9 Colors of Fire

1) Red-Orange.

The brilliant embers of a true fire are impossible to mistake.

All other flames are corrupted forms of this ancient and pure flame.

2) Blue.

Cobalt flame, immensely hot.

Smoke from a flame this hot can reveal wayward spirits and bring light to the truth long lost.

3) Azure.

The light of the dead star Gnottis, like ever-shifting azure glass, chill to the touch.

The star is dim and still, a monument to what was, like a glass eye. Gnottis died before Neurim knew life, yet still it clings to life animated by the glass flame. It was carried to Neurim by the servants of the Bodyless Ones known as husks. The azure flame of Gnottis is said to bring life to the inanimate though harvesting the flame is nigh impossible.

4) Burgundy.

The light of love, passion, and death. Lit ever eternal in the Crematori. 

In Sisthea the East the burgundy flame, carried from drowned Sisthea the West, burns eternal in the furnace of the great Crematori, where all Sistheans are burnt upon their death, their ashes feeding the flame. It is said that their passions color the flame. Such a deep and vibrant red could only be forged by love.

5) Magenta.

The light of illusion, a burning fire of falsehood.

It's a figment, really. An impossible sight born of an impossible color. All illusions are the shadows of this magenta flame. The most wily of illusionists can hide the flame, though novices and incompetents often fail to fool anyone with their magic. The flickering of a false flame gives it away.

6) Green.

Pale and sickly, simultaneously the color of half rotten olives and under-ripe limes.

Green flame roams the Eyeless Lands, brought by the ogres and their insipid illness from below. It is the flame of rot and disease, lit deep within the earth in the ancient city of Yersinia, long buried and left to rot and ruin. It is there that disease originates, and it is there that the sick flame burns brightest.

7) Royal Purple.

It is a regal flame, lit with a sense of self importance. It holds itself high.

It is the queen of flames, self appointed of course. Some believe it sapient. Grandiose arrogance allows fire to grow a mind. It thinks itself greater than you. It looks down at you with eyes made of drifting ash and tilts up a chin made of cinders.

8) Brass.

Liquid metal, flickering like fire.

A creation of the dwarves, once used by warriors who specialized in liquid metal weapons and armor. The art is mostly lost to the dwarves, stolen by the dragon-cult Hatavites.

9) Black.

It eats light.

An orcish invention, a flame designed to scorch gods. Few things can harm an idol and fewer still can harm divinity, but the horrid black flame of the orcs can. Enough flame and enough time will result in an undead god, the most powerful and twisted weapon of the orcs.

How Many Ancestries Is Too Many?

It's a question I have asked myself many times because I don't know. Ask anyone and you'll get a different answer. The human-centrist will argue one, just human. The standard-fantasy gamer will argue for 4, human, dwarf, elf, and halfling. The 5e-gamer will argue that there's no such thing as too many: more choice is always better.

Personally, I think there is a limit to the number of how many you can reasonably have. At a certain point, you have so many options that the average party becomes a glorified circus attraction and the things that are weird and unique cease to be interesting. In 5e, a party can consist of a sapient ooze, one of three seperate varieties of bird person, an interplanar warrior from space, and a turtle. That's not a party of adventurers. That's a zoo.

Neurim has 6: humans, elves, dwarves, halflings, mokhan (sapient rock people), and half-orcs. I have toyed with adding more, namely in the form of curseling ancestries, such as cambion/tieflings and ghouls, with curselings not being available for a first character due to weird rules and narratives. That feels good to me, though at times I wonder if cutting one of the original ancestries for something different would be cool. I like my dwarves and my halflings, which means it would be elves, and considering elves are such an extreme rarity in Neurim, it might make sense.

You'll notice I haven't answered the question. I don't have an answer. I'm not sure there is an answer to be had.

Three Action System for Exploring Dungeons

Today on an ever-growing list of half-baked ideas from Pastel.

A couple of weeks ago I made a post about why I disliked 10-minute turns. Today, I bring you a way that I think helps alleviate some of my worse issues: implementing Pathfinder Second Edition's 3 action economy into exploration.

The idea is simple: During each dungeon turn, a party/player has 3 actions that they can spend performing actions. A simple action, one that takes 2-3 minutes, takes one action, a more complex one two actions, and a long and in-depth one takes all three actions. All actions are declared  before anything happens, and then the GM describes the results of their actions before ticking down time and checking for random encounters. If multiple players, or a player and some number of hirelings/retainers attempt the same action, only one roll is made (if necessary) but is made with some sort of advantage.

For example, a rogue might be exploring a dungeon and come into a new room with a single chest in the middle. They might spend 2 actions checking the room for traps, then 1 action unlocking the chest. That's their 10 minute turn.

It's very simple on its face, though I am not dumb enough to not see the flaws. For one, there is a bit of "mother may I" in determining the length of actions. A player might think an action simple, but the GM might think it complex. These sorts of interactions can feel bad for the player, though I don't imagine it happening on a regular basis. For two, this is going to massively increase the amount of time each turn takes. I cannot answer if that's good or bad, but it most certainly is true.

I am also not 100% sure of whether or not actions should be for each player or an entire party. On one hand it doesn't make a whole lot of sense for everyone to stand around the rogue while they lock pick, but on the other giving 4-6 players each 3 actions is going to be a lot, though I do know that hirelings and retainers likely shouldn't get actions or it all gets obscene very quickly. It needs some ironing out and perhaps someone else will have an idea worth implementing further.

Some other ideas: for using this system with the Underclock, just give the players 3 actions for each time-based roll of the clock (not for rolls from making noise or general tomfoolery). For random encounters, you can roll a d3 to determine during which action monsters appear to see where each character is currently.

Level 0 (And a Bit on Shadow of the Demon Lord)

I don't know if you've heard of Shadow of the Demon Lord, but it's probably my favorite TTRPG right now, though that might be replaced by Shadow of the Weird Wizard when it drops. It's very good, pretty much everything I've wanted out of a TTRPG except for a thriving 3rd party scene. The mechanics are simple but fun, the crunch is generated via player choice and the choices players have are interesting, and enemies are threatening even to high level players to encourage creative problem solving even when combat is engaging. It's simple, but has a lot of depth.

This isn't a review of SotDL, this is a review of a single aspect of SotDL that I love: level 0. The intended start for a SotDL game is as a level 0 commoner, nothing but your ancestry, your starting equipment, and some sort of weird extra item or bonus or curse or something.

It's great. I've recently started running a SotDL campaign and the first session was one of my favorite sessions ever. Tossing the party in and letting them get way in over their heads and come out on top via creative problem solving is 100% what I play TTRPGs for. 

There's often this adage that backstories should be simple (I often limit players to a single paragraph) because the game is the story of them being adventurers, and level 0 hits that perfectly. This is the story of how the party become adventurers. How they went from nobodies to monster hunters and tomb divers.

It was great. I loved it. I think it really solidified my love of SotDL. A singular encapsulation of what makes the system good. Overall, the idea of a session 0 is one I can't recommend enough. The story of how the party becomes adventurers is such an interesting one to tell. It might take a bit of homebrew (DCC is the only other game I know of with something similar), but I can personally attest to how cool the results are.

Why I dislike 10-Minute Turns (And Why I Love the Clock)

If you aren't familiar with Goblin Punch's Underclock, I'd recommend reading that before reading this.

I doubt I'm about to say anything that hasn't been said before, but I think the concept of 10 minute turns for dungeon exploration is silly. I get the point: provide a simple and consistent procedure for dungeon exploration to make resource management and random encounter generation as easy as possible. Does it do that? Yes, sort of. It does it effectively enough, though I think we can do better (chances are, we can always do better). Let me start with my major points against 10 minute turns.

1. Let's start with the most obvious: 10 minute turns break verisimilitude. By their nature, they are restrictive. Everything must fit into a 10 minute slot or a 0 minute slot, even things for which either slot makes no sense. It also leaves no opportunity for "something you thought would take long took basically no time" or the opposite.
2. I find 10 minute turns extraordinary tedious. Mark down duration, roll for random encounters, so on and so forth. There's a laundry list of things that must be done after every single turn, which is an issue when taking turns are the most common action players do.
3. I find turns actively discourage experimentation. If you know that any action can result in wasting 10 minutes, then taking actions becomes a dangerous dance of "will this take 10 minutes". Examining a cool statue becomes risky when it could mean losing a sixth of your torch and a roll for random encounters. Ultimately this problem is born of the restrictive nature of 10 minute turns, but I'm listing it separately because I feel it is an extreme antithesis to the game we play.
4. Random encounters lose a lot of interest when they are truly random. Random encounters are best as a tool to drive the narrative and build suspense, but when they just appear they lose a lot of interest.

If you read about the Underclock, I'm sure you can see where this is going.

I've finally be given an opportunity to run a new campaign for some friends, and I've been using the Underclock in it, though I simply refer to it as the Clock. Whenever the players do something that takes time, or makes noise, I roll a d6 and subtract it from 20, with 6's exploding. When they do something that takes a VERY long time, or makes a lot of noise while taking time, I'll roll multiple d6's, with 6's exploding. When the Clock strikes below 0, a random encounter appears. That's not all I do, but it's the gist.

The big point of the Clock is that the players can see it. Random encounters are no longer truly random, the players now know when things are going to happen and tension is built. They plan around the Clock, but I think that's a good thing. Adventurers should have a sixth sense for when something is about to go wrong. This fixes problem 4.

It also helps that a full cycle of the Clock is approximately an hour. Things take as much time as they need, as represented by the roll of the d6. If the roll is low, then it didn't take much time. If the roll is high, it took a while. This fixes issue 1. The whole rolling for the Clock thing is easy too. Just some d6's and simple subtraction, and when it goes below 0 an hour has passed and torches will go out and spells will need to be reset. Makes issue 2 a non factor too. And finally, because I control when the clock is rolled, I can choose not to roll it for things that are short and simple. Examing a statue could take 2 minutes. That's not worthy of the Clock, and fixes issue 3.

Basically, I wrote all this to talk about how much I like the Underclock and how much it fixes one of my largest issues with old school play. I'm not saying it's perfect for you, but it is perfect for me, partially because I am a fan of cutting a lot of the fat out of my games. I find such strict time keeping unnecessary for the way I play, so I prefer a system that removes it.

Neurim Lore Primer

This post should act as a reasonable introduction to my fantasy world Neurim. Neurim was designed as a fantasy world that appears very standard on its face, but becomes weirder the closer you look. This post should help make some of that weirdness more obvious. 

The universe that Neurim takes place in is the Concordance. Neurim is a Concord, or world, within that Concordance.

The World.

See map here.

Neurim is a roughly Earth-sized world with a year of exactly 360 days. Most cultures divide these days into 12 months of 30 days each. The current year is 443 AF (after founding) as defined by the Zetterite calendar. 

In the east are the Tiers of the Sevenwoods, the Folleyfaults, and Dunset, charecterized by vast forests and rolling hills. The Sevenwoods are home to the seven major kingdoms of the Zetterite Empire, as well as it's capital of Anastor. The Folleyfaults are barren, hilly, and rocky, home to many ancient ruins and the city of Witches. Dunset is a land trapped in eternal autumn, and is the empire's defensive line against invasion.

To the north is Oth Elana, the land of the Kingdoms of the Omentahl. These lands cold and bitter, and frequented by rain and snow. Immense taiga forests dot the land, as well as the immense Stillwind Rise, a plateau without wind. Further north are the boreal lands, and to the west is the great forest of Songmaiden's Meath, the home of the druids. Further west still are the great wastelands of Azad-Ghul and the Dust Abyss.

Separating the Tiers and Oth Elana is the alpine region of Lost Muine, the once homeland of the dwarves. West of it is the Silkcat Jungle, a massive temperate rainforest. Past it are the lands of Zaruchyat, now called Hayekar by the orcs that drove the human inhabitants away.

East of the Tiers, across the Reaches of our Hands is the Thousand Miles, a track of endless desert. From the Painted Desert in the north, to the Stone Forest, to the Dune Sea and the Tar Marshes. The southern tip of the Thousand Miles is the magic city of Zahallas, and on it's eastern edge are the rotting lands of Asur, home of the first kingdom of humanity Asuria.

South of the Tiers is the great crater known as Svog, home of the Svoggite Church who worship the slumbering god Svoggoth within. Bodies have a habit of winding up within Svog. Further south still is the decaying remnants of the Great Tree of the Elves, and even further south is the Zetterite nation of Sisthea. East from there leads to the great canyon-valleys of the Dromudine.

Crossing the sea to the south leads to the continent of Mgamba, a land of jungles, deserts, and savannahs. A number of nations dot the land, most united in a great union.

There is also the Shattered Continent of Zatrom, which orbits the earth, completing a cycle twice a year. It is a land of harsh terrain and floating stones, connected by a metaphorical sea which allows ships to float and fish to swim. It's most common inhabitants of the Mokhan, a kind of rock person, and the alchemists of Arcologium.

Major Factions and Core Conflict.

The Zetterite Empire, the greatest in the world, is a powerful fuedal state (think 14th century Europe) that controls its subsidiaries by taking their gods, trapped in physical idols, and keeping them in its capital city, only allowing the most powerful to speak outside of the city's walls, known as the Zettar. It is lead by the Godhead, a title passed down from worthy female successor to worthy female successor.

Their primary enemy are the Omentahlic Kingdoms (think 9th century anglo-saxons, celtic tribes, and norse tribes), who are led by an enigmatic religious prophet known as the Word. After losing their gods to the Zetterites in a great war, the Omentahl rebelled by creating new gods that were not bound by idol. and thus harder to steal, known as the Omentahl.

The Omentahl and Zetterites have fought two wars, one 120 years ago, and another 40 years ago.

Smaller Factions.

The Svoggite Grand Church is a hyper-religious society with a positive view on undead and dark magics. 20 years ago they attempted to convert the world by force to their views during the Cadaver Crusade, which hurt the Zetterite Empire immensely, though the crusade was unsuccessful.

Many druids, fearful of Zetterite oppresion, have also banded together under a figure known as the Animus, who wishes to destroy the Zetterite Empire.

The Trading House of Hatavius is a merchant-cult obsessed with gaining money and ascending to dragonhood. 

The orcs of Hayeker, led by a figure known only as the Warchief, have attempted many times to invade the lands to the west and destroy all gods for good, though they have been driven back all times.

In the south, much of Mgamba is united under a single senate, the Electrum Council. The land is a testament to what humans can do with peace.

There is also the ghoul kingdom of Asura, the art and reincarnation obsessed Dromudine, the enigmatic doomsday Star Cult, the demon worshiping Disciples of Mother, as well as the mage society led by the Winedark Council and the Alchemists led by the Five Engines..

Magic and Technology.

Magic in Neurim is pure chaos distilled into words which can be read by the magically gifted. These words are located on quartz gems known as steles, which are copied onto scrolls for ease of daily memorization and use. Magic works by breaking down reality and causing fundamental rules to break.

Alchemy, synonymous with science on Neurim, is a set of complex rules, interactions, experiments, and theories to explain how the universe works. Alchemists can perform all sorts of technological feats, from creating automata to firearms. Alchemy breaks down near magic, and thus alchemists and mages rarely get along.

Ancestries.

These are the most common sapient species in Neurim, ranged in order of least rare to rarest. There are more, but these are by far the most common.

Humans.

Humans are the most common ancestry on Neurim. They are extremely varied, and around what you'd expect, though humans do have the ability to smell magic.

Dwarves.

Dwarves are short and stout, often with grand and mighty beards which they take pride in. Dwarves do not reproduce sexually (in fact, they have no sexual organs at all), but are instead constructed by their forefathers. Dwarves have hearts made of rare gems, and are immortal as long as they eat gems or valuable minerals. Dwarves are defined by their cycle, or generation. The current cycle is the 13th. The dwarves are slowly dying off, and many believe the 13th cycle will be the final.

Halflings.

Halflings were a diplomat-species brought to Neurim by aliens known as the Bodyless Ones. Halflings have an appearance resembling whatever species they live nearest, as they have an uncanny ability to adapt to the most common local species. Often, they appear as short humans with elf ears. Halflings are easy to get along with, and are incapable of creating their own societies without the presence of other species.

Elves.

There are three kinds of elf, lead, bark, and root. Together, they were once trees, but millennia of jealousy and hatred split them. Elves are haughty and self-important, and live lives with as little risk as possible, as their deaths will kill an elf of the other types. Elves that deny this lifestyle are known as half-elves, and are the kind of elves most see outside of elven cities. Elves are an extreme rarity outside of their cities, to the point where many generations can go by never seeing one.

Mokhan.

Mokhan are intelligent stone humanoids, animated by a magical force that gives them life. They have elonged limbs, are around 7 feet tall, and are stronger than humans. Mokhan often feel a lack of purpose, which they find physically painful, and try to alleviate it with art or adventure.

Voghul.

The mask-makers. Thin and lithe, with needle legs. They have universally pale hair, and their faces lack any discernible features. They make masks to fit in with common society, often taking after animals. Voghul are seen as strange and eccentric, with their almost dance-like movements and peculiar patterns of thought causing them to stand out despite their best efforts.

Half-Orcs.

Orcs are a virus that infect and warp humans into stronger humanoids with mottled skin, goat-eyes, claws for fingers, a lack of blood, and bones that twist in unnatural ways. Orcs are natural dystheists, believing that all gods must be killed, and have created an endless war machine to do this. Orcs that reject this are known as half-orcs, and are the only kind of peaceful orc you are liable to find in much of Neruim.

Common Threats.

These are some of the common enemy creatures common to Neurim. It isn't inclusive of every option, and only include intelligent beings. Presented in order of most normal to least normal.

Humans.

Bandits and raiders, to Zetterite and Omentahlic forces, to Svoggite crusaders and Asurian ghoul nobles, aggresive humans are common to all of Neurim.

Goblins and The Dark.

The Dark is an intelligent malevolent force that wishes to destroy all sapient life. To do this, it creates monsters, known as goblins. Goblins are highly varied, but are united by a lack of nose and sharp ears. Goblins are incabaple of doing anything that will not eventually result in the death of sapient humanoids, and while they build societies, it is simply to destroy better. It isn't their fault, they can't do otherwise.

Orcs.

An endless industrial war machine. Orcs use anti-holy magic and turn god corpses into powerful machines to aid in their war. Orc invasions are rare, but smaller orc warbands are a common sight .

Kobolds.

Blue scaled lizard humanoids. They live in the deep places of the earth, as the sun causes them to catch fire. Their breath is toxic smoke, and given time they would replace all air on Neurim with it. Kobolds are gifted craftsman, able to create complex machinery out of nothing but stone and waste-copper. They are the sworn enemies of dwarves.

The Fomorian.

Also known as the ogres, the Fomorian are a species of lesser giants cursed with endless disease. They are massive, with bodies covered in a network of wounds, fungal infections, and insects. They live all over Neurim, but are most common near their home in Eluid's Pox.

Husks.

Husks are necro-mechnical machines made of bone and bismuth and animated by astral fire, like azure glass flame. Husks were workers of the Bodyless Ones, but were left behind after being used for war. They are like malfunctioning machines, confused and dangerous. They come in many shapes.

The Gaolmen.

The once faithful servants of a deity, they were imprisoned for committing the Crime Unspoken. When they finally found their way out, they were misshapen, malformed, wrong. Elongated proportions, twisted shapes, and empty pits where faces should be. Though they are incapable of speaking, they continue to worship their traitor-god, kidnapping people and turning them into more gaolmen, endlessly growing their god's flock.

Ghaal, Ghaal-ar, and Ghaal-ratha.

Beings from another world, the Land of Flesh and Metal, often called demons, are malformed and twisted half-metal monstrosities that relish in death. Ghaal-ar, or true demons, are incapable of coming to Neurim if not summoned, so they turn themselves into evil and corrupting weapons known as Ghaal to convince mortals to open portals to The Land of Flesh and Metal. Ghaal-ratha, or devils, are demons that have constructed societies with strict rules. They can come to Neurim without assistance, but are bound by a strict code.

Bhityile.

Two-dimensional psychic beings most commonly found in the vast caverns beneath Neurim known as the Dark World below. They are led by the Abathethi, the voiceless lords. Their plans are unknowable and to them we are but pawns in their great work. 

 

 

The Aesthetics of the Unknowable

Cthulhu isn't scary. Sure, the idea of an unknowable elder god who's schemes have defined all of existence and are impossible to understand and the mere attempt to do so is going to end in, at best, death and, at worst, insanity is scary, but Cthulhu is not scary. Cthulhu is a silly looking tentacle man.

It is hard for humans to write about the unknowable. By the very ways we create art, making art of something that is completely abstracted from our reality is difficult. It's hard to make something you can't parse. In reality, the best art of the unknowable we can create are series of unrelated shapes and colors. The second any part of it makes sense is the second it's no longer alien.

As a result, we have a habit of picking things on Earth to use as the basis for our eldritch horrors, most often deep sea animals: especially squid and octopi, as the terrors of the deep sea are the closest thing to a true unknowable horror we have on Earth. Octopi are intelligent, very much so, but the way they think is foreign to us. They're a solid basis for eldritch horror.

Yet, we fail to go for something true alien. We humanize the idea of an eldritch horror. Notice that a certain iconic monster from Dungeons and Dragons is shaped like a person. They have defined arms and legs and heads, just with the addition of tentacles. Is this scary?

We have a habit of this. Mushrooms are alien to us, but mushroom-people are almost always mushrooms with stumpy little legs and little arms with cute little mushroom fingers. It's easier to see them as cute than it is as a weird alien being so wholly different from us that the fact we can communicate at all is a miracle.

What's the point of the unknowable being so...recognizable? Perhaps I am the only one who thinks that unknowable eldritch horrors from a reality out of time should look as weird as they think. Turning them into the planet of hats robs them of being anything more than just another bad guy. And that's not to say there's anything wrong with that. I like my squid people too. I just wish we had our horrible alien eldritch monsters too.

But how do you communicate the idea of something that is not of this world? My best advice: make something impossible. Something that couldn't possible exist, and then turn it into an all knowing scheming mastermind. The Bodyless Ones of Neurim are memetic thought viruses (they exist only as thoughts) that built an interstellar empire. The Abathethi (also of Neurim) only exist in two of our world's dimensions (they appear flat).

The point of all this wasn't to crap on squid people. Again, I like squid people. I just feel that squid people are pigeonholed into the role of "servants of the great old gods" when they're really best used as weird guys that want to eat your brain.

Choices, Information, and Meaning

When I wrote this post on the Fallacy of Freedom, I mention that players want their choices to matter but I realize that I haven't quite defined what a choice that matter is. So let me continue my dive into game design about player motivation.

Let's define terms:

• A choice is any time a player is presented two or more options.
• A choice can be meta (outside the game) or narrative (within the game)
  
• A non-choice is anytime a player is presented two or more options, but one choice is clearly and objectively correct.
• A false choice is anytime a player makes a choice where all outcomes are essentially the same.
• A choice is meaningful if all options have tangible and measurable consequences.
  
• A choice is informed if the players have the ability to reasonably predict the result of each option.

Choices are extremely common. By the very nature of the game, players must make choices on a regular basis. The question of whether to go forward or backward in a dungeon is a choice. Choices define the game, which is why I like to think about things in terms of the choices offered to the player. Note that I split choices between meta and narrative. Neither are inherently bad or good and both have their times to exist, though it can be bad when a meta reason is used for a narrative choice (this is called metagaming). Choosing a class is a meta choice and there's nothing wrong with that.

Non-choices are an interesting topic because they aren't choices. If option A is leagues and bounds better than option B, then you aren't making a choice. You choose A. There's nothing wrong with presenting non-choices. Sometimes there is merit in making the players realize that option B is bad, but I do think it's bad to try and trick players into picking option B.

False choices are bad. The standard false choice is the party coming to a fork in the road. To the left there is an ogre, to the right is the same ogre. The GM has decided the party is going to fight an ogre, and this their best answer is Schrödinger ogre. False choices are essentially a lie, and at a point it's better to simply not provide a choice than it is to provide a choice where all options have the same outcome.

Now we come to the two interesting terms: meaningful choices and informed choices. Let's start with meaningful choices.

You might be inclined to think that all choices are meaningful, but this is false. Plenty of choices have no meaningful consequences. The choice of whether or not to buy supplies or weapons first is mostly meaningless. That doesn't mean it shouldn't exist and it surely doesn't make it bad, but it is still meaningless.

Note that I define a meaningful choice as having tangible, visible consequences. If a choice has no visible consequences, then to the players it has no consequences. If the players fail to stop a bad guy and the bad guy takes over a region they never seem then this doesn't mean anything to the players. It is essentially window-dressing. If that bad guy instead burnt down their base of operations, suddenly their actions have visible consequences, and the choice feels meaningful.

Information and informed choices present an interesting topic because what exactly is the ability to reasonably predict an outcome. Well what it doesn't mean is that the players need perfect knowledge of all outcomes. They don't, they simply need a good guess as to the result of their choices. As long as the players have some half-decent idea of what the consequences of their actions might be, they can make informed choices. The choice between dungeon A and dungeon B with no information about either is often not a choice: it is random selection, which limits player agency (or autonomy, as I called it before).

My post on the Fallacy of Freedom boils down to players wanting agency, not pure freedom. Agency, then, is generated by the ability to make meaningful and informed choices. Choices without meaning can be fun, but they have limited application and can get dull fast, and choices without information often boil down to random selection, but a choice with both meaning and information is one the players can actually make. A good choice has no correct answers and equally valid options.

Let me provide an example. The party knows of two dungeons. The first has an ancient sword that can destroy evil, and the second has a necromancer threatening to destroy the town the party lives in. These are options with measurable consequences, thus the choice is meaningful. The party has heard of the sword through various rumors, and they have met the necromancer and heard his evil plan before. This is the information the party needs to act on those choices. This is a good meaningful and informed choice.

In conclusion, while it is fine to provide non-meaningful and non-informed choices, and it is at times reasonable to provide a non-choice, the primary choices in a game should be meaningful and informed.

I Love Weird Monsters (and You Should Too)

Looking through the Second Edition Advanced Dungeons and Dragons monster manual has reminded me that seeing some weird and utterly nonsensical monster is great. I just look at the feyr or the deep spawn or the thought eater and am filled with so much inspiration that I don't get when I look at goblins or orcs.

There is a certain magic to the classics, don't get me wrong. I like my goblins and orcs as much as the next gal, but I feel that with the classics you run into a problem. Say you encounter a troll. You know how to deal with a troll: with fire. The act of using fire on a troll is less good thinking and more a test of "do you know your dungeoneering basics?" A fine question, and one that should be asked at times.

But we can do better. What if you didn't immediately recognize what you were fighting. Instead of a troll being tall with green mottled skin, a troll is instead a giant insect with fast regrowing chitin. The answer is still the same, but then the question has changed, and thus discovering that fire works is new and exciting! The issue that there is only so many times you can reskin a troll before players begin to suspect that every new monster is troll in sheep's clothing.

What happens when you come across a feyr though? It's weird and different, and obeys its own rules. Figuring out how to deal with it comes with the same magic they must have had back in the day when they realized how to beat trolls. The classics are the classics because they're easily recognized, a shorthand form of symbolism. New monsters, weird monsters, ignore this symbolism. That makes them interesting.

As a GM, using cool monsters is a large part of my enjoyment. Putting a cool challenge in front of the players and seeing how they deal with it is my fun, and weird monsters are the perfect cool challenge, fresh and new and exciting. This is why bestiaries are my favorite kind of TTRPG product. A monster can be an entire adventure, a whole and complete session bundled in a few dozen sentences of description. It's also why I've added different types of monsters into my setting Neurim, and changed up the ones that are more classic while removing some of the usual suspects. You've seen a goblin, but you likely haven't seen my goblins, and you assuredly haven't seen my husks.

Long story short, I think we should stray from the classics every now and then and use something a bit more exciting. Not always, weird monsters are like candy, too much and you'll rot your teeth but perfectly fine as an occasional treat.

Better Torches

Despite the fact that a key factor in the survival horror gameplay of the OSR, torches are ultimately kind of boring. They are often left as little more than a checklist. Did we buy torches? Have we lit a torch? Busy work, I'd call them.

So I've decided to throw some ideas out there for more interesting torch mechanics, ones that are interesting to engage with and have the following traits:

1. The question of whether or not to light a torch is an interesting one.
2. There's a reason to keep using torches once lanterns have been purchased.
   
3. The torchbearer doesn't feel punished for having the torch.
4. The torch going out is bad news.

The Five Levels of Light.

Level	Sources	Human Effects	Monster Effects
Shining	Magical brightness, Brightbugs	+1 to attacks	-1 to attacks
Bright	Fresh Torch, Sun	As normal	As normal
Dim	Dying torches, Full moon	-1 to attacks	+1 to attacks
Fading	Candles, New moon	Disadvantage to attacks	Advantage to attacks
Dark	The pitch dark of no light	Automatic failure on attacks	Automatic success on attacks

Torches.

A torch burns for 1 hour or 6 turns. When lit, it burns bright for three turns,  dim for two more, and fading on the final turn. After, the torch goes dark. Torch timers are incremented at the end of a turn. A torch can be intentionally dimmed as many levels as desired. The brightest source of light in an area is the light level used. A torch can provide reasonable light for a half dozen characters.

Torches in non-human dungeons or carried by monsters are never brighter than dim.

Striking with a Torch.

If a torchbearer misses an attack with a melee weapon, they can chose to swing with the torch. The torch deals damage equal to the die of a sword minus one die size (if a sword deals 1d8 damage, the torch deals 1d6). On a hit, there is a 50% chance the torch dims one level. For example, if a bright torch is used as a weapon and is rolled to dim, it moves to the dim stage and burns for 3 more total turns. A dark torch is not a torch, and is instead a club.

A torch can be thrown, say to light a pool of oil. A thrown torch has a 50% of going out upon impacting something.

Lighting a Torch.

A torch can be lit from another torch, automatically gaining that torches light level, but not its remaining time. A torch lit from a bright torch burns for 6 turns, though one lit from a dim torch only burns for 3.

Torches can also be lit from a flint and steel. In good conditions, with at least fading light, this process succeeds automatically and takes no more than a minute. In poor conditions, such is when it's wet or dark this process takes an entire turn and has a 25% per negative condition to fail.

A torch can be automatically lit using a brightbug, a special alchemical mixture that creates extremely bright flame. A torch lit this one way burns shining for one turn, then bright for two, dim for two, and then dim for one.

Torch Replacements.

Lantern.

Lanterns burn dim for one hour when given oil. Lanterns cannot be used like a torch to attack, but can be attached to a belt instead of carried.

War Torch.

A torch holder designed for combat. Holds a normal torch. When used to attack, the torch has no chance of getting dimmer.

Candle.

Borderline useless as light for a dungeon. Burns fading for 6 turns. Only enough light for one.

Alchemical Flare.

Burns extremely bright and fast. Burns shining for one minute. Rare.

Specialized Torches.

One can get torches (or lanterns) designed to burn different colors for certain uses. Such torches or lanterns cost three times the normal prices, and are likely harder to find, but can burn with a number of unique properties. Examples include:

• The violet flame of ghost warding: spectral undead cannot enter its range while bright.
• The golden holy flame of demon warding: demons and similar outsiders have disadvantage within the torch's range while bright.
• The silver mercurial flame: reveals hidden doors and text while bright.
• The pale blue astral flame: is cool to the touch, cannot start fires, is not put out by water.
  

Using Light Levels.

Using this torch system, light levels can be used as an interesting way of engaging with monsters. Different creatures can interact with light in ways that are interesting to learn and to engage with. 

For example, goblins could be terrified of bright light, fleeing while in the presence of it. While the party is engaging with goblins, the questions relating to "do we light a new torch" become even more interesting. The inverse is also true when fighting other humans. Turning off your torch makes them worse at fighting you just as it makes you worse at fighting them.

Conclusion.

To me, the most interesting part of this system is that torches get worse over time, thus the question of lighting torches early is raised. A dim torch is still usable, but it ramps up the danger and whether or not you wish to spend the extra resource of a new torch is a legitimate question, which was my primary goal.

The risk reward of wasting torches or being in dimmer light could be amped up further. Perhaps, XP gains are increased while the torch is dim or fading. A piece of gold grans 1.2x or 1.5x xp, meaning there's even more reason to play risky with a dying torch. I have no idea if that's a good idea, but it definitely sounds like one worth testing.

Husks, the Azure Dead

The Azure Dead.

There are few places on Neurim where one can find hordes of the mindless dead: the great crater-tomb of Svog, Asuria, and the southern reaches of the continent of Mgamba. A different plague infests the world: husks. Ancient worker constructs made of bismuth and bone, animated by blue astral fire, like gaseous glass.

Husks, also known as the Azure Dead, are not undead, though most anti-undead measures on Neurim are designed to also work on them. They are constructs, animated by magical energy, skeletons reinforced with bismuth armor and forced to move by astral fire, the force of the Dead Star, Gnottis, forcing animation into that which is long dead. 

Husks are ancient, hundreds of thousands of years old. They were the worker constructs of the once rulers of Neurim, known only as the Bodyless Ones. They are connected by a vast mind-network that allows them to communicate in an instant, though this network is in disrepair and husks have a tendency to lay inanimate for millennia, until forced to rise again by the presence of a demiurge or a mage with the knowledge of the arcana of stars.

Armies of the Bismuth Host.

The husks were not built for war. They are service-machines, designed for manual labor and planet re-shaping. Even today, the husks are not designed for combat. They try to kill with sharpened fingers and rocks. Husks are incapable of using weaponry. Their machine minds cannot grasp the concept.

No one knows why the husks gave up on their mission to do war. All that is known by historians (elves alive since that day) is that one day the husks began to tear each other limb from limb. Beautiful violence performed by machines with no idea of how to do violence. Wherever one finds supplies of bismuth, it is a safe assumption that the husks warred there in elder days. The husks that survive today are those that were the victors of their battles.

Modern husks are only animate when in the range of a demiurge or a controlling mage. Better maintained husks can travel further from their source of animation before shutting down, up to 100 miles.

Husks.

Drudges.

The lowest workers. Built of the skeleton of a human or elf, reinforced with bismuth armor. 

HD: 1

Defense: As Chain.

Mobility: As Human.

Tactics: Swarm. Husks are incapable of more complex tactics.

---

Halfling Solidarity: Husks will not attack halflings unless the halfling attacks them first.
Half-Dead: Effected by all effects that only work on undead, such as turn undead, but do not take damage from being healed.

Claws: As sword.

 

Reavers.

Immense harvester husks. Built of the skeletons of ogres or trolls but with their arms replaced with massive bismuth blades. 

HD: 6

Defense: As Plate.

Mobility: As Ogre.

Tactics: Swarm with the drudges.

---

Halfling Solidarity: Husks will not attack halflings unless the halfling attacks them first.

Half-Dead: Effected by all effects that only work on undead, such as turn undead, but do not take damage from being healed.

Reaping Blades: As greatsword times two. Hits all adjacent creatures, including other husks.

Priests.

Repair husks. A humans skeleton hovering a few inches above the ground, with robes of paper-thin bismuth. Their skulls are replaced with bismuth. They move as if puppeted by string.

HD: 4

Defense: As Chain.

Mobility: As Human, but Hovers.

Tactics: Hide behind other husks.

---

Halfling Solidarity: Husks will not attack halflings unless the halfling attacks them first.

Repair Protocol: Another husk is healed for health equal to 1 HD.
Overdrive Protocol: .Another full-health husk takes an immediate turn, then dies.

Hosts.

Formed of the skeletons of a large beast like an elephant. The back has been replaced with a bismuth construct with a number of holes carved in the side. Deploys small workers, formed of smaller beast skeletons, no larger than a dog.

HD: 5
Defense: As Plate.
Mobility: As Human.
Tactics: Hide behind other husks. Deploy lots of workers. When out of workers, flee.
---
Halfling Solidarity: Husks will not attack halflings unless the halfling attacks them first.
Half-Dead: Effected by all effects that only work on undead, such as turn undead, but do not take damage from being healed.
Worker Host: A hosts has 2d20 workers remaining in it. Workers have 1 hit point and deal 1 damage with an attack (no roll to hit). When killed in melee by a trained combatant, the killer gets another attack.
Deploy Worker: The host deploys 1d4+1 workers.

Demiurges.

Husks designed as receptor towers for other husks. Built of the bones of an immense creature, like a dragon or giant, but with bismuth wings.  

HD: 12

Defense: As Plate +2.

Mobility: As Dragon.

Tactics: Use the husks as legion. Only engage when forced.

---

Halfling Solidarity: Husks will not attack halflings unless the halfling attacks them first.
Half-Dead: Effected by all effects that only work on undead, such as turn undead, but do not take damage from being healed.
Emergency Husk Call: Every turn the demiruge calls all nearby husks to its aid. Husks drop all current tasks and move at maximum speed to the Demiurge.

Husk Animator: The presence of a demiurge animates nearby husks. If the demiurge dies, all nearby husks animated by the demiurge cease animation.

Bismuth Claw: As greatsword times three. Makes this attack three times.
Astral Fire Breath: 60' cone, deals damage as fireball.

Oracles.

Oracles are heavily modified drudges, converted from physical labor to remembering machines. Oracles have the knowledge of the ancient days stored in their machine minds, though most of their data has been corrupted over millenia. Oracles are animated of their own will. Unlike all other non-demiurge husks, oracles can move throughout the world, which they do to record data and history.

An oracle has a 50% chance to remember any occurrence in the past century. Every century prior reduces the chance by 5%. A husk has a 1% minimum chance of remembering anything.

Oracles are non-violent, and will not attack unless provoked, even if nearby husks attack. If stats are necessary, use the drudge's.

Spell Words and Steles

Spell Words.

Magic is chaos, raw entropic force that bends the very laws of the universe to its whims. Thus is why alchemists hate magic. Science breaks down in the presence of magic. The fundamental laws break down. It is only near a spell that 1+1=3.

The raw chaos of magic is written into words. These words are illegible, barely more than a random assortment of lines and squiggles in the vague shape of something that might be readable if you squinted and tried very hard. Most find these spell words to be the nonsense that they are. It is only those who are magically inclined who can look upon the words of magic and understand that there is some hidden meaning. It is only they who can read the words, and it is they who can become mage.

When a mage speaks a spell word, a welling of magical energy is created in them, which is then usually channeled out through a tool such as a staff. The word is then forgotten. It is only in rare circumstances of the truly magically gifted that spell words can be remembered after use, and those with such power are often poisoned by an overabundance of magic. 

Spell words are divided into arcana. Each arcana contains a dozen or so spells, though no arcana has been completed. Doing so would allow the spell words to be combined into an immensely powerful ur-spell. The most common arcana is the prismatic arcana, which contains such spells as magic missile, multicolor armor, and color spray. The arcana of prayer, mostly used by clerics, contains spells like heal, flash of light, and turn undead. The number of arcana is unknown.

Steles.

Spell words exist on steles. Steles are quartz gems, somewhere between 3 and 10 feet tall, with a single flat face with a softly rounded side and back. A single spell word is carved into the flat face. The type of quartz varies based on the arcana of the spell (for example, spells of the prayer arcana are found on citrine while spells of the leaf arcana are found on moss agate).

Reality breaks down around steles. Those that hold weaker spells might only destabilize the rules of the universe within a few feet around them. Powerful ones can destabilize entire regions. Gravity reverses. Suddenly a square has 5 sides. Technology breaks near them. The more complex it is, the faster it breaks. 

It is lucky, perhaps, that such powerful steles no longer exist on Neurim. They have long since been destroyed. In ancient days, empires attempted to transport the most powerful of Neurim's steles. Doing so nearly destroyed the world. It did destroy much of the lands of the North, now referred to only as the Wastes.

There have been attempts to make more steles, but doing so has proven difficult. The only steles made in recorded history are the 17 teleportation words (the words of teleportation are all modified forms of the base teleportation spell word, thus they do not belong to an arcana).

Scrolls and Spellbooks.

As steles cannot be moved (not without consequence at least) the easiest way to access their knowledge at a difference is through the power of a scroll, a recreation of the spell word of a stele. Scrolls can be copied from each other, and it is through this method that spells spread. Spell words can be read off of a scroll, but doing so will destroy the scroll with magical energy. It is more common to memorize a spell word off a scroll so that it might be reused time and time again.

Scrolls are made using special parchment designed to hold magical energy This parchment is more resilient than other forms of paper to the general wear and tear of the world. Such is why scrolls tend to last centuries rather than years. Copying the word from a stele is an easy process, taking no more than a minute. Copying a spell word from a scroll requires copying the illegible scratch of the language of chaos perfectly. It is a difficult process that can take days or weeks.

Multiple scrolls bound together is a spellbook.

Steles as Reward.

Stele are an attempt at solving two issues: making magic feel stranger than the norm found in most DnD adjaecent settings, and to encourage mages to explore more. I find that mages don't have a lot of reasons to explore. Gold loses its luster after a while and mage find most magic items to be of less use than those of fighters. Steles solve that. Now a mage explore to find new spells, sometimes brand new spells that haven't seen the light of Neurim in millennia..

A stele can exist in a dungeon or other dangerous place much like any magic item or pile of treasure. A mage can learn of it and then adventure to it to add a new spell to their book. Outside of more common spells, where one might be able to procure a scroll, this is the only way to gain new spells. This provides an active reason to explore, even for experienced mages, as there is no way to research a new spell into existence. You either buy it off another mage, steal it off another mage, or go find it. Some steles, the powerful ones, can even warp dungeons into chaotic realms where reality works weird and is extra interesting to explore.

Map of Neurim

This is the world map of Neurim, or at least all of the world that matters. It's made by me. It gets its own post because I want an easy access place to link back to.

Neurim. Not pictured are the orcish steppes to the west, the extend of the norther wastes, the bitter northern sea, the bug isles to the east, the rest of Mgamba, and the Shattered Continent Zatrom.

Floating Islands Should Be Weird

Floating islands are a staple of fantasy fiction. It's easy to see why: floating islands are cool. Take an island and push it into the sky and it goes from mundane to extraordinary in moments. It is a shame then that most sky islands are kind of boring. It is strange that the underground (a thing that exists in real life) gets treated with a sense of wonder and mystery and uniqueness while sky islands (a thing that does not exist in real life) gets treated as "an island but sky".

Let's start with an example. There's this game called The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom (TotK), perhaps you've heard of it. TotK happens to have both deep dark caverns and sky islands and the difference between them is obvious and apparent. The underground is weird. It's dark and ominous and plays differently to much of the game. The things you find down there are alien; strange rock formations and trees long since petrified into rock. It's cool. The sky islands are just islands in the sky. They're autumnal, which is cool, but otherwise just some islands and some ruins. They're cool, but they're not interesting.

This is a common occurrence. All too often I have seen a setting that boils down to "sky islands!" as the beginning and end of its pitch. Sky islands are cool but why do we accept sky islands as the end of the concept? Sky islands would be weird. Like extremely weird.

Let's start with the obvious. Sky islands are in the sky. This, at the very minimum, means they're going to be colder and have less oxygen than most places on the surface. They're also an incredibly isolated environment, so whatever evolves on them is near guaranteed to be weird and hyper-specialized. Even beneath the island, where its presence creates a permanent dark spot on the surface will have a strange environment. A lack of sun will lead to a lack of plants. Perhaps a mushroom forest will grow there, or something weirder.

There's a reason that the Shattered Continent of Neurim (known as Zatrom), is a weird alien environment that lacks plant life, primarily being inhabited by living rocks and stone dissolving fungus. To me, part of the fun of fantasy is seeing a new weird world, and that's part of why it bothers me that sky islands are often treated as "an island but sky" rather than "what are the ramifications of having an island in the sky?"

The Ooze Mastermind

The Ooze Mastermind.

It's body is thoughts. A protoplasmic slime formed of churning memories and half-formed ideas. A single cell with a dozen minds. This is the ooze mastermind.

An ooze is a simple creature. It exists only to eat, creating a slime network across its environment, receptors that activate in the presence of food. When the ooze grows too big, it splits into two identical daughter oozes. It is little more than a single cell.

An ooze mastermind is also a simple creature. It exists only to eat, creating a slime network across its environment, receptors that activate in the presence of food. When the ooze grows too big, it splits into two identical daughter oozes. It is little more than a single cell. Except that a mastermind feeds not on death and detritus, but on the thoughts and memories of intelligent creatures.

Ooze masterminds are intelligent, their entire body acting as a pseudo-brain filled with the thoughts and memories of those they have devoured. They are cunning, able to develop and execute complex plans in order to feed. Masterminds have the ability to create ooze-clones of those they have eaten, a near perfect replica formed by memory, a perfect recreation in all ways except their ooze-like texture. With these clones, a mastermind can infiltrate a society, slowly replacing everyone within with itself, until it is the society. From there, it'll expand like an infestation, daughter masterminds infecting nearby villages until an entire region of the countryside is nothing but ooze-clones.

Young Ooze Mastermind.

An ooze mastermind that has yet to develop the power to create ooze-clones, generally one that is freshly born. Around the size of a small bush. Come in a variety of colors, but most often gray-green.

HD: 1

Defense: As Leather

Mobility: Below average, but can squeeze into tight spaces.

Tactics: Devour the thoughts of sleeping people. Otherwise, hide.

---

Pseudopod: As Dagger, but Bludgeoning

Engulf: Can swallow the head of a target that is unconscious or prone

Devour Thoughts: While engulfing a target, can devour their memories for damage [as sword] to intelligence, or similar effect. If reduces target to 0 intelligence, consumes their mind and grows 1 hit die.

Adult Ooze Mastermind.

An adult ooze mastermind, one that can form clones. Can be as large as a semi-truck. Come in a variety of colors, but most often gray-green.

HD: At least 6, up to 12

Defense: As Leather - 1

Mobility: Below average, but can squeeze into tight spaces.

Tactics: Use ooze-clones to lure prey to it. Otherwise, hide.

---

Pseudopod: As Sword, but Bludgeoning

Engulf: Can swallow a target adjacent to it

Devour Thoughts: While engulfing a target, can devour their memories for damage [as great-sword] to intelligence, or similar effect. If reduces target to 0 intelligence, consumes their mind and grows 1 hit die.
Create Ooze-Clone: Creates an ooze-clone of a creature the ooze mastermind has eaten. Ooze mastermind takes damage equal to health of ooze-clone (it still regains this health over time)

Ooze-Clone.

An ooze-clone formed by an ooze mastermind. Appears as a human but with skin that feels like ooze. They split into cytoplasm when cut open. Capable of using normal equipment.

HD: 1

Defense: As Equipment

Mobility: As Human.

Tactics: Convince others it is human.

---

Pseudopod: As Dagger, but Bludgeoning
Weapon: As Equipment

Conclusion.

The ooze mastermind is a re-imaging of the oblex from the 5th Edition Dungeons and Dragons book, Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes, my favorite original monster from 5e and one of my favorite monsters in general.

It's also an attempt at system neutral monster stats, something I'm not entirely sold on my execution yet, but that should be more helpful than my older method.

Hacking: Environment Based Magic

Today on my ever growing list of "ideas that would be fun to design around but currently lack the defined mechanics to make them useful": hacking.

This is a little outside of the wheelhouse of what I usually discuss, but I want to talk about hacking. In TTRPGs that have a high tech level, hacking is often included because it's cool and ingrained in popular society as an aesthetic of high tech fantasy. Hacking is often seen as an advanced parallel to magic (because people lack understanding of how computers and their ilk really work), with the ability to do anything if the hacker is given enough time.

This is fine. Cool even. The issue is that hacking is implemented in TTRPGs poorly. Hacking is often a sub-system, a minigame within the TTRPG (just look at Shadowrun). Such minigames can be fine, but the issue arises when the mechanics grow complex and engaging with the system takes time where the non-hacker players simply watch someone else roll dice. This can be fun every now and then, but if you want to play THE hacker, well, prepare to take the spotlight, and a lot.

I think this sucks. It sucks to play and it sucks because it fails to capture the aesthetic of hacking. I personally cannot think of a piece of media where the process of hacking something is important rather than the outcome of the hacking. The tech-wiz tapping on her laptop keys to open the door is what people find engaging about hacking, not the process of finding weak points in code-based defense and tricking firewalls into ignoring you.

So what? Is hacking supposed to be a glorified version of lockpicking? A quick dice roll, some narrative tapping on the keyboard, and the door clearly labelled "use hacking here" is opened? That's also not what people want from hacking. Well, it's not what I want, and I imagine you don't either.

Well, if hacking is magic, why not lean into that?

Environment Based Magic.

A group of mercs are attempting to bust into the skyscraper of a shady megacorp (not that there's such a thing as a non-shady megacorp). The lobby is heavily guarded and the mercs are outgunned, but they have a secret weapon: a hacker sitting in an alley across the street. She's already got her eyes in the camera system, so she has a bird's eye view of the lobby. Before any combat starts, she trips the fire sprinklers, spraying the room with water and giving her team the advantage of surprise.

First round of combat she activates a smart grenade on a guard's belt, causing it to explode. Second round she causes a turret to haywire and shoot at the wrong target. Third turn she jams a call for support from the guards, but accidentally trips security and gets herself locked out.

Environment based magic is exactly what it sounds like: magic based on the environment presented to the hacker/mage. An environment based mage's spells (or a hacker's hacks) take advantage of distinct traits of the environment: such as a roaring fire or fire sprinklers.Effects are guaranteed, but something has a chance to go wrong. These spells/hacks would be tiered, similar to spell slot levels. As a mage/hacker gets better, they get access to better tiers of spells/hacks, and eventually can do lower tier magic/hacks without fear of backfire.

A low tier spell/heck on a half decent mage/hacker is 100% safe. The next tier up would require a d12 roll, then the next tier would be a d10, and so on. If the mage/hacker rolls a 1, something bad happens. Perhaps a magical anomaly forms, or a hacker trips security and gets locked out of using their abilities. Something dangerous to fill the aesthetic of accidentally tripping the alarms and realizing everything is going to hell.

Personally I prefer the idea of a system with defined spells/hacks rather than a more open one. In a more open one, it becomes the GM's responsibility to define how difficult any action is at any time which makes running for a mage/hacker annoying. You might think that if a mage/hacker only has certain spells/hacks, then they'd be useless if none of their abilities work in the situation they find themself. And I'd agree. I'd argue it's good.

Staking out a place before causing a problem there is peak cyberpunk media for me. Asking the player to plan and think ahead of doing anything dangerous is, I think, good. It's fun to plan ahead. And besides, it's very possible to shift the environment into your favor (start a fire to use said fire).

Example Spells/Hacks.

Magic.

Level 0: Expand Fire, Freeze Puddle, Redirect Wind

Level 1: Create Flamethrower, Earth to Mud

Level 2: Freeze Pond

Level 3: Create Tunnel, Condense Air

Hacking.

Level 0: Look Through Camera, Disable Light Security, Open Door

Level 1: Stun Machine, Jam Weapon, Trip Fire Sprinklers

Level 2: Disable Heavy Security, Activate Grenade

Level 3: Control Machine, Jam Communications

Thief and Thieves

I've been thinking about Thief recently. Not the class, but the 1998 game. It, and it's sequel, Thief 2: The Metal Age, are the games that I believe get closest to making you feel like a thief. It got me thinking about thieves (the class this time), or as they would later come to be called the rogue (a name I find better, but I digress).

Thieves suck. Thieves have sucked in every edition of DnD except for 4th. From their inception thieves have always been the worst class, or at least near the worst, and I don't think it's just a numbers game. You could make the B/X thief better numerically and I think it would still suck.

The Thief.

Let's start at the beginning. What's a thief? Someone who steals. In DnD terms, they handle the lock picking and scouting and the assassinating. The thief (in OSE) has two major defining characteristics: sneak attack (or backstab, if you prefer) and thief skills. 

Sneak attack is bad. In theory, sneak attack makes up for the thief's lack of combat skill, being that they have a d4 hit die, leather armor, and no shield, but sneak attack is such a limited effect in B/X. It exists exclusively to allow the thief to slit necks, except it is still very easy for the thief to fail at doing that, either by missing or just not hitting hard enough. Later editions would codify sneak attack into a bit more of a central piece of the thief toolkit. In contrast to fighters, thieves are about one really big hit. Frankly this just makes missing feel worse.

Thief skills are equally bad. Hide in shadows is the thing you'd expect thieves to do the most. They sneak, that's what they do. Hide in shadows has a 10% chance to work at level 1. By level 8 that is up to 55%. At that level a mage can let someone fly. Twice. You might say "well the thief can do it infinite times a day" and to that I'd argue that it only takes the thief failing once to end up a corpse.

This is beating a dead horse. I haven't said anything that hasn't been said a thousand times before. We all know thieves suck, and if you didn't you would sooner rather than later. Let's open a new can of worms then.

Why is the Thief One of the Big 4?

The big 4 is my personal name for the fighter, mage, cleric, and rogue, the four main archetypes in DnD classes. You might notice a small difference between the first three and the thief.

Fighters are hard(er) to kill, with an emphasis on weapon combat. They hit stuff good. 

Mages are people who do arcane magic. They have access to a wide variety of spells that do dozens of unique and useful things.

Clerics are worshipers of gods that are given divine power and can be mediocre at hitting stuff.

Those three archetypes are varied. A lot of different ideas can fit under them. A fighter can be a fighter, or a fighter can be a barbarian. A mage can be a mage, or a mage can be an illusionist.

Let me ask again. What's a thief? Someone who steals. Thieves live in this magical place where what they are is so strict. A thief is a thief. There are no other options. You might argue that a dexterous archer is a thief, but no that's more of a ranger, which is definitely more of a fighter than a thief. An assassin is a thief, I suppose, but it's still someone who steals and sneaks, it's just a thief with greater emphasis on slitting throats.

I think thieves make the game worse. There's an argument for older DnD that goes "the lack of special abilities on character sheets implies you can do whatever you want". I think this argument is dumb, partially because it's false. Thieves have special abilities that only they can do. It makes no sense that only thieves can pick locks. I can pick locks and I am most assuredly not a thief. I can put my ear to a door and hear behind it. Anyone can do that. There's an argument, and a good one, that thief skills are just adventurer skills. Go tomb robbing enough and you'll learn how to lock pick.

So where does that leave us? Obviously removing the thief is silly. Thieves are baked into the fantasy genre at this point and I think there is merit to having a big 4 rather than a big 3. The question is if everything the thief does is bad, what is it a thief should do?

A thief never plays fair.

Now we loop back to Thief (the game). Something I love about the Thief games is that you are weak. You will lose in a fair fight 90 times out of a hundred. So you never take a fair fight. You cut the lights with water arrows, make new paths with rope arrows, and when all else fails you clobber someone with a blackjack. Hard to catch a thief when you're asleep.

There's an expectation in the OSR that the players should never fight fair. A fair battle is a lost battle. Thieves should take that a step further. A thief isn't just tilting the odds in their favor. A thief is changing out the machine that weighs the odds.

Adventuring equipment is a part of DnD that's been there from the early days. You wouldn't know this if you started with 5e, because the stuff is treated with an obscene lack of improtance. It's often little more than a checklist, a bit of tedium before the fun of dungeon crawling. I think we can change that. Think about a fighter for me. Anyone can use a weapon in DnD. A fighter is simply the best at it. Do that with items and thieves. Sure, you can use a 10-foot pole to poke for traps. Anyone can. The thief can just also use it to pole vault over the enemies and fire a net from their crossbow once they land. A thief never plays fair.

Thieves are masters of all sorts of mechanical and alchemical items. Anyone can use normal poison, but a thief knows how to use and where to get special poisons with unique effects. A fighter could use a normal arrow. A thief could use an arrow that explodes into a pool of oil to set up for their mage's fireball. A fighter wouldn't know what to do with a grenade. The thief knows exactly what to do with it.

While fighters are masters of weapons and combat, and mages and clerics are masters of their respective types of magic, thieves should be masters of items. Their tools and the environment itself are the weapons of a thief.

The Fallacy of Freedom

There's this wonderful 2017 GDC talk that I think applies heavily to the world of TTRPGs. Allow me to summarize: freedom and autonomy are not the same thing. Freedom is the ability to do what you want and autonomy is the desire to want to do things. Equating them is the Freedom Fallacy, the idea that simply giving the players options will make them want to do stuff. 

Let's put this in more TTRPG terms. Freedom represents the players options in what content they can engage with, be it linear or open. There's nothing wrong with either option. A linear game is not inherently worse than an open game. On the other hand, Autonomy represents the players self-motivation to engage with these options. There must be things the players want to do. A lack of autonomy is a bad thing.

Players don't want freedom. They want autonomy. There's a reason a lot of narrative linear games have lasted a long time: the players are autonomous even if they lack freedom. More freedom is, often, not better. Players don't necessarily want infinite options: they want their choices to matter.

Moral of the story: You can't just throw a cool world at your players, they have to have a reason to interact with it.

This is a mistake I am guilty of. I, in the past, though putting a cool map in front of the players was all it would take to get them excited.Instead, it left them confused and disinterested. There has to be a reason to engage.

Though I dislike it, gold for XP has a reason to exist: it's a reason to interact with the world. This is, I think, one of the greatest failings of modern TTRPG design, milestone leveling, is bad. It actively encourages a lack of autonomy. You are rewarded for the bare minimum. Even when you are free to do whatever you want, there's no reason to do anything.

The solution is simple: create reasons for players to interact and do stuff. Create interesting plot hooks, cool rewards and magic items, sources of XP that aren't rewarded for doing nothing. This is some of the best advice I can give for a new GM. Do not fall into the fallacy of freedom.

You Enter the Forest Deep Part 3: Denizens of the Deep

This is part three of You Enter the Forest Deep. You can find part 1 here and part 2 here.

These are the 10 factions within the Forest Deep. Each has goals, virtues, and resources. These are all conflicting, which brings these factions into conflict. I have a post on factions and conflict that you can read here.

The Wolves.

Like wolves, but larger and more primal. The platonic ideal of a wolf. They can speak. They prefer their own tongue, but can snarl out human words if demanded. They actually dislike the name wolf, as it is a reminder of their less civilized kin. They prefer to be called Protectors or Guardians.

They are noble and proud. Take a medieval knight and remove any possible angle of corruption. Those are the Wolves, the pure essence of chivalry and nobility. They are the Forest Deep's charged protectors, something they do with pride and grace and joy. In return, the Forest gives them all that they could ask for. A Wolf in good standing never goes hungry.

They are wise, and far smarter than the average human. They build societies, family-clans where the eldest leads, thought they lack the ability to construct homes or tools. They would make fabulous allies, friends of the Forest as they are, but they are slow to trust and impossible to bribe.

Goals: To protect the Forest Deep no matter the cost.

Virtues: Nobility, chivalry, and kindness. They act on an invisible moral code.

Resources: The protection of the Forest Deep. The Wolves and their allies have no fear of the Forest's more dangerous aspects.

To use the Wolves in combat, take a dire wolf and add a hit die. Then, roll a d4 to determine which of these once per battle abilities the Wolf gets:

1. Howl - All enemies that can hear it save or are demoralized (-1 to hit)
2. Rabid Bite - Wolf bites, enemy saves or takes additional damage equal d6's times the Wolves hit die.
3. Go For the Throat - Wolf bites, enemy must save or be pulled prone
4. Skirmish - Wolf bites then leaps back its movement. Another Wolf can move for free.

For elder wolves, add 2 more hit die (adjust other stats as necessary) and roll for abilities twice. 

The Ants.

A perfect working order guided by chemical trails and instinct. They are ants, giant ants. Workers the size of horses and soldiers the size of elephants. They act like normal ants, a perfect biological machine transporting materials back to the hive. The hive must grow. The hive must always grove. Such is the Queen's demand.

They can't communicate with you, not unless you can understand their chemical trails. The only way to communicate with the hive is to follow them back to the their hive. The princesses (and the Queen) can talk. Well, they can communicate through psionic telepathy. They're psions, all of the intelligent Ants. The Ants survive day to day with chemicals, but they can all be ordered instantly through telepathic messages in the chemicals.

They don't understand you. They're Ants. They think of you as female. You'll have to explain things to them. The princesses only know what the other Ants see through the chemical trails. They can learn, and will inscribe this knowledge in the chemical trail. Then, all Ants will know it. They've been all over the Forest. They can find anything, given time.

Goals: The hive must survive. That means more resources, more food, always.

Virtues: Subservience and endless work.

Resources: Manpower. The Ants number in the thousands. You think you've seen a lot when you see them harvesting food. This is nothing compared to the Ants in the hive. Connecting yourself with the chemical network would give you control over the lesser Ants.

Ants come in 5 varieties. Workers are the size of horse. Stat them the same, but give them a low chance of capturing an enemy in their pincers (Around 20%). Soldiers are huge. Stat them like elephants. Princesses are like workers, but with psionic powers of a level equal to their hit die. Male ants are a rarity. They are like workers but winged. The Queen is immense, the size of a castle. She has too many hit die to count.

The Ettercaps.

A thousand thousand years ago a human city sunk into the earth. They worshiped the Eight Eyed Mother. They continued to worship her in their home in the dark world below. She protected them in exchange for secrets. One day they came back up, changed. They had eight eyes, skin like chitin, and could speak to spiders. They were no longer human. They were ettercap.

Ettercaps are a religious cult dedicated to the Eight Eyed Mother, but you wouldn't know this by looking at them. Most are shepherds and hunters, tending to flocks of giant spiders. This itself is an act of worship, a collective secret of their species. They are thieves and assassins and bandits. No one likes them.

The ettercaps do not deal in coin. They deal in secrets. They can trade you many things for a secret, the more horrid the better. The Eight Eyed Mother prefers things unspeakable by a normal voice. They deliver these secrets to their temples in the dark world below. Woah befall you should you stumble into one of their temples.

Goals: To gather secrets for the Eight Eyed Mother.

Virtues: Spiders, for one. The collection of unspeakable knowledge, for another.

Resources: Secrets. Lots of them. They will trade them. Spiders and their products as well. Silk is rare and valuable and the ettercaps have it in droves.

I imagine your game already has stats for ettercaps and giant spiders. They will never fight fair. They prefer to assassinate quietly, with garrotes made of spider silk. Priests can cast spells like a cleric of at least 5th level.

The Aes Sidhe.

The fair folk of the Fair Court. Those that rule the other, more fair, world. These are the Aes Sidhe. These are the fae.

They feed on entertainment. For the fae, to be bored is to starve. They find no entertainment more sweet than that of mortals. It is why they play at mortal ideologies, kings and queens and courts and nobles. They have no need for this, for a fae's place in the court is an objective truth. Titania and Oberon must always rule.

There are many kinds of fae. Spriggans and faeries and sprites and brownies and boggarts. These are all lesser fae, the servants of the Fair Court. They spend much of their time in the mortal world, causing minor problems and annoyances for mortals to feed on their delightful reaction. The true sidhe would remind you of elves. Pale and impossible fair with hair like that of copper wire. They dress like nobles, in flowing silks and linens, and wield needles, fanciful rapiers of enchanted steel. This is not their form, not truly, but is a costume they wear in their eternal play. They rarely step into our world, and when they do it is most often in the Forest Deep.

The Aes Sidhe will never lie. Warp and twist the truth, yes, but the fae will never lie. They are incapable of doing so. At the same time, the fae take every comment as a promise. Any offer, no matter how small or non-genuine, is a full and complete contract that can never be broken.

Goals: To feed on mortal reaction to their pranks.

Virtues: Anything fun! Of course, a fae idea of fun is not a mortal idea of fun. The fae cause chaos. They consider this good.

Resources: Gifts from a more fair world. All cursed for mortals of course. You'll never get a fair deal with the 

Use whatever lesser fae stats you think are fun. For the fae nobles, they have 5 hit die and fight using needles. Needles sap your emotions (consider something like charisma damage). They also have random illusion spells. Whatever sounds funny. They aren't here to kill you, just to feed on your reactions.

The Eoten Moot.

In the Forest Deep, some trees are more than just trees. They are sapient and can move and speak. They were once confused with giants, thus their name.

The lowest of their kind are the dryads, like humans but with skin the color of bark and moss. They are shy, but find humans and their ilk fascinating. Next are the bark ogres, immense golem-like entities made of logs. They walk like gorillas and are impressively dumb. The greatest are the eoten themselves, immense walking trees.

They want peace and quiet for the most part. To relax and pretend to be a plant for decades on end. Every century, they meet in a grand moot to discuss the coming years and cycle places of rest. They do this so that one eoten does not hog the quietest part of the Forest to themself.

Goals: To relax in peace and harmony in a Forest that is healthy.

Virtues: They value friendship and knowledge. Though they wish to relax, they will gladly make a new friend.

Resources: They don't have much other than stories. They spend 90% of their time resting. 

Stat dryads like, well, dryads, and eoten like treants or walking trees or whatever works. Bark ogres are like ogres but resistant to slashing weapons and extra weak to fire.

The Wealden Court.

The druids. It might come as a surprise to know that the Forest Deep dislikes the druids. Many think of the druids as anti-civilization and pro-nature. This is wrong. Druids are pro-civilization and pro-nature. They are priests of nature who believe in harmony between the two halves, and that both are better for the other. There are anti-civilization druids out there, but they are extremists. You may make the Wealden Court anti-civilization. I do not.

The druids of the Deep.are there on behalf of civilization. They hope to find common ground with the Deep. They believe there are places within the Deep that require mortal hands to grow stronger and better. The Deep disagrees. It would rid itself of them if it could, but they are like an infection. The druids and the Wolves are natural enemies. It is no wonder the most common shapeshift of a druid is the bear.

You can hear them singing, if you listen. The great verses of all the druidic knowledge. It is the only way for them to spread their teachings. Druidic knowledge cannot be learned by reading.

Goals: Find common ground with the Forest Deep. Allow civilization to prosper within its bounds.

Virtues: Combining nature and civilization is good. Taking from nature without giving back is bad, as is wasting part of what nature gives.

Resources: Druidic magic. They can heal or resurrect the dead. They are also some of the best at finding their way through the Deep, second only the Wolves.

They are druids. They have the powers of the druid class, be that magic or shapeshifting or summoning or whatever. Pick what you want. Druids are versatile. They travel in small groups, never staying in one place for too long.

The Bolemen.

Yellowed eyes, frantically darting from one shadow to the next. An axe with a handle of gnarled wood and a head stained with blood and sap. A quiet life where all involved have no trust in each other. These are the bolemen. 

The bolemen lost their minds. They are owned by the Forest Deep now. It ignores them, perhaps amused by their state. They are paranoid. Fearful of each rustling leaf and skittering insect. They live in small communities, steadings carved from the Forest Deep. They don't trust outsiders (they don't trust anyone or anything) but can be bargained with. They're still people deep down.

Bolemen logic makes no sense. A family of bolemen could be loving and sweet one day and the next the daughter has murdered her parents because she believed that they were going to turn her into soup. Paranoia is a deadly virus. Their paranoia often represents itself as superstition. The bolemen will believe anything if they think it will protect them. Their homes are covered in trinkets said to ward darkness. They salt their doors and windows at night. To understand the bolemen, find a list of various superstitions. The bolemen believe in all of them.

At times, larger groups of bolemen will form villages. With guidance, they can work together and do great things. An elder boleman, or at times an elf or Wolf or eoten or druid can get them to cooperate, to lay aside their fears. The second this figure of peace is gone, they will rip each other apart. Such is the curse of the bole.

Goals: Survive.

Virtues: Whatever normal humans find virtuous. They're still humans just, a little lost.

Resources: What you'd expect from a homesteader. Food, wood, pelts. Superstitious trinkets designed to ward away evil.

Stat bolemen like bandits, but give them lumberaxes (like a battleaxe or greataxe). An elder gets an extra hit die or two. There are bolemen clerics and wizards, but they only appear in larger boleman villages.

The Elves.

They are the elves of the wood. The elves of the high canopy, haughty and proud, have long since abandoned these woods, and the elves of the roots below, jealous and cruel, have long since descended to the dark world below. Only the wood elves remain. 

Most think them xenophobes. This isn't necessarily true. The wood elves fear outsiders like they fear the Forest. Outsiders are a threat to their guise. The elves are not welcome within the Deep. They survive by hiding from its eyes, sitting at the peripheries of its vision, like blurs on a camera. Outsiders risk this. Outsiders know not of their ways of hiding and sneaking. This is a danger.

Elves build villages and roads through the Deep much like any other species, but they do so in a way that denies their existence. Their homes only appear like homes if you know what you're looking for. Their villages are mirages, their roads an easily denied falsehood. If something made by the elves is obvious then it was made like that on purpose, as a trap. It is not uncommon to walk through an elf village with no idea you were ever in one.

Goals: To stay hidden and stay safe. To tend to their families.

Virtues: Elves love those that are good at stealth (especially their kind) and good hunters.

Resources: Their stealth. Bow and arrows designed to wind through the trees. Ample supplies. Elves have some of the only healing magic in the Deep.

For every 25 elves (a normal village size) there will be 12-14 hunters. They use longbow and spear and have 2 hit die. Another 8-10 will be trappers, who use glaives and traps and also have 2 hit die. Another 2-3 will be shrouds, masters of the elf-illusion that are impossible to find and uses as scouts and spies. They have 5 hit die, use dual short swords, and carry potent poisons  The elf village will be led by a mage (they are equally adept at arcane and divine magic) of 7 hit die, and a swordsmaster elder using an enchanted greatsword of 9 hit die. Some elves train elk to ride, though this is more common in larger villages. The elves do not have young in their villages, for they have not reproduced in any known age.

The Sporelings.

Where there is fungus there are sporelings. They are dumb and slow and short-lived, with stumpy bodies made of fungal chitin. Each sporeling is unique, like a pastiche of a mushroom.  They have eyes, but they barely work. Most navigate via the subtle disturbances in the air as things move. They don't live long. A week at most. When they uproot, they loose their connection to the mycelia network that feeds them. They slowly starve. They're a mobile propagation method. A way of spreading the fungus. They don't know this. They'd hate the knowledge.

Due to their short lives, sporelings learn fast. They can become masters in days what would take others years. Sometimes they fail. They die and their body is absorbed by the fungal network that originally created them. The network absorbs their knowledge, and the next cycle of sporelings is better. This repeats forever. Eventually the fungus could know everything. instict fights this. The sporelings desire to leave their host far behind.

Yet, there are sporelings out there with a grasp on complex topics. Complex language, kingdoms, cities, culture. They are all born of a single fungal super-network: The Ur-Fungus. Every mushroom is an offshoot of the Ur-Fungus. In the end, every mushroom will once again be a part of the Ur-Fungus.

Goals: Grow. Survive. Eat. Propagate.

Virtues: There is no time for morality when you live a week. All is fair in the eyes of the fungus.

Resources: You can eat them. They store things, valuable things, deep in the mycelia. They will trade it for food. Only food. They don't keep knowledge that isn't useful for survival. It's a waste.

The earliest form of the sporeling was the spore pod, a floating ball of toxic spores. They have 1 hit point and explode when hit, and all nearby creatures must save or take light poison damage. This explosion explodes all nearby pods too. When they appear, roll a d6 for how many appear. This dice explodes. It keeps exploding. Let them grow into the thousands. For normal sporelings, use whatever stats your game has for mushroom people. 25% of all sporelings are born of the Ur-Fungus. They are intelligent, use human language, and can have armor and tools and tactics. If you encounter Ur-Fungus sporelings again, they will remember you.

The Owls.

You've seen owls, perched on high branches, ever vigilant in the dark hours of the night. They aren't real. Sure, they have flesh and blood and eat, but they're a lie. They are but scouts and messengers for the Owls.

Take a barn owl. Make it the height of a human with a wingspan to match. They speak in our tongue (they learned it from their lesser ilk). They watch and wait for things to die, so that they might carry them to their next life. You believe Death to be a skeleton? No, death is an Owl, with bone white face and dark wings draped over it like a cloak and claws like a harvesting scythe.

The Owls worship death. The concept of it. They believe that death is pure and blessed and that is a great honor that all are destined to it. This does not mean that they go out of their way to seek death. All things have their time and place. It is, however, a blasphemy to run from it. The entire Canopy is their cathedral, decorated with bones and offerings. Every moment of their lives is worship. Think of the most strict cult possible. Make it stricter. That is the life of the Owl.

Goals: To maintain death.

Virtues: Accepting death is good. Necromancy and prolonging life are horrid sins to be purged.

Resources: Bones. Lots of them. They are master diviners. They keep the magic items of the fallen. They will trade these things for death.

Take the stats of a giant bird. That's an Owl. They can use weapons in their talons, but why would they, they have talons. 50% of Owls can cast spells as a cleric of a level equal to their hit die. When in danger, they will fly into the air, and if necessary pelt those below them with stones and magic and only swoop in for the kill. Some Owls are bishops. They have 7 hit die, are clerics, and use a staff made of entwined wicker. The staff can turn undead 3 times a day.