Hey, hello.
For some time now, I’ve been wanting to ‘play’ kingmaker, and since forever, I’ve not been able to get on any game that lasted past the first battle. Kingmaker, the game that I can never play…
That being said, I’m getting more and more tempted to run Kingmaker myself, but with some differences,
Instead of using pathfinder, I want to use Mongoose Legend Legend as rule set.
Here are the basics of this system:
Every Adventurer is comprised of certain game statistics that describe the character and what he is capable of. These statistics are as follows:
Characteristics – Seven Characteristics define an Adventurer: Strength, Constitution, Size, Intelligence, Power, Dexterity and Charisma. These are physical and mental attributes that define how strong, resilient, large, clever, quick and charismatic the Adventurer is. From these seven Characteristics all other game statistics flow.
Attributes – Derived from the seven Characteristics, Attributes are secondary statistics that provide modifiers for certain actions or determine particular capabilities. Each is described in more detail later in this chapter but the attributes are: Combat Actions, Damage Modifiers, Improvement Roll Modifiers, Hit Points, Magic Points, Strike Rank and Movement.
Skills – Skills are the engine room of a Legend Adventurer. Skills are particular talents, abilities, capabilities and professional skills that are shaped by an Adventurer’s culture, the profession he has chosen for himself and the way he has chosen to develop his interests and competencies. Skills are divided into Common and Advanced; Common skills are common to all Adventurers. Advanced skills differ from one Adventurer to another, reflecting culture, profession and individual interests. However all skills work in the same way and have starting values derived from a combination, or multiple, of the seven Characteristics.
Community – No man is an island. Even before your Adventurer has set forth on his career as a potential hero, he has been supported by family, friends and allies. He may also have made valuable contacts, gained a few rivals and perhaps even some enemies. An Adventurer’s Community is a summary of those people he knows and may be able to call upon in the future – or who may call upon him.
Magic, Weapons, Equipment and so on – In addition to these game statistics every Adventurer has additional information relating to what magic they know (if any), weapons they are experienced in using, equipment they carry and other pertinent information about the Adventurer in the here and now.
Combat is an inevitable part of Legend. Violence, whether it is a squabble descending into fisticuffs between childhood rivals, a drunken bar-room brawl, or a duel to the death between mortal enemies, is handled using these rules.
Legend combat has certain hallmarks that are worth bearing in mind; these are as follows:
- Combat is a deadly business, irrespective of an Adventurer’s level of skill. A well-placed blow can take down the hardest or best armoured Adventurer.
- Combat is tactical. Good tactical decisions or choices can greatly influence the outcome of a battle. The combat rules are designed to support tactical options.
- Combat should be fun. Although it deals with violence – and does so seriously – there is little like a good, well orchestrated melee to get the pulse racing and the adrenalin flowing.
- Legend combat aims to be cinematic. What is meant here is that melees and ranged combat can emulate the feats seen in television and movies – be they dashing, swashbuckling duels; gritty, bloody one-on-one combats, or large-scale, epic stand-offs between heroes. The combat rules are designed to handle all such confrontations.
Magic is inherent to Legend. Access to it is not restricted by culture or profession and, in many cases, magic is a commonplace element used by most people to aid their daily lives. In a high-fantasy setting, for example, most Adventurers begin with some common magic, taught to them along with all the other mundane skills of their society. In other settings magic may be less common but still apparent: it remains, however, as fundamental as the physical laws of the planet or plane of existence.
The Pursuit of Magic
Even though the magical types work very differently and are, to a large extent, mutually exclusive, there is nothing to prevent Adventurers from learning and developing more than one magical style. An Adventurer may therefore freely learn Common Magic, dedicate himself to a god to gain Divine Magic and even learn a smattering of Sorcery. Sorcerers will more than likely have a good understanding of Common Magic but may also pray to their gods to gain a few Divine Spells.
In reality Adventurers who desire great magical power will choose one form to pursue above the others and many societies or cults consider some magical styles to be taboo – but these are cultural limitations rather than a limitation of the rules. In reality any Adventurer can pursue any magical style and develop several style simultaneously, if they so wish.
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Other than that, the game uses a concept of ‘time invested’ to perform some action. Here is an extract from the rulebook:
Routine activities; those an Adventurer conducts time and again, under normal circumstances and expected pressures, do not require a roll for success. For example, riding a horse at a trot or gentle gallop across an open field, on a fine day, does not need a Ride test. Similarly a blacksmith making horse shoes with all the right tools and raw materials does not need to make a Craft (Blacksmith) roll.
Skill Tests are required where the circumstances are out of the ordinary and/or impart some degree of stress, urgency or difficulty to the situation. Riding a horse at a gallop across an open field whilst being pursued by bandits is an instance where a Ride roll is called for. Attempting to make horseshoes with poor quality implements or a Skill Tests of resources is another.The watchword is circumstance. The Games Master is the best judge as to whether the conditions and circumstances warrant a Skill Test. An Adventurer might not need to make a Perception test to hear a neighbouring conversation if the surroundings are relatively quiet. However, if there is a degree of background noise it will be necessary to roll to overhear accurately. If the people the Adventurer is eavesdropping on are whispering, then the Skill Test should incur a penalty for the circumstances, as outlined in Difficult and Haste.
So it allows for greater depth on history, without calling for a roll for everything as pathfinder does.
One other point is that, even tho you have a ‘class’ or ‘job’, you are not entirely defined, or limited by it.
You can be a sword wield rogue wizard (albeit not better than if you had gone into those single paths), and still be a force to be reckoned with!
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So, here is the deal:
If there’s enough interest, I might run the kingmaker game (at least the entire first module), using legend rules.
So, what you guys think about it?