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GimpInBlack posted:Beyond the wall stuff The writer for this should probably be paying you some kind of commission. I was playing around with character creation and I noticed with a few rolls some of the playbooks can go above 19 in a stat. That doesn't seem all that useful. Would you just re-roll those results, or reassign the stat points?
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Apr 2, 2015 01:23
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thatbastardken posted:The writer for this should probably be paying you some kind of commission. I was playing around with character creation and I noticed with a few rolls some of the playbooks can go above 19 in a stat. That doesn't seem all that useful. Would you just re-roll those results, or reassign the stat points? Nope, you just lose any points in excess of 19. Sucks a bit, but a 19 in Beyond the Wall is way more valuable than in, say, 3E, so it more or less evens out.
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Apr 2, 2015 01:46
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Yeah it seems a bit harsh at first but I see your point
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Apr 2, 2015 01:54
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One thing I realized is that the Duckman RPG actually predates Dungeons & Dragons 3e by four years, so it actually had feats long before 3e. I wouldn't go so far as to say 3e got the idea of feats from the Duckman RPG, but you never know. 
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Apr 2, 2015 04:18
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Alien Rope Burn posted:One thing I realized is that the Duckman RPG actually predates Dungeons & Dragons 3e by four years, so it actually had feats long before 3e. I wouldn't go so far as to say 3e got the idea of feats from the Duckman RPG, but you never know. Yes, it really is quite a discovery. This game is downright groundbreaking.
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Apr 2, 2015 04:33
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It's a shame they never made the Weird Science TV show game. It had a great deal of potential.
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Apr 2, 2015 05:43
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GimpInBlack posted:Nope, you just lose any points in excess of 19. Sucks a bit, but a 19 in Beyond the Wall is way more valuable than in, say, 3E, so it more or less evens out. Yeah, I tried rolling up a Reformed Bully and wound up with a 19 strength -very- quickly, to the point I had to use my one free choice to -not- get more useless strength bumps.
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Apr 2, 2015 13:13
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Green Intern posted:The Craps resolution system sounds so weird, but kind of fun. I'd definitely spend a night playing this with friends while enjoying brown liquors. Make sure to tune in to next week's Afterthought, or at least visit the page for it on the website.
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Apr 2, 2015 16:32
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I am super excited for the Tales From The Crypt episode. So many Crypt-Keeper impressions await us.
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Apr 2, 2015 16:55
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theironjef posted:Perfectly in character for the show though. I mean you wouldn't normally have an RPG where "Roll to give your daughter some juice" comes up, but it would totally happen on that show.
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Apr 2, 2015 17:29
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MadScientistWorking posted:Yeah well it clashes with the artwork which for some reason features the crypt keeper dressed up from Elvis. Also, all the artwork is pictures from the show.
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Apr 2, 2015 20:20
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Halloween Jack posted:Huh? If we're talking about the Masterbook Tales from the Crypt, I can assure you that's not the case. The interior art is mostly bad-to-middling WEG art from that era, with a few really good pieces that are done up like old TftC magzine covers. EDIT: Oooo you know what. We are talking about different books. You are talking about the Box Set while I own the standalone book. MadScientistWorking fucked around with this message at 16:43 on Apr 4, 2015 |
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Apr 4, 2015 16:36
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I actually forgot that I owned the box set. The box has long since collapsed and been thrown away, I didn't bother keeping the "Masterbook to D6 conversion guide" they included, and I even lost one of the 2 "blood-spattered" dice they included  I should dig out my hardcopy of the book itself; I don't leaf through it much because the binding has long since disintegrated. I don't know if that's a fault of paperback supplements in general, but all my WEG paperbacks are like that.
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Apr 4, 2015 18:46
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Halloween Jack posted:I actually forgot that I owned the box set. The box has long since collapsed and been thrown away, I didn't bother keeping the "Masterbook to D6 conversion guide" they included, and I even lost one of the 2 "blood-spattered" dice they included Early WEG binding was fairly durable but the late 90s and beyond went downhill. My copy of the Death Star Technical Companion from 1991 is still going strong after over 20 years of occasional moderate use.
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Apr 4, 2015 19:37
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 In this final update covering the core rules, we'll talk a bit about magic and monsters, then wrap up with a quick look at the various short, free supplements Flatland Games has released. So let's dive in, shall we? Spells and Magic We already saw the basic rules for the three kinds of magic earlier in the Core Rules section, but the book reprints all the rules for each category of magic at the beginning of its respective spell list. Which is convenient, I suppose, but in a book this short (the Magic section of the core rules is only 20 pages before the list of cantrips starts), it seems like a bit of a waste of page space. Personally, I'd have preferred if the mage class just said "rules for magic begin on p. 47" and the game had used that page in the Core Rules section for something else, but oh well. To recap the three types:
Cantrips RPGs, especially those trying to emulate a mythic or fictional source material, live and die on the flavor of their magic system, and fortunately Beyond the Wall has flavor in spades. Cantrips have just the right level of flexibility and utility without overwhelming power to feel like the sort of small, subtle magics you'd expect from a wizard out of folklore. There are eight Cantrips in the book, and helpfully every description covers not only the basics of what you can do with it, but some suggestions for "stretching" the magic to do a little more at a penalty to the roll. For example, Beast Ken lets a mage speak to any one kind of non-magical animal and find them generally agreeable to his suggestions, but with a -3 penalty he can also compel them to action even against their best interests, or at a -6 penalty can call them to fight for him. Second Sight, which you might remember as Keelin's go-to cantrip, lets the mage perceive invisible spirits like ghosts, faeries, demons, and gods. Furthermore, if she knows a spirit's True Name, she can attempt to compel it and set it to perform a task for her. This trick requires a Charisma check, which does receive the +5 bonus for knowing the target's true name. However, if the check fails, not only is the spirit free of the mage's control, she can never attempt to command that spirit again. Since a natural 20 always fails an attribute check, the even a very charismatic mage is smart to keep a Fortune Point or two handy before trying to bind a big, scary demon. Other Cantrips include Blessing and Hexing (small bonus/penalty to a specific action), Druid's Touch (makes plants grow and bloom and ensures that gardens are bountiful), and Glamour Weaving (minor illusions, with penalties to create more complex or mobile illusions). Spells Beyond the Wall's spell list has a fair few D&D staples, including standbys like turning undead and healing magic, but skewed heavily toward the support and creative problem-solving end of things than the "smash entire encounters" end. A bunch of spells have familiar effects, but are renamed to something that feels a bit more folkloric than technical. For example, instead of Resist Fire, the spell that makes a mage immune to fire is called Brave the Flames, and Cure Light Wounds becomes Healing Touch. In another nice touch, most of the spells include a bit of flavor on how they're cast. For example, Flash of Brilliance, a spell that conjures a dazzling burst of light, has this to say: Flash of Brilliance posted:The mage makes the ancient sign of light with the fingers of both hands, then claps them together with a sharp crack, producing a blinding flash of light. There are only two direct combat spells: Magic Missile and Burning Hands, but spells like Veil of Sleep and Web are probably more effective ways of dealing with fights. One spell of note is Blight of Loneliness. The idea behind it is cool--all targets automatically fail any Charisma checks for the duration--but since monsters and NPCs don't have attributes and thus don't really make attribute checks, it's tough to adjudicate mechanically. Forgetful Mind is similar: the target forgets the details of basically anything important unless it makes a successful Int check, and also loses the benefit of all skills for the duration. Again, though, attribute checks and skills are PC mechanics. Other fun spells include The Howling, which conjures an otherworldly howl that forces everyone in near range to save or spend the duration clutching their ears in agony and fear, Smuggler's Luck (cast it on an object no larger than a short sword or a small sack of coins and any non-magical searches will fail to find it), and Terrifying Presence (basically, this.  Wizard people, dear readers. Rituals Rituals are where the big, dramatic magic that's not practical for use in action scenes. Their effects are usually much bigger and/or longer-lasting than spells, but they come with a commensurate cost: they take an hour per level to cast, and they require rare, expensive, or otherwise story hook generating components. (A sidebar briefly talks about how it's okay to reflavor ritual components to better match the feel of a character's magic: subsituting nature stuff for a druid-esque mage, for example, or bones and tomb-dust for a necromancer.) Even first level rituals are nothing to sneeze at, including Circle of Protection (wards an area up to the size of, say, a room or a forest clearing against demons, the dead, faeries, or whatever the caster specifies), Staff of Might (imbue a cudgel or staff with the ability to strike even incorporeal spirits), and Steed of the Sorcerer (summons an otherworldly horse with a night-black coat and eyes of fire that serves for 11 hours). Steed of the Sorcerer also has one of the best ritual components in the game: Steed of the Sorcerer posted:The caster must sit perfectly still for the hour it takes to cast this ritual, uttering only a single, unintelligible word at the culmination: the name of his dark steed. He must then saddle his mount with a pristine, never used bridle and saddle of black leather, which will fade with the beast when it departs this world. First level also bosts the Bind Familiar ritual, which alone of all the rituals in the game says that, if a mage begins play with it, she can be assumed to have cast it before the game starts and thus have a familiar at the beginning of the game. Most familiars are no bigger than a cat, but the GM may allow a more unusual familiar of up to 2 HD. This is discouraged for a oneshot since a 2 HD monster can potentially outshine first-level PCs, but in longer-running games it will quickly become academic. At second level, a mage can do things like call forth a massive thunderstorm, summon spirits from the Otherworld (or shades from the land of the dead), or enchant an ordinary object such that it seems like a powerful mystic artifact. At even higher levels, she can do things like make herself preternaturally trustworthy (Friends, level 3), divine the future (Augury, level 4), or permanently curse a target with -5 to all rolls, forever (The Great Curse, level 6). The most potent rituals include raising every corpse in a cemetery as a zombie or skeleton under your control (Raise Undead Horde, level 8), causing everyone in the region to have the same dream (or terrifying nightmare; Dream, level 9), and calling forth a wall of stone from the earth itself, several yards thick and up to a half-mile long (Wall of Stone, level 10). Resurrection is also a level 10 ritual, but casting it ensures that, success or failure, something nasty finds its way back through the doors of death along with the resurrected character. Magic Items Aside from making sure to tell us that every magic item is unique and has a story, Beyond the Wall doesn't really do anything revolutionary with magic items. The example ones we get are pretty cool (like Weyland's Iron, a +1 sword forged by Weyland Smith himself that can wound any creature, no matter its immunities), but it's the standard weapons, armor, potions, rods/staffs/wands, and miscellaneous items. The one item I have to call out in particular is the obligatory Love Potion: Love Potion posted:A staple of every witch’s repertoire, the love potion’s strength will vary by maker. Our local wise woman’s brew made me fall in love with the next woman I saw; it took the work of another three witches to free my heart. The drinker is affected as though the target cast the False Friend spell. I... what? This is the only place in the entire book where the voice switches to an in-character narrator; the book does occasionally refer to its athors in the first person, but always in the sense of the designer talking to the player (e.g. "we suggest a -3 penalty for this sort of action"). It's not called out in any way, it's just there and I have no idea why. Bestiary Finally, we get to the monsters section. Monster stat blocks are dirt simple: hit dice, hp, AC, attack/damage, Alignment, and XP value for killing them. The text here is vague on whether each PC gets the listed XP or if you divvy it up among the whole group. (Further Afield clarifies that it's the former.) Special abilities are usually pretty concise; this is neither 2E-3E's ridiculous monster spell lists nor 4E's "every monster has tactical abilities to use." The list includes D&D staples like goblins, ogres, trolls, and zombies, plus plenty of stuff pulled from Celtic mythology: the cat sidhe is a faerie cat that sometimes brings omens of future battles to heroes on the spring equinox, and the Green Man is a vast, mysterious figure they say is as old as the hills and the rivers. He's not the only unique monster in the book, either: you might come across the nightmarish Creature of Fear and Flame, the cruel Nameless One, or even the trickster-faerie Pukka. The Sluagh is a great example of a foe you can't fight traditionally: this host of spirits of the unquiet dead appears as a rushing black cloud or a swarm of carrion birds. It can't be killed, only temporarily driven off or held at bay by ancient magics. It can also attack anyone it finds out of shelter in an area up to Near range (so, for example, anyone caught outside anywhere within the village). There's also "monstrosities," which are convenient stat blocks that can sub in for any kind of one-off monster like a chimaera or what have you. The Bestiary wraps up with sections on how to create your own demons, dragons, and goblins. In all three cases, this is basically a set of four "vanilla" stat blocks of increasing power levels and some custom powers to tack onto them. For goblins and dragons, that's about it, but demons get a bit more attention. Demons can either be incarnate (actual, corporeal monsters clawed up out of Chaos) or incorporeal, in which case they possess people or animals. Demons' extra powers are determined by two rolls on a table of demonic influences, with the first roll being what the demon feeds on and the second roll being how it procures that food. For example, a demon might feed on Greed, which it creates through Betrayal: this might be a demon that convinces siblings to poison each other over inheritances or adventurers to turn on each other over the dragon's hoard. It's a neat idea, I just wish it wasn't structured in such a way that you could roll for a demon and end up with one that feeds on Lust, which it creates through Violence and Fear.   Pictured: A beautiful, majestic unicorn. Free Supplements With monsters, we wrap up the Beyond the Wall's core rulebook, but I'm going to touch briefly on the four free supplements Flatland Games has released for the game: The Village, The Nobility, and Dwarves, Elves, and Halflings all follow a similar pattern: A short, 3-page overview of interesting locations and NPCs you might find in the village, the castle, or the lands of nonhumans, plus a few new character Playbooks. Highlight playbooks include the Assistant Beast Keeper (a rogue/mage with a special animal friend), the Fae Foundling (warrior/mage, a creepy faerie baby left on the outskirts of the village and taken in by humans) and Nobleman's Wild Daughter (warrior, Merida: the Playbook). All About Goblins is a bit more involved. In addition to a new Goblin Infestation Scenario Pack, we get a 12-page booklet with some goblin magic, a few new goblin monsters (including goblin animals), and, coolest of all, a system for randomly generating networks of goblin warrens. Rather than trying to create a precise dungeon map, this system generates a loose flowchart of goblin "neighborhoods" and the connections between them, which are abstracted out as lots of shifty, twisting tunnels, rickety bridges, and the like. (If you roll that a neighborhood connects to itself, that neighborhood instead has a secret room with treasure!) You start off rolling 1d6 to figure out what the entrance is like: is it underwater, guarded, trapped, etc. Then you roll on a series of tables to determine the various "neighborhoods" that connect off of the entrance (e.g. sleeping quarters, mines, throne room) and what special features they have. Each neighborhood has one or more exits, and for each exit you'll roll to see what neighborhood it connects to and what the exit is like (narrow tunnel, ladder, bridge, etc.). Eventually you'll have a maze of interconnected zones and crazy hazards and hijinx to get between them, something that might look like this:  It's a neat little mechanic, and the game suggests varying the size of the die you roll on the neighborhoods table to control how big the dungeon is: A d6 will create a small warren suitable for an evening's gaming (since there will at most be 6 neighborhoods), a d8 will create enough for a long session, and a d10 warren will probably take multiple sessions to complete.  Next time: I put this to a thread vote: Shall we continue talking about Beyond the Wall by diving into its sandbox campaign supplement, Further Afield, or shall we detour and talk about one of the following:
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Apr 5, 2015 20:44
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I'd personally love to hear more about Beyond the Wall and Further Afield, but after that Katanas and Trenchcoats, because honestly.
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Apr 5, 2015 21:07
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GimpInBlack posted:
This one.
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Apr 5, 2015 21:14
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Katanas and Trenchcoats sounds amazing in the best worst ways.
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Apr 5, 2015 21:20
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Obviously going with Katanas and Trenchcoats, too.
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Apr 5, 2015 21:55
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Katanas and trench coats
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Apr 6, 2015 00:27
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GimpInBlack posted:Katanas and Trenchcoats, a glorious paean to the deep, brooding, tragic badassery of being a brooding, tragic, badass immortal in Darkest Vancouver, the most occult city of the 1990s. Ahem. Forever Knight and Seeing Things are clear evidence that Toronto is the most occult city of the latter 20th century.
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Apr 6, 2015 01:11
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Apr 6, 2015 01:12
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Wakizashis and Greatcoats
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Apr 6, 2015 01:20
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Zweihanders and I-just-like-the-uniforms
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Apr 6, 2015 01:33
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Nodachis and Buffcoats!
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Apr 6, 2015 02:19
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Empty mailing tubes and cardboard boxes!
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Apr 6, 2015 02:35
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Flamberges and petticoats!
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Apr 6, 2015 02:44
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If someone does do Katanas & Trenchcoats, then they need to do it in the "it's the 90's and this is awesome" tone of the game.
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Apr 6, 2015 02:53
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Katanas & Trenchcoats and also more TORG please. I want to learn how to defeat the cyberpope. This is important information the world must know.
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Apr 6, 2015 03:05
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Drakyn posted:Katanas & Trenchcoats and also more TORG please. I want to learn how to defeat the cyberpope. This is important information the world must know.
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Apr 6, 2015 03:14
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The Obtenebrous Mysteriorum that resides within the deepest soul of FATAL & Friends has spoken, and Katanas & Trenchcoats has won by a landslide. Come, darkest immortals. Dare you enter its fuliginous realm? Breathe in Inspiration Bendigeidfran posted:Wakizashis and Greatcoats Kavak posted:Zweihanders and I-just-like-the-uniforms Snorb posted:Nodachis and Buffcoats! Cythereal posted:Flamberges and petticoats! Katanas & Trenchcoats encompasses all these and more, for it is the pinnacle of deep, story driven roleplaying. pkfan2004 posted:Empty mailing tubes and cardboard boxes! Except this one. Failure to take the secrets of darkest immortality seriously is the height of bad roleplaying, and will be punished to the full extent of the rules. Evil Mastermind posted:If someone does do Katanas & Trenchcoats, then they need to do it in the "it's the 90's and this is awesome" tone of the game. You say that like there's any other way to talk about Katanas & Trenchcoats. GimpInBlack fucked around with this message at 03:18 on Apr 6, 2015 |
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Apr 6, 2015 03:15
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GimpInBlack posted:Except this one. Failure to take the secrets of darkest immortality seriously is the height of bad roleplaying, and will be punished to the full extent of the rules. You don't understand. My Black Soul Flame allows me to master any weapon. I choose the humble board of card to humiliate foes who are not worthy of tasting my immortal, pure starmetal steel folded six hundred and sixty six times by the blind monk Sensei-sensei. I DEFY YOUR PUNISHMENT.
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Apr 6, 2015 03:24
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Drakyn posted:Katanas & Trenchcoats and also more TORG please. I want to learn how to defeat the cyberpope. This is important information the world must know. I'm working on it. I know I'm way behind; I'm trying to get back into the rhythm of writing updates.(also you cannot kill the cyberpope because
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Apr 6, 2015 03:25
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pkfan2004 posted:You don't understand. My Black Soul Flame allows me to master any weapon. I choose the humble board of card to humiliate foes who are not worthy of tasting my immortal, pure starmetal steel folded six hundred and sixty six times by the blind monk Sensei-sensei. I DEFY YOUR PUNISHMENT. Now just add lycanthropy and you're ready to roleplay Changing Breeds.
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Apr 6, 2015 03:30
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pkfan2004 posted:You don't understand. My Black Soul Flame allows me to master any weapon. I choose the humble board of card to humiliate foes who are not worthy of tasting my immortal, pure starmetal steel folded six hundred and sixty six times by the blind monk Sensei-sensei. I DEFY YOUR PUNISHMENT.  Take +1 Glory Rank.
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Apr 6, 2015 03:38
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This cardboard has been corrugated 300 times, granting it a strength unknown to lesser construction papers.
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Apr 6, 2015 05:45
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Evil Mastermind posted:I'm working on it. Also, goddamnit. What good is an unkillable cyberpope? It's like an uneatable cupcake.
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Apr 6, 2015 15:17
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Drakyn posted:All good, no pressure, just was curious if it was still a thing. Remember, this is a 90's RPG with a 90's metaplot. The players can run around and do stuff and take territory back from the High Lords, but at the end of the day they can't defeat the High Lords until the game line says they can. They have a storyline in mind, and by god you're going to stick to it. I mean, I have no problem with the idea that "these guys are effectively gods, they've destroyed countless realities to become so, they have waves and waves of operatives between you and them, you can't just walk up to them and punch them into submission because they can just squash you like a bug". 13th Age is a game that shows that that you can have untouchable uber-NPCs and make that poo poo work. But in Torg, the whole point is that you're trying to stop these guys once and for all but the best you can do is just take their territory and maybe drive them off Core Earth. They want the High Lords to be the guys you want to take down, yet they don't give you the ability to do so. You're given a bunch of great villains, but the PCs barely get to interact with them.
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Apr 6, 2015 15:46
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Ah, but they're gods because of the Darkness Devices! So, naturally, you need to separate them from those and destroy the things, thus rendering them vulnerable! Except last I checked the Darkness Devices are indestructible, can gently caress you up and teleport away and poo poo on their own, and so on. Did they ever release an adventure where you finally get to take out a High Lord?
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Apr 6, 2015 16:04
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Zereth posted:Except last I checked the Darkness Devices are indestructible quote:can gently caress you up quote:and teleport away and poo poo on their own, and so on. quote:Did they ever release an adventure where you finally get to take out a High Lord? Sort of. The're an adventure called "High Lord of Earth" where you have to stop one of the big NPCs from finding Core Earth's Darkness Device. Spoilers for late-game-line stuff I'm going to cover eventually: There's an adventure that was done episodically in the newsletter where you get to watch Baruk Kaah defeat himself, and in the game-line-ending adventure "War's End" you actually get to fight the Gaunt Man assuming you don't get greased by the scenes beforehand where you fight literally hundreds of P-rated troops. I'm not even exagerating.
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Apr 6, 2015 16:29
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