Whitehack - great new rpg

[Deleted]

When was the last time an RPG caught your attention and demanded to be played - DCC ? LotFP ?

Whitehack is a newly-published complete fantasy role-playing game in only 32 pages (6" x 9"). It's author, Christian Mehrstam, has taken the Swords & Wizardry (Whitebox edition) retroclone and has developed his own vision of a old school-meets-new ideas ruleset.

What makes this ambitious ruleset stand out from the pack is the depth of design. From the cover as character sheet to the rules within there is a clarity and creativity that is positively endearing. It will be played...

[More to come]

[kesher]

Well, a Deft Kobold Assassin is pretty much guaranteed to get my attention.

This looks awesome--lots of goodness packed into 32 pgs. Added to my lulu queue.

[Finarvyn]

But it's not free, right? I was looking for a free download and didn't see one.

[machpants]

No PDF at all that I can find?

[tec97]

Looks like at the moment, hard copy is the only option.

[kesher]

A PDF would be nice. I was just intrigued enough to put my money down.

[Finarvyn]

I'm intrigued as well and certainly like the inspiration (cough, S&W WB, cough) but am not ready to plunk down my money yet. When you get the book, give us a review.

[Deleted]

I have the book, just haven't played yet. But here are my thoughts on character creation as I primarily wanted a ruleset that could handle the following query:

'Can I play a Fighting Man, a planewalking Dragonborn, Ergo the Magnificent or Sand Dan Glokta ?'

Other retroclones cannot do this to MY satisfaction, so I looked and found Whitehack.

The intention behind the ruleset is to cater for adventures with modules and resources available for all editions of D&D (0e to 5e) AND homebrews (taking into account the vast range of classes and races) while keeping the rules of a manageable length.

Character Creation is rolling up the attributes then picking whether the character is Deft, Strong or Wise. Deft characters rely on their skills and/or are attuned to equipment (e.g wandering monk's staff, ranger's hound, your father's blade) and experiences. Strong characters are melee specialists and Wise characters have abilities with use of special knowledge - magic/miracles/science.

Other games that have used a similar split seem to boringly imply that Deft =Thief, Strong = Fighter, Wise = MU/Cleric but Whitehack allows that a Wise Mercenary or a Deft Alchemist are viable options.

Deft/Strong/Wise each have different advancement tables and rules tweaks - using 'slots' for special abilities/powers.

Then decide on the vocation/species/affiliations of choice e.g Egg of Coot Orc Mercenary, Barbarian Dwarf Ranger, Lankhmar Thieves Guild Wizard etc, then equip your character.

The beauty of Whitehack character creation is not just 'you can play what you want' but that it is mechanically supported without being complex. I have left out details on slots or how assigning a vocation/species/affiliation to a stat affects dice rolls but it works like 5e Advantage/disadvantage.

So by the end of the 1st chapter (a few pages) you already have a ruleset that does what 5e promised but has so far failed to deliver. And that's just the start.

[kesher]

So by the end of the 1st chapter (a few pages) you already have a ruleset that does what 5e promised but has so far failed to deliver. And that's just the start.

Funny--that's almost the same vibe I got from it just looking at the (short) lulu preview and reading the reviews. I also like what I've read about the task-bidding mechanism; it seems robustly brilliant.

I will indeed post my thoughts once my copy arrives.

Does anyone know the author? Any chance he could be directed over here to comment himself?

[bexley]

I've already been doing to advantage/disadvantage thing for awhile. What is the bidding system and is that the sole reason why I should buy this in non-pdf form?

[Deleted]

Oct 18, 2013 8:20:58 GMT -6 bexley said:

I've already been doing to advantage/disadvantage thing for awhile. What is the bidding system and is that the sole reason why I should buy this in non-pdf form?

From the author in reply to a query on G+:

Let us say that the characters are trying to board a ship and rescue a prisoner before the ship leaves shore. The villain captain deploys some of his people to stop the characters on the shore, while the other crew members make ready for departure. I’d run the fight on the shore as an auction, but I’d run the consecutive fight with the captain and his best fighters using the regular combat rules.

For the auction, I’d make one group of enemies for each player character, and decide on an approximate attribute for each group, using 10 as a base value (see p. 19). A group of eight goblin minions facing Kalynna (Paladin, back cover) might get 18, while the group of three human sailors facing Howl (Kobold Assassin, back cover) might get 13. If these minions have some special equipment, skills, advantage/disadvantage etc., I’d adjust those values a bit. But I never plan this ahead, and don’t use more than a few seconds for this decision. I don’t tell the numbers to the players.

Next, I tell the players what is happening. Like "Kalynna, as the ship is starting to take off, eight goblin thugs spread out in a semi-circle, looking to overwhelm you on the shore. They’re armed with scimitars and knives, and one of them has a crossbow. No armor. What’s your plan?" Then I listen to Kalynna’s player. If she says she’s just gonna try and get past super fast without trying to defeat all of them, I’d let her use Dexterity. If she says she’s going to use Kalynna’s weapon skill and strength to kill them, I’d let her use her total attack bonus + 10 as a stand in "combat attribute." If she says she’s gonna rely mainly on her superior armor, letting this battle take its time, I’d let her use her AAC.

Based on what she says, I’d also decide on what’s at stake. Like: "Each loser in this auction is gonna take 1d6 damage," or maybe "if you lose, you will still defeat the goblins, but you will be too late and you will take d6-2 damage."

Once this is done (about 30 seconds), me and Kalynna’s player play out the auction using the regular auction rules, role-playing each bet:

Me: "I bet 2. The goblins rush you!"
Kalynna: "5. I charge their flank!"
Me: "7. The crossbow goblin fires at you."
Kalynna: "9. I raise my shield crash into them."
Me: "10. Two of them manage to get up behind you."
Kalynna: "No more bids. I stand and fight."
Me: " Crap. 9. You win. All die but two, who run away wounded. Wanna describe it?"
Kalynna: "Sure. Their knifes are too weak to penetrate my armor, so I take out the scimitar fighters first. The sand is black with goblin blood, and I laugh as I let the remaining knife-fighters encircle me …"

When you write this down like I’ve done above, it takes a lot words. But in reality, this scene would take maybe 2–3 minutes with zero planning, and the descriptions for each bid would likely be longer than what I've written above. There would still be some tactical choice involved in choosing strategy for the player characters and in placing the bids, but also room for free descriptions of cool scenes.

There are ideas throughout that you could bolt onto my/your system if desired but the way the author has smoothly integrated all the tweaks together is cleverly done.

[Stormcrow]

What are the numbers they are bidding?

[kesher]

This bit from another review touches on your question (since I can't answer it definitively yet...)

Combat feels refined and elegant. Something that is aided for the players by the games simple character sheet. Wielding weapons with different powers are easy enough to add up on your attack and melee rolls. The game also suggests using an “auctioning” system that allowing players to determine the outcomes of such encounters like chases or hordes. You are basically placing a bid to win this type of an counter. The rule reads, “Any participant starts with a bid that she promises to beat with a successful skill roll. For instance someone with dexterity 12 might bid 1, meaning that she promises to roll 12 or below but also more than 1. Any other contestants have to bid higher or make a final bid of 1 (a “one-bid”) to show that they are in the contest. When all have made their final bids, the one with the highest bid rolls first. If she succeeds, she has won the contest, but if she fails, the second highest bidder has to roll. The person with the lowest bid does not have to roll in the order to win if everyone else fails, but you have to bid to participate in the contest.”

WHITEHACK handles death in a way I have not quite read before. For starters, if you are attacked and take enough damage to drop you down to zero or negative hit points you have a special save option. Think of it as a boost of adrenaline at the last second allowing you to reduce the fatal hit by 1d6. Should a character hit points be reduced to zero or some number below zero that character is considered unconscious and injured. Now if that character is attacked again they can provide a saving throw. So long as the character passes the saving throw they will remain unconscious. If they fail they are dead but the character is allowed to continue playing in ghost form providing advice and maybe aid to their fellow players.

[bexley]

Ahh. Scene framing mechanics. That's a nice little touch. Sounds like a cool mix.

[kesher]

Here's a brand-new review that actually walks through a lot of the mechanics:

A Look at Whitehack (Part 1)

I'm eagerly awaiting my copy...

*Edited to fix link

[coffee]

Oct 20, 2013 15:36:07 GMT -6 kesher said:

Here's a brand-new review that actually walks through a lot of the mechanics:

A Look at Whitehack (Part 1)

I'm eagerly awaiting my copy...

NOTE: That link takes you to the blog, not the post; scroll down for the Whitehack entry.


The more I hear about this, the more eager I am to try it. kesher, maybe you could run this over a G+ Hangout (since we don't seem able to find the same time free these days...)

[kesher]

Hey, how did you tag me in this post? I wanna know how to do that!

You know, Will, that's not a bad idea; I'll work on setting that up. OR, we could try it on tomorrow at The Spyhouse...

Which leads logically to:

My copy arrived yesterday, and I'm almost done reading it (it is only 32 pgs, after all...) Physically, it's an awesome, digest-sized, stapled book, with a durable cover and high-quality, slightly glossy, paper. Well worth $10, especially when using a 20% off coupon.

I plan to write a more thorough review once I've actually finished reading and and perhaps played it, but here are some initial thoughts:

• This is a toolbox. Amost NOTHING is defined within the rules. FREX, you can make a Wise character; all this means mechanically is that they can perform "miracles". Miracles aren't defined other than as being some sort of special effect that costs HPs to use. So, a Wise character could be a Wizard, a Priest, a Psychic, a Scientist, a Superhero, a Mutant... etc. Concurrently, a miracle could then be a spell, a prayer, a mental power, the effect of a device or compound, an innate power, a mutation. This. Is. Cool.Even the HP cost is determined via negotiation between player and GM.


• It accomplishes a LOT with the simple advantage/disadvantage double-d20 roll that I, anyhow, became familiar with through the first playtest iteration of DNDNext. I love that mechanic, so it's nice to see it in play in a different set of rules


• There are many suggestionsin the text, and very few prescriptions. It puts me in mind of the text of T&T, not to mention the S&W Whitebox rules from whence came its inspiration.


• As previously mentioned, it has a robust conflict-resolution system (outside of combat), ranging from straight ability checks, to opposed contests, to a bidding system. I really like this, though it's somewhat problematic to use it with monsters. These systems all rely on ability scores, and the monsters, defined only on a table, have no ability scores. It's possible, of course, to just make them up on the fly, but it would've been nice to see that mentioned in the text.


• The introductory adventures, while both cool in their own way, well, I would rather have seen only one, with the remaing page space dedicated to a few more examples of WHITEHACK-unique things like Vocations and Affiliations.




The game just begs you to adapt/create a setting, come up with a list of Species/Vocations/Affiliations, and start playing. The included setting (The White Curse)is essential for providing an example of how this can be done.

[Deleted]

Use the at symbol (@) and the desired user name kesher.

[kesher]

I've ended up doing a bit of WHITEHACK evangelizing as part of what might become an online OSRish Con...

So many games, so little time!

[bea]

I DMed the House of Rogat Demazien with Whitehack as the rule set on a small local OSR con a few weeks ago. None of us took the time to read through the rules properly before starting off, so take my few cents with a grain of salt

First off, the miracles mechanic is amazing. It's a superbly simple and incredibly powerful way of describing spells, magic abilities, mutations, special feats and higher tech as limiting or free as your gaming group sees fit. A specific miracle can take a few attempts to 'settle' - that is, you might go through two-three usage scenarios before the DM and player have reached a consensus and gut feeling about the power level and flexibility of it. I recommend that you take this time in character generation. When a player describes the miracles she wishes to use, just ask "can you tell me two or three circumstances in which you would use this and what effect it would have?" Then give your idea of how many hit points this would cost and if you'd like to limit, expand or balance it somehow. That's five minutes well spent. Don't feel like doing that? Just pick a spell from any other game, assign a hit point cost to it and go.

We never tried the bidding mechanic, so I don't have anything to say about that.

In my humble opinion the real innovations of this game are the character types (Deft, Wise, Strong), how they influence gameplay and the concept of Miracles. We didn't try out the group affiliations, which I believe are more useful in campaigns than one-shots.

I should probably give the rules a good thorough read through and get back with more info...

[kesher]

First off, the miracles mechanic is amazing. It's a superbly simple and incredibly powerful way of describing spells, magic abilities, mutations, special feats and higher tech as limiting or free as your gaming group sees fit. A specific miracle can take a few attempts to 'settle' - that is, you might go through two-three usage scenarios before the DM and player have reached a consensus and gut feeling about the power level and flexibility of it. I recommend that you take this time in character generation. When a player describes the miracles she wishes to use, just ask "can you tell me two or three circumstances in which you would use this and what effect it would have?" Then give your idea of how many hit points this would cost and if you'd like to limit, expand or balance it somehow. That's five minutes well spent. Don't feel like doing that? Just pick a spell from any other game, assign a hit point cost to it and go.

Exactly! And that's great adivice, too.

Some of my cronies and I will be testing out the character-making flexibility tomorrow morning. The plan is to try and emulate as many types of D&D as we can think of, see if we can recreate their characters from my own rule-set that we've played a few times, and my gut tells me it should be able to do literary pastiche with aplomb as well...

Hans E Magnusson: Have you tried this game?

[Finarvyn]

I'm torn on this.
1. It sounds really neat.
2. I already have OD&D, C&C, S&W, and other games to fill a similar niche.

I wish there was a free download to look at, because I hate to spend much money on something that I might never play.

[bea]

Nov 8, 2013 11:58:27 GMT -6 Finarvyn said:

I'm torn on this.
1. It sounds really neat.
2. I already have OD&D, C&C, S&W, and other games to fill a similar niche.

I wish there was a free download to look at, because I hate to spend much money on something that I might never play.

I kind of felt the same way (which is why Whitehack and Vornheim are the only OSR products I've bought this year). That said, it's cheaper than a ticket to the movie theatre and you're pretty much guaranteed to get more than three hours of fun from it

You glance enough of the base mechanics to give a clue if you read a few reviews. The selling points are really what's already been presented: beautiful layout (it really is 32 pages of joy to look through), bidding mechanic for larger conflicts (doesn't interest me, tbh, so I haven't checked it out), the deft/strong/wise character concepts (allowing for a diversity of characters I frankly didn't think was possible while being OSR compatible), Miracles, group affiliations (I read through it just now; it's basically a way to anchor the character to the setting. Nicely done and affects gameplay positively, but not a vital mechanic by any means).

Having all the other games as you do - and I suspect you're very comfortable playing and running your own Whitebox - I doubt Whitehack will be your primary game. There are easily elements from it you can use in your other games, though. As well as inspiration for game design.

It's a neat little book. You'll have to decide for yourself if you think it's worth the $10 (what's the shipping cost, anyway?). I paid 95 SEK (~$14) for it, have played it for about five hours so far and regret nothing. I don't think it will be my primary game, but should I go travelling and want to bring a game with me Whitehack is easily it.

[kesher]

I second bea. Fin, after living with the text for a couple of weeks (I've read the whole thing a few times), and as @relic implied in his first post, I've really come to see this game as a sort of Rosetta Stone for playing any edition of D&D, all together at once, easily. That last point is important; while the games you mentioned robust enough to be twisted and formed into all sort of new shapes without breaking, it still takes a lot of effort, and it demands singular focus. WHITEHACK does it effortlessly, all at the same time, by providing a breakthrough OSRish design (whatever that is) focused on the fundamental building blocks of adventure games, while never sacrificing (and perhaps increasing) the spirit. I've read a lot of d**n games, and I haven't seen anything else that even comes close.

That's my two bezants, anyhow...

[Finarvyn]

That's certainly a strong endorsement. I'll have to rethink my position, if there really is that much goodness therein.

[keith418]

I got a copy and am very impressed with it. The production very tight and very, very well-designed.

[tec97]

OK. I've broken down and ordered this... Looking forward to perusing it!

[jeff]

Could someone break down how the auctions work in more detail. Those sound really interesting.

[skars]

I decided to go ahead and buy three copies. One for me and a couple to gift...More notes once I have read it. Loving the product quality

[discuit]

I bought this and love it, but i was just wondering if anyone has come up with a solution for making all the mechanics roll over" as per saves and to hit? The opposed system (roll low but still high, and sometimes on 2 dice which might be negative or positive) is really grating on my players.