New Years Celebrations

New Years Celebrations
1. The villagers light a big bonfire and everyone gets really drunk.
2. A large feast is held after slaughtering a bull, with gifts given to friends and family.
3. The eldest person in the village is sacrificed to the gods to ensure the upcoming year is better.
4. A large dance is held, with much drumming and wild costumes.
5. New Years is the one day a year where marriage bonds do not hold. Everyone has a great time.
6. A parade is held, with all of the children born that year brought forth. Gifts are given to the parents.
7. A captured goblin, orc, or other monster is placed in a wooden effigy of the local god, which is then set on fire.
8. Races, wrestling matches, and archery contests are held. The winners receive gifts and gold.
9. Magicians create colored lights that twirl throughout the town. Illusionary dragons and other creatures fight in mock battles in the town square.
10. Priests hold day long sermons reminiscing about the previous years and those who died. The townsfolk all attend and are dressed in black robes. As night falls, bells ring and the townsfolk throw off their robes to reveal brightly colored clothes. A large party then ensues (and includes the clergy).

Silver standard

I've decided to use a silver standard in the mini6 game I'm working on. It makes more sense to me than the buckets of gold approach found in D&D. It was a pretty easy conversion, as I just took the D&D equipment list and converted it to silver pieces. It's still not very accurate historically, but I think it makes a bit more sense.

There's a pretty cool thread about all of this over at RPG Site. I recommend giving it a lookover if you are interested in this kind of thing.

And regarding my mini6 fantasy game, it's coming along. I still need to come up with a bunch of magic items, but much of the work is now done, other than tweaking stuff.

Some Mini Six stuff I've made

I'm working on a standalone fantasy game using Mini Six. It's going to have a  lot of influence from D&D. It uses hit points instead of wounds. Here's a couple things I've come up with, so far:

Spells:

Cure Disease

TN: 20 + Resistance Roll

Duration: Permanent

Resisted: Disease Severity

The target of the spell is cured of all diseases. Assign the Resistance Roll based upon the severity of the disease. A common cold would be an Easy roll, while the Black Death would be a Difficult roll, and a magical disease might be a Very Difficult roll.

 

Linguist

TN: 14 + Resist Roll

Duration: Concentration

Range: 20 feet

Resisted: Charm

When cast, you can understand someone speaking in another language. You can speak limited phrases in their language, as well (I’m hungry. Where is store. Etc.). You can also read basic sentences in other languages (complicated passages are beyond this spell, though). No Resist Roll is required if the target wants to speak with the spell caster (just the standard spell roll is needed).

Monsters

Tyrannosaurus Rex ***** Scale: +4D

Top of the food chain.

Might: 6D Wit: 0D

Agility: 2D Charm: 1D hp: 50

Attacks: Bite (11D damage vs. human scale)

Tail Bash (8D damage vs. human scale)

Perks: Tough Hide (+5 armor)

Static: Dodge 6, DR 5

Velociraptor *** Scale: +0D

Fast hunter.

Might: 4D Wit: 0D

Agility: 4D Charm: 1D hp: 50

Skills: Tracking 3D

Attacks: Bite (4D damage)

Perks: Tough Hide (+3 armor), Fast (Base move 25’, Runs 50’)

Static: Dodge 12, DR 3

Elemental (Air) **** Scale: 0D

Living air creature.

Might: 4D+1 Wit: 1D

Agility: 4D+2 Charm: 1D hp: 37

Skills: Brawling 5D+1, Dodge 5D+2

Perks: Insubstantial (Can only be harmed by magic weapons or spells).

Whirlwind (Can throw characters ten feet up into the air on a successful Might check vs. the character’s Might. Character takes 1D of damage and must make a Difficult Agility check or drop all items in his hands).

Fly (can fly up to 120 feet per round).

Static: Dodge 17, Block 16, DR 0

Ooze *** Scale: +2D

A living pool of acid.

Might: 0D Wit: 0D

Agility: 1D Charm: 0D hp: 24

Skills: Acid Touch 3D, Stealth 4D

Perks: Ooze (can only be harmed by fire or magic),

Acid touch (attacks do 3D acid damage and ignore armor).

Static: Dodge 3, DR 0

I have a number of other spells and monsters completed, but this should give an idea of what I'm doing. If something doesn't look right compared to similar stuff in the game, let me know. Thanks!

Christmas wrap-up

I went out to my parents place for the holidays. Lots of relatives were in town. We ate a ton of food and watched a lot of football on Saturday (Christmas Eve).

I am SO glad the Steelers played at 1 pm and not 4 pm. Dinner and presents would have sucked if the game had been on then, as most of us would have been trying to watch it.As for presents, I got some clothes and a couple gift cards to Barnes and Noble. Not sure what I'll buy with them, yet.

Yesterday my brother and I watched the Firefly marathon through most of the day, then went back down to my parents for another meal and another round of presents (and different relatives). It was a good time.

We then watched the Doctor Who Christmas special, which was pretty good. Not great, but not bad. It was a bit more cheesy happy Christmas than the typical Who episode, which kind of surprised me. Usually, something horrible happens to the Doctor or his companions on Christmas. We then finished watching the rest of the Firefly marathon.

Overall, my holidays were damn good! I hope everyone else's were as well!

Merry Christmas! Ho! Ho! Ho!

Merry Christmas, everyone!

Mini Six rpg

I've been making my own fantasy version of the Mini Six rpg the last week or so. I've still got a lot to do, and I'm not sure this will ever see the internet, but it's a lot of fun. I really like what AntiPaladin Games did with their version of the Open D6 license. I really recommend people check it out.

Mini Six is a pared-down version of the old Star Wars D6 game, and I think it's amazingly well done. They got rid of a lot of the extraneous rules, and made the game simpler to learn and play, while still allowing  a lot of options.

For my personal version, I'm working on the following:

1. It's going to be fantasy. I've removed all the guns and starships and aliens. done
2. I'm using hit points instead of wound levels. I do not like the death spiral created with wound systems. done
3. I'm adding in new monsters and spells, mostly stuff I'm converting from D&D. started
4. I'll be adding in new races like the cambion, nephilim, and wildfolk, that are already in my BFRPG Sword & Board supplement. not started yet
5. I'm going to add in the standard D&D gold system. not started yet
6. More magic items. started

I've already gone through and done some stuff, like getting the basic formatting set up and removing references to wounds. Now it's just adding things.

trailer for "The Hobbit"

I'm excited! Love that the dwarves are singing. Many familiar faces, as well. Wish it would get here before next December!

I like chainmail bikinis!

Why yes, I think they are fantastic! I'm also easily annoyed by people saying they are unrealistic and "break the immersion". Guess what, 99% of the stuff you see in any D&D campaign is completely unrealistic. This includes the fact that your characters are allowed to run around with weapons and in armor while not being nobility. Unless one of the party is a noble of some type, every adventuring party would be jailed, and possibly tortured and executed, just for carrying a sword.

The Daedra

The Daedric Princes in The Elder Scrolls series really feel like the Titans of Greek mythology. They are more forces of nature and and not really concerned gods. A few would count as really evil, depraved gods that don't like their own followers, though.

The quests they put you on in the game are generally really nasty. They get in your head and try to get you to kill your companions. They try and force you to sacrifice good priests, especially Boethia, the cannibal. I really like how they are implemented in Skyrim, and they should provide a great base for DMs to model evil gods and priests on.

As I've said before, DMs who need inspiration owe it to themselves to play Skyrim, especially the side quests (the main quest with the dragons is not even the best questline in the game, IMO).

Skyrim Official Game Guide for D&D

Not sure how many of you play Skyrim, or have seen the game guide by Prima. I would recommend it for GMs. It has tons of maps in it for small to medium sized dungeons, along with some towns. The various dungeons also are detailed with monsters and some treasures. Mining and Alchemy and Enchanting are also covered, which would provide ideas for GMs, especially for OSR games that dont' have a lot of detail. There's also a poster map of Skyrim. If you like Norse style gaming, this book would be a great purchase for setting ideas. I really like the book. Also, it's 656 pages and only $27.

Anyone have the new Carcosa yet?

I have the original unexpurgated edition. I was wondering if anyone has the new version being published by LotFP and what they thought of it. I'd really like to know is if it's worth bothering with if you already have the original.

Harry Morgan passed away, too

M-A-S-H star Harry Morgan dies at age 96

He was Col. Sherman Potter on "M-A-S-H"and Sgt. Joe Friday's loyal partner in later "Dragnet" episodes. He apparently had studied pre-law in college, and then became an actor after working with some people in DC.

When he was not on the set, Morgan enjoyed reading books about the legal profession and poetry. He also liked horses, which he once raised on his Northern California ranch.


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Seems like this is a really bad day for people I was influenced by growing up. RIP Harry.

Darryl K. Sweet passed away

If you have the old Hobbit and Lord of the Rings paperbacks, the Wheel of Time books, the Shannara books, the Thomas Covenant books, and lots of others, you recognize his work. He was an amazing artist. I've kind of grew up associating his artwork with fantasy fiction. RIP.

Finally got burned by a Skyrim mod

I knew it would happen sooner or later. A mod to have the bard in Solitude sing the YouTube version of "The Dragonborn Comes" screwed up my game. There was a crackling noise when anyone talked. I removed the mod and then I couldn't load any saves that used it. Kinda sucks.

Not really surprising, though, since it was done without the Creation Kit. I was going to put a warning up on the Nexus site about it, but they had already removed the mod, so I guess it nailed a bunch of people.