Stargazer's World » 2009

There’s more to OGL than d20 (Part 2)

Posted by Stargazer | Posted on 31-07-2009

Category : Freebies, Game Design, Legacy D&D, Other Systems, RPG

This is the second and concluding (for now at least) episode of my series on OGL games. D&D 3rd Edition and the d20 System started it all, but a lot of other companies jumped the bandwagon and released many games, settings and even a few derivative rules system (like the already mentioned Anime d20).

True20
True20 is a streamlined version of the original d20 System created by Green Ronin Publishing and was first used in the romantic fantasy RPG Blue Rose. Instead of using attributes and attribute bonuses, True20 uses the bonuses as the attribute value directly. They also changed the way damage worked, so every roll in the game is now done with a d20 which makes a lot of things easier. It’s does not do away with classes entirely (like Mutants & Masterminds did), but it reduced the number of classes to three: Warrior, Expert and Adept, which works perfectly for almost every genre.
But as far as I know Green Ronin never released an official SRD of the True20 system and as far as I’ve read, they are not entirely happy with the fact that some fan created such a document. Perhaps one of my readers has more information about this. If so, please let us know.
The True SRD can be accessed as an HTML document here.

RuneQuest
Probably no game has changed hands more often than RuneQuest, which lead to the strange situation that now two companies own the underlying Basic Roleplaying System: Mongoose Publishing and Chaosium. Chaosium has used it for their Call of Cthulhu games for many years now and recently released a generic roleplaying game using the “Basic Roleplaying Game” name. Mongoose owns the rights to RuneQuest and has released its rules under the OGL.
When I am not mistaken was RQ the first game to use percentile dice for task resolution and the basic system hasn’t changed much over the ages. RQ is a true classic.
You can download the SRD at the official RuneQuest site, or check out the “Runic SRD“.

Traveller
Traveller is another classic game, released in 1977 and is the classic SF roleplaying game. I was pretty surprised when I learned not only that Mongoose Publishing secured the rights to produce a new Traveller line, but that they released the Traveller rules under the OGL. But alas all is not gold that glitters! Most careers are sadly missing from the SRD (only the scout is included) and it may even be that the other classes are considered closed content. So if you wish to release your own game using Traveller rules you’ll have to create your own careers or you’re out of luck. Of course it’s Mongoose’s right to do so, but all other SRDs are more complete. I won’t go into more details on the rules itself here. You can check out my review of the Traveller core book for more information on that.
You can download the Traveller SRD on the official site (look for the Developer’s Pack).

Did I miss anything? I am pretty sure there might be a few more OGL games out there. Please note that I only included games in that list that have a SRD of their own. And if you have any more information regarding one of the games I wrote about, please let us know in the comments!

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Reading Recommendation: “Quick Primer for Old School Gaming”

Posted by Stargazer | Posted on 30-07-2009

Category : Freebies, Legacy D&D, News, Reviews & Culture, RPG, Reviews & First Looks

Quick Primer for Old School Gaming I have never played the early editions of D&D. Not even one of the retro-clones that are now freely available all over the internet. The oldest game I’ve ever played was the original Traveller and that was in the 90s, when I already had some experience with games like Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay, Shadowrun and a few others.

But I started to get interested in this side of our hobby, shortly after I joined the RPG Bloggers Network. The Old School revolution may not be a as big as some proponents think, but it’s big enough so that you almost can’t avoid reading about it. While I was on my quest to find out what makes a game “Old School”, fellow RPG blogger Chgowiz recommended Matthew J. Finch’s “Quick Primer for Old School Gaming”.

What I liked about the book (aside from the fact that it’s free) is that it doesn’t tell you that Old School is the correct way to play RPGs. But it explains how things were done back in the way and what the real difference between old and modern gaming is.

And I have to admit that I very much liked what I read. Matthew describes several “Zen Moments”, where he thinks a “modern gaming concept is completely turned on its head” by an older gaming style:

Ruling, not Rules
Player skill, not Character Abilities
Heroic, not Superhero
Forget “Game Balance”

I believe every player, gamemaster and especially every RPG blogger should have read this book, because it’s a great primer on Old School gaming and will probably help to understand the other perspective better.

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What kind of player are you?

Posted by Stargazer | Posted on 30-07-2009

Category : News, Reviews & Culture, RPG

I just read about a quiz that reveals what kind of player you are and of course I had to give it a try. And it seems I am a Storyteller (I am not surprised):

You Scored as StorytellerYou’re more inclined toward the role playing side of the equation and less interested in numbers or experience points. You’re quick to compromise if you can help move the story forward, and get bored when the game slows down for a long planning session. You want to play out a story that moves like it’s orchestrated by a skilled novelist or film director.

Storyteller

83%

Method Actor

75%

Specialist

67%

Tactician

58%

Butt-Kicker

42%

Power Gamer

33%

Casual Gamer

25%

So, what about you? What’s your playing style?

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There’s more to OGL than d20 (Part 1)

Posted by Stargazer | Posted on 29-07-2009

Category : FATE, FUDGE, FUZION, Freebies, Game Design, Legacy D&D, Other Systems, RPG

A couple of years back, when Wizards of the Coast released 3rd Edition of D&D, they not only updated the famous franchise, but they also gave us the Open Gaming License. For the first time, you could create new games, adventures, supplements based on the d20 System without special approval from the creators of D&D.

In a way this helped resurrect the RPG industry. A lot of new companies appeared and produced products using the d20 System back then and over the following years more companies jumped the OGL bandwagon by releasing their game rules under the OGL.

So, what other games are currently available under the OGL? In the last days I had done some research, since I initially planned to use an OGL game for my Ad Astra campaign before I settled for Savage Worlds instead.

Here’s what I’ve found:

D&D 3.5 (as Revised 3.5 SRD)
Of course not everything contained in the D&D 3.5 rulebooks is open content, but the majority of the rules, classes, monsters and spells is included in the Revised 3.5 SRD (SRD stands for System Reference Document).
The SRD is actually still available from the WotC website in RTF format. My favorite version of this document is the website “The Hypertext d20 SRD“.

d20 Modern (as SRD Modern)
D20 Modern was a pretty cool game, in many part IMHO even better than D&D itself. Alas WotC treated d20 Modern a bit like an unwanted stepchild and support stopped a few years ago, with no updated version in sight.
The d20 Modern SRD can still be downloaded from the WoTC site in RTF format. There are also a couple of PDF versions floating around the net, including the very good looking Modern d20 Core Kit from RPGObjects.

FUDGE
FUDGE always had a pretty open license even back in 1995, long before the OGL. Pretty recently Grey Ghost Press decided to release FUDGE under the OGL, too. So, what kind of game is FUDGE? If you ask me, it’s not a game at all but more like a toolbox for creating your own RPG.
You get a pretty simple basic mechanic using Fudge dice (six-sided dice with two blank sides, two sides with “-” and two sides with “+” on it) and a lot of optional rules. You can even easily introduce concepts from other games to FUDGE. The FUDGE SRD is available as RTF from Grey Ghost Press here.

FATE
Perhaps you’ve already read about “Spirit of the Century“, the pulp RPG by Evil Hat Productions that has been praised by gamers and critics alike. SotC is based on the FATE RPG which itself was based on FUDGE. So, when FUDGE was released under the OGL, Evil Hat jumped the bandwagon and made FATE 2nd Edition and 3rd Edition (which is used for SotC and the upcoming Dresden Files RPG) available under the OGL, too.
If you are interested in learning more about FATE (at least the 2nd Edition), check out my review. You can download the FATE 2nd Edition rules and the SotC SRD on the official FATE website.

The Action! System
The Action! system is Gold Rush Games‘ version of the FUZION system that was as far as I know one of the first free systems on the internet. FUZION is a combination of the Interlock and the HERO system. The Action! system that is available under the OGL is supposedly 95% compatible to the FUZION system. Alas the Gold Rush Games’ site is more or less down and a couple of links on the official Action System site are dead as well. But I could find a HTML version of the SRD (which also removed all trademarked content) here.

BESM d20 (as Anime d20 SRD)
Big Eyes Small Mouth was the anime-inpired roleplaying game created by Guardian of Order. BESM d20 was their try to tap into the d20 market. Although I prefer the Tri-Stat version of BESM, the d20 variant has its charm. One of the highlights is the fact that GoO reverse-engineered the standard d20 classes and by doing so created a point-based system to create custom classes. Even if you don’t care for anime, this aspect of BESM d20 makes it very interesting. Alas GoO is out of business and as far as I know there was no support for BESM d20 aside from a Slayers setting. But you can still get the Anime d20 SRD here.

This concludes part 1 of my look at the different games released under the OGL. There are still a few more systems to write about in my next post of this series. So, what are your thoughts about the games I mentioned so far? As always I am very interested in your comments!

1 person likes this post.

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NOIR is now “Thrilling Noir Stories”

Posted by Stargazer | Posted on 28-07-2009

Category : Freebies, Game Design, RPG

“It was another cold and rainy night. I was sitting in my 20 square yards appartment and bureau, staring into a half-empty glass of bourbon whiskey. A knock on the door brought me back to reality and ended the daydreaming. Who might that be? A gorgeous blonde who wants to hire me to spy on her cheating husband or the landlord trying to get last month’s rent…”

Thrilling Noir Stories is our attempt to create a rules-light roleplaying game inspired by the “film noir” genre. Some time ago it started as a project by Michael Garcia and me. When we released the first playtest version several people started to send in their ideas and comments which quickly lead to an updated release. Then someone noticed that there is already a roleplaying-game called NOIR, so we changed the name. And since the copyright status of the artwork we used was unclear, I changed the cover art. And if you ask me, the new cover fits even better!

We also decided to release the whole game under the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial Share-Alike 3.0 license, to make it easier for everyone to share and adapt the game freely.

If you want to have a look at the latest version, you can download the “Bogart Edition” PDF here. And please post your notes at the playtest forums!

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