Game Talk 2 - rpg punk

Thoughts on Shields Shall be Splintered

The original is at Trollsmyth’s page here.

It’s a wonderful rule and I’ve incorporated it into LotFP games in the past. I wrote a previous post about shields and armor, with different shield sizes and materials. Wood can be sacrificed once, metal can be sacrificed twice. I am thinking about changing that though. Both can be sacrificed once, but metal shields give a bonus of +2 melee AC and +2 ranged AC, as opposed to the +1/+2 of a wood shield. The idea being that a metal shield will allow fewer things to go through; much like leather armor and plate armor cover the same amount of body area, but the material of plate gives it a much higher armor class.

Anyway, back to Shields Shall be Splintered…

Looking through the comments though, I got some ideas.

Why can’t armor be sacrificed in the same way?
Can you use the rule to block damage from any attack? Like a giant throwing a huge boulder that would realistically squish you completely?
Since the shield already adds to your AC, why should it also block damage?

So, to address the first point, allow armor to be sacrificed. That helps to get rid of the armor the player character has had for the last 10 years of game time through hundreds of battles and a half dozen levels. It makes armor more than just an after thought, same as it does for the shield.

The second point, is simple; GM fiat. That’s the GM’s job after all; to adjudicate situations. In the aforementioned example, I would say no, you can’t sacrifice your shield or armor to block that attack.

Third point is the trickiest and least likely to be incorporated; just an idea I’m bouncing in my head. Instead of simply blocking damage, a shield or armor can be sacrificed to turn a critical hit into a regular hit. This would not be applicable to sneak attacks or backstabs, as the person being attacked is surprised.

Armor and more on Encumbrance

Because of the specifics of the setting I’m working on, the large list of armors from Castles & Crusades, as well as the very small list of armors from Lamentations of the Flame Princess, do not work for what I want.

First, about armor and encumbrance. I detailed encumbrance in this post.

Shields and helmets are considered a standard item, for encumbrance purposes, so they take up a single item slot.

Helmets: While there are a dizzying array of helmet designs, they fall into the following categories. Helmets provide an AC bonus only against attacks specifying the head. Helmet AC is not added to regular AC. Cost is generic: I haven’t decided to go with a silver or gold standard yet.

Leather Cap: +1 AC, cost: 4
Metal Pot: +2 AC, cost: 5
Helm: +5 AC, cost: 10
Great Helm: +7 AC, cost: 20

Shields: Shields provide two defensive bonuses, and a special defense. The first is against melee attacks, the second is against ranged attacks, and the third is the Shields Will Be Broken Rule. This rule is that a shield may be sacrificed to take the full damage from a single attack. A Modification to the rule allows for the material the shield is made of. Wood shields are unusable after being sacrificed. Metal shields can effectively be sacrificed twice. This rule does not apply to the Buckler, which is too small (you’d be sacrificing your arm).

Buckler: +1 AC melee, +1 AC ranged, cost: 2
Small Shield: +1 AC melee, +2 AC ranged, cost: 3 wood, 9 steel
Medium Shield: +2 AC melee, +3 AC ranged, cost: 5 wood, 15 steel
Large Shield: +3 AC melee, +4 AC ranged, cost: 7 wood, 21 steel

Like any other item, armor uses up an item slot. No matter what kind it is, armor takes up a single item slot. Heavier armor, because of its weight, bulk, and restriction of movement, also has a further penalty.

There are three basic types of armor, and how they work with encumbrance is as follows:

Light Armor fills an item slot.
Medium Armor fills an item slot AND a point of encumbrance.
Heavy Armor fills an item slot AND two points of encumbrance.

A half suit, basically covering the chest and torso, or the classic chain/plate bikini, or the bracers/gauntlets, shoulder plates, shin guard combo all work the same, and are considered a half-suit for game purposes.

A half suit of Light armor takes up an item slot.
Half suit of Medium armor takes up an item slot.
Half suit of Heavy armor takes up an item slot, AND fills one point of encumbrance.

Now, on to specific types of armor available! The armor listed includes the Armor Class bonus for half and full suits, as well as the cost. These are guidelines, but cover most types of armor. While many other types of armor exist, they all effectively fall within these categories and use the same stats.

Light Armor:

Hide or Leather: +1 AC half suit, +2 AC full suit, cost: 5/10
Studded Leather: +2 AC half suit, +3 AC full suit, cost: 12/24

Medium Armor:

Chain or Scale: +3 AC half suit, +5 AC full suit, cost: 100/200

Heavy Armor:

Plate: +5 AC half suit, +8 AC full suit, cost: 300/600

Encumbrance; a Little Less Sucky

Encumbrance is probably the least used and most boring part of RPGs. I don’t think I’ve ever been a player in a game where encumbrance was ever an issue that really came up, as most games use complicated systems that suck the fun right out of the game, so no one ever bothers with them. Or they use a system based on Strength and how much you can lift and nothing else, making it silly and unrealistic. Castles & Crusades, at least in the 4th printing that I own, has a terribly convoluted and dare-I-say-it unplayable encumbrance system. I knew when I started this that it would be the very first thing I scrapped from the system.

Encumbrance doesn’t have to be so crappy, though.

Lamentations of the Flame Princess was the first game I ever played that had an encumbrance system that wasn’t terrible and was simple to implement.

So I’m porting that into this game.

In LotFP, you can carry any number of items. However, the more you carry, the more Encumbrance Points you accrue. It uses a system of equipment slots. Every sixth slot you fill grants an encumbrance point. Small items, like an arrow, can have many carried before filling a slot. Certain types of armor automatically count for encumbrance points.

Having so many encumbrance points affects your speed and, in the case of Magic Users, your ability to cast spells.

While Encumbrance doesn’t have to be continually tracked throughout play, the Referee is allowed to audit a player’s equipment at any time, with the player penalized accordingly if they are carrying too much stuff.

Add to this the importance LotFP places on hiring retainers, and it’s a very effective and simple system.

In a nutshell;

Carrying 6 or more items is a point.
Carrying 11 or more items is two points.
Carrying 16 or more items is three points.
Carrying 21 or more items is four points.
Oversized items, two-handed weapons, some armor = 1 point.
Giant sized items, some armor = 2 points

More on armor and how it affects encumbrance in the next post.

Lamentations of the Flame Princess, though, is designed for a more gritty, low-fantasy, setting. Not the high-fantasy, ridiculousness of Strathos. Some some changes are necessary.

Constitution Modifier applies to Encumbrance. This means that you receive extra item slots based on your Con mod, before you take an encumbrance point. On the other hand, having a negative Con mod means you can fill fewer slots before taking an encumbrance point.

Example 1: Sheila the Barbarian has a +2 Con modifier. This translates to her being able to fill 7 slots of items before accruing an encumbrance point.

Example 2: Brxrfrx the Mushroom has no Con modifier. It can fill up to 5 slots of items without accruing an encumbrance point.

Example 3: Trent the Wizard has a -2 Con modifier. He can only fill up to 3 slots of items before accruing an encumbrance point.

Okay, but what does it mean to accrue and Encumbrance Point? How do they affect the game?

Zero or One encumbrance points = Unencumbered. This has no effect on your character.
Two encumbrance points = Lightly encumbered. Speed is reduced 20%.
Three points = Heavily encumbered. Speed is reduced by 40%, and Magic Users cannot use magic. Characters suffer a -1 penalty to all combat rolls and skill checks, as well as dexterity based saves.
Four points = Severely encumbered. Speed is reduced by 80%. Characters suffer a -3 penalty to all combat rolls, skill checks, and Dexterity based saves.
5 points = Overencumbered. The character cannot move.

Example 4: Trent the Wizard is carrying a spell book (1 item slot), a pen and ink set (1 item slot), a dagger (1 item slot), a weeks worth of rations (1 item slot) and a staff (two-handed weapon: 1 encumbrance point), making him Lightly Encumbered. Why? Because he has filled 4 item slots (remember, he can only fill three slots without accruing a point) and has a two-handed weapon. That totals 2 encumbrance points.

While all of this makes sense to me, I know that it doesn’t necessarily make sense to anyone reading this. So I am happy to answer any questions.

Castles and Crusades

Image via Wikipedia

I just got my hands on a couple of Castles and Crusades books. I’ve been hearing a lot about it and decided to try it out.

I was originally designing a Palladium Fantasy 1st edition campaign but decided to go with C&C instead. Particularly after I read Grinding Gears by Lamentations of the Flame Princess.

So, I had to make new races for my campaign; Goblin, Hobgoblin, Orc, Kobold, and Troglodyte. I’m still using the race descriptions as they are for Palladium (I like them a lot more than the D&D versions).

Humans, Elves, Dwarves, Halflings, and Gnomes are the enemy! In some cases, individuals of these races can and will be allies to the characters, but this will be very rare.

The idea behind the campaign was inspired by the Goblins webcomic. Basically, the characters have gotten fed up being fodder for low level “adventurers” and have decided to become adventurers themselves in order to protect their people. Not only are the players playing monsters (and from the monster’s points of view) but the characters themselves are vaguely aware that they are part of a game. Breaking the 4th wall and all that.

I’m also including a lot of humor in the campaign, mixed with quite a bit of potential death for the characters.

I’m going to be running this game for two different small groups (scheduling conflicts have forced this). One is my main gaming group, and the other is a group of people that for the most part are brand new to role playing. That’s another reason I chose to go with Castles and Crusades – it’s so ridiculously simple.

The final reason I’m using Castles and Crusades is because my roommate has an extensive collection of 1st and 2nd edition AD&D books that are all easily converted to C&C.

As a GM, I’ve never been big on pre-made adventures or modules. In fact, I’ve only ever used one pre-made adventure in over 15 years of running games. However, due to my own time constraints, I’ve decided to start the players off using two different low-level adventures; Grinding Gears by LotFP, and Beacon at Enon Tor for C&C. I actually have no idea who wrote the conversion for Beacon, but I’m aware it was originally printed in Dragon for D&D.

Both adventures are very different from each other, are good for introducing the game to everyone, and are short enough to fit into a single game session.