Spes Magna Games

Work continues on our first for-sale product, a one-shot convention-style adventure featuring the heroic Anklebiter League. I’ll be running the first public playtests this weekend at Con-Jour in Clear Lake, Texas. I’m corresponding with a fantastic artist to do the cover (and maybe some of the interior).

Part of the adventure will feature a chase scene. I hunted around the Internet for d20-style chase rules and cobbled these together from what I found:

Chase Rules
A chase scene is a type of combat. All combatants are in motion, whether they be running, riding, flying, et cetera. A chase takes place round to round in initiative order, but the special conditions of the chase require a few special rules.

Actions During the Chase
Here’s where the normal rules must give way to fun. During the chase, everyone is moving all-out all the time, which would normally mean you don’t get to do anything else that round. How dull. Actions during a chase work differently. In addition to moving all-out, you get to perform a single standard or move action each round.

Terrain Checks
At the beginning of your turn, you must make a Terrain Check. This is a straight 1d20 roll against the chase terrain’s DC. There are three categories of terrain: open (DC 3), close (DC 6), and tight (DC 9). If you fail your Terrain Check, you must draw a card from the Chase Deck*. This will probably dictate what you must do for your action during the round.

Close terrains impose a -2 penalty on Notice checks but a +2 bonus on anything to do with tricky maneuvering or hiding. Tight terrains impose a -4 penalty on Notice checks but provide a +4 bonus on anything to do with tricky maneuvering or hiding.

Actions
The basic action in a chase is to Chase. This is a Strength check against a Difficulty of 15. If you succeed, you gain on your opponent by one chase increment. You receive a +2 on this check if you have the Run feat. If your faster than your opponent, you get another +2 bonus. If you opponent has the Run feat, you receive a -2 penalty on the check. If he’s faster, you get a -2 penalty as well. In place of a Strength check, you can attempt a stunt using any of your skills that you can convince the DM is reasonable.

You can forgo your Chase action in order to take a standard or move action of another sort, to include attacking your opponent. These other actions automatically cause you to lose one chase increment (unless, of course, you manage to stop your opponent).

Chase Increments
It doesn’t make sense to try to count squares, draw on battlemats, et cetera, during a chase. Instead, each chaser has a distance from the pursued expressed as one of five chase increments: Point-Blank, Short, Medium, Long, and Extreme.

The DM determine the range for each pursuer when the chase begins. Characters at Point-Blank can use melee attacks against each other. Characters at Medium range suffer a -2 penalty on ranged attacks, and characters at Long range suffer a -4 penalty. For purposes of spells, if the chase increment exceeds the spell’s range category, then the opponent is too far away to target. Characters at Extreme range cannot target their opponent.

* The Chase Deck is a small deck of 20 or so cards, each one with a specific, exciting chase-related event to thrill and challenge the players.

This past Saturday, I was DMing a Pathfinder/Fencing & Firearms/Rewarding Roleplaying adventure, using Goodman Games’s Lost Vault of Tsathar Rho. A good time was mostly had by all. Our resident grouch bad-mouthed Pathfinder‘s consolidation of certain skills (such as combining Listen, Search, and Spot into Perception). I was suddenly reminded of something I read on EN World. I’m not sure if the poster was actually referencing a game system, but the post stuck in my mind, and I pointed out, “Hey, it could be worse. d20 skills could be reduced to just six.”

So, if you think that there are still too many skills, you can always use The Ultimate Skill Consolidation List:

Doing Stuff (Strength)
Doing Stuff (Dexterity)
Doing Stuff (Constitution)
Doing Stuff (Intelligence)
Doing Stuff (Wisdom)
Doing Stuff (Charisma)

Player: I jump over the table, and then knock it on its side to hide behind.

DM: Please give me Doing Stuff (Dexterity) and Doing Stuff (Strength) checks.

How’s that for consolidated?

Alzrius continues to provide some grade-A feedback on Spes Magna products. Here’re some clarifications about the “Expanded BAB” section of Fencing & Firearms. First, let’s sum up what “Expanded BAB” does for you:

Every character has a Base Attack Bonus, or BAB. F&F expands the uses for BAB two ways. First, BAB is added to your Armor Class as a dodge bonus. BAB reflects a character’s general skill in combat This includes not only the ability to land a blow, but also the ability parry and dodge attacks. Furthermore, a character’s BAB affords a certain amount of flexibility in combat from round-to-round as well.

Each round on his turn, a character can “shift” his up to his BAB to provide a bonus to a specific facet of combat. The same value is applied as a penalty to another facet. This bonus/penalty combinations lasts until the beginning of the character’s next turn. A character can apply up to his BAB as a bonus to attack rolls, to damage rolls (for attacks that require an attack roll), or to AC (as a dodge bonus). He must apply the same value as a penalty to one of the two other facets.

Now for Alzrius’s questions:

Alzrius: “Does that rule (regarding BAB as dodge bonus, and “shiftable BAB”) apply only to PCs, or to NPCs and monsters also?”
Me: “Only if the DM wants it to. I wouldn’t bother with it except in the case of a solo BBEG or in the case where a monster has a stock tactic. For example, I regularly run monsters that have Power Attack as if they go All Power Attack All the Time.”

Alzrius: “To be clear, the shiftable BAB can only be used for one thing at a time, right?”
Me: “Yes. The intention is to provide a character with a bonus/penalty trade-off that is both flexible and easy to track. So, a 5th-level fighter could go +5 attack rolls and -5 AC, but not +3 attack rolls, +2 damage, and -5 AC.”

Alzrius: ” While martial characters will always be applying the offsetting penalty somewhere that’s of concern to them, this doesn’t seem to be true for spellcasters. A wizard, for example, can max out his shiftable BAB to his AC, putting the penalty towards attack rolls…and then just cast a fireball, which has no attack roll….”
Me: “Excellent catch! This was certainly not my intention, and my lack of clarity could easily cause confusion. The idea behind “Expanded BAB” is that you only get the bonus if the penalty applies. So, that fireball-lobbing wizard can’t flex his BAB to get an AC bonus by reducing his AC.”

Alzrius’s last question there got me thinking. I clearly envisioned a wizard flexing his BAB with, say, shocking grasp. The idea is that a character has to be making an attack roll at some point during his turn in order to get the “Expanded BAB” benefit. Alzrius also theorized that the spellcaster “problem could be solved by applying it to his magic check instead, using the F&F rules.” IOW, the caster could make his spell harder or easier to resist in exchange for a bonus or penalty to either the spell’s attack roll or its damage.

This is an idea worth exploring, especially since Magic, Mind & Muscle will be using the Base Magic Bonus concept found in Trailblazer by Bad Axe Games. I definitely have to expand on Alzrius’s magic check idea to see how it looks once it’s all worked out on paper. My initial instinct is that it could indeed prove a fruitful exercise.

On another front, I’m still dithering about whether “Expanded BAB” should have a cap. IOW, should there be an upper limit to how much BAB a character can flex? The more I think about it, the more I’m inclined to say, “Yes.” I’m thinking about capping the flex to +5/-5 at most. The question I have is this: Should this be an actual rule, or just a friendly suggestion?

Among the many other Spes Magna Games projects in the works, it’s about time to start another round of editing on Rewarding Roleplaying. I have the feeling that I need to (a) change the number of Action Points characters get and (b) streamline the uses of Action Points. At the same time I’m reviewing Rewarding Roleplaying, I’m thinking about completely removing the use of Action Points for d20 re-rolls. Instead, I’m considering adding this to F&F:

Extra d20s
A character gets a pool of extra d20s equal to one-half his character level (maximum 4d20 at 8th level). Whenever a character rolls 1d20 to determine success, he has the option of rolling one or more extra d20s from his pool and choosing the best result out of the dice rolled. Since F&F has the players roll their own fate, this gives a character a powerful tool to determine the results of a wide variety of situations.

For example, Jeremiah Dawes is doing battle with a fierce gnoll. The gnoll’s attack score is high, and Jeremiah has failed most of his defense checks. As a result, Jeremiah has suffered serious damage. He won’t be able to fight much longer at this rate. The next time Jeremiah makes a defense check, he rolls 2d20, using a die from his pool. He takes the better of the two results, improving the odds that he’ll avoid more harm at the gnoll’s hands.

Extra d20s Issues: A couple of questions pop up in my mind when looking at this possible addition to F&F.

1. Is it a good idea?
2. What is the mechanic for replenishing a depleted dice pool?

Well, the roll out for Fencing & Firearms seems to have gone off without a hitch. My Internet ninjas report that about two-thirds of Quid Novi? subscribers have downloaded F&F. I’ve already received some great feedback, either by e-mail or on our website.

Work on The Mad Monk’s Revenge continues. This convention-style module is Pathfinder-compatible and uses F&F. It’s public debut will be at Con-Jour and at OwlCon, and it’s still scheduled to go on sale in March. Also, don’t forget: 50% of all TMMR sales will help benefit Mission of Yahweh, a Houston-area shelter that helps homeless women and children.

If you missed the debut of F&F, it’s not too late. All Quid Novi? subscribers receive both Rewarding Roleplaying and Fencing & Firearms. Speaking of Quid Novi?, issue 4 arrives in subscriber in-boxes early Sunday, 24 January 2010. Issue 4 will include another monster inspired by North American lore, a 5-Room One-Shot, and more Recommended Reading.

Finally, work has also started on Magic, Mind & Muscle, the handbook for players related to our upcoming Novus Mundus campaign world. Novus Mundus blends myth, history, and fantasy RPG within the context of the 17th and 18th centuries. The Pathfinder-compatible MM&M retools character creation, races, and classes to fit Novus Mundus at the same time it presents new interpretations of psionic classes, skills, and feats.

Just a quick update today!

Issue 3 of Quid Novi? is in the final editing stage. It will go out as scheduled in the wee hours of the morning on Sunday, January 10. Issue 3 includes:

* Making History: Lost in the Wilderness – Read all about Rene Robert Cavelier, sieur de La Salle. Marvel at his semi-competence that ultimately leads to his murder at the hands of his own men in East Texas. Enterprising DMs can take the broad strokes of La Salle’s misadventures to create their own games of exploration, intrigue, and dysentery.

* Recommended Reading: Shameless Self-Promotion – It’s all about me as a I briefly highlight three places on the Internet where you can find literally hundreds of creatures and NPCs lovingly crafted for three systems: 3.5, Mutants & Masterminds, and the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game.

* Fencing & Firearms Debut – Quid Novi? subscribers will receive a link from which they can download a zipped copy of Fencing & Firearms.

In other news, I’ve spoken with Ron Sterlekar, Director of Development for Mission of Yahweh. It’s official! Mission of Yawheh will receive 50% of sales from The Mad Monk’s Revenge, a convention-style module highlighting the Spes Magna way of gaming that goes on sale in March 2010.