Aslan Poetry

(Note: This is a translated form of an Aslan Yoyeaokhtef, which is an artform that combines poetry, calligraphy, and drama. The calligraphic elements are missing, of course, the translation is imperfect, and the poetic ornament does not carry over well. Still, it should get across the general meaning and some of the beauty of the artwork, which was created in the wake of a specific incident.)

The bright flower shivers
In the shadow of the grazing cow.*
I pounce and preserve its fragile beauty.


*"Cow" is the closest Anglic word available to represent the Aslan term for a grazing meat animal native to Kusyu. It is seen as quite stupid and so frequently is used to represent dishonorable persons.

Not Everyone Thinks The Same Way

This is going to meander for a bit, so bear with me as I slowly move toward the point.

A long time ago, I played my first game of Pendragon. I had heard about it, of course, but it was my first opportunity to actually play the game. Now, one thing I've never been secretive about, but which I don't bring up unless it's relevant, is that I'm a "pagan", or polytheist. When atheists bring up the argument that "we all don't believe in Zeus, why not just not believe in one more god?", I'm left laughing, because I "believe" in Zeus (as it were - "belief" is a complex subject for me; suffice it to say that I "believe" in Zeus in the same way that someone else might "believe" in the Prime Minister of Japan), among other gods. This is relevant because, when we were making characters, I found out that I could play a "pagan" knight in Pendragon. That was pretty cool to me, since at the time I was still just finding out that there were other polytheists in the modern, Western world, so of course I made a pagan knight as my character.

Here's the thing about people who are coming into an identity, and it was true of me at the time: they tend to be pretty intense. Since they are finding self-definition in terms of that identity, they tend to see everything in terms of that identity and relations to that identity. It's kinda like the old saw that when all you have is a hammer, all problems look like nails. Anyway, at the time, I was pretty strongly involved in my identity as a polytheist or pagan. Another thing about identity is that, when a person is strongly involved in it, people who don't belong to that identity are something of a threat. They either challenge that identity or create a boundary that reinforces that identity. It is pretty easy, actually, to force the challenging factors to conform to the reinforcement role by treating them as opposing forces. That is, someone who is not part of that identity can be either someone who presents an opportunity for deeper thinking about that identity and so deepen our connection to that identity (but this has two drawbacks: first, it is difficult work, and second, it can cause us to reject the identity), or they can be an opposing force that causes us to entrench more strongly in that identity. We can force people from the first category into the second by redefining them as "enemies". It is also possible to force people from the second category into the first, but that requires a subtlety of approach that is very rare (though it can be learned).

So, here I am, playing a pagan knight, with all of this identity matter still running hard in my head (I think I can't have identified as pagan for more than about 5-8 years at that point, and my serious involvement must have been less than 2). The scenario was set at a tournament, at which there were (of course) both Christian and pagan knights. Step by inexorable step, I found myself building a narrative where my pagan knight - and the other pagan knights were following my lead here - was in opposition to the Christian knights.

The thing is, in Pendragon, there isn't a strong theme of pagan vs. Christian. The GM of the game also didn't really want to deal with that theme. So, his first reaction to this development was to tell us that there wasn't a big pagan vs. Christian vibe at the tournament or in the world at large. He quickly backed off of that, to his credit, but that initial reaction, to try to control how the players reacted to the world, was an interesting one in retrospect.

At the time, gaming was starting to move in the direction of "story" that would ultimately result in the White Wolf concentration (in theory, at least) to the extent of redefining the Referee as a Storyteller, and then to the modern "story games" that bear only slight resemblance to the earliest adventure games. As a result, the idea that the GM was presenting a story within which the players would have some interactive power was becoming fashionable. This is a perfectly valid way to play this sort of game, of course, but the reaction of the GM of that Pendragon game is particularly interesting in that he stepped back from imposing his story. His impulse was to ask the players to head back to the story he wanted, but he chose instead, at least ultimately, to allow the players to lead the game where they wanted it to go, for good or ill.

For me, this was a critical moment in my gaming history. I started at that point to see that the "storytellers" in a roleplaying game were the players. The Referee was not the storyteller (though I would be derailed from this train of thought by White Wolf, and later by story games, for a while), who instead resembled something more like an editor.

What that long-ago Pendragon GM should have done, rather than tell us that "there's not really an opposition between pagans and Christians", which was basically telling us what our characters should be thinking, was to either let us run with what we wanted our characters to think (to be fair, that's what he did, in the end) or to, at most, present an NPC authority who would try to guide our characters. For instance, an older Druid priest who gave our knights guidance and tried to smooth over our conflicts of religion by, I don't know, teaching us about the Grail or the way that the Christians' idea of the Crucifixion resembles the native ideas of the King in the Ground (such as the head of Bendigeidvran, buried and protecting the island of Britain from invaders until it was disinterred). It's because not every person in a game world is going to be seeing things the same way. Like in our world, where on the one hand you have people like the Quakers, who are Christian, but also people like Fred Phelps, who is also Christian. Which one of them is correct? Sure, most people would pick the Quakers as better people, but the Phelps family are still Christians. There isn't a GM out there telling them that Christians don't think that way, but there are people (and perhaps spirits, if you accept that sort of thing) who are, and people who are telling them the opposite. It's still down to the Phelps family members, though, as to what they choose. If they did not have those choices, then they would not be responsible for them. Similarly, players should be responsible for the choices they make for their characters, and if the GM is making decisions for them, then why are they playing? (That gets a little more complex when morale and temptation systems come into play, or the personality trait system from Pendragon, but that's a topic for another time.) That's one of the reasons that I think the Alignment system as presented in AD&D is a problem and should be discarded.

Which is me coming back again to the idea of the sandbox, where the players are allowed to have their characters do what they want those characters to do. The environment can react to the characters, and there can even be NPCs with goals who actively affect the environment, but the environment shouldn't be altered for metagame reasons (that is, it should follow the classic idea that, if there are six trolls in a room on the third level of a dungeon, then if a single 1st level character shows up there will be six trolls, and if 20 10th level characters show up there will be six trolls, but if the trolls have been attacked and send for help from the hobgoblins there might be an additional 20 hobgoblins along with the surviving trolls the next time the players show up; I guess that one is a pretty big room).

A Little Bit Of A Personal Gaming Update

I have a number of projects ongoing, and some news on my own gaming front. Since I can't seem to sit down and write content that I want to put up on this here blog thing, I guess that a personal update is in order.

In general, I am doing a lot less than I would like to be. In part, this is because I really can't stand the heat, and there's no way to get out of the kitchen. Of course, people in other parts of the country are sneering at me right now, as I am in one of the most temperate parts of the Lower 48, but I am acclimatized to here ("here" being the Pacific Northwest), and it is hot for here (and humid, which is very unusual). Other parts have to do with life issues.

First up, the project on which I want to be spending a lot more time than I am is the Top Secret retroclone. I am working on it, but like this blog, gaming takes second place to things that are happening in real life. I am considering how to get art for it, which leads me to thinking about Kickstarter, which further leads to the idea of doing a real print run rather than, or in addition to, a Lulu.com product. I'm not sure about the ins and outs of that, though. I'll talk to people and see what can be done.

Second, it looks like I'll be trying out this newfangled online gaming by teleconferencing thing. Happily, it looks to be a Traveller game, albeit the Mongoose version. I still have to make a character and whatnot, but that should go pretty quickly.

Next there's the AD&D game I've been working on. I've done a reasonable amount of work on it. I've got some of the main city of the campaign mapped, along with some sketches toward the ground floor of the tower-citadel of the city's masters. I have ideas about the megadungeon, but haven't gotten to putting lines on paper for the map yet. I don't know whether to wait until I have at least the sketches of the city's sewers done first (the dungeon is located underneath the city) or fit the sewers around the dungeon. However, those issues have dropped in priority because…

Thinking about Traveller has made me realize that I really, really love that game. I have a science fiction setting that I had been working on for some short stories, and decided that now would be a fine time to put it in gaming form. Some of the themes I want to explore with the setting include the value of multiple cultural expressions to the long-term viability of intelligent species, the nature of human institutions like honor, empire, and such, and the ability of varying worldviews to coexist or not. There are a dozen human interstellar polities, and a dozen aliens. Players will only be human, and at least at first, I intend to limit them to the central Terran Federation. Things are not always what they seem, of course, but sometimes they are. The setting has a lot of secrets sitting in my head. For now, I'll be using MegaTraveller, with some ideas taken from GURPS Traveller: Far Trader and First In. Eventually, I'll convert it to T5.

Other projects, like the WRG Game, are on hold right now.

What have you been doing in regard to gaming these days?

Not-So-Obscure Games: Traveller: The New Era

What is going on here?

I pretty much skimmed over this game in my discussion of Traveller earlier. That was because it is a significantly different game than the others of the Traveller series of games. It develops from the GDW "House System", which was an adaptation of the second edition of Twilight 2000, modified for use with a D20 instead of D10 (and the rest of the House System games, including Twilight 2000 would follow suit). Closely related was Space 1889, which used a D6 instead. There are similarities with 2300AD (formerly Traveller 2300), but that was a direction of development that GDW abandoned.

Traveller: The New Era (or "TNE" for short) was a melding of concepts from the previous Traveller games with the House System. Characteristics were similar to Traveller, but not quite the same. Instead of Strength, Dexterity, Endurance, Intelligence, Education, and Social Standing (and Psionic Strength), a TNE character was rated in Strength, Agility, Constitution, Intelligence, Education, and Charisma (plus Psionics and Social Standing). Unlike Traveller, which rated initial characteristics on 2D6, TNE rated characteristics on 2D6-1. This is an easy conversion, of course, but it does require conversion. Other editions of Traveller can be used directly with each other, no conversion required.

In other editions of Traveller, character skills are rated in small numbers. A skill rating of 1 is acceptable, 3 is significant, and 5 is amazing, with different editions implementing those numbers in different ways. TNE, on the other hand, uses "asset" ratings, which are the sum of an ability and some skill points. These are around 10 for an average professional skill (roughly equivalent to about 3 in other Traveller games). The asset is multiplied by the difficulty modifier (1 for "Difficult" tasks, 2 for "Average" ones, ½ for "Formidable" difficulty, 4 for "Easy" tasks, and ¼ for "Impossible" tasks) to find the roll needed on a D20 for success. There are some finer points, like degree of success based on the difference between the target number and the actual roll, but that's basically how action resolution works. There are occasional instances where the skill points matter, so they are also tracked.

Characters gain starting skills by engaging in "careers". This is also like other Traveller editions, though there are many differences in the actual implementation of that basic idea. In other Traveller editions, most of the previous experience in careers is adjudicated by random dice rolls, but most of the previous experience in TNE is by player choice (though there are some random dice rolls, too). Each period of four years in a career gives a number of skill points to divide between the skills available in that career. Those skill points, when totaled at the end of generation, are added to the appropriate characteristic to determine the character's asset in that skill. In addition, careers that involved combat would give a bonus to a character's "Coolness" rating, used in combat.

In most of the other editions, combat is based around abstract "range bands" and 1.5m squares, depending on the exact situation (the squares are usually used for interior and starship combat, the range bands for outdoors combat), with 15m squares replacing the range bands in MegaTraveller. In TNE, the ground scale is based on 2m squares. It's a small change, but it makes previous materials (such as starship deck plans) useless, and so was annoying. It was also annoying for those of us who tried to use the material to make our own starship deck plans, as the 1.5m squares were perfect for that (2 of those squares, assuming 3m per deck, were 13.5 m³, which was the approximate value of one "displacement ton"), while the 2m squares did not break down into those traditional Traveller measurements so easily. In fact, I don't think that any deck plans were ever released for TNE (or, if there were, they were from secondary publishers, not GDW).

A turn in TNE was 5 seconds, which is comparable to most of the others (usually 6 seconds, though Classic Traveller had a combat turn of 15 seconds). Coolness rating was important, as it was a character's initiative rating, with higher Coolness taking actions first. Very high initiative characters (over 5) would also get an extra action in the round.

TNE had hit locations, which was available as an optional rule in MegaTraveller, but which has never had much importance in the game other than in this edition. A character would take damage in each location separately, with the amount of damage to a location determining the effect. Unfortunately, the "hit capacity" of each location was very high (the chest alone had triple STR+CON points, or an average of 36, the head twice CON, and the other body parts twice STR+CON - compare to an overall total of about 21 for damage dice that were about the same in the other Traveller editions, with about 14 points of damage to render a character out of commission, at least on the first hit). There was a special rule in TNE for auto-kill results to close the lethality gap.

Where TNE shined was in Fire, Fusion, and Steel, the "technical architecture" book. That was a set of systems for designing everything from starships to ground cars, from meson accelerator spinal mounts to body pistols. It was the first major release that included all of those in one place, deriving ideas from both the Striker and MegaTraveller vehicle design systems and from BTRC's Guns, Guns, Guns (aka 3G) weapon design system. This would kick off the fashion for extensive design systems that would culminate with GURPS Vehicles and the CORPS VDS ("Vehicle Design System"). Some people found these design tools intrusive on their experience (even if they didn't actually use them), and these sorts of systems have been falling out of fashion, sadly.

Quick digression about gaming philosophy: Some people have been complaining about detailed gaming systems. The usual argument is that they are too much work for games, since it is just as easy to simply eyeball some numbers, and the effect on the game is the same either way. Most of the information that shows up in those design sequences has no impact on games, they argue. There is much to be said for that latter approach. It was, for instance, the approach used in the original Traveller rules (excepting starships, of course). However, not everyone wants to approach a game in that way. Let me draw a comparison to Poul Anderson. Back in the '60s and '70s, most SF authors would eyeball their fictional worlds. Poul Anderson, though, would work out all of the details of his worlds: their orbital periods, surface albedo, axial tilt, primary's luminosity, and so on. Most of that information had no effect on his stories. However, that deep background informed his authorial choices. In the same way, a lot of these design choices in games don't have any direct effect, but they give deeper background information. Plus, in an open sandbox style, you never know what will be important. It's not to say that detailed design is the best way to do things, but it is one way to approach a game, and "good enough" estimation is not necessarily the best way to go either.

The starship combat system of TNE was excellent, as well. The designers learned what they could from people who had worked on the SDI project of the 1980s, among others, and presented a fairly realistic system. The first release of it was in the board game Brilliant Lances. Starship hit locations were filled with the systems from the design sequences and selected by die roll from among a subset that depended on the facing of the target in comparison to the firing ship. The boardgame used hexes (of 30,000km each) and vector movement, while TNE abstracted this to range bands and other abstractions.

Anyway, it was a solid game, it's just that I prefer Traveller to Twilight 2000. I'm also very much, as I mentioned in the previous discussion, not fond of the background changes made. One of these days, I'll talk about how a Traveller game works. That is, the general outline of play.

[V&V]FBI Guide to Metahumans: Project GILGAMESH

In addition to Princess and the teacher, Tyger, there are four other children (all of the other four are teenagers, actually) who are part of Project GILGAMESH.

Umbra

Identity: David Smith
Side: US Government/Project GILGAMESH
Sex: M
Experience: 0
Level: 1
Age: 17
Training: Education (Military)

Powers:

1. Teleport: instantly travel a number of inches equal to 100 times his current Power. PR = 3.

2. Non-Corporealness: PR = 4 per hour.

3. Animate Shadows: similar to Solid Energy Illusions, can animate up to current Power x 2 Creation Points. Damage is by a chilling touch. Range = 26".

4. Invisibility: PR = 1 per hour.

5. Special Requirement: Can only use powers when shadows are present (that is, not in bright light or total darkness). Teleport must begin and end in shadowy areas.

Weight: 160 lbs.
Basic Hits: 4
Agility Mod: -

Strength: 10
Endurance: 15
Agility: 13
Intelligence: 17
Charisma: 8

Reactions from:
Allies: -2
Enemies: +2

Hit Mod: 2.808
Hit Points: 12
Damage Mod: +2
Heal Rate: 1.6
Accuracy: +1
Power: 55
Carrying Cap: 200 lbs.
Basic HTH: 1d4
Movement Rates: 38" ground
Det. Hidden: 12%
Det. Danger: 16%
Inventing Points: 1.7
Inventing: 51%

Origin & Background: David never wanted to be noticed. Getting noticed only meant that his father was paying attention to him, and that never ended well. When his father came home drunk and started beating his mother, David's powers manifested as he faded into the shadows, then the shadows came to life around him and stopped his father. He wasn't in time to save his mother, who died of cerebral edema several days later. David was put into foster care, then found his way into Project GILGAMESH.


Nike

Identity: Linda Chen
Side: US Government/Project GILGAMESH
Sex: F
Experience: 0
Level: 1
Age: 15
Training: Education (Military)

Powers:

1. Wings: fly at 1764" (401 mph), PR = 1 per hour. (+3 Agility)

2. Heightened Strength +11, Heightened Agility +13

Weight: 120 lbs.
Basic Hits: 3
Agility Mod: +2

Strength: 22
Endurance: 13
Agility: 28
Intelligence: 14
Charisma: 14

Reactions from:
Allies: +1
Enemies: -1

Hit Mod: 7.7616
Hit Points: 24
Damage Mod: +3
Heal Rate: 0.9
Accuracy: +5
Power: 77
Carrying Cap: 717 lbs.
Basic HTH: 1d8
Movement Rates: 63" ground, 1764" flying
Det. Hidden: 10%
Det. Danger: 14%
Inventing Points: 1.4
Inventing: 42%

Origin & Background: No one really knows where Linda came from. She was found on the streets, seeming about 14 years old, complete with wings, but without any memories of where she came from. She was named by one of the technicians at Project GILGAMESH, and knows no other life. She has a very strong crush on David/Umbra, and will follow him anywhere. She carries a sword (+2 to hit, +1d6 damage) made of adamantium-like glass (structure 15), which she was carrying when found.


Diamond

Identity: Michael Glass
Side: US Government/Project GILGAMESH
Sex: M
Experience: 0
Level: 1
Age: 16
Training: Education (Military)

Powers:

1. Invisibility: PR = 1 per hour.

2. Force Field: range = 30". Can create a wall up to his current Power inches on a side, and other abilities as listed in the rules.

Weight: 210 lbs.
Basic Hits: 5
Agility Mod: -

Strength: 7
Endurance: 15
Agility: 13
Intelligence: 8
Charisma: 10

Reactions from:
Allies: -
Enemies: -

Hit Mod: 1.6848
Hit Points: 9
Damage Mod: -
Heal Rate: 2
Accuracy: +1
Power: 43
Carrying Cap: 194 lbs.
Basic HTH: 1d4
Movement Rates: 35" ground
Det. Hidden: 6%
Det. Danger: 11%
Inventing Points: 0.8
Inventing: 24%

Origin & Background: Very shy, Michael prefers not to be touched or seen. When his mutant powers manifested, they reflected his very withdrawn personality. His parents were at a loss for how to deal with him, so when some men from the government said that they could help him, they were relieved and let him go without a fuss. Michael doesn't blame them, as he knows that their life has been hard.


The Cat

Identity: Katherine Glockman
Side: US Government/Project GILGAMESH
Sex: F
Experience: 0
Level: 1
Age: 14
Training: Education (Military)

Powers:

1. Cat Powers (Heightened Agility +20; Speed Bonus +90" ground; Natural Weaponry +2 to hit, +4 damage in unarmed combat; Heightened Senses: Night Vision).

2. Regeneration: take an action to heal full healing rate up to once per turn. Can't regenerate damage from silver weapons.

3. Heightened Defense: all attacks against The Cat are at -4 to hit.

Weight: 140 lbs.
Basic Hits: 3
Agility Mod: -

Strength: 10
Endurance: 13
Agility: 33
Intelligence: 11
Charisma: 12

Reactions from:
Allies: +1
Enemies: -1

Hit Mod: 4.76
Hit Points: 15
Damage Mod: +4
Heal Rate: 0.9
Accuracy: +6
Power: 67
Carrying Cap: 161 lbs.
Basic HTH: 1d4
Movement Rates: 146" ground
Det. Hidden: 8%
Det. Danger: 12%
Inventing Points: 1.1
Inventing: 33%

Origin & Background: A fan of anime from a young age, and especially fond of cats and catgirls, Kat was delighted to discover that she had the grace and agility of a cat, and then found that she could extend claws from under her fingernails and her eyes had changed to look like a cat's! Obsessed with catgirls, she dresses in that style all the time. The officials of Project GILGAMESH have been very permissive of the unusual preferences of the kids on the theory that repressing them might cause the mutant powers to become less useful.

Not-So-Obscure Games: Traveller Through The Years

As most people know, there are four editions of Traveller that have seen print from companies with which Marc Miller is or has been directly involved, one edition from Mongoose, and a few editions converted to other game systems (or "engines", as some would have it). The two most well-known of the latter are GURPS Traveller and T20 (the D20 system Traveller conversion), but others such as a HERO System conversion and even a D6 System conversion exist. These seem like quite different animals to me, as the conversions, by necessity, focus on the default background, while the Marc Miller games (and the Mongoose edition; in fact, the Mongoose edition offers several alternate settings) can be used with that background or with any other the Referee wants to design. In addition to those editions, Marc Miller is about to print a "definitive" edition, Traveller5.

Here's a quick overview of the editions, including some notes as to how they differ from each other.

First was classic Traveller. Often called "CT" or the "LBB Edition" (for "Little Black Books", which was the context that I first heard that acronym used, only later seeing it used for the Little Brown Books of original D&D). This was actually several sub-editions. In the very first edition, the space combat rules used a scale of an inch on the table being 1000 miles scale, and a turn being 15 minutes. One G of acceleration for one turn gave a vector of 2" on the table. This was changed quickly to a scale of one cm on the table being 1000km scale, and a turn of 1000 seconds, or 16 ⅔ minutes. In this version, one G of acceleration for one turn gave a vector of 10cm on the table. Other than that change, the game was largely the same through all printings of the LBBs and the squarebound paperback edition called The Traveller Book. This was the edition in which a character could famously die during character creation (which made more sense than it sounds, but I'm not writing an apologetic here). Combat was arbitrary, with armor and weapons cross-indexed on a table to determine a modifier to the attack roll, and damage being rated in an absolute number of dice if a hit was scored. Damage points were applied directly to the physical characteristics of a character. The only dice used in the game were six-sided, frequently used as a 2d6 roll. As time went on, a lot of additions were written, such as the "enhanced" character creation for Army, Navy, Marines, Merchant, and Scout characters, vehicle design (the first in gaming that modeled the mechanical parts of a vehicle and derived a set of ratings for the game from those, in the Traveller miniatures rules called Striker), alternate combat systems (in Snapshot and Azhanti High Lightning, mainly, but Striker had an influence as well), robot design, enhanced star system generation, and so on.

As those various details accumulated, the game started to become somewhat unwieldy. A new edition was called for (this was 10 years after the game was released, so it wasn't like they rushed into this), and the result was the second full edition, the atrociously-titled MegaTraveller, which is usually abbreviated "MT". Character creation was revised a bit, to give players a little more control over their characters and to reduce (but not eliminate, thank goodness) the "death in character creation problem" that some perceived in the original game. Many aspects of Striker combat were incorporated into the game, such as the vehicle design system (expanded to starships, though the derived ratings were different for starship combat, since it was treated much more abstractly even in terms of damage effects) and the combination of weapon penetration and armor ratings. Because the systems were not perfectly integrated, damage became a little complicated, and characters tracked two entirely different sets of hit points! One of these was the traditional Traveller system of applying damage to the characteristics of the character, while the other was derived from Striker damage ratings, and was a pair of hits ratings (the first for unconsciousness, the second for death) based on the "Life Level" of the character, which is the sum of the first three characteristics. Again, this works better in practice than it sounds, but it is still an obvious kludge. Personally, of the published editions so far, this is my favorite, though I strongly dislike the "Rebellion" background and the events that follow on from that. As time went on, a number of additions were made to the game, many of them from the company called Digest Group Publications (DGP) that belonged to the people who did most of the work in revising the game, and it continued to grow, but never became the unwieldy mess that classic Traveller became from its additions.

[ADDENDUM: 26 June 2012] In the spirit of the game, let me take a moment to issue a correction, and point out that one of the biggest problems with MegaTraveller was the immense amount of errata and corrections that were issued over the six years of its active publication. Most of those have been consolidated, and you can find them, for instance, here. There is also errata for the other editions there, but none of them approach the extensive errata issued officially for MegaTraveller. Well, the errata for T4 comes pretty close, I suppose.

However, GDW was making some… let's call them "interesting" decisions in the early 1990s. One of them was to create a "house system" to which all of their various games would be converted over time. This was based on the second edition of their popular (at the time) Twilight: 2000 game, and was an outgrowth of the system that they had developed for the excellent Space 1889 game (I'll talk about that one another time). Since the Rebellion background was growing interminable, they also decided to, in effect, reset the background. In my opinion, this was the biggest mistake that GDW made in its entire history. Through a dramatic plot device, nearly the entirety of known space in the Traveller default setting was subjected to an apocalyptic computer virus that nearly wiped out the spacefaring races. One area was spared this fate (through the foresight of its enlightened ruler), allowing more traditional Traveller games to continue if desired, but the idea was now that players would be trying to rebuild interstellar civilization. The new edition was called Traveller: The New Era, often abbreviated "TNE". I'm not really going to discuss this edition, as it was a dramatic change from the traditional Traveller system. It did include a book called Fire, Fusion, and Steel, which was a complete design system for everything from robots and guns to cars, tanks, ships, and even spacecraft. This was the forerunner of such gearhead books as GURPS Vehicles and CORPS VDS. Some of the "alternate tech" in the book made it clear that GDW intended to convert its other SF RPG, 2300AD (formerly known as Traveller: 2300, but changed when it became apparent that too many people were confused by the similarity of the title to Traveller, and another game that I intend to discuss on this blog in the future), into the system, but this never occurred. I do like TNE, but not enough to make it a regular option at my table. It did include some excellent supplementary material, such as the space combat boardgames Brilliant Lances and Battle Rider, a superior edition of the miniatures game (Striker II), a colony mini-game designed to be integrated with a roleplaying campaign (The World Tamer's Handbook), and so on. It was also a little frustrating, since it came out only 6 years after MT was released, and lasted less than 3.

Sadly, GDW closed its doors, relegating TNE to the dustbin of history (though you can get PDFs of it, from RPGNow or DriveThruRPG). Three years after releasing TNE, a new company formed by Marc Miller, FarFuture Enterprises, would release a new edition of Traveller which went back to its roots. Taking a cue from MT, it made character creation more player-friendly (enhancing choice, reducing pre-play lethality). Combat was greatly simplified such that now armor simply reduced the dice of damage rolled when a hit was scored, and damage was returned to its CT elegance. However, this edition, called Marc Miller's Traveller or Traveller4 (abbreviated almost always as "T4") was plagued by typos and insufficient development. A number of supplements were released (notably, the superior Pocket Empires, which introduced a mini-game of interstellar economics and politics), but the problems in the main rules and in the new Fire, Fusion, and Steel attached to it helped prevent the game from gaining any traction.

That brings us to today, 16 years after T4 was inflicted on an unsuspecting world, and 35 years after the game was first released. Later this year, Marc Miller's Far Future Enterprises will be releasing, at long last, Traveller5. With luck, this will be a definitive edition of the game, incorporating the best of all of the editions. I doubt that sunny prospect will occur, but I can dream.

If it doesn't, I notice that Mongoose's edition of the game includes the OGL, allowing third parties to use large portions of their text verbatim. You can find a link to their developers' kit toward the bottom of the sidebar on the left side of this blog. [EDIT 2025-11-28: They no longer carry it, but it can be found at this link.] I would be interested in using that to put together my own version, taking what I consider to be the best of each edition (and stealing liberally from other games as I desire). You can bet that it would look a lot like MT, just integrated more thoroughly. But I have a lot of other projects to get to first, so I am hoping that T5 is all it can be.

The other major option is GURPS Traveller, which makes use of an alternative timeline in which the Rebellion of the main background did not occur. I like this, since one of the reasons that I am no longer as fond as I once was of the Imperium background is that we know how it is going to turn out. Everything is for naught. Anything you build will only fall into the pit of Virus and have to be rebuilt. The setting is not endowed with the infinite possibilities of the future, since we know what the future must be. I hate metaplots, is what I'm saying. GURPS Traveller's alternate timeline erases the metaplot from the setting and allows players to chart an uncertain course into a dynamic future again. Unfortunately for me, Steve Jackson Games has chosen to present the rules updated for GURPS 4E such that they focus on the very early part of the setting where Terra is taking its first tentative steps among the stars, and meeting with the old and decadent Imperium (later to be called the First Imperium, as the Imperium of the main part of the setting is called the Third Imperium). This is unfortunate because it means that they have not converted a lot of the technology over to 4E standards. Ah, well. It's not like I haven't been moving away from GURPS recently. Designed, point-bought characters just don't meet my needs at this time.

Inspiration

Some links of inspiring content from around, because I can't think of any useful content that isn't more V&V characters right now:

If you can't come up with story or scene ideas from these pictures, you aren't trying. Best of all, these things are all images from real life.

If your heroes aren't as brave as these children, then they're doing it wrong.

A psychopomp god at the symbolic crossroads of a city.
You can't make this up. What are the Secret Masters of
the World up to here?

This company makes real-life secret doors. You may find their ideas of value.

Tap-dancing Satan. Your argument is irrelevant. Also, let me reiterate, tap-dancing Satan. On Lawrence Welk.

There are people who are looking forward to "uploading" their minds to computers. This should prove a useful corrective to their wide-eyed optimism.

[V&V]FBI Guide to Metahumans: Tyger

(This is the first of these in which I include a "Mutant Power", that is to say a power that is not included in the basic V&V rules.)

Identity: Justin Archer
Side: US Government/Project GILGAMESH
Sex: M
Experience: 28433
Level: 7
Age: 29
Training: Intelligence

Powers:

1. Time Powers: a) Time Stop - PR = 8, take an action to activate, then take a full turn in which no other characters can act, though already active defenses will be in effect; b) Time Jump - vanish, then reappear in the same place a number of rounds later, PR = 1 per round jumped. He can only have one Time Power active at a time.

2. Teleportation: instantly travel a number of inches equal to his current Power score, PR = 1 per use.

3. Dimensional Travel: time travel, PR = 10 per journey.

Weight: 190 lbs.
Basic Hits: 4
Agility Mod: -

Strength: 12
Endurance: 13
Agility: 13
Intelligence: 14
Charisma: 15

Reactions from:
Allies: +2
Enemies: -2

Hit Mod: 2.4024
Hit Points: 10
Damage Mod: +1
Heal Rate: 1.2
Accuracy: +1
Power: 52
Carrying Cap: 288 lbs.
Basic HTH: 1d6
Movement Rates: 38" ground
Det. Hidden: 10%
Det. Danger: 14%
Inventing Points: 8.0 (1 was spent, I was increased)
Inventing: 42%

Origin & Background: When his mutant powers manifested, the orphan Justin used them to embark on a career of theft, stealing objects out from under the noses of their guardians. Finally captured by a Special Forces team equipped with advanced technology, he agreed to work with Project GILGAMESH as a trainer in exchange for immunity from prosecution for his prior crimes. When he has to fight, he likes to use a pair of Bowie knives (+1 to hit, +1d2 damage) to cut down his opponents between ticks of the clock. Never having had a family of his own, he is having some difficulty coming to terms with his new relationship with the kids of GILGAMESH.

O Fortuna

One of the things that occasionally shows up in rule sets is the idea of "luck" as being something that a character can have that is not connected to the normal luck of dice rolling. For instance, in Fantasy Wargaming, almost every interaction with the rules is affected by a luck roll that can itself be modified by the native luck of the character (as a special ability gained during character creation). In GURPS, there are several types of luck advantages, each of which allows varying benefits, such as re-rolling dice (the most common) or narrative benefits (like "Serendipity", which forces the GM to include one "fortuitous but plausible coincidence" per game session). CORPS Luck causes all rounding done in any calculation (except character creation and calculations that do not directly affect the character) to be in the player's favor. Some games have Luck as a characteristic (such as Tunnels & Trolls and Flashing Blades) or as a roll based on a characteristic (the Luck rolls of Basic Roleplaying and its progenitor, RuneQuest, both of which are based on the Power characteristic).

But what is "luck"? Why should it be different than just the result of the series of dice rolls made during the game?

Obviously, in those games which include it as a separate concept, luck is an active force in the game world. Rather than being a description of events after the fact, it is a prescriptive concept that rests in certain people and not in others. It (usually) can have the qualities of "bad" or "good", so that those cursed with bad luck see detriments in the game world, while those blessed with good luck see benefits. From this, we can conjecture that it must be an actual force in the world, and not just a description of relative fortune.

The term came late to English, but was based on much older concepts in Northern European (Germanic, Scandinavian, and Celtic, mainly) societies. In those societies, the success of a community, or a person, derived from its connection to the invisible world. In most cases, the community would have a connection through its sacrificial religion, especially through the institution of sacral kingship, which is the origin of political kingship. In this institution, a person would be chosen as the representative of the community to act as a sort of high priest. His (or sometimes her) duties would include observing various ritual taboos, engaging in ritual activities, and living a virtuous life. Failure in any of these was thought to bring ruin on the community. An individual would have a similar connection through his or her particular ritual and personal actions that would affect his or her life. For instance, a person might build his house on an elf path and see his luck drain away, or she might sing a particularly pleasant song in a place that the elves are present and find that she is afterward living a charmed life. On the larger scale, a bad king (for instance, one who gave bad judgments) would bring ruinous weather, unchecked banditry, and failed crops to his community, while a good one who observed his taboos, was pious, and embodied the virtues of his people would see pleasant, peaceful days and bountiful harvests under his reign.

So, "luck" was the favor of the invisible world. That matches pretty well with RuneQuest and Basic Roleplaying, where Power is also the characteristic that is associated with spirits and magic. It also fits well in games like Flashing Blades, where God has ordered lives for good or ill. What would be interesting would be to see ways of affecting the luck rolls and advantages. Luck could be used as a way of enforcing alignment (or whatever) restrictions, by making characters who do not live up to their professed philosophies lose luck, and those who hew closely to the restrictions of their ethos gain it.

(Inspired by a couple of comments here.)

Traveller5: The Kickstarter Campaign Is Live

OK, for a lot of people, D&D is where it's at. I do like me some D&D, for sure, but my main gaming love has always been Traveller, ever since I first saw a copy at the small bookstore where I got all my earliest gaming stuff. It had a book on starships, for Pete's sake! While Mongoose has had an edition in print for the last few years (and it is OGL, so anyone can publish material for it - and I have vague ideas of using it as the basis of a variant SF game to publish), the real deal has been away for a long time. The last official version from Marc Miller was Marc Miller's Traveller, the fourth edition of the game (with a couple of 0.5 editions in there, as it were). It was a problem for various reasons, most importantly that there were extensive problems converting the electronic files to match the printer's software (or something like that - I never did find out the real story, all I know is that there were significant errors when unusual characters were in use).

Anyway, it looks like all that is in the past, as the long-awaited fifth edition, Traveller5, is the subject of a new Kickstarter campaign. For a hundred bucks, you can get a signed hardcover of the game (which is extremely complete, and 600 pages or so), Traveller dice (one black, one white, and one red), a CD-ROM of the PDFs, and other stuff. As you add more to your pledge, you can get other stuff, but mainly it seems to be a card giving you a land grant and title on an Imperial world, plus the satisfaction of helping out above and beyond. At the really high levels, you can get your (character's) name attached to examples in the rules.

Anyway, I'm all about this. You might be, too.

Superheroes Without Comic Books

While I've been working out stats for various Villains & Vigilantes characters, I've been thinking about superhero games and worlds. There's an aspect of fantasy worldbuilding that isn't present in most modern-day games, in that the worldbuilder has to consider effects of fantastic powers on the setting, and personalities loom large in ways that they do not in the actual world.

But that's not what I'm going to talk about right now. What I was thinking about was what if we were to design a superhero (or metahuman, if we don't want to consider costumed crimefighters) world, but without the direct influence of any comic books at all. What if, instead of comic books, we design the setting so that movies provide the canonical source material. And, to make it a little bit tougher, let's avoid any movies that are based on comic books, or which present superheroes directly (so, no Zoom, no The Incredibles, and so on). To that end, here are the movies that I would want to use as source material, treating the events of each movie as if it occurred in the same setting as all of the others, just like Doctor Strange's weird astral journeys coexisted with Thor's Asgard, the Fantastic Four's journeys to strange dimensions, and so on. The fun part is trying to rationalize the stories that don't fit precisely:


The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the Eighth Dimension (how could I not?)

Archer (superspies! plus comedy!)

Big Trouble in Little China (ancient Chinese curses and martial arts magic)

The Bourne Identity and sequels (superspies!)

Dead Like Me (the afterlife and times of a group of grim reapers)

Dog Soldiers (werewolf packs, compatible with The Howling)

Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai (an unusual hit man works for the mob; kinda like superspies)

The Ghost Whisperer (spirit communcations)

Hanna (superspies! With the implication of genetic engineering)

The Hellstrom Chronicle (OK, this is cheating a little; I'd actually use the book that Frank Herbert wrote, Hellstrom's Hive, which treats the movie as if it were the product of one of the characters in the book. Among the creepiest villains ever)

The Howling (werewolf packs)

Humanoids from the Deep (fishmen make good villains)

The Hunger (immortal blood drinkers)

Inception (dream bandits with technological access to the deepest secrets in a mind)

Insidious (astral journeying as a superpower and source of Doctor Strange-like stories, plus dangerous astral entities; it's approximately a reimagining of Poltergeist, so I could include that too)

Labyrinth (a strange creature tries to give a girl what she thinks she wants)

The Last Dragon (martial arts mayhem and mysticism in the inner city)

Mr. & Mrs. Smith (superspies!)

Pan's Labyrinth (a different take on faery creatures)

Repo Man (punks and collections agents chase down a very special car, but what's in the trunk is the thing that matters)

The Secret of Roan Inish (a family with a special relationship to seals)

Simon, King of the Witches (magic!)

Time Bandits (a group of little people who are running through the cracks in creation to ransack the universe of its treasures)

In addition, I'd probably include the Indiana Jones movies as deep background, just so I could include that wonderful warehouse.

What these give me: superscience, aliens, superspies, super martial arts, an afterlife conception, werewolves, spirit mediums, genetically engineered supermen, a society of humans who aspire to be insects, fishmen, vampires, dream machines, astral travel, faeries, UFO/time machines, selkies, magic, cracks in the universe, and Indiana Jones's legacy. That's a good start, I think.

What movies or TV shows would you include?

[V&V]FBI Guide to Metahumans: Princess

One more, and I'll set this aside for a day or two. Maybe I'll do Tyger later on today.

Princess

Identity: Heidi Amundsen
Side: US Government/Project GILGAMESH
Sex: F
Experience: 0
Level: 1
Age: 6
Training: Education (Military)

Powers:

1. Invulnerability: Ignore 25 points of damage per turn.

2. Heightened Strength +50

Weight: 50 lbs.
Basic Hits: 1
Agility Mod: +4

Strength: 62
Endurance: 11
Agility: 16
Intelligence: 10
Charisma: 12

Reactions from:
Allies: +1
Enemies: -1

Hit Mod: 7.04
Hit Points: 8
Damage Mod: +1
Heal Rate: 0.25
Accuracy: +2
Power: 99
Carrying Cap: 5986 lbs.
Basic HTH: 2d8
Movement Rates: 89" ground
Det. Hidden: 8%
Det. Danger: 12%
Inventing Points: 1
Inventing: 30%

Origin & Background: When her parents could not handle her very high strength, Heidi was sent to a government facility that said it would be able to take care of her. She feels very alone there, while she is being trained as an agent of the US government, but she is starting to form an attachment to Tyger (who will be presented later). What will happen to these children of Project GILGAMESH is a story that will have to wait for the telling. Her code name is one that she was very insistent on having.

[V&V]FBI Guide to Metahumans: Arclight and Gaussian

This time, a brother and sister pair who fight against metahuman supremacists, but are hunted by the police for their crimes.

Arclight

Identity: Michael Day
Side: Criminal
Sex: M
Experience: 1268
Level: 1
Age: 20
Training: Strength

Powers:

1. Light Powers: Range 34", Dmg 2d8, PR = 1 per attack; Blinding flash with a radius of 34", PR = 1; PR = 1 to set up a Light defense; May create mundane light for no power cost.

2. Lightning Control: Range 22", Dmg 2d8, PR = 4 per attack; Electrical defense costs an action to start, but no PR or movement to maintain; Control electronics by save vs. Intelligence on 1d20, save vs. Agility on 1d20 to avoid mishaps for each action taken, PR = 4 per attempt, Range 22"; Short out electrical devices, PR = 4 per attempt, Range = 22", 22% chance of success.

Weight: 160 lbs.
Basic Hits: 4
Agility Mod: -

Strength: 8
Endurance: 11
Agility: 17
Intelligence: 12
Charisma: 11

Reactions from:
Allies: -
Enemies: -

Hit Mod: 1.408
Hit Points: 6
Damage Mod: +1
Heal Rate: 1
Accuracy: +2
Power: 48
Carrying Cap: 129 lbs.
Basic HTH: 1d4
Movement Rates: 36" ground
Det. Hidden: 10%
Det. Danger: 14%
Inventing Points: 1.2
Inventing: 36%

Origin & Background: Michael played around with his powers from a very early age, but with his sister's help managed to keep them secret from even his parents. The arrogance of being able to do something that no one else could twisted his priorities, and he decided to make his living at the expense of everyone else. He hates metahuman supremacists, though, as he is afraid of no longer being the most special person, other than his sister, in his world.


Gaussian

Identity: Linda Day
Side: Criminal
Sex: F
Experience: 1832
Level: 1
Age: 22
Training: Intelligence

Powers:

1. Magnetic Powers: Magnetic control, PR = 5 per attempt, Capacity 850 lbs, Range = 17", Lasts 13 rounds.

2. Lightning Control: Range 26", Dmg 2d8, PR = 4 per attack; Electrical defense costs an action to start, but no PR or movement to maintain; Control electronics by save vs. Intelligence on 1d20, save vs. Agility on 1d20 to avoid mishaps for each action taken, PR = 4 per attempt, Range 26"; Short out electrical devices, PR = 4 per attempt, Range = 26", 26% chance of success.

Weight: 130 lbs.
Basic Hits: 3
Agility Mod: -

Strength: 17
Endurance: 13
Agility: 10
Intelligence: 9
Charisma: 11

Reactions from:
Allies: -
Enemies: -

Hit Mod: 1.96
Hit Points: 6
Damage Mod: -
Heal Rate: 0.9
Accuracy: -
Power: 49
Carrying Cap: 404 lbs.
Basic HTH: 1d6
Movement Rates: 40" ground
Det. Hidden: 8%
Det. Danger: 12%
Inventing Points: 0.9
Inventing: 27%

Origin & Background: When Linda's parents found her levitating the silverware, they punished her and made her hide her abilities. That became her reflex, and she learned what she could do very secretly. When she found out that her brother Michael could do similar things, she hatched a plan with him to live a life of crime and adventure. Like her brother, she hates metahuman supremacists, but in her case it is because she has a true sense of equality.

Linda likes to fly above the battlefield on a manhole cover or other metallic object, while tossing lightning bolts at her targets. During a robbery, she uses her powers to short out alarm systems and communications devices like phones, computers, and radios before even allowing her presence to be known.

[V&V]FBI Guide to Metahumans: Amoeba

Ameoba

Identity: Gordon Jenkins
Side: Mutant Supremacist
Sex: M
Experience: 49852
Level: 9
Age: 28
Training: Agility

Powers:

1. Transformation: normally has no powers, but can change into a form that includes all of the following (or back into human form) at the cost of an action.

2. One-Celled Organism Powers:
     a) Water Breathing: PR = 1 per hour to breathe water.
     b) Stretching Powers: Maximum 7' 6", square 3' 9" on a side, or block 1' 11" on a side. PR = 1 when used as a defense.
     c) Regeneration: Take an action to heal full healing rate (max. once per turn).
     d) Heightened Endurance +6.

3. Absorption: Gains 1 hit point per hit point scored on opponent (in hand to hand unarmed combat only); hit points gained vanish when taken as damage or when transformed back into human form.

4. Poison/Venom: Paralysis Venom causes unconsciousness without hit point loss. 15 uses per day.

5. Reduced Charisma -7.

Weight: 240 lbs.
Basic Hits: 5
Agility Mod: 0

Strength: 15
Endurance: 9 (15)
Agility: 11
Intelligence: 13
Charisma: 11 (4)

Reactions from:
Allies: - (-4)
Enemies: - (+4)

Hit Mod: 1.54 (2.772)
Hit Points: 8 (14)
Damage Mod: -
Heal Rate: 1.25 (2)
Accuracy: -
Power: 48 (54)
Carrying Cap: 513 lbs. (585 lbs.)
Basic HTH: 1d8
Movement Rates: 35" (41") ground
Det. Hidden: 10%
Det. Danger: 14%
Inventing Points: 11.7
Inventing: 39%

Origin & Background: Always made fun of for his weight, Gordon retreated into study of the tiny creatures under his microscope. One day, when the taunting of his high school peers escalated to physical violence, the stress caused his mutation to manifest itself by transforming him into a translucent, amoeba-like humanoid creature, and he proceeded to get his revenge on his tormentors. The community was shocked, and he was hunted by the police to stand trial for his crimes of assault. Full of hatred for those who bullied him because he was different, Gordon ran, swearing that the "freaks" would inherit the Earth. Now he does all he can to make that happen.

[V&V]New Series: FBI Guide To Metahumans: Ice Queen

I love Villains & Vigilantes, because it is the one superhero game that is easiest to create a character, and is inspirational just by looking at the list of powers. The others require either too much effort (Champions, GURPS Supers, Supergame, Superworld), end up forcing particular powers on the characters (Superworld, Champions), are too closely tied to a particular background (Marvel Super Heroes), or are not to my taste in other ways (DC Heroes, just about any superhero game from the last 10 years except Godlike). It is possible to make a character in V&V almost as quickly as a character in original D&D, which is no small feat.

Anyway, I have a superhero (or, more accurately, metahuman) world in my head, where I've been coming up with metahumans off and on for years. In the world I envision, there are a couple of characters taken from my favorites in V&V's default background and from GURPS IST, but the majority are my own creations. Obviously, some are inspired by heroes and villains from the comics, but with the serial numbers filed off (though a few remain recognizable). In that world, things are not so simple as the V&V alignments of Good, Evil, and Neutral, but then neither is V&V as presented in the supplements. Instead, there are a number of "alignments" that can be chosen, which amount to factions. Some factions are allied, some are opposed, and some are indifferent to each other, which determine the equivalent to the basic Good/Evil sides. The major factions include: US Government, The Public (which is a catch-all for everyday people, and can't be chosen by heroes, villains, or mutants), Mutants, Mutant Supremacists, the State Governments, other national Governments, and so on.

Mutants (that is, any metahuman character or character with psionic powers) are treated by the "One in a Million" rule. That is, metahumans with significant powers exist in the world with a frequency of about one per million population. There are about 313 in the US in 2012, for example. There are other heroes, who have powers from devices, or magical powers, or extreme training. The FBI Guide that will be given in this series, though, covers only the one in a million and perhaps other mutants.

Things are not so simple in the world, of course, as just humans and metahuman powers. There are mutants who do not have significant powers - these are the completely disenfranchised. They are mutants and undergo the same prejudice and treatment, but have no compensating abilities or talents. They might look bizarre, but some are fortunate to look human. They simply carry mutated genes. Their children might have abilities, or look inhuman, or perhaps they will just be another generation of carriers. There are also a couple of mutant races, where particular mutant powers bred true. There will probably be a few entries in the FBI Guide dealing with those.

To kick it off, here's an entry for you:

Ice Queen

Identity: Lily Snowfield
Side: Protectors
Sex: Female
Experience: 5722
Level: 3
Age: 22
Training: Agility

Powers:

1. Ice Powers: 6" range, 1d12 dmg, PR=5 per attack

2. Emotion Control (Love the Ice Queen): 12" range, PR=8 per successful hit

Weight: 125 lbs
Basic Hits: 3
Agility Mod: -

Strength: 15
Endurance: 11
Agility: 8
Intelligence: 12
Charisma: 14

Reactions from:
Allies: +1
Enemies: -1

Hit Mod: 1.078
Hit Points: 4
Damage Mod: 0
Heal Rate: 0.75
Accuracy: -2
Power: 46
Carrying Cap: 280 lbs.
Basic HTH: 1d6
Movement Rates: 34" ground
Det. Hidden: 10%
Det. Danger: 14%
Inventing Points: 3.6
Inventing: 36%

Origin & Background: In High School, Lily was thought of as the most attractive girl, and she developed a cold disposition to fend off her suitors. When her mutant powers manifested, they enhanced her icy disposition, even as they drew in everyone who saw her.


(As an aside, the following mutant characters from V&V's default background are part of this one: Skyhawk, Nomad, The Shrew, Evergreen, Dreamweaver, and Marionette. I may include others, such as Kali, who is not a metahuman.)

Obscure Games: Fantasy Wargaming, Part Eight

The series began here.

It's always disheveled maidens
that dragons want, isn't it?

The final chapter of Fantasy Wargaming is the list of "monsters, magical beings, and general fauna". This chapter has been roundly criticized, and for once I agree with many of the criticisms. The monster listings lack many vital details (how much damage an Alphyn does with "tooth and claw" is never stated, for instance, nor is the damage of any other creature listed), the creatures chosen are strangely idiosyncratic to the point of near uselessness, important creatures for the period are ignored (where, for instance, is the schrat?) while obscurities are elevated in importance (the two-bodied lion? really?), etc. On the other hand, though, some of the creatures listed are evocative or at least amusing (this was the first place that I ever heard tell of the bonnacon). There's a surfeit of Celtic critters, which as I have noted previously is sort of odd given the lack of interest in the Celtic context that would make such monsters comprehensible.

One of the places I disagree most strongly with FW is in the matter of how to handle damage. Since a character in the game has "hit points" equal to his Endurance, but Endurance has other functions, we end up seeing such ridiculous things as dragons with a mere 25, in relation to a typical human with about 10 or so. I'd consider a change in which the size of a creature affects the final hit point total, rather than stringently relying on the Endurance rating.

And that's it. I could comment on each monster entry specifically, but I won't bother. Instead, I'll spend the rest of this entry discussing the game as a whole.

Obviously, I like it. Or, rather, I think that there is one of the greatest fantasy games around hiding underneath its rather rough presentation. The treatment of magic and religion was ahead of its time, and in my opinion has never been equaled. Mage: The Ascension, to choose one notable example, played with the same ideas, but clothed them in a game system that was, at best, difficult for the average Referee (or "Storyteller") to use effectively. It was one of the first roleplaying games to present mass combat rules in conjunction with the main rules (as I recall, only Chivalry & Sorcery preceded it in this, though one could make a case for D&D, if Chainmail is considered). It was arguably the first roleplaying game that took pains to lay out the reasoning behind most of the design decisions (much of the first half of the book could be seen as "designer's notes" explaining the game). It integrated fairly sophisticated personality mechanics before such now-classic games as Pendragon, and well before modern, well-received games like The Burning Wheel or The Riddle of Steel. It developed the "black box" table mechanic that would become fashionable in game design for a brief period, and which powers such classic games as Chill, James Bond 007, or, especially, Marvel Super Heroes. It is, as far as I know, the first game to treat gods and other spiritual powers as individuals with goals and personalities.

But. The game's design team was very inexperienced at writing rules, and they did not understand the value of playtest or development, and it shows. There are terrible mechanical ideas (such as the need to roll dice in order to find out on which column to roll more dice to determine success), cumbersome record-keeping (the Piety Point system being only the worst offence), inexplicable omissions (a character can learn to sing, but not to play an instrument, for example, there is no unarmed combat permitted, apparently, and as mentioned monsters and animals are not provided with a measure of appropriate damage), unnecessary sexism (while an attempt to portray women as the middle ages saw them is, perhaps, defensible, the mechanics used to do so are not - for instance, by the rules, there are fewer women born to high social status fathers, and in fact emperors can't have daughters at all! Go ahead and do the math; never mind that there are more Pisces slaves than any other sign, or that Aries nobles outnumber Scorpios*). The claim of historical accuracy has holes, as well, since there were occasional medieval Christians who studied Cabala, but the game artificially limits that study to Jews and Muslims. Weapon damage is odd in practice, as a dagger does more damage than a sword at high Physique levels. For that matter, as noted above, there are problems with the specific number of hit points allowed to various characters and creatures.

There are matters of presentation that could use fixing, as well. I've noted that the lists of factors should be listed by category rather than by factor and that major sections should be set off more noticeably. I'd, personally, revise the personality factors so that they represent virtues rather than vices ("Chastity" instead of "Lust", for instance), which would occasion only minor changes to the rules. A more clear order of play should be presented, so that the Referee has more guidance for how a roll once a day for minor complaints should function, or how to give the daily Piety Point bonus fairly.

Implied sections of the game are missing. Since there are rules for mass combat, it should be expected to see (as we do in Chivalry & Sorcery or Pendragon, for example) guidelines for running a manor or other political unit that would give a reason for using the mass combat rules. Since there are explicit discussions of how a character can rise in the Ethereal hierarchies after death, perhaps a brief overview of Afterlife adventures would be in order, even if not all Referees and groups of players would use the ideas presented. And so on.

There are times that the authors allow their opinionated natures to shine perhaps too brightly. There are arguments both for and against these moments. When the authors say, for instance, "Fantasy Wargaming awards no experience merely for gathering money or other valuables - picking up 100 'gold pieces' and carrying them for a day and a half is not physically different to picking up and transporting two medium-sized bricks; it is what you have to do to get the money that counts!", it gives some insight into what they intend "experience points" to represent in the game. On the other hand, the constant sniping at other games gets tiresome at times.

With a thorough rewrite and revision, this could have been one of the greatest fantasy roleplaying games of all time. As it stands, it is still one of the most valuable for (actual and would-be) game designers to examine for ideas. It is important for the history of gaming, as well. Its reputation among online gamers is largely undeserved, and the game should be sought out for examination, if nothing else.


*Yes, I realize that this is only for characters created as PCs. The point is that the system by which Social Class is influenced by Star Sign, or even Aspecting, is a silly one, and the system by which one's father's Social Class is determined was, perhaps, not well thought-out. These are issues that could have been fixed in playtest and development.

Life, Eh?

Life has gotten in the way. Will finish up the FW series later today or tonight, I hope.

Meanwhile, let me point out some other blogs of interest.

Over on Vaults of Nagoh, Chris Hogan has been analyzing Mythus, with a much less approving perspective than I bring to FW. So far, he's at 15 (actually 17, because there's a prelude before that entry and part two is in two posts) parts, and he's not quite through the end of Chapter 11 (of 17, plus Appendices), or page 200 of 400+. He makes some cogent observations on game design in the process, and has a larf. Other than one post in February and a few posts in March, it's the only thing he's done lately, so you can pretty much just forward through the posts.

James Maliszewski at Grognardia discusses my favorite H.P. Lovecraft story of all.

Roger the GS at Roles, Rules, and Rolls makes the only comment on DNDNext/5E so far that has interested me. I'm not going to playtest it, and I have no idea if I will pay money for it. We'll see. But this mechanic can be appropriated.

Guy Fullerton at Chaotic Henchmen Productions sets out some ideas about production design. I think that they are ideas to keep in mind, but like all design decisions they are just one tool in the toolbox.

Peter D at Dungeon Fantastic discusses why adventurers loot dungeons, but don't rob from the merchants who have the money to pay them for that loot. Discussions like this are generally useful for everyone who does D&D-style adventure gaming.

Alright, one more post about 5E. Dan of Earth at Goblinoid Games lays out the final argument about why this coming edition will ultimately not support old-school-style play. Without presenting a real option for consequences to a character's actions, the game moves firmly from challenging entertainment to mere ego-stroking time-waster. If I wanted that, I'd watch TV or play a MMORPG.

Obscure Games: Fantasy Wargaming, Part Seven

This series began here.

I couldn't find an appropriate image,
so I just went with the default.

Religion! The occupation of the finest medieval minds and the source of all intellectual thought in Europe for centuries, or even millennia. Fantasy Wargaming ties it tightly to the magic system, which only makes sense, as magic is the way the world works in the world simulated by the game. There are three religions that are covered in the rules, two of which are mirrors of each other (or, accurately, one of which is a mirror image of the first). In this sense, a "religion" is an Ethereal hierarchy, a temporal hierarchy, and a set of religious customs (ceremonies, rules of piety, and so forth).

The most obvious way in which religion manifests in fantasy adventure gaming is through miraculous events and divine intercession. These are, of course, covered in the game. A character determines his Divine Grace or Devil's Favor by adding his religious level, his Religious Rank, and his Piety or Impiety (called "(Piety)" in the game) level. It is not made clear whether one should subtract Impiety or Piety from its opposite Grace/Favor, treat it as zero, or deny characters in the wrong Piety category from Appealing to those powers at all. I incline toward treating it as zero, but other Referees might choose another option. After calculating this, there are other factors to apply in an Appeal to an Ethereal Power, which are then applied to a table. This gives four possible results, success or failure, either with or without a penalty to the number of Piety points the character possesses.

If successful, the Power to whom the Appeal is made will then either Intercede with another Power or execute the miracle directly. A "miracle" can refer to either a magical operation or certain other types of action, such as giving information, forgiveness (which affects Piety level), a personal appearance by the Power, or even the resurrection of the dead (which is not possible by magic). Really, anything can be attempted.

That matter of Divine Grace and Devil's Favor brings us to the character of the first two religions covered in the game: the Christian Church and Devil Worship. Each has a hierarchy, with Ranks ranging from 1 (unordained clergy, monastic novices, or the members of a witch coven) to 10 (the Pope or the Devil's Anti-Pope). There are rules for promotion within a hierarchy, which for the Christian Church are strongly affected by Social Class, but the Devil is apparently more egalitarian.

Piety and Impiety are calculated by tracking a number of Piety Points. 10 points is PB 1, 40 is PB 2, 80 makes the character PB 3, and so on, each Band increasing in width by 10 points from the last. Below zero, the character tracks Impiety, or (Piety) (rated as (PB)), though PB 0 is the same either way. Piety Points are lost by committing Sins, which are classed from 1 through 7, with Class 1 Sins being the worst (murder, acts of worship to other gods or the Devil, denying God), and the least being 7 (laziness, lying to strangers, gluttony, drunkenness). There is a table showing the amount of Piety Points that are lost by each category, with more Pious characters losing much more, as God expects more from them. For instance, a character with PB 2 will lose between 8 and 15 PP for a Class 3 Sin, while a character in PB 6 would lose between 22 and 28. To gain Piety Points, there are two ways: a free and automatic increase of 30 points per day (but only for days that are actually played out), to cover "all the times [that the character was presented] the opportunity to Sin but didn't"; and also by the commission of Virtues, also rated in Classes 1 through 7, gaining fewer PP for characters in a higher PB and more for those in low PBs or in (PB)s. I do dislike the abbreviations, but they may actually be the clearest way to present the information. Virtues range from Class 1 (defending God or His interest against His enemies) through Class 7 (moderation in food and drink, activity (i.e., not laziness)). Going back to the rules on Temptation, resisting Temptations can gain Piety Points.

There is a discussion of the dangers of Impiety, which mainly opens one to the depredations of Devils and the censure of the Church.

After a character dies, there is a calculation of the state of his soul. Whether he goes to Heaven, Hell, or Purgatory (and how long for that last) are discovered by the addition of factors. By this means, actually, a character may become a Saint or Demon, and so may be Appealed to by his former compatriots!

The clergy gain the ability to perform ceremonies, such as holding Mass or Ordaining a new priest. Confession can help with the state of a character's Piety, or Maledictions and Excommunications can be directed at a character's opponents. Each ceremony also transfers an amount of mana to the appropriate Power, at a rate of ¼ the amount gained through magical preparation (so, a preacher might gain mana for his God by the process of Incantation & ululation). Each ceremony also gives religious XP to the celebrants. Diabolical ceremonies are parodies of the Christian ones, but the Devil also retains some ceremonies from the Pagan forerunners of his anti-Church, such as the Feast or Sacrifice. A ceremony also creates a chance that the celebrants might become Inspired. Inspiration is a powerful state that increases the character's Piety Points and morale level, improves many of the character's characteristics temporarily, and gives bonuses to self-control in the face of Temptations and the anger of Berserk states. In addition, an Inspired character gets a bonus in Appeals. In addition to ceremonies, there are circumstances where a character may become spontaneously Inspired, or Inspiration can happen by Appeal to an Ethereal Power.

The next section is one of the most lampooned in other reviews. It is where the various Ethereal Powers are given statistics for use in the game. People claim that this table gives combat stats for Jesus, but this is not entirely true. While "God" (as the Trinity) is given a combat level (24, for those without access to the book), His other characteristics are pretty much infinite. As a result, there is no way to actually "kill" Jesus, and any strike by Him would be transcendentally effective. Of course, any Referee who used God in that capacity is probably not worthy of the office. The Ethereal Powers are not intended for use in that way, but are given appropriate characteristics because players are given authority to make decisions for their characters, which might include swinging a sword at a Saint, or more likely a Demon. The fact is, though, that most such entities are beyond the ability of most characters, and it is only the least of them (say, the Cherubim or Demon warriors) that might be interacted with in that way - or an Appeal for appearance might cause a clash of Demon and Saint! From a character's perspective, though, the most important characteristics of the Ethereal Powers are their Rank in Host, Resistance to Appeals, and Areas of Interest and Disfavor.

Religious XP are given for successful Appeals, ceremonies (as mentioned), resisting Temptations (to a certain limit), and Correct behavior (characters in good standing with their religion gain ⅓ of their total Piety Point gain for the day, rounded up, in XP).

Medieval Europe of the period had at least one other religion, though (and, yes, it is true that Devil Worship as presented never existed in reality), which was the Norse religion. This gets covered in some detail, showing the differences between the monotheism of the Church and the polytheism of the native religions. Many of these differences are subtle, but create significant differences when applied. For instance, there is no, strictly speaking, Impiety level for the Norse (however, it is noted that the Devil will take an interest in a Norseman whose Piety drops toward Impiety, and from then on his Sins in a Christian sense will affect his level of Impiety). The Virtues and Sins of a Norse (or Anglo-Saxon) pagan are different, and are enumerated in Classes from 1 to 7. The daily bonus of 30 PP applies, as well. Intercession in the Norse hierarchy is slightly different, involving factors covering the spouses, offspring, and siblings of various gods and goddesses, as well as their personal feelings toward one another. Do not ask Heimdall to intervene with Loki!

There is a calculation for the state of a Norseman's soul after death, as well, but it is affected strongly by the specific circumstances of death, with the drowned going to a particular place, for instance. It is possible to become a minor god or a Valkyrie, and even to rise in stature in the Afterlife. This implies a possible game of life after death for those involved, say, in a TPK, but this is not really explored deeply in the rules presented.

The hierarchies of Norse religious figures is quite different, as any man (or woman) may perform ceremonies. There are specialist religious, but any free man or woman has a Rank of 1 or more. Ceremonies and Inspiration are detailed in the ways they differ from those of Church or Coven. Finally, there is a listing of the Ethereal Powers in the Norse host, similar to the listing of Christian and Diabolic Powers.

Though the Celts (Irish, Scots, Manx, Welsh, Cornish, Breton, and so on) are referred to fairly extensively in the background material, there is no attempt to present their religion. It would not be too different than the Norse, however, and so could be easily modeled.

Next time comes the last entry discussing the rules, which will cover the monsters and magical beings, along with other animals, and sum up my thoughts on the game.