GYGAX 75 CHALLENGE: WEEK 2

Continued from here. 

Download the Gygax Challenge here.

Week 2:

So far I'm really enjoying the challenge. Making a setting from scratch really forces me to think outside the box to make things interesting. The world took on a more "prehistoric" feel after I added Ice Age American megafauna to the random encounter table for the Sancana Steppe. I also decided to add enormous deadly tar pits to the map. Since all my players and myself are from LA we all know the stench of tar from the La Brea Tar Pits, a cool touch to to describe the landscape with.

THE TASKS:

1. Get a sheet of hex paper. Draw the following on it, one item per hex (or more if indicated). Name anything worthy of a name.

The tasks also asks you to name multiple settlements and landmarks. I named the bigger city-state Evangelos and the smaller one Cappadocia. There's a small town between named Mun. The forest north of the Zane river is the Blackmagne Forest, south of the river is the Sancana Steppe. I was heavily inspired by the map in the challenge zine so I stole it's style.

CENTRAL LIMURIA 1 Hex=6 miles.

After drawing the map I put it in a plastic sleeve which lets me draw the dungeons and stuff over with a wet-erase marker. This has the dungeon entrance that the task ask you to do. Oh and the "mysterious site" is Devil's Rend, a deep canyon located south of Evangelos. A horrible devil is rumored to reside there.

2.  Extra Credit: Write a Random Encounter Table

The random encounter table was really fun to make and helped the setting take on a prehistoric flavor. Also I managed to write in my hatred of elves by killing them off in an extinction event. Their bones still walk the land though. Also no horses, moa are this world's horses, Final Fantasy chocobo style.

CONCLUSION
I'm getting a little worried about Week 3 since I've never done a "traditional dungeon" but it should be interesting. Also might update this post with random encounter tables for the Blackmagne Forest and the old main road between the cities. All in all a very cool challenge, thanks for reading!

GYGAX 75 CHALLENGE: WEEK 1

Over on the blog Verbum Ex Nihilo, author xmoonxhowlerx is doing the Gygax 75 Challenge (found here). In short the challenge asks you to make a small campaign setting and everything you would need to get a campaign going in 5 weeks. Including a stocked 3-level dungeon, which is hella old school.
I've been wanting to run a "vanilla" fantasy campaign anyway and thought this challenge would be the perfect opportunity to get one rolling.

Note: I assume you downloaded and read the challenge going forward.

WEEK 1: THE CONCEPT

1." Get/Create a notebook:"

Got a really cool leather notebook for my birthday last year, now's the perfect time to use it. 

2. "Develop Your Pitch: Write down 3-7 (no more!) well-crafted bullet points that will “sell” the world to your players."

I'm calling this campaign RE; LAMENT (heh) and will be using the LotFP Rules & Magic for the base rules. I thought about using Necrotic Gnome's Old School Essentials for a more "classic" d&d game but I remembered b/x only gives Magic-Users 1 spell at Level 1. Clerics don't get spells until lvl. 2 and it's possible to have 1HP fighters. Hilarious but also kinda lame. LotFP fits my tastes better anyway.

Onto the pitches!

• Forces of Chaos lie beyond these walls, stay inside and alive! Or, venture beyond them to a world filled with dungeons, monsters, and treasure!
• The City-State of Evangelos is the main "hub", anything outside the City is frontier land with towns and villages dotting the map. A points of light campaign with dungeons galore!
• Humans only, demi-humans were hunted to extinction by the other worldly Dread Emperor.
• Setting is low-magic, but the city is filled with strange modern-esque structures like skyscrapers and sprawling apartments in the "slums".
• Heavy anime/manga vibe.
  
  
  

3."Sources of Inspiration: List them as an annotated bibliography – citing the name, author, etc. and a sentence or two explaining what each source brings to, or supports within the setting"

• JAPANESE D&D RULES ENCYCLOPEDIA ART
  The art is so sweet for this and if I could draw this would be the style this campaign would be drawn in. Just my head canon for the campaign aesthetic. 
• The Legend of Zelda, Majora's Mask.
  This game shaped my lifelong love of weird kinda horror(?) stuff. The surreal tone is something I would love to emulate with some of the frontier towns.
• Berserk(manga) by Kentaro Miura
  The monsters are unique and top-notch, and show how to do monsters right. Also the writing is amazing. I want this campaign's monsters to emulate the ones in Berserk.
• KonoSuba: God's Blessing On This Beautiful World! by Natsume Akatsuki 
  See, I'm not a complete edge-lord (I am however guilty of being a huge weeb). Konosuba is pure comedy and I would love to use classic fantasy tropes as a source of comic relief in this campaign. Also making the BBE an isekai'd character. lol
• Adventure Time
  I love everything about Adventure Time and have good memories of watching new episodes with my son. Hopefully I can pull on some of the players heartstrings just like the show yanked on mine.
• City State Of The Invincible Overlord by Judges Guild
  While it's a little more "high fantasy" than I like, I love how it feels like a real breathing city. Hopefully I can get my city state to be a quarter as good as it.
• Dorohedoro by Q Hayashida More inspiration for the City State. I want my slums district to be similar to The Hole in Dorohedoro. Also the satanic imagery in the manga is just awesome. 

I'll be posting these each week on Sunday until the challenge is complete. Stay tuned next week for Week 2!

WEEK 2 HERE!

TERPSICHORA MASK

TERPSICHORA MASK

A white domino mask with elaborate gold and black inlays carved around the eyes. Black laces made of silk hang from the mask’s eyes like tears. It changes from pale white to blood red once activated. Said to be possessed by the spirit of a dancer murdered by an obsessive fan.

What's It Do?
When the command word (TERPSICHORA!) is spoken the mask removes the wearer's subconscious strength limiters allowing them to fight at peak performance at the cost of damage to their body. The wearer's STR & DEX score becomes 18 (+3) and they fight as a Fighter twice their level for the duration of the ability. However the human body has limiters to protect itself, each round the ability is used the wearer's muscles become shredded & their bones riddled with hairline fractures causing 1d2 points of temporarily CON damage. The wearer may end the ability early before combat ends by asserting their will and passing a save vs magic. A failure means the wearer will fight until combat ends regardless of any CON damage received.

Updated the Body Over Mind Spells here btw.

Additionally if the wearer's HP or CON is reduced to 0 or less the user’s body (corpse) rises and eloquently fights unarmed as a Fighter twice their level with their STR & DEX becoming 20 (+5). The body fights (anyone, including allies) for 1d4 plus level rounds or until the body takes damage equal to 8 plus level.

Influence:

My favorite video game of all time is The Legend Of Zelda: Majora's Mask. One of the things the game tasks you to do is collect an assortment of weird masks scattered throughout the world map. All the masks are unique and have different properties and abilities. Now I tend to throw in weird magical masks in my games as an homage to Majora's Mask. This particular mask's ability is from the anime/manga Hunter x Hunter and was used by the sinister royal guard Pitou.
Anime and manga are a gold mine for RPGS btw.

Like this magic item? Let me know in the comments and definitely let me know if you throw it in your games.

Body Over Mind, Limiter Release

I wrote these homebrew spells for LotFP based on the stories of people using superhuman strength in times of duress.

Body Over Mind I
Magic-User Level 1
Range: Touch
Duration: 1 Round per level
This spell removes a person’s subconscious strength limiters allowing them to temporarily fight at peak performance at a cost of damage to their body. The target of this spell’s STR & DEX score becomes 18 (+3) and they fight as a Fighter twice their level for the duration of the ability. However the human body has limiters to protect itself, each round the ability is used the wearer's muscles become shredded & their bones riddled with hairline fractures causing 1d2 points of temporarily CON damage.

Body Over Mind II
Magic-User Level 2
Range: Touch
Duration: 1 Round per level
This spell removes a person’s subconscious strength limiters allowing them to temporarily fight at peak performance at a cost of damage to their body. The target of this spell’s STR & DEX score becomes 19 (+4) and they fight as a Fighter twice their level for the duration of the ability. However the human body has limiters to protect itself, each round the ability is used the wearer's muscles become shredded & their bones riddled with hairline fractures causing 1d2 points of temporarily CON damage.

Body Over Mind III
Magic-User Level 3
Range: Touch
Duration: 1 Round per level
This spell removes a person’s subconscious strength limiters allowing them to temporarily fight at peak performance at a cost of damage to their body. The target of this spell’s STR & DEX score becomes 20 (+5) and they fight as a Fighter twice their level for the duration of the ability. However the human body has limiters to protect itself, each round the ability is used the wearer's muscles become shredded & their bones riddled with hairline fractures causing 1d2 points of temporarily CON damage.

LotFP Equipment Kits

Happy Easter/Bunny Day!

I made some Equipment Kits for my players since they're lazy as shit when it comes to buying equipment...

Check'em out here.

Probably some mistakes but it should be usable.