Friday, November 9, 2012

Willow and Tara: Call of Cthulhu

I was talking with my good friend Dr. Lloyd from my days on the Kittenboard.  He was interested in my old RPG sessions of The Dragon and the Phoenix.  I updated him and he was thrilled.  He shared with me this idea he has had to run his own "Call of Cthulhu" game with Willow and Tara.
We talked back and forth for a while and this is what he came up with.

He came up with this "Uber" campaign. What is Uber you ask? Uber has it's roots in Xena fandom.
You can read more about it here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uberfic

Well where Xena and Gabriel go, Willow and Tara often follow.  This is some I have used in my games many times. It was a central feature in The Dark Druid, Heaven Bleeds, and This Blessed Plot.

And of course I am not the only the only one who does this.  There is an entire subsection of fandom that is dedicated to this.  You can see some of them on the "Uber Willow & Tara" site "Through the Looking Class".

Below is an "uber" version of Willow & Tara for the Call of Cthulhu RPG.  This one is set in the 1920s.  These would be the prior incarnations of the girls prior to their appearance in the 1980s (birth) to the present day.

The following was all created by Dr. Lloyd & Rebecca Ashling, enjoy!

When Buffy met Lovecraft

 This is a character build out for a BTVS campaign centering on Willow and Tara that is set in the 1920's world of HP Lovecraft.
There are two build outs for these characters.  One is the "Canon" one, where Buffy is the slayer abet 75 years earlier and everything is the same otherwise.  The other is the "Uber" campaign where Buffy is merely far too inquisitive young woman investigating the super natural.

Willow Rosenberg

Investigator Name: Willow Rosenberg
Occupation: Student/Witch
Colleges, Degrees: Sunnydale
Birthplace: Sunnydale, CA
Mental Disorders: Insecurity, Monomania, also Homosexuality was treated as one
Sex: Age: 20
STR: 8 DEX: 11 INT: 18 Idea: 90
CON: 11 APP: 14 POW: 22 Luck: 110
SIZ: 8 SAN: 110 EDU: 20 Know: 100
99-Cthulhu Mythos: 74 Damage Bonus: -1D4

Accounting 10% Anthropology 11% Archaeology 11%
Astronomy 46% Bargain 5% Biology 41%
Chemistry 46% Climb 40% Conceal 25%
Credit Rating 30% Cthulhu Mythos 25% Dodge 22%
Drive Auto 20% Electrical Repair 30% Fast Talk 25%
First Aid 40% Geology 21% Handgun 20%
Hide 10% History 50% Jump 25%
Law 20% Library Use 60% Listen 25%
Locksmith 1% Machine Gun 15% Martial Arts 1%
Mechanical Repair 20% Medicine 35% Natural History 30%
Navigate 10% Occult 40% Operate Hvy. Machine 1%
Other Language: Hebrew 36% Other Language: Latin 36% Persuade 25%
Pharmacy 26% Photography 10% Physics 56%
Psychoanalysis 16% Psychology 25% Ride 5%
Rifle 25% Shotgun 30% Sneak 30%
Spot Hidden 25% Submachine Gun 15% Swim 25%
Throw 25% Track 10% Fist/Punch 50%
Head Butt 10% Kick 25% Grapple 25%

Willow Rosenberg is a Jewish, Lesbian, Wiccan, and well educated young woman, which in 1920s America *any*of those qualifiers will drawn unwanted attention.  Her father ,Ira, is an investor in the shipping business, and her mother Shelia has a Masters degree in Sociology and is very active in local philanthropic and charitable women’s groups as well as supporting her husband in any business functions. Her father travels a good deal, and her mother is frequently involved in social work. As such this means Willow is almost always left to her own devices.

Her closest friend and companion growing up was the son of the housekeeper, Xander Harris.  They went to school together and while Shelia isn't too happy about their friendship, it makes her feel progressive that her Daughters best friend is a working class child.   Xander's father died of Influenza years before.  In many ways Xander is her "beard" to deflect unwanted questions about marriage.

Willow met Buffy in school in a similar way to "Welcome to the Hellmouth" and worked under the mentor ship of local antiquarian and librarian  Rupert Giles.   She met Tara and fell in love with her as a Freshman in college.  While their closest friends know about their relationship, almost no one outside that circle do and would be hostile if they did.

Having said this, two single women living together for the entirety of their lives itself would not raise any eyebrows even if it led to them both being termed spinsters.
In the uber campaign she and Tara have limited access to magic, and almost all of it is complex ritual magic.  However, because of the emotional, romantic, and spiritual connection between the girls, they are able to work as a Coven of 2.

 This means for the purposes of spells they can combine their POW and Magic points, and loose 50% less sanity from ritual magic when together.

In the "Canon" campaign they have a wider list of spells, and when holding hands use 50% less MP for a spell.

Tara Maclay

Investigator Name: Tara Maclay
Occupation: Student/Shop girl
Colleges, Degrees: Student in California college
Birthplace: Birmingham, Ala
Mental Disorders: Shy, beleaves she may be evil
Sex: F Age: 21
STR: 8 DEX: 12 INT: 15 Idea: 75
CON: 13 APP: 14 POW: 18 Luck: 90
SIZ: 9 SAN: 90 EDU: 19 Know: 95
99-Cthulhu Mythos: 99 Damage Bonus: none

Accounting 10% Anthropology 21% Archaeology 1%
Astronomy 26% Bargain 25% Biology 1%
Chemistry 41% Climb 40% Conceal 40%
Credit Rating 15% Cthulhu Mythos 0% Dodge 24%
Drive Auto 20% Electrical Repair 10% Fast Talk 5%
First Aid 50% Geology 1% Handgun 20%
Hide 50% History 35% Jump 25%
Law 5% Library Use 55% Listen 50%
Locksmith 1% Machine Gun 15% Martial Arts 1%
Mechanical Repair 20% Medicine 5% Natural History 20%
Navigate 10% Occult 50% Operate Hvy. Machine 1%
Persuade 15% Pharmacy 21% Photography 10%
Physics 1% Pilot: Read Latin 55% Psychoanalysis 1%
Psychology 40% Ride 5% Rifle 25%
Shotgun 30% Sneak 50% Spot Hidden 60%
Submachine Gun 15% Swim 25% Throw 25%
Track 10% Fist/Punch 50% Head Butt 10%
Kick 25% Grapple 25%

Tara Maclay is an independent young woman who is a student as well.  She lives far from her estranged family in Alabama, and lives on meager resources.  She works as a shop girl in a local book store and has a small inheritance from her dead mother that was ostensibly for her Hope chest.  Her stutter is more pronounced in this world, and her knowledge of occult even great that Willow's because of her family traditions.   She formerly was sure she was damned for her Witch tendencies, but has learned from Willow and Buffy that this is not the case.

To help set the structure of the campaign, here is a description of Buffy.


Buffy Summers

Investigator Name: Buffy Summers
Occupation: Slayer
Colleges, Degrees: Sunnydale HS
Birthplace: Los Angeles, CA
Mental Disorders: None, but suspected
Sex: F&nbspAge: 20
STR: 21 DEX: 21 INT: 13 Idea: 65
CON: 20 APP: 15 POW: 16 Luck: 80
SIZ: 18 SAN: 80 EDU: 12 Know: 60
99-Cthulhu Mythos: 79 Damage Bonus: +1D6

Accounting 10% Anthropology 1% Archaeology 16%
Astronomy 1% Bargain 25% Biology 11%
Chemistry 1% Climb 65% Conceal 55%
Credit Rating 35% Cthulhu Mythos 20% Dodge 42%
Drive Auto 20% Electrical Repair 10% Fast Talk 50%
First Aid 40% Geology 1% Handgun 20%
Hide 45% History 20% Jump 55%
Law 15% Library Use 35% Listen 55%
Locksmith 1% Machine Gun 15% Martial Arts 66%
Mechanical Repair 20% Medicine 10% Natural History 10%
Navigate 10% Occult 35% Operate Hvy. Machine 1%
Persuade 35% Pharmacy 1% Photography 10%
Physics 1% Pilot: Detect Vampires 70% Psychoanalysis 1%
Psychology 35% Ride 15% Rifle 25%
Shotgun 30% Sneak 50% Spot Hidden 65%
Submachine Gun 15% Swim 50% Throw 65%
Track 60% Detect Undead 65% Fist/Punch 50%
Head Butt 10% Kick 25% Grapple 25%
Stake 65% Sword 55% Axe 55%

Buffy is the daughter of the  well off and often wooed widow Joyce Summers.  Her father was a well off Military officer  but died in the great war.  Her mother took the loss hard, and turned to spiritualism and mediums to deal with the loss.

In the "Uber" campaign Buffy tried to use the numerous magical paraphernalia her mother had to divine her future, and accidentally got a tiny glimpse of the horrors about us.
Her strength,  speed, and fighting skills are all within normal human parameters but are very high.  She was close to her father and he taught her some martial arts he learned in Philippines during the rebellion, and now she is determined to make the best of it.

In the "Canon" campaign the above is still true, but the trigger to her adventuring  was her watcher contacting her as in the show.

The Buffy in both of these worlds is far more fatalistic than the one in the show, she is aware that the cosmic deck is stacked against her and is not optimistic of her having a normal life.   There would be a feeling from her and the other Irregulars that the horrors of the Great War were part of a larger scheme to end the world by unknown forces.

The Freedom of Nonbelief: Carl Sagan Day

Cross posted from The Freedom of Nonbelief: Carl Sagan Day

I don't celebrate on the anniversary of someone's birth or death after they are dead.
I remember their life, I think about how they touched mine, but don't expect long drawn out posts on it from me.

Carl Sagan is different.

For the longest time he was why I was interested in astronomy, math, physics and yes eventually psychology (Broca's Brain is still a favorite of mine).

Today is the anniversary of Carl Sagan's birth.  I don't say birthday, since obviously he not having anymore.

It is also Carl Sagan day.

I talked a lot about him back in April, http://freedomofnonbelief.blogspot.com/2012/04/s-is-for-carl-sagan.html, but honestly though I really can't say enough about the guy.

I have been tempted to re-read "Demon Haunted World", maybe one of the best books on science (as opposed to a science book) I have ever read.

My lament is that he could not have lived longer.  His cogent and critical voice would have been much appreciated in the last couple of years.  I do take solace though  that we still have Neil deGrasse Tyson around.

Evil Red

Evil Red on eBay

.

My  youngest brother is selling some artwork.
Frankly I'd love find a good game for this as a cover.  Some sort of twisted childhood idea where you play ultraviolent kids rampaging through fairy tale land.

Thursday, November 8, 2012

Mega Review: Class Acts

I picked up a bunch of Abandon Arts' Class Act books.  Each is just under a buck and offers some additional features for the Pathfinder classes.

In almost every case the books are 4-5 pages with 1 page for the cover, 1 page for the OGL and the rest the bulk of the new class material.  There is no art, but really it doesn't need any.  Perfect for under a buck really. Also in nearly every case these are for the die-hard fans of the classes.

In all cases if there is a class you like get the "Class Acts" for it and the "Archetypes".

Class Acts: Alchemists
4 pages. 18 new alchemical discoveries, 3 of which are grand discoveries.

Class Acts: Alchemist Archetypes
4 pages. 1 page for cover, 1 for OGL.  The rest covers four different Alchemist archetypes.

Class Acts: Barbarians
4 pages. 32 new rage powers. They look good, but Barbarians are just not my thing.

Class Acts: Barbarian Archetypes
4 pages. Three archetypes.  Favorite is the Viking Marauder   It might not really be historically accurate  but it does look fun.

Class Acts: Clerics
5 pages. At this point in the evolution of the 3.x rules we have covered every domain out there.  This book then presents 18 new sub-domains.  Some of the powers of the cleric are swapped out for other powers.  Of course these could be used as alternate Domains.

Class Acts: Cleric Archetypes
4 pages. Clerics historically have lended themselves well to different archetypes. Only two new archetypes here, but they are rather good.  I like the Voodoo priest in particular in fact. In addition to the archetype there is some great domains associated with the Voodoo Loa.  There is some really nice crossover with the Witch here.

Class Acts: Druids
5pages. A dozen new Druid Animal domains. could work with clerics too.

Class Acts: Druid Archetypes
4 pages. Three new druid archetypes. Of the three the Faeriethrall looks the most interesting to me.

Class Acts: Fighters
5 pages. Cover a lot of new combat feats for fighters of all sorts. Useful for other classes too.

Class Acts: Fighter Archetypes
4 pages, 3 new archetypes. I think these would also work well for Paladins, Cavaliers or any other class to be truthful.

Class Acts: Gunslingers
5 pages and 18 new "Grit" feats.  I like the idea of how this works, I am just not sure if I am a fan of Gunslingers in general.  But that is nothing against this product.

Class Acts: Magi
4 pages.  This one has 32 new Magi Arcana. All of them look very useful and could even work as other power for other classes.

Class Acts: Magus Archetypes
4 pages, 3 new archetypes. Of the three I like the Magus Mysterion the best. Lots of potential for this archetype if you really enjoy roleplaying your characters.

Class Acts: Monks
4 pages.  This one has 18 new style feats in 6 feat trees of the styles. Great if you are playing a monk.

Class Acts: Monk Archetypes
4 pages.  Only 2 archetypes here, but very complete.

Class Acts: Oracles
5 pages. This one includes new curses and new mysteries and revelations.  A lot of good material here really and needed for this class.

Class Acts: Oracle Archetypes
4 pages.  Four new archetypes for the Oracle.  This class could use some more archetypes to be honest, so this is a good addition.  I like the Oracular Opiate, I would love to make one of these for a game except play him as sort of this Rastafarian-like dude.

Class Acts: Rangers
5 pages. Three new combat styles and a bunch of new feats.  Great collection for fans of Rangers.

Class Acts: Ranger Archetypes
4 pages. Three new archetypes. All are variations on a theme, but they work well.

Class Acts: Rogues
4 pages.  32 new Rogue talents and advanced rogue talents (7).  Great if you enjoy playing rogues and looking to expand an already very expandable class.

Class Acts: Rogue Archetypes
4 pages. 4 new archetypes for rogues.  The Urban Stalker and the Lookout might actually be complete diametrically opposed to each other and still be based on the same class.

Class Acts: Witches
4 pages. Obviously one I am very interested in.  This one has 18 new witch Hexes.  All of them look good and I'd love to try them all out.  Scrying Cauldron is one of my favorites, very witchy.

Class Acts: Witch Archetypes
4 pages. Three new archetypes. The Desert Witch is a very neat one and one I need to try out sometime.  I even have a great name picked out.  The Grisly Fetishist is very cool and familiar ground as is the Maleficium.  All three are good and look like great fun.

Class Acts: Wizards
4 pages. 32 new Arcane discoveries. I haven't played a PF Wizard, but these look fine to me.  Certainly a lot of varieties of powers.

Class Acts: Wizard Archetypes
4 pages.  Two new Archetypes. Not much in the way of new ground here though.  Animist is new-ish and the Guild Scholar has been done in the past.  Would have liked to have seen more I think.

So many of these I would love to try out.

Random Pre-Coffee Thoughts

Still thinking through some of my ideas for Ordinary World.  I did not get to go over all my notes for the various games I have laying around though.

Swords & Wizardry was mentioned as a contender for the rule set and that idea has merits.  I am also still looking into Labyrinth Lord as well.  Regardless what system I use I think I want to have it use a compatibility logo.  I did not do that with the Witch because I wanted the broadest appeal and frankly to make it work with ALL the games I had to make some assumptions and changes.  So while it works great (in my playtests) with BFRPG, LL, S&W and the original game, it is not beholden to any one of those.

Rob Conley over at Bat in the Attic has posted link to all the current "big" SRDs for playing various d20 and OSR games.


The S&W one is new to me, so thanks Rob for pointing it out.

This got me thinking.
Would you like to see a S&W version of The Witch?

It would be stripped down to just the class and spells.  Maybe some magic items.
I would include notes on making covens, but I think my goal needs to be 20 pages.
I would include a new Tradition to make it have some value above what you already have from The Witch or Eldritch Witchery.  The Witch has five traditions plus the Eclectic, EW also has five traditions (only 1 that is the same) and five Warlock lodges.  So that is 15 so far.  I am going to do a web freebie when EW comes out for a new total of 16.

I'd like to aim it at $1.50.  Though to be honest I have paid a buck for classes in the past and have gotten about 4 pages.  I am going to struggle to keep this one under 20 pages.

What do you think?

Edited to add: I suppose I could also do a Free one that did not include any new spells, just the class, a new tradition (that is important to me), some Occult powers and some art.
Weigh in on that as well.

Wednesday, November 7, 2012

Ordinary World

Ordinary World


Ordinary World was the working title of a new game I was working on.  It was going to be modern supernatural and use this new system I was developing that I had code named "The Power of Three" system.
The basic premise of Ordinary World was the players would be playing supernatural types just trying to get along in a world that didn't believe they existed and considered them monsters.  In a way sorta like "Being Human" the RPG, but also elements of all the things I like in modern supernatural fiction.

I wanted to have the experience of writing a new game from the ground up and I wanted to do something in a realm I am really familiar with.  Trouble is every time I would bring this game up to friends they would remind me I already did all of that with Ghosts of Albion.

So sometime this past Summer I shelved Ordinary World.

No sooner had I done that than I had this great idea for an Old-School game that I was calling Monster Mash.  The rules would have been Labyrinth Lord compatible and instead of heroes you would have played the monsters.  In particular the old Universal Pictures Monsters, so vampires, golems, werewolves and ghosts.  I would have made it compatible with The Witch since one of my big influences for this was the video to the Rob Zombie song, American Witch.  I thought it might have been a fun beer and pretzels sort of game.
In truth I probably came up with it while listening to Hellbilly Deluxe one too many times.  I even had an adventure partially written "Dr. Satan Needs Blood!".

Last week I was still thinking about these two when I had an idea of bringing them together.  When it also dawned on me that I had other WiPs, some from the earliest days of this blog.

Generation Hex was this really cool, awesome idea I had  for Unisystem/True 20/Mutants & Masterminds or whatever system I happen to really enjoy at the time.  Simply put it was a game to play kids in a magical school.  Since that time this sort of thing has been better done by Witch Girls Adventures.

I also have material laying around for Licensed properties that never saw the light of day and I am now the owner of again (the RPG material, not the properties).  One was d20 and the other True20.

So.  What's a guy to do?

Well the natural thing is to bring them all together under one system to do the one thing they all kinda of were doing anyway.

A few caveats though.
I want to use an old-school system.  I think it would be a great addition to all the material we have out there now and NOT redo something everyone else has already done.

I want to be able to play any character I want.  If I come up with an idea or see something in a book then I need to have a system that can do that.

While it is an Old-School game, I don't want to forget about the advances made in other games. There are a lot of great games out there and they are great for a reason.  This my chance to distill that into a new game.

So. Look for more information coming from me on this.   I think this is one I will design live on the blog.  Posting ideas, sending up files for playtests.  Things like that.

First thing I need to figure out.  What system should I use?

White Dwarf Wednesday #38

Sorry about missing last weeks WDW.  The end of October is crazy for me.

One note before I move on.  James at Grognardia is covering Imagine Magazine on Tuesdays.  Imagine is the sister magazine to Dragon that had a limited run in the UK starting in 1983.  So roughly the same span I am doing with White Dwarf now.  I had also planned on doing Imagine as well, but James is already doing it, so I'll just comment on his site.
You can read his first three entries here: http://grognardia.blogspot.com/search/label/imagine%20magazine
The nice thing about this is I noticed I had some holes in my collection so it would not have been as complete as my White Dwarf run.

On with the show!

White Dwarf #38 opens up February of 1983.
I think we see here a bit about what James might have been talking about in Imagine from June of the same year in regards to censorship.   The cover for WD#38 features a bloody sword, a severed head, and a topless woman.
We follow with seven pages of ads till we get to the first page proper. The editorial is brief one of idyll remarks on the growing popularity of RPGs and what the next year will bring.  D&D is now referred to as a "brand".

Andy Slack is back with Part 3 of An Introduction to Traveller. This time covering Scenarios.  I always thought it was interesting that most games had "Adventures" and Traveller had "Scenarios".  D&D/RuneQuest/T&T characters sought out their adventures, but Traveller characters (to me) always had something happen to to them.  I think this was my weakest point in Traveller.  I was still thinking of Traveller in terms of D&D.  Reading this article (and the next one) again made think back to all the great SciFi shows I loved at this time; Doctor Who, Blakes 7, Sapphire and Steele. They all could have been Traveller Scenarios (with some tweaks I guess).  It also made me think of another show that was popular at the time that really was, in my retrospect, the perfect model for a Traveller game; The A Team.  Think about it.  Instead of 4 guys from the Army, they are now Space Marines and instead of a van it's a small, but tricked out, space ship.  It really would have worked.

Next up is Open Box.  Phil Masters hits us up with a review of "The Traveller Book"  I have very fond memories of this book.  It was my last ditch effort to finally understand and play Traveller.  In retrospect again I actually made a good choice.  It was designed as a new game to introduce new players to Traveller.  Masters gives it 9/10.  It remains to date my favorite version of the rules.
M.L.Rowland gives us Dicing with Dragons, one of the first books about RPGs I can recall.  RPGs were finally getting big enough that there could be books talking about them.  We were on the verge of the big "Satanic Panic" of the 80s and D&D was going to get pulled into that, but we were also just fresh from seeing "E.T." where the kids played D&D (or something like it).  It was a good time for this book.  Rowland praises it for covering it's subject but downgrades it slightly for the sample game included for a total of 9/10.
Oliver Dickson also gives us some FASA books for Thieve's World. Traitor and The Spirit Stones. They get 7/10 collectively.

Fiend Factory is an interesting one this issue with Faerie Folk.  All sorts of interesting fae creatures that look like they were taken out Brian Froud's 1978 book "Faeries".  I say this with some level of conviction since I have gone to that book many, many times for my own books (notably Ghosts of Albion) and I recognize all of these creatures.  Frankly I would use any of these as is in an AD&D game now. It also seems that White Dwarf's on-again, off-again love affair with Monstermark is finally off for good.

Oliver Dickson and Bob McWilliams introduce us to Questworld for RuneQuest.

Lew Pulsipher takes on the herculean task of presenting the Mines of Moria/Khazad-dûm in AD&D terms.  Some interesting choices are made (Gandalf is a Cleric, Aragorn is a Ranger/Paladin) but what strikes me most is that outside of the trappings I am not sure "how" this is Moria vs. some other dungeon.  The sense of size I got from the books (and later the movies) is not here.

Microview is back and Noel Williams talks about some the tasks that computers can do in an RPG game.  Many of which we can take for granted these days, this was the wild west back then.  I even think back to the programs I wrote for the Tandy Color Computer back in the day that did a number of these "donkey" task Williams talks about (dice roller, rulebook, record keeper) as well as number no mentioned (monster database, combat simulator).

Oliver McDonald gives us "Monsters Have Feelings Too" which basically gives us tips on how to have monsters act intelligently.  These ideas have creeped into various games over the years till now it is sometime difficult to tell the monster stats and PC stats apart.  These are not exactly "Tucker's Kobolds" but calling "McDonald's Orcs" is not too far off.

Letters includes a couple of backlash's against Don Turnbull's letter on his distaste of the Necromancer, one of which is Lew Pulsipher. A letter asking for more adventures for other games. And a fairly detailed one on his dislike for AC equaling a chance to be hit.  Stepping outside of all of this for a bit I think we have all established that AC is an abstraction on damaged causing hits, not hits in general.

RuneRites has Lords of the Spirit worlds.  Something between mortal and man.  I think I used this for AD&D back in the day.  Demigods were humans that had been born with god-like power, "Saints" were ascended humans and spirit lords were still something else. Despite it being a "Runequest" article there is not much in the way of crunch.

Treasure Chest has some new spells. Most seem useful.  Maybe for the Necromancer.

We follow that with the Classifieds.  Nothing as interesting as last months. The final 9 or so pages are ads.
The difference in the ads between White Dwarf and Dragon is the same as I remember of UK and US television.  In the US the ads (commercials) are through out the show, in the UK they are at the beginning and end of shows.

I see what are the beginnings of the White Dwarf I remember so fondly.