Sycarion Diversions

Home of the Odd Duk

Category: The Black Hack (Page 3 of 5)

November Campaign Design

November 2, 2017 /

I saw this link on Google Plus and decided it was worth a shot. As a part of NaCaCreMo, I will work on fleshing out the Samoora Sea setting.

The goals for this project are:

  • It'll be compatible with The Black Hack, at a minimum. Swords & Wizardry, too, if I am lucky.
  • There will be non-standard races, extra classes, meaningful magic items (not just +1 items), and monsters.
  • There will be at least one complete map and accompanying descriptive text
  • It will be in a playable (not necessarily publishable) form by November 30
  • It'll have at least one new magic system.

The Red Concordant is my take on The Black Hack that includes my house rules and a few more things left out of the original. When I say compatible with The Black Hack, I mean compatible with both, assuming I get The Red Concordant finished. The conclusion of this project will put me about 90% of the way to completing The Red Concordant.

The races include some I've written about here before; uplifted dolphins (I never read the books), trans-dimensional fire elementals, and lizardmen-tigers. I may include one or two more traditional races, just to provide some common point of reference to more traditional fantasy settings.

I actually hope to have more than one magic system. The choices include psionics, salt magic, converting The Fantasy Trip spells to The Black Hack, casting spells with a chart, the cult of hot iron, and clockwork. It sounds like a lot, but with TBH, a new magic system is a mechanic, some fluff text, and a spell list.

Wish me luck. Any and all feedback, even negative, is welcome.

Keep up with my development on my Google+ Collection or my Facebook page

The Red Concordant

May 17, 2017 /

The Red Concordan Covert

This is my current project. I am about 19 percent finished with the first draft of my Black Hack based game. So far, character creation is finished. The goal of The Red Concordant is to provide a few more options and examples for newer players. The final product should be about 10,000 words.

The text of the game will always be 100% OGL. I will publish a PDF, RTF, ODF, and DOCX version of the text.

I have been writing updates on Google+ in my RPG Ideas and Projects collection. Starting with this post, updates will also be posted on my Facebook page. I’ve quoted the beginning of the book below to explain the game.

What is The Red Concordant?

The Red Concordant is a game that provides classic fantasy adventures. The rules are broadly based on role-playing games of the 70s and early 80s. Specifically, the rules are based on The Black Hack to give it a simpler, streamlined flavor. The goal of this game is to have fun in a series of adventures, not to get bogged down in the minutiae of the rules.

The Red Concordant is also a framework for you to have adventures in your own worlds. A standard world is sketched out, but tools for making this game yours are provided near the end of the book.

In short, there is no wrong way to play this game if everyone is having fun.

What now?

Hopefully, I’ll have the first draft finished by June. Stay tuned!

Skills and Classes for the Younger Set

April 27, 2017 /

Two players from my old Dungeon World group are looking to play something different. They have expressed interest in either my White Star house rules (but fantasy) or 5e. They don’t know that my White Star game house rules are essentially Swords & Wizardry classes with The Black Hack mechanics. The only concern for my old school proclivities was a lack of differentiation between characters of the same class.

I know, I know. I believe the memories of a characters’ exploits make them different from other characters, not the character sheet. Yes, it took me many months to train them to stop staring at the character sheet to see what they could do. Still, I feel like it would help them if they had a system that felt more like 5e. Selfishly, I think it would also help me ease into running a 5e game, so maybe we can all win.

I am considering a skill system bolt-on that adds only two rules:

  • You can try a skill, roll per normal rules against the attribute the GM names.
  • If you have the skill, add +2 bonus to the attribute being tested, a roll of 20 is always a failure.
  • You can add a new skill every 3 levels.

The list of skills would be the standard from 5e, but wouldn’t be tied to an attribute. On the character index card, skills would be listed next to special abilities. Since I haven’t had a game go beyond 10th level yet, three skills doesn’t feel like too many. At higher levels, since their primary attribute will likely be 17 to 20, it encourages skills for weaker attributes. This fits with the goal of making characters of the same class feel very different mechanically.

The only difference mechanically between a character with a skill and a special ability is that a character with a special ability rolls with advantage. More specifically, a Conjurer with the skill can roll under Dexterity for Sleight of Hand (which could mean picking pockets, palming a coin, or something) while a Thief rolls the same task with advantage. In fact, using the 5e skills (because they are more broad than 3.5 skills) also gives me tools for building classes.

A Bard is a character that rolls with advantage (Charisma) for Persuasion and Performance tests. An Ranger rolls Perception tests with advantage. Thieves could range in abilities (roll with advantage to deceive, or to gather food while adventuring outdoors.

The benefit I see mechanically occurs at lower level, but the bonus is low enough that it might encourage diversification. I’ll have to play with this some more.

« Older posts Newer posts »

© 2024 Sycarion Diversions

Theme by Anders Noren — Up ↑