
Humans are the most adaptable of the common races. Short generations and a penchant for migration and conquest have made them physically diverse as well. Humans are often unorthodox in their dress, sporting unusual hairstyles, fanciful clothes, tattoos, and the like.

Class:
Wizards are arcane spellcasters who depend on intensive study to create their magic. To wizards, magic is not a talent but a difficult, rewarding art. When they are prepared for battle, wizards can use their spells to devastating effect. When caught by surprise, they are vulnerable. The wizard's strength is her spells, everything else is secondary. She learns new spells as she experiments and grows in experience, and she can also learn them from other wizards. In addition, over time a wizard learns to manipulate her spells so they go farther, work better, or are improved in some other way. A wizard can call a familiar- a small, magical, animal companion that serves her. With a high Intelligence, wizards are capable of casting very high levels of spells.

So a pretty useless wizard. Not even a fireball to my name. I knew I should have gone Cleric or Druid back in Class School.

Actually I was a practising druid back when I was in my early twenties IRL. I stopped practising when I started getting it right.

The detailed analysis is quite interesting:

Detailed Results:

Alignment:
Lawful Good ----- XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX (23)
Neutral Good ---- XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX (24)
Chaotic Good ---- XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX (18)
Lawful Neutral -- XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX (23)
True Neutral ---- XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX (24)
Chaotic Neutral - XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX (18)
Lawful Evil ----- XXXXXXXXXXX (11)
Neutral Evil ---- XXXXXXXXXXXX (12)
Chaotic Evil ---- XXXXXX (6)

Law & Chaos:
Law ----- XXXXXXXXXX (10)
Neutral - XXXXXXXXXXX (11)
Chaos --- XXXXX (5)

Good & Evil:
Good ---- XXXXXXXXXXXXX (13)
Neutral - XXXXXXXXXXXXX (13)
Evil ---- X (1)

Race:
Human ---- XXXXXXXXXXXXXX (14)
Dwarf ---- XXXXXXXXXX (10)
Elf ------ XXXX (4)
Gnome ---- XXXXXXXXXX (10)
Halfling - XXXXXXXX (8)
Half-Elf - XXXXXXX (7)
Half-Orc - XXXXXX (6)

Class:
Barbarian - (-2)
Bard ------ XX (2)
Cleric ---- (-8)
Druid ----- (-2)
Fighter --- (-2)
Monk ------ (-23)
Paladin --- (-17)
Ranger ---- (0)
Rogue ----- (0)
Sorcerer -- XXXX (4)
Wizard ---- XXXXXX (6)

So pretty much I'm on the line between True Neutral and Neutral Good, which is pretty much where I expected to be. I don't understand where the whole Wizard thing came from nor why my wisdom is high but my intelligence is just above average.

Find out What Kind of Dungeons and Dragons Character Would You Be?

House Rules, Part the Second: Classes, Backgrounds and Factions.

Classes.

There are Three groups of classes, four including Demi-humans. Yes I'm going with race-as-class. However the demi-human classes pretty much resolve as being based off of one of the other three groups.

The three groups are Fighting Man, Holy Man, and Magic User. Fighting Men are, quite naturally combat orientated. Holy Men are a mix of combat and magic typically with religious overtones. The Magic User is the spell specialist.

The Fighting-Man Classes are currently:

• Archer.
• Barbarian. Mighty hewed, sneaky, good climbers and hard to surprise.
• Outlander. Comes from another world, typically somewhere called Dirt, or Ground, something like that. Highly adaptable but start off at a disadvantage when it comes to languages and weapons they're proficient with. May start with a Background at level 0.
• Rogue. Although I may rename it Scout as many of the thief abilities come from the Criminal Background. Sneak attacks, superior climbing and stealth come from the rogue. For stealth I'm using the surprise rules. Rogues, Barbarians and Halfling Adventurers get a bonus to their surprise rolls.
• Warrior. I almost just called it the "Fighter". Gets weapon specialisation as a class feature.

The Holy Man Classes are currently:

• Monk. Currently just a placeholder.
• Slayer. Roughly your classic B/X style cleric with Turn Undead and spells beginning at second level. I've also granted them Wisdom modifier to damage against undead.
• Theurge. A miraculous spellcaster. Spells begin at first level but they have no turning ability except through spells.

The Magic User Classes are currently:

• Thaumaturge.

Finally the Demi-Human Classes are:

• Dwarven Adventurer. Based off of what I like to think of as the "Holy Man Template". Dwarves get the ability to cast "Runes" at 2nd level and can create "Permanent Runes" from 5th.
• Elven Adventurer. The classic mix of Magic User with added Fight.
• Halfling Adventurer. Sneaky and fighty. Halfling Adventurers are so sneaky that they can be practically invisible to anyone other than another Halfling.

Backgrounds.

To more accurately model fantasy characters from literature I decided to split off what a character does while adventuring, their Class, from what they do the rest of the time, or did before they became an adventurer. Not a unique idea, I know. Lots of d20 games had something similar. In my case Backgrounds give access to specific abilities or subsystems which improve as the character's class progresses in experience. A specific example would be the Healer who can speed up the recovery of injured comrades but also use the healing system to combat diseases. Backgrounds can also provide a non-adventuring income for characters.
Finally NPC's who don't have an adventuring class are typically modelled on their background instead.

Factions.

Factions, called "Sodalities" in my original notes, are the guilds, churches and societies that litter the typical D&D style fantasy world.They're mostly a roleplaying thing but I decided that there should be system based effects depending upon which of them the PCs decide to join and interact with. At the least intrusive level a character's "level title" would be based upon their rank within a given faction and not their actual experience level. That said my default presumption is that a character's experience level and their faction rank would be linked, based upon their level when they joined said faction. However my thoughts are leaning more towards making progression in some factions at the very least be based upon actual deeds and accomplishments, including "dead man's shoes" style progression. So for example a character progressing through the ranks through a criminal faction may have to successfully perform a certain number of tasks for that faction to progress further. A character progressing through an Arcane College may have to learn and cast a spell of a particular level to prove their worthiness to progress.  There would be system-based benefits from progression, access to libraries of spells, henchmen provided by an increase in rank, discounts of certain items, as well more roleplaying based benefits.
Factions would accessible through class, background and roleplaying. A character could be a member of more than one faction, since factions would be limited by geography and/or interest. If conflicts did arise they would just be grist for the mill of providing adventure for the PCs.

On Immortals

Inspired by Tim Brannan's recent post over on The Other Side I wrote a bit of my own opinions. So much so that I realised I had a post of my own instead of just a comment. I'm going to illustrate my points with some fiction my wife and I have been working on and I'm going to be doing it out of sequence. Sorry, it's an early draft and I'm not going to go into any detail or explanation as to what may be going on.

I've always made learning difficulties a symptom of undeath while the undying (ie Immortals) are stereotypically afflicted with ennui.

Recently I've given up on ennui. Now my immortals struggle less with learning new things but more with filtering out the relevant stuff from all the experiences of centuries of life.

Kadia pulled off the highway in to Cluj-Napoca, Romania's third largest city. 

    "Why are we stopping?" Igor asked her.

    "It's lunch time," she told him, pointing at the dashboard clock, "And I need a wee."

    "I used to know a great place in Cluj to eat," Igor told her. He bit his lip for a while trying to remember where it was.

    "That was in the eighteen nineties" Gabriel said.

    "No you're thinking of that place down in Varna," Igor said. "This was the place with the barmaid with the absolutely huge breasts, did fantastic Paprika Chicken... oh where was that?" he paused again. Gabriel rolled his eyes.

    "Seventeen thirty three," he said, "if I remember you took the barmaid in question up to your room after the meal."

    "Oh yeah, I used to do that a lot." He smiled.  Kadia pulled the car over to the side of the road and turned off into the car park of a highway service station.

    "You know what this place would be called in Britain?" Igor asked the car.

    "Little Chef" Kadia said and climbed out, heading for the little cafe.

    "I was going to say Hungry Eater" Igor said as Gabriel pushed open the passanger side door and followed.

They also all tend to go through a process I'm thinking of as "the Horrors", wherein they get that realisation that everyone and thing they know and love is going to wither and die before their eyes. Some people can put it off for centuries but in some cases, usually the more empathic and compassionate ones, it can hit almost as soon as they learn they're immortal. It drives them mad. They lose focus on what it means to be human and mortal. They can become monsters who think no more of killing a mortal person than that mortal would think of swatting a fly. Many do at least for a while. In the end most find some sort of cause, duty or focus to sustain them. Usually multiples thereof down the ages. Those that don't remain monsters.

Their focuses can be used to manipulate them, but at the same time they give them reason to remain human.

Kadia polished off what was left of her breakfast before taking the plate and mug to the sink to wash them.

    "So the question is what are we going to do now?" Gabriel asked Igor over the sound of running water.

    "Well we can't just let her walk into Saden unprotected."

    "Why not? You brought her into this with all your code's and cyphers. And she wouldn't be the first relative of a dragon to become undead." Kadia recovered their empty mugs and washed them too.

    "When the enemy realise what she is..." Kadia walked past them into the bedroom, slamming the door closed behind her.

    "She'll be dead, one way or the other." 

    "I can't let that happen. We worked so hard..."

    "You worked so hard Grigori, I spent my time seeking redemption in the love of our Lord. Not galavanting around sleeping with any woman I could find and practicing any and all sorceries I could learn. If you and I walk into Saden then we are giving the enemy exactly what she wants. Dragons!" The door to Kadia's room flew open. Kadia stood there in motorcycle leathers, her jacket open to show a pale blue t-shirt with the motto "I'm a Slayer. Ask me How." above the image of a stake. She looked at them.

    "We're going to Saden" She said. Gabriel opened his mouth to protest but Kadia kept talking, "Rather I'm driving to Saden and the two of you can come with me. If you have the guts."

    "Young lady..." Gabriel managed to say.

    "Don't you young lady me," Kadia interrupted. "You've always been a hero to me; the elderly man who went through hell to save one life, one soul. Now I find you're just a scared old monk, talking it up but too scared to go and face his foe. Giving up in the face of an opponent because they're too hardcore for you. And you call yourself a knight, but the truth is you're just too scared to do anything that you can't get someone else to do for you. You couldn't even raise Igor by yourself, you had to get Tara to find you a victim to sacrifice."

    "This true?" Igor asked. Gabriel hung his head.

    "We're going to Saden," Igor said. Kadia moved towards the door. Igor turned to Gabriel. "We're going to Saden and if you mean a word of what you've always claimed to believe in you'll come too. Unless, as this young lady claims, you're too scared." Gabriel glared over at Igor.

    "Don't you judge me..." he began.

    "Prove me wrong." he leaned in close, "you didn't have the strength to save her before, old friend, save her now." he whispered and then headed for the door. Gabriel stood for a moment before following, his face unreadable.

This can be why immortals gather together, they can sustain each other, but the downside is not even true love can last forever and given enough time even the closest of people will drift apart. It can easily happen in a mortal lifetime so with immortals much more so.

Even more so as the Horrors will invariably leave an immortal, at least inwardly, cold and distant.

The tall woman seemingly ignored her, focusing her attention on the rakish vampire. She strode towards him and swung her blades at him. He parried both with his wrought iron candelabra. Again and again she struck at him, seemingly without emotion. Each time he parried and was forced back a step. She was a fast as him, if not faster, and he found each attempt he made to strike back was blocked before he could even begin to make it. The tall woman regarded him with distain mixed with boredom. Even John could see that he was only delaying the inevitable. Then the rakish vampire took his last step and found himself backed against a pair of the coffins arrayed around the room. The tall woman struck with her blades. The centre of the candelabra struck the floor and the coffins behind the vampire shattered. The vampire was wide eyed with surprise as the sickly scent of corruption and decay seemed to erupt around him. he fell into three parts, his legs and torso dropping separately to the flag stone floor as his head bounced across it the floor making a noise not unlike a melon or coconut striking a hard surface. The broken coffins behind him were empty and the tall woman seemed mesmerised by the sight. Then Suzi screamed, a fearful wail that rose up to pierce the night. The tall woman turned to regard her, as if noticing her for the first  time, puzzlement crossing her features along with something else. perhaps concern, possibly annoyance, John could not be sure. The skull of the rakish vampire had come to a rest before Suzi’s feet and her cry was from watching it wither to dust before her. The tall woman cocked her head, like a raven, as if waiting for the noise to abate. 

It was then that the female vampire struck, plunging the oaken stake into the tall woman’s back as she stood watching Suzi. The tall woman cried out and twisted away, the stake emerging from her ribs below her left breast, her swords clattering to the flagstones. She struck at the female vampire with her fist, breaking her nose and sending her staggering back. As the vampire tried to think straight with her nasal bones embedded in the her frontal lobe.  The tall woman took this opportunity to grasp the oak stake with both hands and, with an almighty cry, pull it from her chest. There was blood, but not as much as John had expected, and as he watched the flow stopped and the flesh began to knit itself back together. In a matter of moments bare unbroken skin could be seen through the tear in the tall woman’s leather cat suit. She grasped the blood stained stake in her hand and advanced on the remaining vampire.

Finally my immortals always have a vulnerability or curse, usually related to the method they gained immortality. Or are encoded in mythology surrounding their form of immortality. Pretty standard fare I know. But, for example, if someone became immortal from eating a Peach of Immortality from the Heavenly Jade Palace they themselves may perish if their heart is cut from their body and consumed. Even if they'd already proven to be able to recover from the loss of their heart. Thus the Emperor of the Jade Palace could have an army of immortal warriors at his beck and call, any of whom he could slay by eating their heart, already removed and put in a place of safe keeping. The emperor's own heart is hidden amongst them but only he knows whose heart is where. Eating your own immortal heart may free you from the emperor's control but eating the wrong one could very well slay a friend.

So. A bit of a stream-of-conciousess and look-how-I-write post. Sorry about that.

House Rules, Part the First

I want to get something down here so I can reference them.

Attacks: (1d20+BAB+modifiers>=Defence (Def)+1d20)

Possible modifiers include

• Strength modifiers for Fighting Men in melee combat.
• Dexterity modifiers for ranged combat.

BAB = Base Attack Bonus (of course)

Defence = BDB+'Magical Bonuses'
BDB (Base Defence Bonus)= AC+DEXmodifiers.

There is a class based maximum on BDB. I think I got the idea for that here. Somewhere.

Scale: (5ft, 6 sec.)

1 battle scale inch equals 5 feet.
1 combat Round equals 6 seconds.
1 combat Bout equals 10 combat Rounds, equals 1 minute.
1 Scene equals 5 minutes.
1 hour equals 12 Scenes.

Encumbrance:

1000 coins = 1St.(Stones)
Player Characters may carry a maximum number of Stones equal to their Strength Attribute.

(taken from here)

Money: Silver Standard.

1 Plantinum Piece (P.P.) equals 10 Gold Pieces.
1 Gold Piece (G.P.) equals 20 Silver Pieces.
1 Silver Piece (S.P.) equals 2 Bronze Pieces.
1 Bronze Piece (B.P.) equals 5 Copper Pieces (C.P).

All prices given in the original rulebooks are converted down. So items listed in Gold Pieces are considered to actually be be in Silver Pieces.

I may expand this later

The Great Campaign - Design Part 1

So I decided to go with the Great Campaign Idea. It's more traditional and I can always spin off my Celestial Door campaign later. So here is the Atlas map I generated using Welsh Piper's hex map generating system and template in Hexographer.

It's about 1125 miles to a side, with each hex being 25 miles wide. I've designated this as the players map, hidden all the details except the major settlements and the terrain. I've not placed the rivers yet but I have a good idea where many of them will be. I've also not placed farmlands anywhere except around the Great City (the red settlement towards the middle). That's because when you change the terrain type in a hex you delete the icons in it too. Ideally I'd convert all plains within two hexes of a city into farmland (inspired off of the settlement patterns on page 286 of the good-old WHFRP rules produced under license by Hogshead back in 1995). Of course in the Regional maps I'm working on I've begun to do that anyway.

Those settlements that appear to be in the middle of sea hexes will be on islands or on the coast once I've got around to doing those regions. At every step I'm letting the dice guide me. I find it quite liberating.

I'm planning on running the Tower of Zenopus for my family when I start the campaign, or rather I plan on giving them lots of rumours towards the tower. The only thing I can't decide is if I want to start them in the Great City proper of that city south of it down the coast. The one which is a complete blank slate for me so far. The problems with the Great City is its size and the amount of additional rumours I'd have to come up with to breathe life into it. The southern city will require both more and less work since there is less of it done but I can do just enough instead of wallowing in the details inherited from the pre-generated metropolis. What you can't see from this map is the southern city is right on the border of its region meaning more mapping. C'est la vive.

Campaign Options

I'm trying to decide where to go and what to do. I have two ideas for campaigns.

The Celestial Door Campaign.
The first one is set in a 'ruined' city in a jungle with a megadungeon beneath it and is cast from the West Marches mould that I have heard and read so much about. This city has become the bridgehead of an expedition to explore and conquer the city and the surrounding countryside in the name of the "Great Kingdom". The PCs are all members of this expedition. It is the second expedition to the city through a "Celestial Door" that was discovered in the Great Kingdom after a meteor shower.

It took the first expedition several months before they figured out how to open the celestial door back to the great kingdom, during which time most of the members of the expedition perished but the area was 'pacified' at least in part. What that means is the city centre is 'safe' for everyone while things get progressively more dangerous the further from there someone goes. The door opens into the city every day at dawn, bringing in new adventurers and supplies while it opens out to the great kingdom once a week, at dusk, allowing some people and half the found wealth to leave. The NPC survivors of the first expedition are now the leaders of the second (all effectively name level).

The Pros are:

• I've pretty much mapped everything in 4-5 days journey from the city in Hexographer, using Welsh Piper's Hex-based campaign design stuff. Placing quite a lot of different things around for the PCs to find and explore. Just not in great detail.
• I've sketched out the main streets of the ruined city using Vornheim.
• I've also sketched out some rough ideas for the megadungeon underneath it.

The Cons are:

• The world of the Great Kingdom remains undefined which, while it allows almost any character background my players may choose, means that the game would pretty much take place in a vacuum and many of the standard fantasy tropes could be hard to use.
• The megadungeon is fighting me. Seriously I can't seem to come up with any clear concepts and themes for the main levels let alone sub-levels. Mainly I have problems with just coming up with ideas. I have Central Casting: Dungeons but that's really only good at designing small dungeons and sub-levels of megadugeons, not whole vast dungeon complexes.
  

The Great Campaign.

The second idea is tangential to the first. Why not set my campaign in the Great Kingdom? We've previously used 0one's Great City maps as the campaign base for the Dungeon Grinders and the aborted reboot of the Beer Hunters campaigns using Pathfinder. I have the whole damn thing printed out and in a folder on a shelf across the room from me. I make the great city the capital of the great kingdom and everything will be great right? I mean I even have some idea of the geography around the great city from those three previous games set in the same world, right. (There was also a 'road movie' group including the kidtehs but it suffered the same problem as the Dungeon Grinders did; the other adult players in the group agreed to "Hot Seat" GMing in theory but in practice they just left me to burn out).

The Pros of this are:

• I already have a plethora of maps available, many keyed. It wouldn't be too much of a stress stretch to adapt them to whatever OSR system I end up using. This includes the first level of the Dungeon Under The Mountain along with a number of the keyed encounters, with the rest of the megadungeon available for sale online. Although I'd have to get them printed off.
• I can also use more published modules.
• It wouldn't take too much effort to Welsh Piper out a hex map for it either.

The Cons of it are:

• Whereas the first one suffers from a lack of background, with the players literally discovering the world as they go this one would require possibly too much. 
• I'd have to do more hex-mapping since a more settled areas would have fewer adventure sites. Or rather the adventure sites would be further apart.

So while the first choice would probably take more work as I'm designing a mega dungeon from the ground up (or down, as it were). Of course nothing stops me doing both. I could work on the Celestial Door setting while running the Great Campaign. Once I feel ready I can have the Door be 'discovered' and open up the expanded setting for play.