A Role Playing Games Blog
Fluff/Inspiration
Boardgames and Roleplaying
4There are quite a few boardgames or miniature skirmish games with elaborate background stories that almost beg to turned into a roleplaying game. In some cases the developers of these games came up with their own roleplaying game. And some games like Heavy Gear or Savage Worlds can be used as either a miniatures game or a roleplaying game.
Recently a friend of mine proposed we could play some Battletech again. Battletech is a tactical board game where you control one or several huge mecha called Battlemechs. The game was initially created by the now defunct FASA Corporation. His idea was to use the rules from Mechwarrior (we decided to use the 2nd Edition rules) to create some mechwarriors that are in charge of their own unit of mercenaries fighting in the wars of the 31st century. We will use standard battletech rules for the mech-vs-mech fights and the roleplaying game for all other encounters. When everything turns out as planned, we all will have a great time.
But this made me thinking. There are a lot of games that would work great as a combat system for roleplaying games. Take some miniatures skirmish game like Games Workshop’s Necromunda for example. In that game each player controls a gang in the Underhive of a huge 41st millenium megacity. The combat rules are very detailed and there are even rules for campaigns and improving the stats and skills of the gangers. So, why not turn it into a fully-fledged roleplaying game? You can of course write up you own rules but it’s much easier to keep the combat rules of the skirmish game intact and add some other rules for the non-combat parts.
This is easy to do with a roleplaying game like FUDGE. FUDGE allows the GM to choose the attributes and skills he needs for his campaign. So just use Necromundas Stats and Abilities as detailed in the rules of the skirmish game and you’re done. You just have make sure that the fighting skills for the combat part of the game can easily be represented using FUDGE. Necromunda like all GW tabletop miniature games uses WS (Weapon Skill) and BS (Ballistic Skill) for combat checks. All stats including WS and BS can usually range from 1 to 10. FUDGE normally uses skills and attributes ranked from Terrible to Superb with 5 steps in between. For normal gangers you can set Terrible=2, Poor=3 etc. until Superb=8 and you’re mostly done. You can now easily convert between both systems. That could work for other GW games as well.
Another game that comes in mind, when thinking about boardgames that would make a great background for a roleplaying games is Crimson Skies. Crimson Skies is a tactical boardgame much like Battletech (it was created by FASA too), but this time you control fighter planes in an alternative early 20th century. The background is pretty detailed and gives a lot of opportunities for adventures outside the cockpit. For a fitting roleplaying game for Crimson Skies I would just take Spirit of the Century since it’s close enough to FUDGE to being easily adaptable and it’s already the right genre. Just use the standard Crimson Skies rules for air combat and you’re done.
What are your thoughts on that matter? Have you already used a boardgame as part of the roleplaying experience? As always, feel free to post your thought into the comment section below!
Monotheistic religions in roleplaying
6November 17, 2008
Usually most roleplaying game backgrounds feature polytheistic religions like the classic D&D pantheon. You have several gods that are responsible for certain domains like war, trade, luck, you name it. Monotheistic religions resembling real life religions are usually avoided in high-fantasy games. In my opinion monotheistic religions are much more interesting from a roleplaying standpoint.
In most fantasy settings gods are real and the interact with their followers in a direct way. In D&D for example the gods grant their clerics power in form of spells. And it is not unheard of gods walking the earth in the guise of mortals or by using avatars. Gods can be challenged and even slain. Although there are clerics and temples of certain gods it’s not unthinkable that a larger temple of Pelor perhaps includes a shrine of Bahamut. And even good people pray to the more sinister gods from time to time in hope they get spared from their wrath. Even the most devoted member of one god will not deny the existence of any other god. (more…)
Dungeoncraft: Asecia reboot
1November 13, 2008
During the last few months I have been working on a campaign setting called “Asecia”. The development of this world has been documented in my Dungeoncraft articles. But recently I was starting to get discontent with some of the decisions I have made and I am not entirely happy on how Asecia turned out. I had introduced some radical ideas to the world and in the end I had some trouble to get it all together.
So I decided to try some kind of reboot. I took a sheet of paper and wrote down all the things I liked and what I didn’t like and thought about how I could emphazise the strong points of the setting while eliminating the things that just didn’t work out.
On Magic
I’ve made some major changes to get the mood of the setting more in touch with what I had in mind when I started working on it. Although I really like the idea of the sorcerer marks and all what came with it, it doesn’t exactly fit the pseudo-victorian feel of the short story I wrote. And I had some trouble on how to make the avatar idea more than some nice fluff for gamemasters and players to read. So I decided to go another route with magic. In the “rebooted” version of Asecia magic was lost for a thousand years. Before the fall of magic, there were powerful magicians and they ruled over the world, but suddenly the magic winds subsided and all wizards, sorcerers, witches etc. were robbed of their powers. For a long time magic was thought to be a myth. Then, shorty after a industrial revolution was in full swing, magic suddenly reappeared. Now, a century later, Mankind tries to harness this new power source and a few magic academies have started training new wizards all over the world. It’s a time of change.
On Religion
The religions of Asecia will change a bit because of the lack of magic for a thousand years. The Brotherhood of the Three Sisters was created during ancient times, when there still was magic all around. When magic came back they found out that the rituals they repeated in their worship were actually working magic rituals. Several people that started to dabble magic have also started to pray to the Sisters, so that they may help them with their magical development.
The Church of St. Michael still exists in the rebooted version but it’s quite changed. In the “rebooted” version of Asecia, Michael d’Arellien was the second son of a noble from the Western Isles that chose the life of a monk in the Church of the Architect around 300 years before the return of magic. During that time church has become corrupt and many high churchmen were more interested in the gold in their coffers than in spiritual affairs. He became abbot of a monastery and started to preach against the corruption of the church. He started a movement that lead to a split of the Holy Cerynian Church of the Great Architect. The Michaelites, as they were called, finally converted most of populations in the Western Isles and western Cerynia. Today the followers of the Great Architect are still split into the Cerynian part of the Church and the Church of St. Michael.
Both the Church of the Great Architect and the Michaelites are wary of magic and the clergy if forbidden to practice magic, but the Brotherhood of the sisters fully embraces the magical arts.
On Technology
For over two hundred years the industrial revolution is in full swing. There have been major improvements in technology that lead to steam driven trains, airships, steamdriven ships, modern ways to wage war, like firearms and cannons. With the recent comeback of magic the industrial revolution was not set back. Some inventors have successfully combined magic and technology. Magic driven warmachines, called Wargolems have appeared on the battlefields and the armies have started recruiting wizards and sorcerers.
Since most practitioners of magic treat their art like just another scientific field, most people see magic as nothing else as some fancy new technology.
On the World
The world from a geographical standpoint will not change that much. And there will still be the same countries I wrote about before, but they will all be quite different because of the major changes when especially magic is concerned. My current plans is to start an Asecia campaign using FATE rules soon. The focus of the campaign will be the city Cerynia, home of the Holy Church of the Great Architect, center of learning and art and home of the Cerynian University of the Sciences, Arts and Magick.
Dungeoncraft: The Future of Asecia
2October 28, 2008
In the last few weeks I wrote about my campaign world Asecia, its people, nations, history, magic, religion, secrets and even provided you with a short story to set the mood. Currently everything is at a turning point, as I am still unsure to where I want to go from now. There’s still the open question of which roleplaying rules I should use for example. D&D 4th Edition could worth a try but I am not sure if I can bring the fluff I’ve already written together with D&D’s crunch. Savage Worlds is another possibility, so is Mutants & Mastermind which never ceases to amaze me. I also thought about using the d20 SRD as a basis for my own OGL rules for Asecia.
The main problem is that I currently don’t have the time to make the necessary next steps. So I am thinking about putting all my work into a neat box and wait until I have enough time to finish the work. Perhaps it would be worthwhile to have another look at the “World of Asecia” in a few weeks and make some adjustments. While I was writing one article after the other I noticed that my image of the campaign world shifted a bit with each post written. And some ideas that I were very excited about when I first wrote them down now look bland and uninteresting to me. They probably just don’t fit my current idea of “Asecia”.
One plan I currently have is to focus on a smaller area of Asecia and set my campaign there. A perfect place would be Cerynia. It’s a big city with several districts, industry, a magic university and a long history. And urban campaigns are pefectly suited for the genre. I also think about scrapping the avatar idea and changing some of the religions. And then I will have to convince my gaming group that they ever wanted to participate in an urban steamfantasy adventure in a place called Cerynia. And that’s probably the toughest nut to crack…
The Lost Continent Illyria
6October 21, 2008
Some time ago our fellow RPGBlogger Philippine Gamer has posted about a D&D 4th Edition campaign setting a member of his gaming group, R. Velasco, created: “The Lost Continent Illyria – A Renaissance Magiteck Setting”.
Although (or perhaps because) I am currently working on my own project “World of Asecia”, I had to check out his work.
And I was totally blown away. The setting is only 14 pages long but it’s very well written and uses some great artwork. The PDF document almost looks like a professional roleplaying sourcebook on par with WotC’s work.
Here’s an excerpt for your convenience:
Illyria is a setting where magic, fantasy and technology exist side by side.
Magitech, Portals and Magical skyships, espers and engineers, summoners, and gunknights. Illyria is an unforgiving monarchy where the blood of dragons promote a person’s identity and social status. But still heroes arise in the name of the Queen, or in the name of the Country. Never both.
If you are looking for some setting for your D&D game or some inspiration for your campaign check it out! You won’t regret it!
Heroes’ Guild
6October 20, 2008
The video game “Fable” featured a “Heroes’ Guild” that was a center of learning an training for Heroes for hire. In the game the player’s character entered the guild after his family was killed and is trained in swordmanship, archery and magic. During the game there were many quests and often the player was able to choose if he wanted to take the good or evil route. The guild’s members were not forced to be “good”.
Could such an institution work in a D&D setting for example? I say: “why not?”. In most campaigns the players’ characters are some kind of mercenaries, hired swords, treasure hunters or soldiers of fortune. But every party is usually on its own. So why not introduce some kind of “Heroes’ Guild” or “Adventurers’ Union” to the game that helps adventurers to organize, enforces some regulations and represents the adventuring part of the population at the royal court?
I think the name “Adventurers’ Union” is much better than the slightly cheesy “Heroes’ Guild”. So, let’s go with that. Ok, we have settled on a name let’s make up some more details of our new faction. It makes sense that the union has offices in all the major towns, so that interested hero-wannabes may sign up and join the union. As a member of the union you are allowed to wear the official union badge and take on union-sponsored quests. You also have to pay some percentage of your income to the union. The union will make sure that you get paid when you’ve done your job and will provide places where you can rest, train and socialize with other adventurers.
No capes!
1October 8, 2008
Capes, costumes, secret identities are the common tropes of the superhero genre. But there are people who think that adult men and women clad in skintight spandex suits with masks and fancy capes just look silly. Recent superhero movies have done away with skintight suits in most cases (and replaced them with leather suits for example) and the superhero cartoon “The Incredibles” gave us a lot of arguments why capes are just evil!
So, can you pull of a superhero campaign without some of the most common superhero tropes? Sure. Look at the superheroes TV show “Heroes“. There you have people with incredible powers but no capes, no costumes, no secret identities, no silly names. In my opinion the premise of “Heroes” could make a great base for a superhero campaign.
- Origins
Most (if not all) characters have the same origin. Let’s just go the X-Men/Heroes route and they all have some genetic mutations that give them super powers. Call them mutants or homo superior, whatever tickles your fancy. Another possible origin could be super powers that are caused by nano bots in the supers’ bloodstream (like in the computer game “Deus Ex”). Whatever it is it should be grounded in natural science. No magic, no aliens, no gods! - Secrecy
Superpowers are real, there are heroes and villains, but the majority of the world has not taken notice of them. Most supers keep their powers secret in fear of being repressed by normals or not to become a guinea pig for ruthless scientists who want to find out the secret of their powers. - It’s the world as we know it
You don’t need to make changes to the world as we know it. Everything is pretty much the same, there are just a few people starting to dicover their emerging powers. Perhaps add in a secret organization that controls supers (like the Company in “Heroes”) - Start small
If I would start a Heroes-inspired campaign I would probably use Mutants & Masterminds 2nd Edition. A good starting power level would be around 5 or 6. During the campaign you of course can rise that level as it suits the story. - Grey is better than white
As we’ve seen in Heroes, most “heroes” have their bad sides. No one is 100% perfect like most Golden Age heroes. The player characters should have some flaws too. Let even the villains have some redeeming qualities. - Not everyone is super
A PL 5 or 6 campaign should allow you to add people without any super powers to the team. It could be someone like Hiro’s friend Ando or Dr. Suresh, the scientist, who is trying to find and help these special individuals.
It could also be interesting to let the players create their characters without any powers first. So they start like normal humans and the GM grants them some powers during the first adventure. So the players have to find out what their powers are first.
The character concept should always be viable without the powers. Nathan Petrelli from Heroes for example was (and still is) a politician first before he even knew about his flying ability, Sylar was a watchmaker, Hiro a corporate employee, Clair Bennett is still going to school. Keep that in mind when you create characters. A superhero that is focused on his super powers alone without any other skills is not recommended for that kind of campaign.
I am still trying to convince my gaming group that we should do a superhero campaign. Perhaps if we go the “Heroes” way, I can win them over. 
Note: The ChattyDM is hosting this month’s RPG Blog Carnival. The topic is “Super Heroes in RPGs” and this post is my contribution.
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