Month: October 2008

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Welcome to The Haunted Realm…Hope You Survive the Experience!

Sunday we kicked off my new Savage Worlds Sandbox setting with a bang, or at least a whole passle of players: Wendy, Dan, Paul, Elyssa, Russell, Mac, Walter, and Mike M.  Russell and I spent a bunch of the afternoon making a variety of pregens for the people who didn’t already have characters (everybody but Wendy and Dan) to pick from.  After they grabbed a character that sounded appealing and assigned a name and gender, we got started.

The roster ended up being:

  • Loric, the Physician/Mage – male – Wendy
  • Thorvald, the Demonologist – male – Dan
  • Aerys, the Duelist – male – Paul
  • Qwirk, the Brute – male – Elyssa
  • Tyrok, the Dwarven Architect and Priest of Fess – male – Russell
  • Dorakyra, the Priestess of Kyr – female – Mac
  • Angelina, the Tomb Raider – female – Walter
  • Ranth, the Scout – female – Mike M

Because it was the first game, and there were so many players, including ones who only show up once in a great while, I gave them a mission to start out instead of going for the full-on sandbox.  That is, I gave Dorakyra and Tyrok a mission, and left it to them to recruit the others.

Dorakyra has been charged by the senior priestesses of her Goddess, Kyr, the Collector of the Dead, to travel to the village of Brightfalls, approximately one day’s journey to the north of Losian and find the church that records indicate should be there, clear it, and consecrate it to the Gods.  Tyrok was assigned to go with her and aid her.  The pair had been given 500 gold to get supplies and perhaps aid in recruiting (not a lot of money in the economy of the Haunted Realm, since as yet almost all necessities need to be imported from the New Kingdoms).

After some by-play where Dorakyra bet Tyrok that she could find three women to go with them before he could find three men (the stakes were she would let him braid dwarven ornaments in her queue vs. he would let her tattoo “My Heart Belongs to Kyr, But My Soul Belongs to Fess” in henna on his chest), they managed to recruit the rest of the part.  Tyrok weaseled out of the bet by getting the women he found (Ranth and Angelina) to stay out of sight until he managed to convince Dorakyra (who had only found men, in the form of Qwirk, Loric, and Thorvald) to call the bet a draw.  After the parameters of the task were described to them and remuneration discussed, they all agreed to go, though Tyrok once again had to fib…this time telling Loric, who was a bit cautious and reluctant to venture into the wilderness, that the church at Brightfalls was a famous repository of death records that would certainly aid him in his research into the Soul Plague.

The party decided that they would set out at mid-day, so they’d camp well away from Brightfalls and whatever was currently inhabiting it, and arrive the next day with plenty of sunlight left.  They began hiking to the north, passing the newly established farms and tiny villages around Losian, and gradually leaving civilization–or what passed for it–behind.

Shortly before dusk, they were set upon by a pack of skeletons that had been lurking behind some trees near the path that’s what’s left of the road to Brightfalls.  To keep things simple, and because it was most of the players’ first introduction to combat in Savage Worlds, there were only 4 Skeletons, and they were all Extras.  They made relativel short work of the skeletons, with only Angelina taking a hit hard enough to cause a Wound, which she spent managed to Soak.

After spending time interring the remains of the skeletons and performing the proper rights of Kyra over them, the party decided to camp there, rather than continue in the deepening gloom.  They set watches for the night, but aside from something large moving past the camp, the night passed uneventfully.

And there we broke for the night.

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It Takes a Thief

This is something I posted to Dragonsfoot a little while back that I wanted to have a record of, mostly because I could have sworn I had posted it here and just wasted a bunch of time searching for it in vain. It’s also relevant to JM’s (not me, some other JM) post To Catch A Thief, where he talks about Thieves in D&D mostly in answer to the really, really old school (pre-Greyhawk) objection that the problem with adding Thief as a character class in the first place is that it takes skills that everybody was assumed to have pre-Thief and makes it that character’s sole job.  My basic suggestion is that you can assume that everybody can still do all those things, but the Thief is the only one who gets a “saving throw” against screwing up so it makes sense to have the Thief try it if there’s one available.

It’s not that relevant to what we’re doing now, because I’ve replaced the D&D as filler campaign with the Haunted Realms, using Savage Worlds.

My players mostly feel that playing a low-level thief is not very fun, because almost all the special abilities (except climbing) are hopeless, if not suicidal, to even try.  E.g. Out of every 100 traps the party encounters, a 1st level thief will successfully disarm one.  It’ll go off on the thief 9 times, and the other 90 times, the party will have stood around while the thief accomplished nothing.

I could address that sort of thing by fudging die-rolls, but I prefer not to do that very often, since if I do it often enough to matter the players no longer really know what the rule is and if I don’t do it often enough to matter, then…well it doesn’t really matter.  And I could amend or replace it with house-rules, but again I’d prefer not to; if I go very far in that direction I might as well be playing one of my home-brews.

Ideally, then, what I’m looking for is way of letting the thief do cool, class-appropriate stuff, that doesn’t contradict the rules as written.  This ties in with some advice I saw (I forget whether it was here or in the ODD Guild) that by the time that dice are being rolled, the characters are in trouble…all the save or die stuff is fine, as long as you give the players enough leeway so that clever play can let them avoid being put in a save or die situation; the save becomes an escape from mistakes they made (or at least risks they knowingly took), not something that’s continually thrust upon them until they inevitably fail.

So here’s an approach I’m thinking of taking with Thief special abilities:

Find Traps: the player describes exactly what the thief is looking for, and automatically detects the trap if the player is looking for the right things.  It’s only if the player isn’t looking for the right things that you roll, in which case the chance is as listed that the thief notices the trap anyway.
The DM must be scrupulous in noting what will set the trap off or what the clues might be.  e.g. if the thief is looking for tripwires in the hallway, or tapping ahead with a 10′ pole, and there is a tripwire, the thief finds it.  If the trigger is a pressure plate and the thief only says he’s looking for tripwires, then roll to see if he notices the pressure plate anyway.

Disarm Traps: the player says what the thief is doing to disarm the trap, if it would work, it works automatically; if it wouldn’t, or would require great skill or dexterity to pull off, roll.  E.g. the thief has noticed a tiny hole in the door handle, such as a needle might come out of, and announces he’s blocking it with sliver of wood before he turns the handle.  If it was a needle trap, that just works. If it squirts gas or some other effect (e.g. a blade trap triggered by covering the hole), then roll vs. Disarm Traps to see if it worked.

Hide in Shadows: thieves can automatically hide if there’s actually something to hide behind; only roll against Hide in Shadows if there’s nothing but shadows to hide in.  If the thief is trying to move from place to place this requires a Hide in Shadows roll if there are gaps between the hiding places, otherwise it’s still automatic (though it may require a Move Silently check).

Move Silently: the check is only necessary against alert opponents. Surprised opponents or those that the DM rules aren’t paying much attention or are making noise themselves won’t automatically notice the thief, even if he fails the roll. The DM should still roll, so the thief remains uncertain about whether there are any alert opponents within hearing range.

Hear Noise: as written, but emphasis is on needing to roll only to hear relatively faint noises; ordinary conversation behind a door, for instance, would automatically be heard by any thief or demi-human listening at the door. A successful Hear Noise roll could reveal the substance of the conversation if the listener knows the language.

Pick Pockets: for picking a selected target’s pockets, the rules apply as written, however any thief can attempt the following:

Working the Crowd: the thief attempts to pick the pockets of targets of opportunity–people who are too distracted to notice the attempt and who appear to be carrying money in an accessible location. May only be attempted in a relatively crowded area, such as at a market. Roll against Pick Pockets once per hour. Success means you managed to gather some coin: roll 1d4 for a treasure from tables P-S (Treasure Carried). A Failure is only detected on a roll of 00.

The Bump: two thieves working together can work the crowd, deliberately trying to distract richer-looking targets, e.g. by one bumping into him while the other picks his pocket. Same as Working the Crowd, but roll 1d8 for a treasure from tables P-V. On an 8 at the DM’s discretion it’s a treasure from any of P-V, but it includes something that the owner is bound to come looking for (or will send someone to look for). The Bump, however, is more noticeable; if there are any guards or other busy-bodies who might be observing the area, for each hour after the first that the pair attempts The Bump, the chance of discovery goes up by 1%. i.e. 2nd hour discovery is on a 99-00, 3rd hour on a 98-00, etc. It’s still pretty safe, but as a way to make a living, it’ll eventually end up in trouble with the law.

Open Locks and Climb Walls (and Backstab!) are all interpreted pretty much as written. I’m tempted to try to come up with a more generous interpretation of Open Locks, or perhaps just label a fair number of locks “easy” (meaning no roll required as long as the thief has tools), but the consequences of failing to open a lock aren’t that dire, and the party can usually try to just break through the door or bash open the chest, which have their own drawbacks, making it worthwhile for the thief to at least attempt it.

Note that this whole way of looking at things owes a lot to Robert Fisher’s thoughts on thieves.

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The Haunted Realm

This is the write-up of the introduction to my new Savage Worlds Sandbox setting, The Haunted Realm:

Up until ten generations ago, the Bright Kingdoms were a happy, prosperous land, where Human, Elf, and Dwarf lived in peace. Then catastrophe struck. Nobody yet knows exactly what occurred, but something vast and terrible happened. In a single moment every mirror and scrying stone across the realm shattered. One by one the Gods died, and the stars went out and the moon cracked. The clerics went mad, and in the days that followed most of them killed themselves. A plague began to ravage the landand as its victims expired their bodies would rise as Soulless Ones. Demons began infesting the empty shells, while the displaced souls wandered as pathetic ghosts.

Dark fog covered the center of the continent, and out of them strode the invading armies. Creatures out of legend–Orcs, Trolls, Ogres, Dragons, and things even more horrible–began conquering what remained of the Bright Kingdoms, rounding up the survivors and enslaving or eating them. The remaining survivors fled: the Elves into Faery, the Dwarves deep below the mountains, and the Humans to the overseas colonies in the New Kingdoms. The Bright Kingdoms were no more; the survivors now called the land Gastmor, the Haunted Realm.

Although much of the magic and knowledge of the Bright Kingdoms perished, the colonies of the New Kingdoms grew and prospered, and the people began following the Gods of the new realm. At first, they could not rest entirely easily after what happened in the West. The mages of the New Kingdoms would repeatedly try to scry for information about the old country, but catch no more than glimpses of a nightmare land where, without the Gods, nothing natural grew or thrived. Gradually, though, the fear of imminent invasion lessened, and Gastmor and the Bright Kingdoms were, if not forgotten, allowed to become the concern of mages and academics, as well as the handful of Elves and Dwarves that had been cut off from their homelands at the time of the catastrophe.

Then, fifty years ago, the magic that had been shrouding Gastmor began to recede. The mages and the Elves investigated and what they found puzzled them. Where the fog lifted, of the whatever had been commanding the legions of Orcs and other creatures, there was not a trace. Instead there was evidence of tremendous battles, with invading hordes turning on each other, and the resulting slaughter decimating their ranks and reducing them to scattered bands squabbling over the ruins. The Soul Plague had apparently burned itself out completely. The Elvish and Dwarven nations were still hidden behind mighty magical barriers, unreachable by the magics of the New Kingdoms.

Through their oracles, the New Gods indicated it was time to re-settle the Haunted Realm, destroy the remnants of the evil forces, restore the natural order and bring it once more under the sway of the Gods. The New Kingdoms came to an agreement to grant land to those who wished to settle across the sea in Gastmor, to fund the establishment of new temples, and to send their criminals and troublemakers into exile.

The characters will be settlers and explorers of the haunted wilderness. They may be adventurers seeking fame and fortune, religious devotees carrying out the will of the Gods, criminals sentenced to exile, settlers seeking land of their own, researchers probing into the history of the Bright Kingdoms or trying to fathom the catastrophe that destroyed them, and so on.

Play will take place intermittently, when we have too few (or too many) players to have a session of one of the regular campaigns, and at least some will take place online (either via VOIP like Skype, or play-by-post on the bulletin board) so that Doug and Paul can participate despite the new babies. I intend campaign time to flow fairly rapidly between adventures, so that the players will see progress in settling the setting, and if all goes well there will be successive generations of characters (similar to Ars Magica covenant play). Players will control four or five characters, so that they’ll always have one or two free for whatever combination of players are available that session even if a particular party ends a session in the middle of some activity. At least for the first few game years, adventures will begin and end in the only settled town (Losian) on the Eastern shore of the Haunted Realms.

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Want!

  • Want!

    Oh yes, it will be mine!  I’m particularly interested since we use LEGO minifigs instead of miniatures for most of our table-top gaming.


    • LEGO Castle fans have wanted more civilians, more women, and more non-equine animals for a very long time — something a little more like this:

      Box art for 10193 Medieval Market Village

      Box art for 10193 Medieval Market Village

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The Adventurers

The Adventurers

Left to right they are:

  • Ranth the Scout
  • Angelina the Tomb Raider
  • Aerys the Duelist
  • Qwirk (behind), the Fighter
  • Dorakyra (in front), the Priestess of Kyr (Collector of the Dead)
  • Loric the Physician
  • Tyrok the Dwarven Architect and Priest of Fess (God of Fire and Smithing)
  • Torvald the Demonologist

Because of special guests from my other game-group, we had about four more PCs than usual last night.

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The Saga of Boatmurdered

This is the record of a game of Dwarven Fortress, as played by a series of people swapping off after each game-year.  It’s both hilarious and sad.

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A Puzzling Conundrum

  • Why Puzzles Often Suck in Tabletop Role Playing Games

    A sample “puzzle”

    • Let’s take a few puzzles by example.

      The Lich’s crypt is guarded by six levers, numbered one through six, and can only be opened when levers 2, 4, and 5 are up; 1 and 3 are down; and 6 is in the middle. The party finds said crypt. Ok, what is going to happen when you have five people who have not read your notes reach this dead end door?

To which I say: A combination lock isn’t a puzzle.

There are two ways that puzzles can appear in an RPG scenario: indirectly, as just another feature that the characters need to beat with the appropriate mechanic (skill roll, magical power, etc); or directly, as a challenge to the players.

The first doesn’t really require much discussion.  Some kinds of puzzles, such as bank vault combinations, will occur naturally in the game world and if the characters want to get inside the vault they’ll have to figure out how to deploy their abilities to do so.  It could be the whole focus of an adventure, say in a caper scenario, it could be a feature of a larger scenario, say a wall-safe in a room where a murder has occurred that might contain a clue, or it could be completely coincidental, as when a group of super-heroes interrupts a robbery in a bank.  In any case, the exact details of the puzzles–even the solutions–don’t matter because the players aren’t expected to solve them.  If there’s any solving to be done it will be at the abstract level of the characters.

The only reason to even mention the indirect kind is because scenario designers will sometimes confuse the two types, and present the details of an in-character puzzle as if it were a puzzle for the players, which leads to sucky “puzzles” as above.

Puzzles that directly challenge the players to solve them are a completely different kettle of fish.  The first thing you have to decide is whether the kind of game you’re playing has any place for such direct challenges to the players at all.  If the players want to approach everything from an in-character standpoint, player challenges are problematic.  The player may even see the solution, but feel obligated not to point it out because the character wouldn’t get it.  Now that’s a recipe for frustration right there, or even hard feelings at the table if not all the players are as dedicated to fire-walling in-character vs. out-of-character knowledge and insights.

Even if you decide you’re comfortable with direct PC challenges, you have to decide what the price of failure is: what are you willing to put up with in game if the players just can’t solve it.  In old-school challenge-oriented gaming, the answer tended to be “if they can’t, they can’t.”  If they don’t figure out the puzzle opening the door to the lower depths of the Liche’s tomb, and they can’t figure out a way around the door, they can’t go down there.  Maybe they can come back later when they have an idea.  That probably seems unduly harsh to most gamers nowadays, who may have an entire plot line riding on the party getting past that door, or just see having the players sit around the table brainstorming for an hour trying to figure out the puzzle as boring and a waste of time.  You could give the players an out of letting the characters roll for it if the players don’t make progress after a certain amount of time, but not only is that likely to be a let-down, you still face the possibility that the characters will fail and the party is still stuck.  At that point you could give in and give them a clue, or have a bright idea strike a party member or NPC from on high, but you have to wonder whether putting the puzzle in was a good idea in the first place.  Whatever you decide, it’s best to have thought it out before-hand.  With forethought, you could place clues or resources before-hand, or design an alternate (perhaps more dangerous) route so that solving the puzzle can reward the players, but failing to solve it won’t get them stuck (see “When Failure Is Not An Option“).  Nothing you’re likely to decide on the spur of the moment as the players are getting frustrated and cranky will be as good as what you can design in from the start.

But supposing that’s all settled, and you’ve decided that the players will have fun with a challenge to their puzzle-solving skills and decided what to do if they get stuck: how do you design a good puzzle?

Good puzzles can be solved by reasoning.  Anything that requires a brute-force approach isn’t a puzzle, it’s (at best) a time-sink.  It’s possible that the puzzle can require some bit of knowledge about either the real world or the game world, though in the latter case you had better be damn sure that the players actually know it and it wasn’t buried in some twenty-page back-story that you handed to them and they never read.  Let’s look at the liche’s crypt again:

Levers numbered 1-6 that need to be in an arbitrary pattern (up, up, middle, down, down) to open the door: not a puzzle.

Suppose, though, the levers weren’t numbered.  Instead, each of the six levers has six positions.  Next to each position is a letter.  The letters, top to bottom, read:  D, E, F, I, N, R.

That, at least, is a puzzle.  Moreover, it’s a puzzle that a fantasy RPG geek is particularly likely to get.

Which brings me to another point: unless you’re running a straight-up challenge-oriented game where everybody will happily spend an hour or two wrestling with a juicy puzzle, good puzzles in RPGs should be simple.  Complicated enough to give that little buzz of aha satisfaction when they get it, but nothing the players are going to agonize over unless you’re absolutely sure that agonizing over puzzles is how they’d prefer to spend their RPG time.  Err on the side of the obvious, which at least won’t slow down the game. Also, unless you have personal knowledge that one or more of your players is quite familiar with something, trivia and pop culture references can be dangerous.  Just because they seem blindingly obvious to you doesn’t mean the players will have the slightest clue, and unless you let them Google it, they won’t be able to obtain one during the course of the game, either.

Good puzzles should also relate back to the adventure at hand, if at all possible.  Don’t just plop a riddle or a logic puzzle that you got off the Net in the middle of your adventure unless you can relate it back to the themes and motifs of the rest of the adventure.  A riddle whose answer is “The Sun” might be good in the Temple of Ra, but seems kind of random in the Tomb of the Liche Lord.  The lever puzzle might be improved by using the Liche’s original name as the key instead, if that’s something the players had good reason to know.

Good puzzles, at least in RPGs, also should reward the players immediately.  If it’s a clue, make it a big honking obvious one, not something that itself further confuses the players or that they file away in their minds and might or might not remember later.  And for heaven’s sake, don’t punish them for figuring it out.  Yes, if you really were a diabolical Liche Lord designing a room, you might think it’s hilarious if you arrange it so that “success” in figuring out your lever puzzle releases a swarm of flesh-hungry beetles into the room, but while the Liche Lord may be a dick, you the GM are not.  And unlike the Liche Lord, as GM you’ve got an interest in the players continuing to accept and look forward to your challenges.

I think the best puzzle I’ve ever put in a game, at least from the players’ point of view, was in a game of DC Heroes, where I cut up a picture of Tutankhamen’s mask into a  simple jig-saw puzzle (about 7 pieces, iirc) and had the Riddler leave one piece of the puzzle behind at each crime scene, leading up to a big Museum of Antiquities heist.  These were college-age players, so it’s not as if a 7-piece jigsaw puzzle was a real challenge, but by careful cutting of the pieces and arranging which order they got them I was able to keep them guessing until piece 5 or 6, and they really seemed to appreciate the whole thing out of all proportion to the difficulty of the puzzle or the amount of time I spent preparing it.  And when they figured it out early (before they had the last piece(s)), I let them get to the Museum in time to be waiting when the Riddler and his crew arrived.  That was a moment they really enjoyed.

In conclusion, if your players are interested in being challenged directly, and you’ve thought out the stakes and the fall-back if the players are stumped, puzzles can be one of the most satisfying things in a game.  After all, it’s not the players actually swinging the sword, or flying the chopper, but it is the players themselves matching wits with the puzzle and it’s not lucky dice but the players’ own triumph when they succeed.

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Savage Worlds New Edge: Demonic Ritual

Requirements: Novice, AB:Demonology

Demonic Rituals take 1 hour to perform per Rank of the demon being summoned. The TN for the ritual is 4 for a Novice demon, +1 per Rank of the demon. A raise on the summoning roll grants a +2 to the attempt to compel the demon. The demon appears at the end of the last hour of summoning, at which point the Demonologist must make a Spell-casting vs Spirit roll to compel the demon to do his bidding. If successful, the demon must perform one task for the summoner. If the Demonologist fails on the initial attempt to compel the demon, the demon may either return to whence it came or break the summoning circle and attack or possess the summoner. The Demonologist must know the true name of the demon he is attempting to summon; Demonologists collect the true names of demons and hoard them jealously, since while a demon is performing a task for (or worse, is in a pact with) one Demonologist it will not heed the summons of another. Taking this Edge gives the Demonologist the name of one demon of whatever rank he chooses for free; additional names have to be acquired in-game, or by taking the Edge again.

Success

The demon will use all of its normal abilities and powers to carry out the task. If the task is ongoing (such as guard this room), the demon may attempt to break the compulsion (spirit vs. spell-casting) whenever the Demonologist sleeps (treat as once per day for simplicity) and once more if the Demonologist is killed; if the demon fails to break the compulsion that final time, it is bound until released by magic. If the demon manages to break the compulsion, it can never be re-summoned by that Demonologist, and it will attempt to seek out and kill him (this becomes that demon’s Major Habit until the Demonologist dies). Generally it is safest for the Demonologist to specify tasks that can be accomplished quickly by the demon, before the Demonologist needs to sleep again.

Failure

The demon may leave, and the summoner may not attempt to summon that particular demon for 1 year and 1 day. If the demon chooses not to leave, it may attempt to break the summoning circle as an Action; this occurs in the same round as the Demonologist’s attempt to compel the demon, so the Demonologist has already used his Action. The demon makes a Spirit roll vs. the original summoning roll. If it succeeds, then it can leave the circle. Starting the next round it is dealt cards as normal, and on its Action it may try to attack the Demonologist, possess the Demonologist (Spirit vs. Spirit), flee physically, or retreat to its home. The Demonologist may attack it or attempt to compel it, but cannot reform the circle. If it does not succeed in breaking the circle, then the Demonologist may attempt to compel it again or dismiss it. It may not attempt to break out of the circle again until and unless the Demonologist once again attempts to compel it.

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Savage Worlds Arcane Background: Demonology

Demonologists get their powers from consorting with demons. Demonologists have three ways of using demons to perform magic: as familiars, by performing rituals to summon them and strike a deal or compel them to perform a service, or by forming a permanent pact. Demonologists may take the Arcane Familiar Edge multiple times. The Demonologist may only take Power Edges if there is a pact with a demon, and those Edges are actually applied to the demon (so if the demon is ever exorcised, the Demonologist loses them).

Arcane Skill: Spell-casting (Smarts)

Starting Power Points: 10 (these are actually the demon’s points and are lost if the demon is ever exorcised)

Starting Powers: 3 (see above)

Demonic Familiars

Demonologists can take a normal animal and bind a minor demon to it to serve as a familiar. Use the Arcane Familiar (AB:Magic) rules from the Fantasy World Builder Toolkit. The familiar has no special demonic powers other than the ones described in the Familiar Edge.

Demonic Pacts

The key to most Demonologists power is the pact they form with a particular demon. This allows the demon to dwell within them, and for them to use the demon’s powers as their own, but it comes at a price, namely the risk that the demon will take them over, either temporarily or permanently.

All demons have one Attribute: Spirit. Their Spirit is determined by the Rank of the demon, from d4 for a Novice to d12 for a Legendary demon. All demons have one Major Habit; this is a vice that the demon will try to indulge in to the maximum extent possible if it ever gains control of the body it shares with the Demonologist. Demons do not get Bennies when they are in a pact with a Demonologist. The GM may choose to create stats, skills and Edges for the demon, in case it ever manifests physically, but while the demon is inhabiting the body of a Demonologist, they are irrelevant. All Demons are also Wild Cards and get a Wild Die on their rolls.

As an Action, the Demonologist may force his demon to use one of its powers. Roll the Demonologist’s Spell-casting die without the wild die. On a roll of a 1 there is Backlash (the demon tries to take control), otherwise the demon will use the power as directed (roll the Demon’s spell-casting die and wild die). The Demonologist may spend Bennies normally on the Demon’s spell-casting roll.

Backlash

On a roll of a 1 on the Demonologist’s spell-casting die, the demon attempts to seize control. The Demonologist now makes a Spirit vs. Spirit test against the demon. If the Demonologist loses, the demon takes control. Regardless of the outcome, whoever is now in possession of the body is Shaken.

Demonic Possession

Once a demon takes control of the body, it will remain in control until it sleeps, or it gets a 1 on its casting die (which causes another struggle for control). If the Demonologist botched the spirit test in the struggle for control, then the demon may remain in control even if it goes to sleep, though it will still have to struggle again if it gets a 1 on its casting die. While the demon is in control, the Demonologist has no awareness of what is going on in the outside world.

During the time when the demon is in control, it will attempt to indulge in its favorite vice to the exclusion of all else. For instance, if it craves alcohol, it will wander off in the middle of a battle in search of a drink. It will defend itself if directly attacked (because the pact forces it to), and avoid placing itself in obvious immediate danger (sitting down in the middle of a stampede to have a drink), but it cannot or will not consider the costs and benefits to anybody else of its actions or voluntarily defer gratification for a greater reward later. A character can make a successful Persuasion roll to bribe the demon, but demons don’t consider themselves bound by any promises that aren’t magically reinforced, so it won’t stay bribed if it spots a better opportunity. The demon may or may not choose to try to hide the fact that it’s possessing the Demonologist, depending on its past experience; if every time it’s gained control in the past, the Demonologist’s companions have tied it up and knocked it out, it will pretend to be the Demonologist at least until it can sneak away. If the companions don’t seem to be in any position to stop it from indulging itself immediately, though, it won’t engage in a long charade unless it’s particularly cunning.

Because control reverts to the owner of the body when the demon becomes unconscious, demons will do everything that the setting allows to avoid falling asleep until absolutely necessary.

Demons and Experience

Whenever the Demonologist gains an Advance, he may choose to improve the demon by taking a Power Edge that applies to the demon. Whenever the Demonologist goes up a rank, the demon’s Spirit attribute automatically advances a die.

Notes

If at all possible, the GM should let the player still play the character while the demon is in control, since otherwise the player can be left sitting out a significant portion of the game. If the GM doesn’t like the possibility that the player’s character will not regain control of his body even after the demon has to sleep, remove the effect of a botch on the Spirit vs. Spirit roll. If that’s still too long, you could allow the player more frequent attempt to break out, but you might want to reconsider letting players take AB: Demonology in the first place.

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This Looks Like A Job For…

This month’s blog carnival, hosted by The Chatty DM, is on the theme Super Heroes in RPGs.

Superhero RPGs are actually one of my favorite genres, though my current game group….well, let’s just say that our last couple of attempts didn’t work out.  I don’t want to be pointing any fingers at Badger Lord (Master of the Super-Sonic Tunneling Vampiric Badgers) or Kikko-Man (chinese food delivery bicyclist with the power to create illusions…of chinese food), but it’s never really clicked as a campaign.  I’ve had much better luck with one-shots where the PCs have super-powers, but the setting doesn’t assume any of the standard superhero tropes.

In the past, though, ah, the glorious past….

I believe our very first super-hero campaign, back in High School, used Superhero 2044, the very first superhero RPG ever, but we played them all at one time or another: Superworld (one third of the Worlds of Wonder),  Villains and Vigilantes, Champions…I don’t really remember much about it, although I do recall that it had a somewhat unusual setting (it all took place on an island nation in the year 2044) and that my brother Alex’s character in that, a super-speedster called Silver Streak, was carried over into successive campaigns as we tried new systems.  I think that was also the original home of an NPC hero that reappeared in campaign after campaign of mine, PyroMan of the International Agency Command.

The next one we tried was Villains and Vigilantes, which I remember mostly for its generation of super-powers via rolling on random charts.  Thus was born one of my only PC super-heroes of that era (since I mostly GMed): Kodiak, Bear Detective… a private eye who could shapeshift into a bear and had laser-beam eyes.  I decided that the bear form was actually his real one, and his power let him shapeshift into human form.

Somewhere in between Villains and Vigilantes and Champions, I created a home-brew system, and most of our super-hero gaming was done in that, though towards the end of High School we did some gaming with Champions.  I liked it a lot, but most of my gaming group didn’t want to be bothered with the bookdeeping, either for character generation or playing out the combats.  They were much happier with the freewheeling style of my home brew.

Notable characters of that period include:

  • Silver Streak: super-speedsters, perrenial in every system
  • Thunder-Fist: martial artist with kinetic energy absorbtion powers that gave him an “Iron Fist” like attack.
  • Defender of Israel: an Israeli Captain America, played by my brother’s Israeli girlfriend
  • The White Princess of Oz : I think this was played by my kid sister…
  • Megaman: powered suit that gave the user one super-power at a time, based on Ultra Boy of the Legion of Superheroes; this was about 7 years before the Capcom game…

In college and beyond, I played a lot of Champions, but that’s a story for another time…