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THE TRAVELLING ALCHEMIST







MONDAY, JANUARY 29, 2024


YET ANOTHER MANEUVER SYSTEM FOR OSR STYLE GAMES



 Long time no see!




Something I noticed a few days ago that has been bugging me to no end is how in
Trad games, mainly D&D, there seems to be a problem with fights that are
stagnant. The fighter rocks up to the opposing Orc and they stand there fighting
until either one of them is dead or retreating. Compare this to all the best
sword fights in movies you've seen. I'll link the famous Princess Bride duel,
though doubtless you've seen it.




Look at the way they move around the battlefield, all while remaining engaged
with each other. I want to replicate this in my combats. I have devised a system
to solve my problems, inspired by Trespasser, Dungeon Crawl Classics, and
Mythras. While designing I had these design principles:







1. Can be bolted onto an existing system with little effort



2. Rewards the use of maneuvers

3. Encourages movement around the battlefield between those in melee

4. Does not significantly slow combat




Without further ado here are the rules, with design commentary at the bottom.




Strong Hits:

When you hit an enemies armor class or above and your die roll is even, you can
confer extra benefits on top of your damage roll. Choose one:



 1. Add +1 damage to the damage roll
 2. Control the battle: Go on the offensive and move the battle somewhere else
    on the battlefield within reason.
 3. Attempt a maneuver: name a maneuver you would like to attempt that your GM
    agrees to. Then roll the attack dice again, if you succeed, the maneuver
    works. Eg. Knock a sword out of someone's hand, kick them off a cliff, etc.
 4. Disengage: Move away from the enemy combatant, this does not provoke an
    attack of opportunity.*

Designer Commentary



First, why the decision to make strong hits on a hit + even dice roll? For this
I can thank Trespasser for the inspiration, where even dice rolls confer
additional effects. I like this because it means these effects are going off 50%
of the time an attacker succeeds, which means they happen often but cannot fully
be relied upon.



 1. The simple +1 damage is a back up plan, for when there is nowhere useful to
    move to and no maneuver an attack wants to use. It is only 1 damage because
    I want to encourage the use of the other options. It is also an easy option
    for most unintelligent monsters to pick.
 2. This was the inspiration for the whole subsystem. By controlling the battle
    you can position yourself into an advantageous position or your enemy into a
    perilous one. For example jumping up onto a rock to gain the high ground, or
    inching an enemies back up against the edge of a cliff.
 3. These are pretty standard maneuver rules. It is worth noting in these rules,
    you can still attempt to do maneuvers without getting a strong hit, only it
    takes your action. This may still be worth it in some cases, as you'd only
    need to succeed one roll, instead of succeeding an attack with an even
    number, then succeeding a second roll.
 4. *While attacks of opportunity may seem counterproductive if my goal is to
    increase the amount of movement in combat, without it my system falls apart
    somewhat. Since in this system you can force movement on your opponent there
    needs to be an incentive not to immediately undo that movement. For example
    if you push back your foe to the edge of a cliff, without a reason to stay
    in that spot, your foe can simply move away from the cliffside. they may be
    more likely to stay there and fight if the threat of an attack of
    opportunity is eminent. Attacks of Opportunity do not activate Strong Hits.

Additional Considerations
Who can use Strong Hits?


If I were using this subsystem for a classic retroclone like Whitebox, I would
probably give these options to Fighters and Dwarves. While writing this the
system I had in mind was Knave. Since Knave is classless, I would give all PCs
access to Strong Hits.


-------
So how did I do? I hope you found my idea interesting at the very least. This
subsystem is still a work in progress, so if you have any suggestions or
comments, please leave them below!




at January 29, 2024 No comments:
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Labels: OC, OSR, RPGs




TUESDAY, APRIL 25, 2023


IN THE REALM OF ME, APRIL 2023



 It's funny to see just how long its been since the last time I posted
something. Time really flies by, huh. Since my last post I have a few updates to
make.

Firstly: I released my first official ttrpg supplement! ACES is a hack of the
game FIST by Claymore, which allows you to take on missions set in the wild
west! Inside the 8 page zine includes new mechanics, character options, a
mission generator, and a loose one-shot to get you started.

You can find ACES on itch.io for Pay What You Want at this
link: https://qw3rty.itch.io/aces





Second: I started a Call of Cthulhu public game at my college. I'm surprised
just how popular it has become, especially since many of the members had no
prior roleplaying experiences. One had never even heard of Cthulhu at all! I
have a post coming soon detailing a one-shot I wrote for that public game, but
for now I will just detail my experiences running. First it definitely made me a
better Keeper and GM. With a constantly changing party the dynamic was always
switching and I was always teaching new people how to play. Additionally it gave
me a lot of experience running, which in all honestly I didn't have a ton of
beforehand. And secondly, it felt very fulfilling to introduce people to the
hobby that wouldn't have otherwise. The more people playing the better,
especially if they go to my school.


Well that's all for this update. I have a few things in the works, but those
will be for after finals are over. As always happy gaming and I look forward to
the next time you stop by the Travelling Alchemist!




at April 25, 2023 No comments:
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Labels: RPGs



THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 16, 2023


BLACKJACKAL DICE GAME, FOR YOUR RPG GAMBLING PLEASURE!



 Today's Blogpost is about a simple dice game to throw into your games when the
players are feeling lucky. It's quite simple, and is a good mix of luck and
skill, in my opinion. It plays very similar to blackjack, only with d12s instead
of cards. Here are the rules:





 * One person is the dealer, this is most likely the house, but a player with a
   particularly large sum could take this role as well.
 * First, the Players put in their bets. You can decide if the table will have a
   minimum or not.
 * The Dealer then rolls 4d12, dropping as many dice as it takes to get below
   25. They then reveal one of the dice.
 * The Players now decide if they want to add more to their bet or fold. Again
   decide if there should be a minimum.
 * The players now choose how many d12s they would like to roll. There is no
   maximum, however if they roll above 24 they lose.
 * The goal of the game is to get above the dealer without going over 24.
 * Finally the Dealer reveals their whole dice pool. If the Dealer wins they
   take the bet, if the Player wins the dealer matches what they put in.
 * If anyone gets a perfect 24 that's called a BlackJackal, and they get the
   entire table's bets, on top of what the dealer owes them. If multiple people
   get a BlackJackal, then they split the pot evenly.

And that's it! This is a pretty popular game at the Travelling Alchemist, you
can find many adventurers losing their hard-earned loot at our beer stained
tables. Some shifty fellows even like to bet secrets and rumors in lieu of
money. 

If you want to have the players roll for a skill check on top of playing the
game (for example Savage Worlds has a gambling skill), have them make the check.
If they succeed let them add or subtract an extra die after their initial roll,
to signify their character correctly calculating the odds. If a player wants to
cheat let them make the skill check, then change the face of a die if they
succeed.

However you play I hope you have fun, and Happy Gaming!


at February 16, 2023 No comments:
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Labels: OC, RPGs



FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 2023


USING PC THEME SONGS TO SHOWCASE YOUR HEROES



So today's blog post is about giving the PCs of your rpg campaign theme songs.
Obviously, this isn't for every game but if your running a game where the PCs
are supposed to be badasses, reminiscent of action hero movies and the like this
may be the perfect fit. Especially if music is important at your table.

Juan Giménez


The setup would be quite simple. During your session zero have each of the
players choose a song they think represents their character well. This might
work better for a modern or cyberpunk setting so that the players can choose
recognizable songs that wouldn't clash with your playlist. Add these songs to
your playlist. Now you can decide how long you want your playlist to be. If you
only play music during combat then you'll probably want it shorter, but if you
play music the whole session you'll want it longer, maybe around 6 hours. When a
PC's song comes up give that PC some sort of bonus. 

A few ideas may be:

 * Give them a static bonus to their next turn (IE a +3 bonus to all rolls in
   D&D 5e)
 * Let them auto-succeed on their next action
 * My favorite, let them describe how the party gets some sort of edge in the
   scene they're in because of the PC's badassery (IE letting the PC describe
   how they use their stealthy skills to sneak past a security system, how they
   smooth talk with a crime boss, etc, etc)




Finally, my favorite use of this mechanic is what I call "The Blaze of Glory".
At any time the player can either ask the GM to play their song or pull out
their phone and begin playing their theme. When a player does this they take
control of the scene and describe how they overcome the obstacles, defeat the
villain, whatever. But at the end of the scene or song, that PC dies in a blaze
or glory. This can create super impactful moments where a PC makes the ultimate
sacrifice, all the while the song that highlighted so many of their achievements
plays in the background.




Let me know if you use this in your own games or one-shots, and how you would
modify it for your own use. Until next time, this is Drew of the Travelling
Alchemist. 


at February 10, 2023 1 comment:
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Labels: OC, RPGs



THURSDAY, JANUARY 26, 2023


CUSTOM FROSTGRAVE SCENARIO: GOREPIN'S MANOR


Recently I was back home for the holidays. While I was home I got my friends
into Frostgrave and we had a bit of a mini narrative over 4 gaming sessions
total. This all culminated in the 4 warbands finding the destroyed ruins of the
legendary wizard Gorepin's manor. While his house was chock full of treasure,
the ghost of Gorepin himself was there to protect it! Well at least he was
supposed too... due to some unfortunate die rolls Gorepin only made himself
known twice in our game. You may want to adjust the summoning target number if
you run this scenario with your group. Below is the pdf scenario.


 Here's some photos of some of the warbands I painted and the ruins of Gorepins
manor!





The Final Battle




My Warband, led by Marieth the Ancient



A Friends Warband, led by Steve Craftmine



Another Friends Warband, led by Tombra



A final warband, pictured partially painted, led by Magus










at January 26, 2023 No comments:
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Labels: Frostgrave, OC, Wargaming



WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 25, 2023


RANDOMLY GENERATING BACKGROUNDS AND THE "YOUR STORIED PAST" TABLE



 Recently I've just had a session 0 for a campaign I am running in Savage Worlds
where I decided to take inspiration from Cyberpunk RED, which I had ran the
previous summer. In RED you go through what is called lifepath generation, where
you roll for or choose various aspects of your character background, until you
have a fleshed out Edgerunner of your own. My favorite part of the lifepath
system is rolling for friends, enemies, and tragic love stories. With just these
3 things I was able to run my summer Cyberpunk campaign with little to no prep,
and it was a blast. It also forced the players to work within limits, which as
many of us know, limitation breeds creativity.

So while prepping this campaign I knew I wanted to do something similar. But, as
I was now running a dark fantasy setting, not all the options would translate.
So I took this as an opportunity to innovate on Cyberpunks lifepath system.

After a few hours I created the Your Storied Past table. with only 2d20 you can
easily generate an invocative story from the past that frames your characters
motivation. I have included this table below.


I tried to include vague but distinct prompts that would spark imagination when
rolled together. For example, Signature Weapon could obviously mean your
character has a cool axe, but it could also mean they've developed a technique
as their signature weapon.





My table used this to great success, I'm happy to say. And all the player agreed
afterward, most had never used random character generation, that it had led to
very interesting characters which were slightly out of their comfort zone (in a
good way of course).




In addition to this table we also used a slightly modified version of cyberpunks
friends, enemies, and tragic love stories, as well as the relationships page
from "This is Totally Not another D&D Fiasco" by Dyson Logos. Between the three
resources, we are starting off our game with a lot of player cohesion and useful
background details.




This table can be found here, on my google drive. It is Licensed under Creative
a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 BY NC SA International License





at January 25, 2023 No comments:
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Labels: OC, RPGs, Savage Worlds



TUESDAY, JANUARY 24, 2023


THE TRAVELLING ALCHEMIST



Throughout all time and all realities, there is one constant. Tucked away on
some back street, inside the walls of an unassuming wooden building, there is a
tavern that exists everywhere. It is called the Travelling Alchemist, and
throughout time it has had many owners. From Leymond the Legendary to Bornis
Bhaghis to Kyap the Wise, the keys to this multidimensional speakeasy have
passed through many hands.

So, who am I? My name is Drew and I am the current owner and manager of the
Travelling Alchemist, at least in my time. I have been into tabletop gaming
since January 2020. I know, quite a short time, but I learn alittle bit every
day. Since then I've done a variety of projects in the ttrpg space that I am
very excited to share with the world.

While you are here, please, take a seat and have a drink. If you wish to stay
allow me to tell you my tales and imbibe you with my findings as I continue my
various RPG and Wargaming projects.

Thank you, and enjoy your time at The Travelling Alchemist!





at January 24, 2023 No comments:
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Labels: RPGs, Wargaming

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YET ANOTHER MANEUVER SYSTEM FOR OSR STYLE GAMES

 Long time no see! Something I noticed a few days ago that has been bugging me
to no end is how in Trad games, mainly D&D, there seems t...


 * In the Realm of Me, April 2023
    It's funny to see just how long its been since the last time I posted
   something. Time really flies by, huh. Since my last post I have a...
   
 * Yet Another Maneuver System for OSR style games
    Long time no see! Something I noticed a few days ago that has been bugging
   me to no end is how in Trad games, mainly D&D, there seems t...
   
 * BlackJackal Dice Game, for your RPG Gambling Pleasure!
    Today's Blogpost is about a simple dice game to throw into your games when
   the players are feeling lucky. It's quite simple, and is...
   





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