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I am looking for a group and GM interested in playing some sort of "hardcore" d20 game. I've been getting by with some PF2 live gaming, but I hate the bounded accuracy systems. I much prefer 3.x, PF1, and SoM/P.
Things I'm Interested In:
1) 3d6 stats
2) character funnel
3) rolled hp (even at 1st)
4) no Vancian casting; roll to cast
5) gritty narrative
So, yeah -- basically, if you've watched the Dungeoncraft YouTube channel, you know what I'm looking for.
Thoughts, folks?
EDIT: And I'll be forthright, here -- I have no business GMing a PbP. You can look at my profile and see my past failures. But I can play consistently, and actively, as evidenced by the Falcon's Hollow game I was in.
Kinda sounds like Goodman Games Dungeon Crawl Classics might be right up your alley with those 5 descriptions; there might be some other games, like There Once Were Dragons, that you might wanna look into...
The no vancian stuff would definitely need 3pp stuff like Psionics though if things were just limited to 3.x/PF1e.
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I might not have been clear in my intent.
I don't need published material, per se; I'm hoping I can find a PbP in this style.
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I've heard of DCC and other OSR games through the Dungeoncraft channel. There's a great deal of good content on that channel, to be sure.
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Evidently, I should have put this in Recruitment. Flagging for relocation now.
I might not have been clear in my intent.
I don't need published material, per se; I'm hoping I can find a PbP in this style.
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I've heard of DCC and other OSR games through the Dungeoncraft channel. There's a great deal of good content on that channel, to be sure.
No worries, Syrus Terrigan; Sounds like a tall order for a PF1e/3.x game but lemmee see if'n I can helps brainstorm it...
For 1. You mean a straight roll of 3d6 down the line or ya meant having a game that uses Str/Dex/Con/Int/Wis/Cha that goes from 3 to 18? The rolling Stat ones that get most commonly used here are the 4d6/drop-lowest.
For 2. Not sure if it can apply since they tend to be used on 0 level characters in DCC. However, one way I can see it "workin" for PF if there were three straight, consecutive rolls of all six scores each.
Then, you count up all the base modifiers of the 3 scores of the six characteristics; these modifiers, including positives, negatives, and zero get added up as base hit points... everything hit point-wise equalling zero or less equals automatically dead. Their 3-18 scores can be looted into the surviving scores of those rolls with actual hit points. If all 3 base set of rolls are dead, then roll-up 3 more until you get some live ones.
Any more than one surviving base score hasta fight it out with each other with the sole highest 3-18 score equaling to their AC/each base score do a base damage equal to the single highest base modifier [anything zero or less equals to .5 damage instead]. The survivor then "loots" the higher base 3-18 score off the other dead ones if they choose to.
Sounds really time consuming but it might serve as a form of character funnel, plus you getta see which ones the dice gods "favor".
For 3. and 5., they're all relative and fine. Gotta get the buy-in from all comers, prospective and chosen.
It'll be 4. that'll be the biggest hurdle to overcome since more than half the usual Paizo classes has some sorta Vancian spellcasting to them; add to that the rarity of 3pp getting allowed and then having everyone applying to a recruitment all buying into such... I just don't see it going over very well- but that's just me. ;)
Your best bet might be to trawl the Recruitment threads for the ones that'll appeal to you; probably the 3pp OSR/Indy ones or the PF1e ones that openly allows for 3pp/3.x [that's what I do, myself]. :)
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I think the narrative serving to push the character funnel into existence is a better way to go. Going for a last-toon-standing brawl in order to establish the survivors before truly getting into the story ends up being math for its own sake (which thing is objectionable, appalling, and in service to dark and terrible forces).
That said, though -- there is a certain amount of darkling glee in the notion of gaining power from the fallen. It reminds me of an event in the career of Harry Dresden (in the books; gotta read 'em all!).
And, yes, the Vancian method is everywhere.
*sigh*
Well, anyhow.
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Ah, yes -- about the 3PP material to deal with my anti-Vancian leanings:
Spheres of Might and Power
'Nuff said.
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In the hope that this thread gets relocated soon, I'll go back through your points and comments, halp, and refine my targeted elements.
1) Stat Generation I think the only way to truly play a hardcore mode game is to generate stats via an in-order-of-appearance set of 3d6 rolls per each character. Utilizing even the 4d6 method is a bit too generous -- your average result winds up being a 12; even a 10- or 15-point-buy reduces the variance that makes this style of gameplay appealing. Which leads us to . . .
2) The Character Funnel I've gone through several iterations of character generation, and PDM on Dungeoncraft has it right: you'll need three to four starting characters per player to have a decent chance of having living characters at the outset of the story. Negative Con mods happen often.
PDM recommends a 1d4 HD for 0th-level characters, and that the die roll modified by Constitution indicates whether the character is living or dead. 0 HP is fully dead, as he describes it; I think it might be better, narratively, for results of 0 HP to indicate invalid characters -- struck by some terrible sickness or injury, and that some personal connection between the invalid and another character funnel PC motivates story hooks and roleplay opportunities. -1 HP results and lower clearly denote characters that die in the first moments of the narrative . . . which can also account for driving the narrative.
If the other characters can earn some story award to revive the incapacitated PC(s), then a reroll of the d4 HD is supplied. That particular result is the be-all, end-all for that character.
That's just a wild idea, though. (You know: the PC with solid stats everywhere but Constitution, which is just a -1 modifier??)
3) Rolling All HP I'm not totally heartless. If your 0th-level village scamp survives the opening scenes of the campaign and gains the first class level, allow a coin flip/die roll that can cover the difference between the d4 and the new class HD (+1d2 for sor/wiz, +1d4 for rogue/bard/cleric, +1d6 for paladin/fighter, and +1d8 for barbarian). No Con mod to that roll, though. . . . . At least you get 1 HP, right?
4) Spellcasting Rolls Swing a sword --> minimum 5% chance that there's a chance you stab yourself in the eye.
Evoke a burst of flame (from the raw potentialities woven into the very fabric of existence by means of obscure lore, strange ritual, and eldritch gesticulations) that can incinerate livestock, angry villagers, or unseen horrors --> Works. Every. Time.
There's a striking disparity there.
Give the casters the chance to slip up, too. Fair is fair.
But to harken back to my mention of Spheres of Power: give the casters spell points, or mana points, or something, and let those very limited resources be spent to allow the casters to make their casting rolls with advantage. Got a +3 modifier at level 1? Cool! 3 times per day, you'd have to roll snake-eyes on a 2d20 roll to napalm [i]yourself[i] with that fancy fireburst trick you learned.
5) Gritty Narrative This is probably the easiest target to achieve.
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Thanks, Heather!
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you ever play warhammer fantasy rpg? you have to roll for any and all spell castings with a potential failure leading to perils of the warp. it's a d100 based system, so percentile based. your base stats usually start between 40-60, which translates to a 40%-60% success rate. and skills can be chosen to increase these by increments of +5/10/15% depending on your investment into these skills. aside from the basic class structure, there's career options for players to have. So, for example, you could go from vagbond to thief to journeyman thief to master thief. and the only way you advance from one career to the next is by purchasing the upgrades for the current career, etc.
as for gritty, dark, depressing, chance at surviving next to nil, well, that is both story setting, story line, and a DM willing to take you there. the warhammer fantasy setting, before GW decided to nerf the game with their end of times BS, was seriously good. it was dark, depressing, everything out in the world was out to kill you or corrupt you, and your decisions were the only thing that kept the light going for the world just a little longer. Goodness and justice wasnt a guarantee, it was something that you had to fight for when the entire world sought to destroy it.
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I'm a huge fan of DCC - and that sounds exactly like what you're asking for. Let me think about this, I could probably run something after the beginning of the year.
Let me know if anyone is interested and I'll start thinking about details.
There is another game out there called Weird Frontiers. It's basically DCC set in the Old West and flavored heavily with Cthulhu.
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I am definitely still interested!
Now, I will say this -- since I've been running a homebrew d20-based Star Wars KotOR 3 game in person for the last few months, I've gotten my non-fantasy genre fix addressed. I would be far more interested in a grimdark pseudo-medieval game than a Weird Old West game.
Regardless, I look forward to hearing back on this, West, and hope you find the time to run a game!!
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Cool! I'll definitely start something after the first of year and post here to give you all dibs on joining in the fun. Happy Holidays everyone!
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What a nice New Years gift from GM West
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Any news on your brainstorming, West?
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Yes! So I'm thinking DCC and running a funnel adventure for 0-level characters. Generally, in a DCC funnel game, there are a LOT of deaths. I mean, a lot! So players will usually run four characters at the same time - this is in part to level the battlefield (sort of...) when odds are stacked against them, and also so they can keep playing when one (or more) of their characters dies tragically.
For now, you don't really need to know the rules, as playing 0-level characters is VERY basic. If you all survive and are interested in a 1st level adventure, I can put up a pdf so folks can learn the intricacies of 1st level Warriors, Wizards, Dwarves, Elves, Clerics and Thieves.
I can let you know what to roll (there's crazy dice in DCC, d30, d24, d20, d16, all the way down to d3) when it comes up. I'll also figure out how to get your characters posted up, perhaps on a slide or something.
For now, if you're interested, roll 4 sets of six 3d6. Be sure to separate them out into four distinct sets, so I can tell them apart. Once I figure out how much interest I've got in this thread, I'll put something up in the general Recruitment and see if I can get a total of five players or so.
We won't worry too much about battlemaps with this many characters running around. It'll be theater of the mind type stuff - you can tell me if you're rushing into battle with your weapon or making a ranged attack (which, by the way, is VERY dangerous to allies in combat), but we'll get into all that later once I've figured out if there's enough interest.
Anyway, again, at least for the moment, roll up four distinct sets of six 3d6 attributes so you'll have your four characters ready to get started. Don't worry so much about the scores, in fact getting low scores is usually a lot of fun! Remember, these guys and gals are basically peasants with delusions of grandeur.
Once you've got your four characters, I'll have you give me a few more rolls to figure out their hit points, starting copper, equipment, occupations and birth augur (related to Luck). Then I'll post them up for you to behold in all their awful beauty and we'll start the funnel.
Sound good? Or at least intriguing? :)
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I'm good with it!!
Four "Personnel Pureè" candidates incoming!!
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Wow. Considering my typical luck with random number generators (physical *or* digital), those are some insanely good rolls!
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Nice, those are very good indeed! What I'll probably do for folks who have absolutely horrible luck is allow a re-roll for all 4 sets (after all, playing a bunch of characters with a high score of 11 among them isn't much fun no matter the ruleset) if circumstances arise that might warrant such. Anyone that winds up with a 'broken' set of 4 characters can ask (or I might just say 'go ahead' if I notice it myself), but again, keep in mind you'll normally wind up with one or two characters that are mostly poor rolls. We call those characters 'cannon fodder'! And somehow, they usually wind up surviving! :)
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*bump*
C'mon! Gotta be more folks out there interested in running some mookish refugees through the proverbial blender!! :)
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15/12/11/11/9/8
Brother Ezekiel
- Priest of XYZ
- Hasn't worked out since he was a child
- Thought that he would grow old, fat and happy. Now it seems like he was wrong on all three accounts, despite his best efforts.
15/14/11/10/9/9
Fulgar Fulgarson
- Blacksmith by trade
- Member of the local militia
- Last trained with a spear two years ago, as he joined the militia as an excuse to hang out with his friends and get away from the family
15/13/11/11/10/8
Laura Helgarsdottir
- Fishwife (sells fish that her husband catches)
- Dreams of running away from the town and living a life of adventure
- Truly regrets said dreams now that she is running away from both the town and the adventure that has consumed it
18/11/11/10/8/6
- Lokhir the Reborn
- Called the reborn because he was sentenced to death and was spared on account of the noose breaking (the superstitious locals called it divine mercy)
- Is not very smart. Is twice as ugly, on account of a fire that scarred half his face.
- Thinks he is a better thief than he really is
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Nice! Got an '18' in there!
I'm going to get a couple of sheets up for the two of you in the next few days. I'll put them on slides and have you make a few more rolls to determine HP, Occupations, and a few other details.
If you think they look good at that point, I'm going to create a game and continue recruiting for another couple weeks or so. Would be nice to get two more players, or even three more.
Plan to start the game in early February - which is good for me because January at my work is ridiculously busy!
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I saw GM West in the recruitment, and this sounds interesting! Start with a swarm of 0 level characters? They die even easier than 1st level! Takes me back a few decades!
#3 and #4 look pretty good!
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Nice! We can probably go with 3 players, but I'll get a game thread started this weekend and see if we can recruit one more!
In the meantime, let me have each of you roll the following for EACH of your refugees:
1d4 (for HP)
5d12 (for cp, not gonna do much really, but hey!)
1d30 (birth augur)
1d24 (random piece of equipment)
1d100 (occupation)
Now I saw that Grumbaki came up with a backstory for each of your refugees - not a problem, as I can come up with an occupation based on your backstory easily enough. So you don't have to roll that 1d100 if you don't want to. The rest of you can follow suit, or just roll the 1d100 and see what you come up with!
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OK, I've got the game thread set up!
GM West's DCC Adventure - Hole in the Sky
Check in on the Discussion thread I've linked to above so I know you're around! I'll be getting your slides up as soon as you've made those extra rolls that Grumbaki has already made. I'll get his up tonight so you can see how it all looks.
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