bravewolf
Level 4 Theurgist
I don't care what Howard says.
Posts: 109
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Post by bravewolf on Nov 11, 2021 14:22:54 GMT -6
This is how I think of them. OD&D (3 LBBs without supplements) Strength is only a number that reflects a Character’s potential for advancement as a fighter. Not really a descriptor of how the character is now. Intelligence: for magic user’s potential. Wisdom: cleric’s potential I use the nomenclature only as convenient tags: identifiers that are specific only to the attached mechanic. After all, what does it mean to be Strong? It’s a pretty broad term, no? Even though three dice are rolled, I do not use the results as a bell curve representing the population. I know, I know. “Later, in AD&D, Gygax explained it that way: 3 Intelligence is basically 30 IQ!” But I don’t see the need to use the numbers in that fashion. My way eliminates the problem of players trying to Act like a Supra genius or, on the flip side, like a 5 year old. This. I tried to sell my gaming group on this concept but they couldn't reorient their thinking, instead choosing to despair over "hopeless" PCs and "meaningless" attributes. Schade.
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bravewolf
Level 4 Theurgist
I don't care what Howard says.
Posts: 109
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Post by bravewolf on Apr 18, 2021 0:00:59 GMT -6
A few ‘gems’ from my collection that have languished since forever… Aftermath! (to be run with the Sydney campaign, of course) The Mechanoid Invasion The Morrow Project I have also wanted to break out Aftermath! I have a (perhaps misbegotten) fantasy of running a game of Red Star/White Star and having my mates pick some of the survivors to develop as Aftermath! PCs in a Europe benighted with a nuclear winter. I also have a fictional setting that I could probably slot Aftermath into.
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bravewolf
Level 4 Theurgist
I don't care what Howard says.
Posts: 109
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Post by bravewolf on Apr 21, 2020 19:15:09 GMT -6
I like refereeing 4-6 hour sessions but I am beat when I get home! I consider 3 hours to be a minimum.
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bravewolf
Level 4 Theurgist
I don't care what Howard says.
Posts: 109
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Post by bravewolf on Apr 19, 2020 13:45:00 GMT -6
Okay, I have a couple "scale" questions for those who are far more adept at military miniatures than I. 1. Fast Rules states it is designed for HO Scale military miniatures. What would that equate to in mm scale? 10mm? 25mm? 30mm? 2. Tractics recommends a scale of 1:1000. What does that translate to in mm size? If I'm not mistaken, that comes out to figures that are like 2mm tall, which seems ridiculous. 3. I really want to play some battles out solo to get the feel for these rules but I don't want to spend thousands on miniatures. I'm wondering if I could just use your basic dollar store plastic army men to do it. What's the scale on those? Thanks for your insights! I think HO is 1/76, which works for 1/72. Think 1 inch figure is 72 inches tall. It's 25 mm, I think. 1:1000 is the ground scale, perhaps? WRG and many other wargames use a different figure scale compared to ground scale. Army men are maybe 45/50 mm?
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bravewolf
Level 4 Theurgist
I don't care what Howard says.
Posts: 109
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Post by bravewolf on Oct 11, 2019 0:06:37 GMT -6
However I choose to roll a D2, I always roll R2 first.
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bravewolf
Level 4 Theurgist
I don't care what Howard says.
Posts: 109
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Post by bravewolf on Sept 8, 2019 7:03:41 GMT -6
This is an interesting document. Does anyone know publication dates for this stuff? I would guess the 1970's, but a quick look at the files didn't show any dates. Chimaera ran from 1975 through 1983. I think the Pits of Cil started about Issue 9 of Chim, but I’m going off of faulty memory here. You could check here: www.diplomacyzines.org.uk/library/zine_pages/Chimaera.htm
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bravewolf
Level 4 Theurgist
I don't care what Howard says.
Posts: 109
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give me...
May 28, 2019 14:39:04 GMT -6
via mobile
Post by bravewolf on May 28, 2019 14:39:04 GMT -6
the elevator pitch for your campaigns, please. I'm starting back up in about two weeks and i need good ideas to steal or jog me memory on how to do this nuts. The monsters won. The few humans who remained behind were as twisted and evil as the monsters. Now? We’re sailing back to reclaim what is ours! Sailing? All my games have been land-locked. Color me intrigued!
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bravewolf
Level 4 Theurgist
I don't care what Howard says.
Posts: 109
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Post by bravewolf on May 28, 2019 10:53:33 GMT -6
There is something wrong with you: in a world characterized by xenophobia, you dare to fraternerize with others not of your kind.
There is sonething wrong with you: in a world that has known aught but desperation, you can envision a different way of life.
There is something wrong with you: in the face of the Old Ones and humankind's fatalistic barbarism, you regard a different path as worth pursuing.
None of these facts make you noble or good per se - the status quo simply doesn't satisfy you. The reason why is up to you.
Welcome to Carcosa. You are one of 13 varieties of man, normally clannish with those colored like yourself.
You've struck out from your stagnated village with other misfits to see what you can make of yourself in this Hobbesian world where life is nasty, brutish, & short.
-for a Carcosan campaign I hope to run someday
(c) Gabriel Roark 2019
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bravewolf
Level 4 Theurgist
I don't care what Howard says.
Posts: 109
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Post by bravewolf on Apr 5, 2019 22:51:31 GMT -6
It's not a PDF, I just wrote it. You should certainly be able to copy it, though. Use it freely, as long as you attribute it. I've already printed it out and made it required reading for my players. The whole thing, author's credit included. They absolutely love it. Really puts a good perspective on the game and how it's best played I had the same experience after sending it to my Arduin 2 group :-) Thanks for writing that up, Gronan.
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bravewolf
Level 4 Theurgist
I don't care what Howard says.
Posts: 109
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Post by bravewolf on Mar 10, 2019 17:49:45 GMT -6
D'oh!
On a cheery note, beginning last weekend, my daughter and I played several sessions of the basic OS game. Achievement unlocked!
Next time we play, we'll run the full Lost scenario. :-)
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bravewolf
Level 4 Theurgist
I don't care what Howard says.
Posts: 109
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Post by bravewolf on Mar 8, 2019 21:13:46 GMT -6
The Lost Grimoire (Arduin Grimoire, Vol. IV), David A. Hargrave
A bunch of early issues of Alarums & Excursions.
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bravewolf
Level 4 Theurgist
I don't care what Howard says.
Posts: 109
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Post by bravewolf on Mar 7, 2019 21:20:54 GMT -6
Is that $11 PDF or print?
I just got in touch with Gamescience; it is $11 for a print book. Brilliant deal!
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bravewolf
Level 4 Theurgist
I don't care what Howard says.
Posts: 109
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Post by bravewolf on Feb 13, 2019 14:43:04 GMT -6
Carcosa often gets a bad rep among oldschool circles, but both the LotFP Carcosa book, as well as "Isles of the Unknown" are among the pieces I go back to for inspiration whenever I do anything related to fantasy gaming. Can't precisely say why, but it's a mainstay in my bookshelf since I bought it, back in... 2011? Yeah, I have the LotFP version of Carcosa and regard the whole thing as excellent and evocative. It is the first OSR piece that I picked up that inculcated in me an interest in hex-crawling.
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bravewolf
Level 4 Theurgist
I don't care what Howard says.
Posts: 109
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Post by bravewolf on Feb 12, 2019 16:25:39 GMT -6
We could end up with a Carcosan campaign pretty shortly. In our Arduin campaign, the party is thinking of going to the Plateau of Forever during the Red Solstice, at which time Arduin's nexus gates to the multiverse are blown wide open...Carcosa is one of the possible destinations should the party chance through the right portal.
I want to go there, but it would be ruinous to so many things!
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bravewolf
Level 4 Theurgist
I don't care what Howard says.
Posts: 109
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Post by bravewolf on Jan 25, 2019 12:43:23 GMT -6
Gronan, that is a masterfully written review - stylistically, that is. I haven't read DATG yet, so I can't comment on how well your review represents the book.
Your blog post has accomplished one of its objectives: this youngish (began playing in 1983) gamer is going to buy and read DATG.
Thanks.
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bravewolf
Level 4 Theurgist
I don't care what Howard says.
Posts: 109
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Post by bravewolf on Nov 27, 2018 23:55:28 GMT -6
What I know about Korns is largely recorded in a fat footnote in PatW, pg310, which covers his introduction to the wargaming community, his reception, and so on. There are scattered in TTT and a few other sources some indication of who he might have gamed with, but if I had anything to add to it now, it would largely be about the SUTC version of the game he published through his Limpex imprint in 1971. You might also be interested in the anecdotes recorded by "Nedzed" here: theminiaturespage.com/boards/msg.mv?id=184214&page=3Incidentally, the connection of McHugh's use of the 2d6 tables for percentile usage to Korns, and McHugh's mention of d20s, is covered on PatW pg315. It was my privilege to bring some of the original Japanese Standards Association d20s to the Gen Con 50 museum last year. Good find regarding the Nedzed anecdotes. Malchor , if you haven't already read it, John Curry has a book out that treats Korns's wargaming rules: More Wargaming Pioneers: Ancient and World War II Battle and Skirmish Rules by Tony Bath, Lionel Tarr and Michael Korns: Early Wargames Vol. 4 22 March 2013, by John Curry, Tony Bath, Lionel Tarr and Michael Korns. I have not read this book but recently read an onside report by Curry in The Nugget 264 (pp. 19-20). In the report, Curry appears to cite verbatim one of the Zuparko anecdotes that increment cited above. This issue of The Nugget was published in September 2013, a few months after Curry's book. Maybe Curry squirreled additional biographical information away in his chapter on Korns?
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bravewolf
Level 4 Theurgist
I don't care what Howard says.
Posts: 109
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Post by bravewolf on Sept 7, 2018 9:19:11 GMT -6
Played Paper War's RUSSIA FALLING solo. This game was designed with single & two-player modes,right? How are the solo rules?
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bravewolf
Level 4 Theurgist
I don't care what Howard says.
Posts: 109
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Post by bravewolf on Aug 10, 2018 13:07:18 GMT -6
Well, consider all the beasts that use those doors and the fact that the doors may not have been built by human hands. The doors also unlock for monsters and close automatically. They must be powered doors wkith biometric locks. I think of the underworld in terms of Ursula K. LeGuin's The Tombs of Atuan - the underworld is alive and wants to thwart incursions from the surface world.
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bravewolf
Level 4 Theurgist
I don't care what Howard says.
Posts: 109
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Post by bravewolf on Jul 22, 2018 22:16:55 GMT -6
If we are admitting any of the ultra-lite OD&D clones, I enjoyed the heck out of Searchers of the Unknown. As long as your don't mind winging monsters & treasures, I could see using it for campaign play. What do I like about it? I like the chart-less combat. Free-form spells are cool, but I would be inclined to have PCs make up two spells to start with - ones that they write - and go from there. It's convenient to be able to hand players a single page for rules, too.
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bravewolf
Level 4 Theurgist
I don't care what Howard says.
Posts: 109
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Post by bravewolf on Jul 19, 2018 12:39:02 GMT -6
Dune: Butlerian Jihad, by Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson.
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bravewolf
Level 4 Theurgist
I don't care what Howard says.
Posts: 109
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Post by bravewolf on Jul 19, 2018 12:38:48 GMT -6
The Butlerian Jihad, by Brian Herbert and Anderson.
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bravewolf
Level 4 Theurgist
I don't care what Howard says.
Posts: 109
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Post by bravewolf on Jul 13, 2018 23:25:36 GMT -6
Has anybody here tried allowing scroll creation at any level? How did that fly in an OD&D campaign?
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bravewolf
Level 4 Theurgist
I don't care what Howard says.
Posts: 109
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Post by bravewolf on Jul 12, 2018 21:52:15 GMT -6
I've only had one player show an interest in spell research when using the Lamentations rules...none with my OD&D-Arduin campaign so far. The issue with the one player is that he never finished the spell description, which is too bad - we would have had a unique spell in the campaign. In my OD&D-Arduin campaign, I give a freebie spell to M-U's upon leveling, and also like tetramorph, figure the costs of that are subsumed in the PC's monthly upkeep costs.
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bravewolf
Level 4 Theurgist
I don't care what Howard says.
Posts: 109
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Post by bravewolf on Jul 12, 2018 18:10:57 GMT -6
Cool, thanks for the heads up, downloading. This morning I was looking for the contributions made to The Wild Hunt back in the day, they were some portion of Chevalier or at least pre-publication C&S. I need to dig deeper among the piles of stuff in my office... Frank Ed Simbalist wrote about C&S in Alarums & Excursions a fair piece as well. The Golds wrote about their C&S campaigns in the same APA. If you like, I could point you toward some relevant issue numbers.
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bravewolf
Level 4 Theurgist
I don't care what Howard says.
Posts: 109
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Post by bravewolf on Jul 12, 2018 18:07:36 GMT -6
I like the spell research rules in Lamentations of the Flame Princess. Magic-users can also create potions and scrolls at any level.
@geordieracer, I forgot to mention that the website for Lamentations has a free, no-art PDF of the game rules. This would allow you to check out the spell research rules for free.
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bravewolf
Level 4 Theurgist
I don't care what Howard says.
Posts: 109
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Post by bravewolf on Jun 12, 2018 9:30:31 GMT -6
I do like the way your scheme emulates Tolkienean and other fantasy literature.
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bravewolf
Level 4 Theurgist
I don't care what Howard says.
Posts: 109
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Post by bravewolf on Jun 12, 2018 9:29:00 GMT -6
I have a minor quibble with capping human clerics at level 8, though it fits your suggested scheme well. Clerics may remain neutral till level 7 (in later printings), at which point they must throw in with Law or Chaos. I should think that some players of neutral clerics might find it anticlimatic to only proceed one additional level upon taking a stance.
I can think of loads of rebuttals to this concern, though. Like I said, minor quibble. Players can take a stand sooner (might have to, if one plays by earlier printings), can keep playing irrespective of advancement, or the ref can concoct an epic 7/8-level transition quest to make that last level gain something to remember.
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bravewolf
Level 4 Theurgist
I don't care what Howard says.
Posts: 109
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Post by bravewolf on May 30, 2018 23:26:12 GMT -6
THAT is flippin' awesome! The OMO backstory is particularly evocative. Well done!
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bravewolf
Level 4 Theurgist
I don't care what Howard says.
Posts: 109
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Post by bravewolf on Apr 27, 2018 17:17:29 GMT -6
Shoot, they made it into M&M, p.7 as well, albeit in a modulated form (Turcopole-type). Turcopoles are probably militarily (and religiously) distinct from Turks, despite their shared heritage, though.
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bravewolf
Level 4 Theurgist
I don't care what Howard says.
Posts: 109
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Post by bravewolf on Apr 27, 2018 17:10:43 GMT -6
My gut-level reaction to Chainmail was that Perrin & Gygax had a Turk fetish. Is it fair to say of the OP that the question might be put, "What made the Turks so bad-ass that they get such prominent mention in CM?"?
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