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Thursday, August 6, 2015

Post-Apoc Sports: Deathball (& DF Henchmen)

I was deeply flattered to see one of the supplements I co-wrote with Sean Punch, Dungeon Fantasy 15: Henchmen, get mentioned in use over on Northport.

But even better, it's mentioned as the players are getting to use 125-point henchmen lenses to make JUGGERS.

I'm not sure I ever mentioned here that Sean Punch and I also once wrote a tribute to the actual sports we like crossed with the mother of all post-apocalypse sports - the Jugger game from Blood of Heroes.



Rutger Hauer? Joan Chen? Delroy Lindo? Vincent D'Onofrio (post-Pyle)? Post-apocalypic sports? That's a freaking five-fer.



Sean introduced me to the film, and I quickly spread the love (and watched it again and again.) When eventually Pyramid 3.0 launched and I was solicited to write an article, I proposed a post-apoc sport article only if I could co-write it with Sean. Some writing pairs finish each others sentences. Sean and I seem to alternate them - he writes something that makes me write something which spurs him to say, "But would be really cool if we then wrote this!" and amazing stuff happens. True fact: I like to go back and re-read my own stuff and remember how it felt to write it. But I love to go back and re-read stuff Sean and I wrote together and remember how it all came together into some whole far greater than I could have assembled on my own.

Even better, though, is that Deathball is available completely free. The whole article. I've long linked to it on my blog but never really discussed it. And to the long-dreamt-of crossover of mine - post-apoc and Dungeon Fantasy - come to life in a bizarre twist - a post-apoc sport in DF - makes me very happy. It's very inspired to combine the ideas of a post-apoc style sport with dungeon fantasy low-point types. And not terribly a-historical, either.

7 comments:

  1. I had pictured the skill as a DX average sport, with brawling as a co-requisite. Qwik's need acrobatics and parkour related skills, Chain coyld vary between net, gusari and bolas, depending on the local tribal varietal , and Hook would use a dueling bill equipped with a hook, and Qtip would use staff. My scenario has aa social issue to be solved, as a particular team rivalry has broken out into acts of vandalism by jugga hooligans in town, and a fully violent response could end badly. Thankfully, the pcs have an initiate along with the archer and the goblin killer. The soldier was built up from a hundred point knight by a player who had DF on the Cheap, but not DF 15.

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  2. Ah, what a fine film that was :) Ever since, I could never help thinking Lacrosse would be even better if we could fight a bit with the sticks - not that modern lacrosse sticks would hold up to that in the slightest.

    Which reminds me of a not-post-apoc setting with a "bloodsport" related to lacrosse - lightning ball. Think full contact lacrosse with tasers built into the butt of the stick.

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  3. Your Deathball link doesn't go to the right place.

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  4. http://www.sjgames.com/pyramid/v3samples/v3-3_Deathball.pdf

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  5. Some friends of mine do live jugger exposition games at wasteland events. I haven't gotten a chance to join them yet, but I may.

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  6. I used to play bastardized Blood of Heroes in the SCA. Chains got 9' spears, Quicks got shortswords, and there were two guys with bastard swords and a guy with a polearm of choice (between 4.5' and 7.5'). I think. I was usually chain, sometimes polearm guy.

    It was crazy fun.

    If you Google at "Blood of heroes grimfells" one of the results is a video put up by my old team.

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