0 hitpoints does not mean instant death in old school

The Labyrinth Lord Flailsnail Google+ Hangout game I took part last week uses the following interesting rule for permanent injuries and mutilation instead of instant death.

Check the table for going down to 0 hitpoints in Trollsmyth's blog!

In the meantime I found a deadlier table on Trollsmyth's blog: Deadlier death and dismemberment table.

Gamma World Vehicle Rules

Wizards of the Coast finally released the rules for vehicles for the new edition of Gamma World. They are available as free pdf. I was waiting for this a long time!

Finally porkers can ride motor bikes in battle. :)

Follow this link to find the Gamma World vehicle rules. 8 pages of fun! :)

There are stats for motorcycles, cars, pick up trucks, RVs, dump trucks and helicopters included. You will also find vehicle augmentations like sidecars and hover kits as well as turrets and mounted weapons. Not to forget stunts, as well as stunt catastrophes.

Everyone should print these 8 pages and put it in their Gamma World box!

And if you still need paper miniatures for the vehicles how about this? Flat paper miniature vehicles. Those are not for free though, you can also check my articles on free paper minis for other options...

Gamma World Random Character Generators

I had lots of fun with the new D&D Gamma World last night, just creating random mutant characters. Today I found a Gamma World online character generator.

Give it a try. Those characters rock!

For even more options (20 additional origins from Famine in Far-Go and 8 from Legion of Gold) check out the official Gamma World Random Character generator on the Wizards of the Coast website. They call it an Interactive Character Sheet.

And finally a third one: it does not seem to include Famine in Far-Go, but has the Origin Powers listed. That was missing from the other two character generators: Gamma World Random Characters with Power Cards.

I printed loads of random Interactive Character Sheet characters and keep them in my Gamma World box. If a player needs a new character, he or she just pulls out one of them and decides if he wants to keep it. (I also photocopied all the origins, so that players don't have to look up their powers in the rule books during the game.)

Update, May 2011: I found out about another JavaScript character generator for Gamma World 7th edition, or D&D 4E Gamma World, as you can call it as well.

Random adventure generators

Random created adventures seem to solve many of the problems people have with GMing. They are created superfast and instead of preparing stuff that maybe never come up for hours you can fill in the details really needed during the session.

With the only versions you don't even need to roll on a lot of tables.

I found this nifty adventure generators recently. Give them a try!

Random dark future adventures.

Random fantasy adventures.

Bonus: a random Viking generator.

Doctor Who Online Character Generator (and Messageboard)

I just found this amazing Flash online character generator for the Doctor Who RPG AITAS.
I got the link from the as amazing Doctor Who RPG Messageboard.

I also found a handy player handout pdf online.

Time travel galore!

The Mythic Gamemaster Emulator

I own the Mythic RPG already for a few years. It is a great way to play solo without a GM. The Gamemaster Emulator takes over the decisions. Most of the time you get a Yes/No answer, but every few rolls, a random event happens, that gives much more detail and new inspiration.

Originally this was a table in a pdf, but recently I found a flash version of the GM Emulator online.

An amazing thread at rpg.net details how to use the GM emulator for world building.

It's especially cool for settings, where you regularly need new worlds - like the Doctor Who RPG.

I just tested it and we created a world, where less than 10 gods exist, but those are banned into weapons and heavily interfere with the life of all mortals. Those gods are now weapons of mass destruction and seemingly can be used by a few chosen (but generally by everyone). These godweapons seem to be missilelike. I imagine them as talking weapon silos. Seems to be a great start!

Free RPG Dungeons: Every Day

Ôkay, Free RPG day is over, but there is still much more great free RPG stuff out there on the web than anyone will ever be able to play. Especially free short adventures, dungeons and modules seem to be very handy. Next to the One Page Dungeons, especially useful with D&D and the Savage Worlds One Sheet Adventures, I especially like the 5 Room Dungeons.

They offer a topological drama structure that inspired my own FAWS7 adventure sketching technique. The most interesting of the 5 Room Dungeons really offer a dungeon and organize the rooms in an interesting way. Honestly we were never able to play more than 5 rooms in an average session anyways. Some see the 5

Anyways: Here you find the link to the dozens of 5 Room Dungeons usable for D&D, Savage Worlds or whatever fantasy system you enjoy.

And a short rant to finish this post:
When I was young I assumed a good module or scenario needed to have been written out in at least 64 pages. I hated hook, line and sinker adventure sketches for examples. But later on I realized: only the short stuff is flexible enough to keep all options open for the players and a GM will rarely be able to remember all the details in long adventures anyways. So what write the details for? For the GM to learn it by heart?Or for him to read it to the players? Ough. That always seems super pretentious.
Anyways: in our good session the adventure is only a simple framework that hopefully does not interfere with our characters' motivations and interactions. The characters should be in the spotlight, not the "plot".

Talislanta is free! What could we play?

I was looking for an old fashioned and simple system recently and stumbled upon Talislanta.
I own the 2nd Edition of thie classic non-EDO fantasy setting, but my books are a few 1000 kilometres away.

So I was happy to be able to download most of the pdfs for the system.

Here you find the free RPG books for Talislanta.

What means "non-EDO"? EDO=Elves,Dwarves,Orcs? Talislanta breaks out of the Lord of the Rings mold and is not influenced by old nothern European myths, but much more by Jack Vance and H.P. Lovecraft's Dreamlands.

But what adventure should you play in such a huge setting?

I would let the players only chose between archetypes from the Seven Kingdoms and maybe the Wilderlands. That is enough choices. And I would set the adventures as well in this region.

Probably I would start in the near the realm of the Gnomekin, as some of the Seven Kingdoms are a little bit too cute. And for exactly that reason I would create an adventure where someone wants to create a Civil War in this nice union of races. An intrique that should split this bright corner of Talislanta apart.

Some interesting seeds:

• The Muses don't have a real ruler, but one is assigned randomly every month. What if a player character Muse becomes ruler, or if an "evil" (or blackmailed) Muse takes reign.

• The bird people (blue and green) seem to be quite split, it is a good point to start a war.

• The Cymril people seem to quite arrogant. It would also be easy to seed suspicion among the other races.

Now combine this 3 ideas through one villain and let the players run wild and create even more of a mess. Then villain should even empower the PCs to behave like PCs do. What a fun mess.

Free dungeon map

Here you can find a free dungeon map.
It is a pity that the description is in German.

Thanks to the LARP dungeon masters Nik and Claudia!

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (TMNT) RPG & Other Strangeness! Do you remember?

I just stumbled upon the Terror Bears in the internet. If you ever player the old Palladium Books Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles & Other Strangeness RPG you will be amazed to find the great old art by Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird all up on the internet. This is an amazing place for TMNT art!

Free Dungeon Tiles RPG Tabletop Maps

Here you will soon find a list of free dungeon tiles and RPG and tabletop war game maps for games like D&D and Savage Worlds.

Raven c.s. McCracken After Synnibarr

Today I found the geocities webpage of Raven c.s. McCracken, the designer of Synnibarr. His tracks on the internet seemed to be lost for a couple of years. The last thing we had heard of him was on an infamous MySpace site about "exotic dancing" from 2006.

It's a pity Geocities will be shut down later this year, so you should have a look on his page right now!

Hex Map Creator Hexographer

Here you find a neat Java tool to create hexmaps as known from Advanced Dungeons & Dragons back in the 90ies. They really fit if you want to set up a sandbox roleplaying game, but any RPG could profit from it.
I myself think about running a short D&D4 or Savage Worlds campaign this way. Maybe I will also convert some region of Aventurien with this tool, so I have a proper hex map for The Dark Eye continent.

savagepedia.com - Savage Worlds resources

Thanks to a great offer I was able to purchase the best possible savagepedia domain: savagepedia.com
Now you can easily navigate to Savagepedia just by typing savagepedia.com instead of the much harder to remember savagepedia.wikispaces.com.
savagepedia.com actually will redirect you to the wikispaces location, but I hope I did something good for my fellow Savages (that's how the fans of Savage Worlds call themselves).

I also have plenty of resources for Savage Worlds here in the blog: just click the following label link: Savage Worlds

Dungeons Dragons Skill Challenge - Revised Narrative System

This looks interesting: a revised narrative Skill Challenge system for Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition. I wonder if it rewards original narratives by the players. This was my initial unterstanding of what the skill challenge system for D&D4 was supposed to achieve. I have to admit that I never played with the original system though.

Free Paper Miniatures Flat Figures and Minis

Here you find lots of free paper miniatures and figure flats!

I initially copied this part of Savagepedia here, because people can now directly link to a resource of cut out paper miniatures - or "figure flats" as they are called nowadays by Pennicle. (Obviously you can use this images not only for Savage Worlds, but also for Dungeons & Dragons (aka D&D) or any other RPG.) Before you had to scroll down the Gaming Aids page on Savagepedia.

In the meantime I added lots of extra resources that are not up on savagepedia yet.

Arion Games Paper Miniature Freebies - Free samples from all genres by commercial provider
Cardboard SuperHeroes - Generic, Marvel and DC Heroes
The Fantasy Trip Pieces - Adventurers, Goblins, Kobolds, Orcs, Toltecs and more to print, cut and add to your game.
Fiery Dragon's The Castle of Shadows - Link to pdf with free fantasy counter collection
Free Paper Toys - A huge link collection to paper miniatures and 3D paper models.
Greywolf's Fonts, paper models and map tiles.
Mike's Minis - Stick figure paper minis
Models & Miniatures in Paper - Huge collection of quality models for many genres. Very cool!
Modern Ops Figure Flats - For the Modern Ops showdown game
One Monk Miniatures - Fantasy, Sci-fi, and more. Plenty of free pdf's.
Paper Soldiers for Junior Generals - A //massive// archive of historical cutout figs free to use.
Patrick's Cardboard Warriors - Cute, cartoonish, and perfect for pulp.
Planet of the Paper People - From RPG.net, new and free flats added every month.
Triple Ace Game's Daring Tales Pulp Figure Flats Preview - One page with Nazis etc.
32mm Androids & Robots" - Made with HeroMachine 2.5 (print & build instructions included).

Paper buildings and vehicles (German site)

I hope, you get some use out of these free paper minis!

New:

Cars and Spaceships on Pup's Playground.
Aztecs, Indios and Slaves on Obsidian Serpent
Free fairies by Sanity Studios. Link at bottom of the page. They also have a lot more stuff for sale.
Paper Friends (especially super heroes and Doctor Who Paper Miniatures, some including Torchwood as photo miniatures) by Seven Wonders.

If you know any other good resource, please write a comment! I will add it to the list and you help all your fellow mini and RPG fans.

Lost treasures of Synnibarr

These Synnibarr resources are not online any longer, but you can find them archived in Wayback Machine:

Niilo Paasivirta's hilarious Synnibarr page

The Sexy Naked Gamer Chick's Guide To Creating A Character In World of Synnibar

You also should not miss the the (Let's Read) The World of Synnibarr thread on rpg.net. It proves that people finally start to appreciate Raven c.s. McCracken as the genius he is.

Raven McCracken himself nowadays posts on the Synnibarr facebook page I initiated. I am the second moderator next to the man himself there and call myself NonRaven.

Aventuria Hex Map (The Dark Eye)

I was finally able to find the "Aventurien-Hex-Karte" from the old first edition Abenteuer-Ausbauspiel online. :) Now it should be easy to organize a Schwarzes Auge Aventurien sandbox game. One hex is 75km. That is too much to walk in a day, but should be 2 walking days in okay terrain. Actually it makes sense, because this way cities are somewhat detached from the rest of the hex. And on horseback you should be able to make one hex a day.

The Dark Eye - Das Schwarze Auge 1 - Open Rules

The rules for the first edition of The Dark Eye (Realms of Arcadia) can be found online in an English language alternative write up (similar to OSRIC). The German title would be Das Schwarze Auge, 1. Auflage. It's called the All-Seeing Eye.

The rules were originally published in 1984 and it was the first RPG I ever played around 1988. It's still a pretty handy rule light system. The only thing I am missing are some tactical and/or cinematic combat manoeuvres.

Hopefully I will present some in this blog soon.