Monthly Archives: November 2017

Rich descriptors

One of the more surprisingly effective character creation innovations I have come across during the last several years was when Ram decided to add a set of random appearance results automatically to the default output from his character generator. For example: Thief, Male, Child, in Uniform, Tall is so much more immediately intriguing than just Thief, especially along with STR 4 and WIS 5.

But there is nothing special about those particular appearance tables, and if anything they are somewhat mundane, apart from one third of characters being either children or decrepit, which is rare for starting player characters and so lends interest. Maze Rats characters have more unusual descriptions, but are still relatively literal and immediate: wiry, singed clothing, and so forth.

What if we tried for more suggestive descriptors, such as roles or life stages? In the following d66 table, I tried for a set of results that in a single word suggest gender and age, along with a dash of social status, without being quite as direct. And of course, one could interpret a role either more or less literally. Depending on campaign particulars, reynard could mean young adult trickster or it could mean that the character was an actual fox who somehow was transformed into a human. Or maybe it means halfling animal person foxling.

The entries perhaps still need some tuning, but the idea seems promising, especially if a few such rich tables could be constructed. I avoided more mundane pairs such as father/mother, husband/wife, king/queen, and so forth. I also tried to select pairs that were somewhat quirky without being ridiculously obscure and tried to avoid pairs that involved explicit hierarchy, though without complete success. Columns control implied gender, with odd male and even female. Rows control implied age, with higher number meaning older.

Though maybe unworthy at this point, here is a PDF of the table.


 d66 1 2 3 4 5 6
1 urchin waif prince princess naif ingenue
2 monk nun chad trixie reynard vixen
3 cicisbeo mistress satyr nymph gallant diva
4 swain wench dogsbody charwoman footman handmaiden
5 widower widow hermit hermitess courtier courtesan
6 alumnus alumna troglodyte hag codger crone

Table form inspired by Maze Rats.

Participants in a conversation on Google Plus suggested some of these entries (I generally post privately; you must be in my circles to see it).


Some other leftover pairs:

knight dame
patriarch matriarch
patron matron
hero heroine
pimp madam
father mother
boy girl
husband wife
magister magistra
seducer seductress
beau belle
??? vamp
adonis ???
popinjay ???
groom bride
actress actor

Hazard System v0.3

The Hazard System is a gameplay engine for traditional roleplaying games designed to facilitate fictional consequences of player decision-making while minimizing bookkeeping.

Find a full HTML version of v0.3 in this post below the divider.

There is also a PDF version (see Downloads).

Significant changes between v0.2 and v0.3:

  • Hazard die results now follow higher = better principle
  • Generalized hazard die:
    1 setback, 2 fatigue, 3 expiration, 4 locality, 5 percept, 6 advantage
  • Introduces free moves, full moves, and conditions terminology
  • Formatted PDF as two letter-sized pages for ease printing two-sided on one sheet
  • Included brief chronological further reading section for context
  • Included simple default subtables for several kinds of outcomes, such as haven shortages and disasters

The text below the divider is released under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license.

Attribution: Necropraxis Productions Hazard System v0.3 (2017)
http://www.necropraxis.com/hazard-system/


Hazard System (v0.3)

The six-sided hazard die deploys threats, manages resources such as light, and keeps time. It is the engine that drives gameplay forward, ensuring that choices have consequences while minimizing bookkeeping. To take a turn, have a player roll the hazard die and have the referee interpret the results relative to the current turn type. During a turn, each player may take one full action. The general form of the hazard die is:

1 2 3 4 5 6
Setback Fatigue Expiration Locality Percept Advantage

Hazard Die Interpretations

Haven Turn Interpretation

d6 Result Interpretation
1 Setback Encounter (use regional table) or disaster (see below)
2 Fatigue Shortage (1 medicine, 2-3 drought, 4-5 famine, 6 trust)
3 Expiration Clear one or more haven conditions
4 Locality Advance season (or other local change)
5 Percept Foreshadow looming disaster
6 Advantage Full recovery

Wilderness Turn Interpretation

d6 Result Interpretation
1 Setback Encounter (use regional table) or road/bridge out
2 Fatigue Rest and consume rations (1/person) or suffer minor harm (1 HP)
3 Expiration Expire transient wilderness condition
4 Locality Shift weather (or other local change)
5 Percept Spoor or clue regarding next encounter
6 Advantage Free wilderness turn

Dungeon Turn Interpretation

d6 Result Interpretation
1 Setback Encounter (use zone table)
2 Fatigue Rest and consume rations (1/party) or suffer minor harm (1 HP)
3 Expiration Expire transient dungeon conditions (light, spell, etc)
4 Locality Shift dungeon state (or other local change)
5 Percept Spoor or clue regarding next encounter
6 Advantage Free dungeon turn

Combat Turn Interpretation

d6 Result Interpretation
1 Setback Opponents act first or additional encounter (use zone table)
2 Fatigue Suffer minor harm (1 HP) if engaged in melee
3 Expiration Expire transient combat conditions (light, burning, etc)
4 Locality Shift battlefield (or other local change)
5 Percept Spoor or clue regarding next encounter
6 Advantage Free combat turn
  • Some disasters (1d6):
    1 invasion, 2 insurrection, 3 fire, 4 earthquake, 5 flood, 6 falling star
  • Some dungeon localities (1d6):
    1 obstruction, 2-3 seal/open door, 4-5 divert water, 6 expose secret
  • Use common sense: ignore results that do not make fictional sense, but only the first time
  • Keep time abstract: quantifying the details precisely is rarely worth the hassle

Moves and Conditions

Moves represent actions relevant to the current fictional context, such as exploring a trackless stretch of swamp. Conditions represent persistence of a transient state, such as adventurer exhaustion. Conditions can apply to areas, parties, or individuals. Strictness tracking conditions is a matter of style. Tokens can help. The lists of moves and conditions below below are suggestive rather than complete. Improvise others as appropriate, according to referee ruling.

Haven turns represent several days or weeks of rest and recovery.

  • Free haven moves: advance/level up, prepare spells, recover, recruit, resupply
  • Full haven moves: craft gear, scribe scroll, conduct research
  • Haven conditions: curse, famine, pestilence, shortage, siege, winter

Wilderness turns represent travel and making camp, approximately one day and night. Making a wilderness move requires consuming a ration or taking the exhausted condition in addition to rolling the hazard die. If already exhausted, at the start of a wilderness turn suffer minor harm (1 HP). Determine randomly whether setbacks occur during day or night.

  • Free wilderness moves: access known landmark in current area, survey adjacent areas
  • Full wilderness moves: travel to adjacent area, search, explore, hunt, track
  • Wilderness conditions: exhausted, lost

Lost: Travel is no longer an option. Use search to locate a landmark, removing the lost condition on success.

Dungeon turns represent exploration at architectural scale, approximately tens of minutes or a few hours, assuming careful advance into hostile places.

  • Free dungeon moves: look under a rug, open unstuck door, pull lever
  • Full dungeon moves: climb, force a door, move to adjacent area, pick a lock, search
  • Dungeon conditions: candlelight, torchlight, overburdened

Combat turns represent tactical actions occuring over seconds or minutes.

  • Free combat moves: shout command, drop held item,
  • Full combat moves: shoot, spell, strike, throw, withdraw
  • Combat conditions: burning, defended, grappled, prone

Notes and Further Reading

  • Consider using a simple slot-based encumbrance system, such as one item per point of strength.
  • Locality results work best if you design areas with countdowns or aspects that can shift between states.
  • I replace traditional initiative with the combat hazard die.
2012-09-16 http://www.necropraxis.com/2012/09/16/abstracting-missiles/
2013-04-10 http://www.necropraxis.com/2013/04/10/solipsistic-hexes/
2014-02-03 http://www.necropraxis.com/2014/02/03/overloading-the-encounter-die/
2014-05-22 http://www.necropraxis.com/2014/05/22/proceduralism/
2014-12-23 http://www.necropraxis.com/2014/12/23/hazard-system-v0-2/
2015-02-09 http://dungeonofsigns.blogspot.com/2015/02/luceat-lux-vestra-making-light.html
2016-07-22 http://www.necropraxis.com/2016/07/22/tactical-hazard-die/
2016-09-19 http://www.necropraxis.com/2016/09/19/let-it-ride-or-push-your-luck/
2017-06-11 http://www.paperspencils.com/2017/06/11/the-haven-turn/

Released under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license. Typeset using Pandoc and LaTeX.

Attribution: Necropraxis Productions Hazard System v0.3 (2017)
<http://www.necropraxis.com/hazard-system/>

Bricks and hexes

Hexes have a cartographic advantage over grids in that the center of a hex is equidistant from the centers all six adjacent hexes. In contrast, on a standard graph paper grid diagonal movement is more efficient than moving in a cardinal direction, assuming a destination other than cardinal-adjacent (that is, other than due north, due south, due east, or due west).

Recently I noticed that squares in a brick configuration are topologically similar to hexes in terms of adjacency. Each brick is adjacent to six surrounding bricks.

Bricks, however, are much easier to sketch than hexes.
2017-01-09-19-59-29-bricks-as-hexes

To see another way how bricks are similar to hexes, consider the following image and imagine the orange brick overlay moving right until the center of the bricks is superimposed over the center of the hexes.

2017-01-09-20-32-47-bricks-as-hexes

(This post is groundwork for another idea. To be continued!)