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Post by derv on Mar 8, 2020 14:35:37 GMT -6
Yeah, THOSE EIGHTEEN PAGES! Did I get your attention? Well, it's not really those--mysteriously--lost--eighteen--pages. It's another Broken Spoke Production called The Eighteen Pages. Grab it before I have any second thoughts or fool around with the document. |
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Post by Finarvyn on Mar 8, 2020 17:28:42 GMT -6
A fun read and a nice slice of speculation.  |
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Post by waysoftheearth on Mar 8, 2020 17:29:22 GMT -6
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Post by Deleted on Mar 8, 2020 18:32:30 GMT -6
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Post by derv on Mar 10, 2020 19:31:20 GMT -6
I knew I would end up messing with the document. Nothing major. Just a few notes under the Armor Classes and a minor edit that added info to the Attack Matrix.
DL it again if you're curious.
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Post by waysoftheearth on Mar 10, 2020 22:30:20 GMT -6
I’d like to see man-at-arms in there between mortal/flunky and hero  |
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Post by derv on Mar 11, 2020 9:07:00 GMT -6
What is intriguing about the time period up to Gygax receiving the 18 pages of notes is that you can find statements from various people, including Kuntz and Arneson, to the effect that the rules did not exist in a "stable" form. They were "in flux", "fluid", and lacked "concrete organization". You understandably start to hear a little push back post-77 about the "organization" of the campaign.
It's really a relatively short period of time we are talking about when you think of it. During this time period Blackmoor moved in several different directions, including tabletop war games. We make various connections to several sources of inspiration for it's methods (Braunstein, Strategos, Chainmail, Ironclads). Some of these sources are not obvious and appear residual until we look deeper. At times, they still appear residual. We might wonder why that is. In my opinion, it's partly because Gygax, in writing the manuscript, thought he was creating something "stable" for publication- concrete methods.
What The Eighteen Pages tries to do is present the concepts and open the door to show some possibilities of how the methods could have evolved. And hopefully open up some discussion in that vein.
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Post by aldarron on Mar 21, 2020 13:23:22 GMT -6
Interesting mix of stuff Derv - I like how you threw in an AiF style treasure table. Your warrior class is pretty good, not so much the wizard. Blackmoor wizards had 4 levels of spells, but at least 14 levels of ability/experience.
One thing I really like is the cover art - that castle is awesome.
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Post by Finarvyn on Mar 21, 2020 17:58:54 GMT -6
Blackmoor wizards had 4 levels of spells, but at least 14 levels of ability/experience. There's another thing I didn't know. Any more details you can share on this? |
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Post by aldarron on Mar 22, 2020 7:48:26 GMT -6
Blackmoor wizards had 4 levels of spells, but at least 14 levels of ability/experience. There's another thing I didn't know. Any more details you can share on this? Probably I should add that to my growing list of blog posts I need to write, but briefly, as we've discussed here and there in the Blackmoor forum, the FFC has a few reverences to the 4 levels of spells, and different wizards have different rates of spell failure for the spells they make (oh, I did write about that not long ago). Anyway, when we look at Arneson's Corner of the Table newsletter, we see references to wizards of differing levels, and the highest one is a Sorceress of level 12 (not 14 - I mis-remembered that). Exactly what going up a level meant for a wizard isn't clear but maybe had to do with the spell failure rate. The RSV has some clues in this regard and I prolly ought to get my next post on that out. |
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Post by Finarvyn on Mar 22, 2020 9:08:10 GMT -6
Interesting. I guess somehow I had blended "4 levels of spells" with "4 levels of wizards" (e.g. the Magician, Warlock, Sorcerer, and Wizard specified in Chainmail) in my mind.
I wish that Dave's CotT newsletter was made public. It would be fun to read some of Dave's stuff, and I wish he wrote more.
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Post by derv on Mar 22, 2020 12:54:37 GMT -6
Interesting mix of stuff Derv - I like how you threw in an AiF style treasure table. Your warrior class is pretty good, not so much the wizard. Blackmoor wizards had 4 levels of spells, but at least 14 levels of ability/experience. One thing I really like is the cover art - that castle is awesome. Glad you liked my latest offering Dan. It was fairly difficult not to develop some ideas further-like the wizard. For instance, I didn't make mention to things like superberries that could allow a magic user to cast spells of greater level. In fact I didn't go into magic items at all. Magic swords was a tempting addition for the rules. What I was concerned with was presenting some concepts in a raw fashion that allowed others to draw their own conclusions as to how the system evolved. I would guess that you agree a 12th level wizard was likely an evolution. I purposefully did not go into a lot of detail about experience gains and progression. But, I alluded to how I think it worked and that it was specific to each players character. Essentially Objectives lead to Investments and/or practice in particular areas. Fighters might invest in martial training, Wizards in spell research, as an example. This coupled with a time factor (because training and research takes time) led to gains in ability scores. Rises in abilities led to level gains. Objectives >>> Investments/practice >>> ability score gains >>> level progression. The Eighteen Pages wizard basically lays this out where there are 4 spell levels and 15+ levels of Magic Point progression (mo points, mo magic). I imagine such levels could be grouped in a number of different manners, much like Arneson started out by categorizing Chainmail monsters in three distinct groups. I look forward to hearing about your next blog post. Perhaps you'll lay out wizard progression in more detail. In the mean time I've added a supplement for The Eighteen Pages called Scratch Build Campaign. Check it out. You could even use Strategos A instead if you like. |
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