Tainted Magic for Lamentations of the Flame Princess

Tainted magic is a house rule that is inspired by Dungeon Crawl Classic's and ACKS's take on the magic-user class. It is intended for Lamentations of the Flame Princess, where magic-users are already considered chaotic in alignment. The rules also affect elves, but to a lesser degree.

First off, the way new spells are learned is changed. The magic-user or elf doesn't really require a spell book. He gains a repertoire of spells. The repertoire for each level is equal to the number of spells the magic-user or elf can cast plus his INT modifier. Thus a 1st-level magic-user with an Intelligence of 13 would know two 1st-level spells.

When a magic-user or elf gains access to new spells, he can either choose among those spells he found during adventuring, or he rolls on the spell tables for the magic-user, or a combination of both. It takes one week per spell to add them to the repertoire.

To cast a spell, a magic-user has to roll a spellcheck (1d20 + Level + INT modifier) with a difficulty class of 10 + 2x spell level. If he succeeds on the roll, the spell takes effect and he retains the spell to be cast again. On a failure, the spell cannot be cast anymore before sleeping. Also, on a failure the spell doesn't take effect.

On a natural 20, any damage rolls are maximized, the caster may select any random results instead of rolling, and the saving throw of the target of the spell is penalized by the caster's level.

On a natural 1, the spell fails and cannot be cast again that day. Also, the caster must roll a saving throw versus magic. The roll is penalized by half of the spell level (rounded up). If the roll fails, the character gains a random mutation. Mutations are rolled on table Mutations (Carcossa, p. 256). If the character is a magic-user, he also ages by a number of years determined by rolling on the aging table on the same page in Carcossa. As an elf he is immune to ageing.

Overall, magic is available more often. But a magic-user will face certain dangers using magic and he'll also be not as versatile - more akin to a 3rd Edition sorcerer.

Experience for Old School RPGs

As I've posted earlier, I don't really like how Lotfp is dependent on gaining treasure for getting experience points. Also, I would like to emphasize gaining experience for defeating monster. Yet, I also don't want to clutter my game with monster encounters. I've so far suggested to hand out more experience for monsters, but that didn't seem right either.

Now, I've read Dungeon Crawl Classics, and really like its approach to handing out XP. But DCC revamps the whole XP system. I want something more compatible with all Old School and Old School+ games. That's what I came up with:

Experience depends entirely on the subjective difficulty level of the encounter. The GM hands out experience depending on the amount of resources expended and the damage incurred by the characters. Each surviving character gets the listed award.

500 XP - The group face overwhelming danger, one or several characters died, and in the end the survivors had to flee. The survivors gain a lot of experience from their defeat.

250 XP - The group faced considerable danger, possibly one of them died, but in the end, the characters were victorious.

125 XP - The group faced difficult danger, they had to expend considerable resources, but defeated their enemies in the end.

60 XP - The group faced danger, but handily defeated them, suffering some injuries.

0 XP - The group defeated the enemies easily and barely got a scratch.

Additionally, the GM may award the following experience bonuses:

150 XP - For each trap dealt with successfully. Each character gets the listed award.

100 XP - For each trap encountered and set-off. Each surviving character gets the listed award.

100 XP - The character was role-played well and entertainingly.

100 XP - For each hex travelled.

100 XP - For each small dungeon or dungeon level explored.

Death Frost Doom meets Dungeon Crawl Classics

Today I finally had the chance to run Death Frost Doom. Without spoiling anyone, it was a predicatable disaster. Of course the PCs decided to do the one thing they shouldn't have...

We played using the Dungeon Crawl Classics ruleset. I gave them the option to start at level 0 to 3.  The group decided to pick 3rd level. Had they decided to start with level 0 to 2, I would have run Sailors on the Starless Sea for them. With level 3 I went for Death Frost Doom.

The group rolled up their stats completely in order. Then they rolled occupations and luck modifier. The group consisted of:

• Liva the Cutthroat, 3rd level chaotic thief
• Gelis the Exile, 3rd level chaotic dwarf
• Gromph the Exile, 3rd level chaotic dwarf
• Rasmus the Chronicler, 3rd level neutral cleric of the White Worm.

Gromph was the unlucky one. His initial luck score meant that he resisted poison with -1 penalty.

Without going into too much detail, the highlights of the adventure were:

• Liva feeling totally spooked in the graveyard and around the cabin, but being her most competent self down in the crypts.
• Gelis playing first harpsichord and then pipe-organ. She was not very talented at the first one, and very deadly for the group at the second one.
• Rasmus deciding his mission to be de-secrating the temple of an apparent rival of his god. Which led him to cast a blessing at a fountain of unholy water - and it actually turned the water back to real unspoiled water (result from the spell check).
• Gromph using his shield to sled down the mountain ahead of the pursuers.

All in all, what I think of DCC:

• My players didn't like the Luck burn (one of them being down zero at the end of the adventure), but personally, I like it. It reminds me of Fighting Fantasy.
• As I suspected, I don't like all the tables and constant need to look things up. Even though the results were pretty amazing.
• I don't care for the strange dice (d5, d7, d14, d16 and d24) at all.
• The neat mechanics for deeds and luck didn't play such a big role. Something I didn't expect.
• Rolling d20 plus a modifier feels strange... I know it is part of OGL, but in 3E it was always like: skill rating + attribute modifier. Now it is only a rating (thief skills) plus d20. Feels flat.
• The spell check mechanic and spell failure mechanic of the cleric were as much fun as I expected. Especially since the cleric went for a divine intervention in the end. Purely fantastic. The game really shines here. Side note: Again, the awesome seems to be with spellcasters. So not really an improvement over similar games.
• I really like the way experience is handled. It frees the referee from handing out too much treasure, and also from too much balancing efforts. With DCC, if I made the encounter too difficult, the player characters just need to flee successfully and I'll be handing out 4 XP.

 What will I do with my limited edition of DCC now? Not really sure. The book is absolutely gorgeous. Style and illustrations transport the intended game style very clearly and very beautifully. On the other hand, it is quite complex with all the tables needed for play. Also, I prefer digest-sized books at the gaming table. LotFP is more elegant in this regard, but DCC has all the rules necessary to turn the LotFP fluff into crunch. What I would really need is a love child of LotFP and DCC. Or I'll take LotFP as the basis, and add DCC bits and pieces I like. Which is probably what is going to happen.

Stay tuned.

Old School+

The last couple of days, I have been looking at the Adventurer Conqueror King System (ACKS) and Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG (DCC). Both look interesting. As some of my players indicated that LotFP maybe a bit too bland in the way of character options, both of these games look more promising.

While DCC doesn't allow for too much character choice, it looks like the Mighty Deeds of Arms and the Luck mechanic promise an interesting game play. I also like how DCC captures the feel of Sword & Sorcery almost perfectly. Actually, I think DCC delivers mechanically on the flavor LotFP tries to achieve.

ACKS is intriguing in other ways. Here, you get more options for building your characters with Proficiencies as well as interesting options for high-level play. Places were LotFP is notably lacking.

What I find odd are the character sheets compared to the books. Where ACKS has a fairly modern layout, its character sheet shines! It reminds me of the Fighting Fantasy books. It gets you in the right mindset. On the other hand, the DCC character sheet is bland and uninspiring, while the rule book reads very interestingly and has brilliant retro-style layout that just inspires your imagination.I really really wish that DCC would have an equally atmospheric character sheet...

Oh yes, and I learned that all three games (LotFP, DCC and ACKS) are considered old school+ games. RPGs that take the basic old school sensibilities and add some modern flavor to them instead of being another retro-clone that tries to exactly mirror the source material.

Maybe I will do some re-imagining of the Lands Beyond the Drowning Woods to conform to DCC. The flavor of the rules fits the flavor of the campaign setting. I could easily see the Weird Warlock as a patron in the DCC-Style. A mighty wizard who has left mortality behind. I think the gods already match-up pretty well to the style of DCC. I just need to give them some stats.