Firearms for His Majesty the Worm

Neurim has guns. If I ever intend to run HMTW in Neurim (and I do) I will need rules for firearms. These are those. Balance is secondary to idea.

General Firearm Rules: Like other ranged weapons, bullets and gunpowder are required to use a firearm and stack 6 to a slot. Firearms are difficult to reload mid combat, and require discarding two cards as a miscellaneous action. Blunderbuss cannot be reloaded in combat. Firearms can't hurt magical things. Intense magic will break a firearm just as quick as water.

Pistol

Pistols deal piercing damage. They do not grant attacks favor when attacking you in melee like other ranged weapons.

Musket (2 Slots)

Muskets deal piercing damage. Muskets grant access to the bow's special Aim Challenge Action. While wielding a musket, those attacking you with a melee weapon have favor.

Blunderbuss (2 Slots)

Blunderbuss can either spray over an entire zone, dealing 1 wound to all things inside of it, or can be fired at an engagement, dealing piercing damages to all things within said engagement. You are liable to shoot your allies with a blunderbuss. Such is life. While wielding a blunderbuss, those attacking you with a melee weapon have favor.

The Powder Monks

Specialist warrior monks who use firearms. They were the first to adopt the strange technology, and as a result have an understanding over their weapons not seen in all of the lands. The Lord Saint Gideon was a powder monk, and it was his years in solitude studying the musket that taught him to skills necessary to hold back the orctide in the south. The powder monks are a reclusive lot, but they will teach anyone with the capacity to learn their secrets.

The following talents are intended to start unlearned for all paths, but can be learned by any path.

The Wind of Black Powder

As a miscellaneous action you can attach or remove a bladed bayonet to your firearm. While this bayonet is equipped, the firearm is a melee weapon (treated as a dagger for a pistol or a polearm for a musket or blunderbuss). If the firearm is loaded, you can remove the bayonet as part of a normal attack action.

Saint Gideon's Blessed Rounds

Spend a resolve to perform a trick shot that would be otherwise impossible, such as curving or bouncing a bullet.  This isn't magic (though it definitely looks like it).

Snapshot

You may Riposte as an interrupt action using a loaded firearm. If the riposte is successful, the attacker does not gain favor from using a melee weapon against you while wielding a missile weapon.

A Rough Idea for Psionics in OSR Games

The Great Big Lie

Psionics are a lie.

Well, they exist, as far as everyone can tell, but they shouldn't. A psion can't really teleport, they're just very good at lying to the universe about where they are. Psionics are a collective fever dream, a lie just believable enough that we can all go along with it. Sure, a psion can teleport, but only because they can convince us they can.

This is why psionics are magenta. Psions are liars, just like the false color that paints their actions.

Are You Psychic?

When you create your character, for each of INT, WIS, and CHA you have above 15, you have a 10% chance to be psychic (up to a 30% chance). This is rolled once, at the end of character creation, and it is a "yes or no" thing. You are psychic, or you aren't.

If you are psychic, you know the Mind Blast power, and its associated passive trait to understand psychic songspeak, and have 2 PP plus 1 PP for each of INT, WIs, and CHA you have above 15 (minimum 3 PP). You gain 1 additional PP for each psionic power you learn. You regain PP when you sleep, same as spell slots.

Anyone can be psychic. Even a barbarian. Imagine how horrifying that'd be.

Using Psionic Powers

A psionic power consists of an activated effect that spends PP to active, as well as a passive effect that is always active. Using a psionic power takes your turn (or action, or whatever) and is treated as a magical action if necessary (but isn't effected by anti-magic). Consume the amount of PP listed by the power to perform its effect. Once you run out of PP, the universe is done with your bullshit and refuses to let you lie to it anymore.

Learning Psionic Powers

Whenever you witness another creature use a psionic power, you have a 1-in-6 chance to learn it. This effect is cumulative, so the second time you see it you have a 2-in-6, and so on.

Once you learn a psionic power, you must meditate to unlock it by expending 1,000 xp (or system equivalent). Once you do, you gain 1 PP, the power's passive effect, and can use its active effect.

Psionic Powers

Art of Mind Blast

Passive: You know songspeaking, the psychic language shared by all psionic beings. It is an incomprehensible song to all other beings.

Active: Spend a PP to attempt to destroy a creature's mind. Creature saves vs. spells (or intelligence or whatever) or takes 1d6 damage per psychic's level. Only works on intelligent beings. Beings of animal intelligence take half damage.

Art of Longspeaking

Passive: You can communicate telepathically with creatures within 10 feet of you. This speech is two-way, but requires a shared language.

Active: Spend a PP to form a long distance telepathic bond between you and a creature. You can communicate telepathically up to 200 feet away. This speech is two-way, but requires a shared language.

Art of Jaunting

Passive: Your feet lie about their position at all times. You can stand on top of liquids, or thin air, or anything really, but if you attempt to take a step you will sink.

Active: Spend a PP to disappear and reappear in a spot within 30 feet. You don't teleport, you just stop being where you are.

Art of Telekinetic Weapon

Passive: You can touch a weapon to cause it to float by your side. It's covered in a thin magenta mist, and hovers around you, never in the way but always there. Doesn't do much except look cool.

Active: Spend a PP when you fail to attack something to try again with your floating weapon. You use all the traits of the floating weapon when making this attack (enchantments, damage, cool magical effects, etc.).

Art of Push-Pull

Passive: You can grab objects up to a foot outside of your actual hand's reach. You still have to hold them, you can just do it further away.

Active: Spend a PP to attempt to move a creature of object. If it's an object, it's moved up to 15 ft. in a direction of your choosing at extreme speeds. If a creature, it must save vs. paralysis (or dexterity) and if it fails it's shoved 15 ft. in a direction of your choosing at slightly less extreme speeds.

Art of Other-Self

Passive: You can make small modifications to your appearance at will. You are still obviously you, but you can make dirt disappear and remove unseemly blemishes. Or add dirt and blemishes if you so desire.

Active: Spend a PP to create a duplicate clone of yourself. This clone acts like you and performs the actions you would in any given scenario, but is incapable of making meaningful impact on the world. It's attacks do no damage, it's hands pass through objects, and everything about it just seems a bit off. When everyone stops believing in it, it disappears in a cloud of magenta smoke.

Art of Easy-Truths

Passive: You have preternatural control over your voice. You always sound like you wish to sound, and the meaning of your words is easy to follow. You can also change your voice in cool ways, like making it louder or echo.

Active: Spend a PP and with a quick wave of your hand while speaking a lie, you convince a creature that your lie is 100% truthful. They'll figure it out if they are presented evidence that obviously disputes your lie, but otherwise they accept it as truth.

Planes are Dumb

 Plane: A world separate to the primary one in which a game takes place, usually representing an alignment or element. Not the air kind.

Today on my list of strange and unnecessary vendettas: Planes.

I don't really like them anymore. Like don't get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with planes as a concept, and a lot of the standard DnD ones are interesting on at least a surface level. In fact, I think the take of planes being separate places is perfectly valid and there's nothing wrong with it, I just prefer otherwise.

I don't need to write an essay on why I think the way I do. I'm just going to ask a series of questions: Is the Plane of Fire infinitely big? If so, what is going on everywhere else? Why do we only see part of it? If it isn't then how big is it? Do all worlds share the same Plane of Fire? Have fire elementals been to other planets? Do they know secrets of the universe that we could never know?

There are answers to these questions, and they are interesting to answer, but oh boy is the result weird.  I prefer my weirdness to originate from things the players can interact with.

Something I've been trying in Neurim is making any sort of outer plane part of the same universe. There was once a demiplane called the Gaol, but now the Gaol is just a cavern deep under the earth. You can go there, no portal required. The Gaol isn't just a thing in the lore, its a tangible thing the players can interact with. You want to visit the high god of this world? That's cool, just climb the space elevator or find a space ship. You want to visit the elemental plane of fire? That's cool, just find a way to the sun.

I am unsure how useful this will be. Perhaps you will find it inspiring.

Make Your Hexcrawls Smaller

 This is a sequel to this post. I'd also recommend reading this post.

A 6 mile hex is 31 square miles, give or take. 31 square miles is a lot. A lot of my complaints with hexcrawl design relate to this size being massive, in that it leaves worlds feeling big and empty and devoid of anything outside of the couple of preplaced things the GM has decreed exist.

My argument is simple: Make your hexcrawls smaller. You do not need 200 hexes. I promise you that you do not, in fact you could have a full, complete, and exciting game in a single hex. Hell, you could have a full, complete, and exciting game in a single building, though perhaps said building would have to be the House of Leaves.

Perhaps that's an unfair thing to say, a lot of us want a big grand adventure. We want to explore open untamed wilderness. To that I say, you underestimate the amount of wilderness in 31 square miles.

In my last post, I talked about the idea that hexcrawls are essentially megadungeons and presented two ways to interpret that: site as dungeon level and region as dungeon level. Something I think I didn't realize is that region as dungeon level implies a big area, but like, a region could easily fit into 1 six mile hex, and if you think about hexcrawls like that then how many six mile hexes do you need? One for each level, so somewhere between 10-12.

Side note: If you're going to do this, and I recommend that you do, then feel free to blend things a bit. A hex is not a hard barrier, it's just that each dungeon site should take approximately one hex of area.

One of my real complaints with most hexcrawl's design is that being big doesn't make them better, it makes them emptier. It kills verisimilitude for each 31 square mile area to consist of exactly one thing worth engaging with. Perhaps you don't care about that. I do.

Part of this is the fact that 6 mile hexes are just too big to be useful, but I'm not sure things improve if you change from one thing per 6 mile hex to one thing per 1 mile hex, still with 200 odd hexes. Part of it is simply that there's too much content to explore, and too much to design, and way too much to keep track of if you want hexes to interact. 

Second side note: I can't remember where (probably Reddit), but I saw a comment about Wolves Upon the Coast where there was an idea brought up in one hex that was only useful in another hex like 8 hexes away, and I think that helps prove my point. 99.99% of players are never going to experience the content of going to hex A, then going to hex B with the thing from hex A, and recognizing that's what the thing from hex A is from, so why is it even in the game? This isn't a knock against Wolves Upon the Coast in general, I have not played it or read it, just an example of the failings of hexcrawl design in general.

Basically: make smaller hexcrawls that are more dense. I know I will.

Hexcrawls are Megadungeons

Is this a contentious take? 

I'm not sure because frankly it seems obvious in hindsight. Hexcrawls (and pointcrawls) are essentially megadungeons, but instead of hallways we have plains and hills and forests and instead of floors we have modules and encounter sites.

I'm not actually going to argue this point, because I don't think doing so is particularly useful. Instead, I'm going to explain why thinking about hexcrawsl like this is amore useful way of thinking about things.

What Makes a Hexcrawl Good?

The ability to make meaningful and informed decisions(I stole this from Goblin Punch and I'm willing to admit that), Hexcrawls are about resource management and exploration, and both of those things require informed decisions. 

This is where most hexcrawls fail. If all you know about the adjacent hexes are their biomes, you have essentially 0 information and no way to make a choice on which one is the best one to go explore. If you go north and "oh surprise there is a river that you cannot cross!" than you feel like you've wasted your time. This makes the resource management less meaningful. It turns exploration from something you think about to something you just kinda do.

What Makes a Megadungeon Good?

Well, the ability to make meaningful and informed decisions. Megadungeons are about resource management and exploration, and both of those things require informed decisions.

Good dungeons are designed in a very certain way. They limit the players options to help them make more informed decisions. Hallways are the obvious one, you can't go from a room to any other room, but you can go from room to rooms 2 and 3. Doors and gates and keys are another way, be they literal doors or gates, flooded passageways, an enemy too difficult to fight head on, or anything else.

Restrictions give us the information to make more informed decisions.

Restrict Your Hexcrawls.

Not, restrict as in size (though you should do that too), or restrict as in reducing the number of monsters you use.

No, restrict your player's ability to go form hex to hex. Use doors and gates to help focus direction. Remember, if you have infinite equal options, then you have no options because you're essentially choosing at random. Limiting options is not limiting creativity

Megadungeon Hexcrawl Design

In my opinion, there are two options for hexcrawl design:

1) Site as dungeon level

2) Region as dungeon level

This is a choice of how grand your scale is. If your sites are dungeon levels, then your goal is to design a hexcrawl where each adventure site is approximately one levels worth of contentt, and if you choose region as dungeon level you'll have one levels worth of content spread out over multiple sites and open areas.

Figure out which you want, then seperate different sites or regions with doors and gates,

In order to go from the snake temple to the crystal caves, you have to find a way through the spooky forest full of spiders! How do you deal with the spiders? I don't know, but you're going to need gold and the best way to get gold is up in the snake temple.

Obviously, this doesn't mean "turn your hexcrawl into a glorified line. It's still a hexcrawl, encourage exploration. Even if sites are a dungeon level, introducing smaller places to explore or interesting places to find make the map feel more alive! And you can always have multiple options. The crystal caves might be level 2 of our "megadungeon", but the spider tree is level 2a, and both are equally valid to explore, and the spider climb boots in the caves could be used to skip up to level 4 of our "megadungeon" up in the mountains.

Basically: think about how you would connect your hexcrawl as if it were a megadungeon, and then shape things around that.

Note: My examples here are all talking about site as dungeon level design, because I think it's easier and more obvious. Region as dungeon level is simply, in my opinion, harder to design because there's just more content. If the spooky spider forest is meant to be enough content to level up, you'll likely need several smaller dungeons, a number of non-dungeon adventure sites, and all that.

Second Note: Do all the other things you'd do in a megadungeon too. These dungeons can(and should!) have factions! There is no reason to think the spiders don't have their own goals and won't interact with the world seperate to the party. The party might ignore the spider tree, but it's hard to ignore the spiders when they're invading level 3, the orc castle.