Writing Update

Gaming today literally consisted of one thing - working on a submittable outline with Doug. News when we can reveal what it is - and that's a ways out from now.

Should I take Odious Personal Habit or Social Stigma?

I'm finalizing a slightly revised version of Handsome, the half-orc* scout.

Right now, he has the alarmingly standard Odious Personal Habit (Dirty Bushwhacker) disad, for -5 points.

Do I keep that? It's on-template and nice for a scout.

Or do I go where I'm leaning, and get Social Stigma (Criminal) instead?

Right now, with just Social Stigma (Savage), he's stopped from entering town on a 6- and has -2/-4 to negotiation rolls (more with Unattractive!) Do I just push that to -3/-4? Well, more with his appearance?

Or do I go with a -2 to in-town reaction rolls and most in-town rolls?


The second is demonstrably worse. But makes sense given that he's a greedy jerkoff with a bow. It won't hurt him in the dungeon but will make his social life in town even worse.


Decisions, decisions!

* Which parent was which? Both were half-orcs.

Hommlet (and beyond) game summaries

I missed the launch of this series, but now I'll all caught up - T1 The Village of Hommlet, played with what sounds like 5th edition D&D.

I enjoyed the summaries . . . I ran that module often back in the day. We never really intereacted with the villagers.

My PC for Vic's Felltower Sessions

I wrote up my character for Vic's Felltower side game.

Handsome is a half-orc scout.

Highlights:

ST 13
DX 14
IQ 11
HT 14
Speed 7
Move 7
HP, FP, and Per all 14.

Traits include Strongbow, Flawless Nocking, Flawless Fast-Draw, and Overdraw, a power-up that hasn't seen print yet.
At the moment with the limited set of disads in DFRPG he has Greed, Bloodlust, Bad Temper (because I do), and a Vow to own nothing more than he can carry, because I don't want to have to deal with a long equipment list like my GT guy Hillbilly has.

My original plan was some torso armor, boots, and a helmet. But since I don't have funds for a cornucopia quiver, I decided to chuck $500 at a Dwarven whetstone to sharpen my impaling and cutting arrows. So all he has is some basic delving gear, a hatchet, a knife, a longbow, 50 arrows, and a will to kill someone to take their armor and helmet. Torso armor and helmet, anyway, and maybe boots and gloves. We'll see - No Encumbrance is 34 pounds and I'd prefer to stay there for Dodge 10 and Move 7.

I may change that decision back. But with a ST 15 longbow I do 1d+3; sharpened up they'll do 1d+4, and I can get +2 with Overdraw for 1d+6. Should be sufficient to start with.

My shortlist of power-ups to get is Slayer Training (Bow/Vitals) for 3 points. I should be able to do that in a single session, and cut Vitals penalties to -1.

Overall I'm pleased with how he came out. I wasn't originally planning on HT 14, which I feel is excessive, but scouts have HT 12, Half-Orcs get +1 for HT 13, and Scouts buy up Speed from 6.5 to 7 for [10]. I saved 5 already there, so why not take the other 5 out and combine them for +1 HT and the same Basic Move? The math just worked. I should have taken Fit and asked constantly "Does Fit add to this roll?"

I gave him some fun quirks. I may noodle around with his disads some more, because I'm tired of every scout feeling the same. But -50 is hard with their selection and there isn't really much else that suits them. And I wanted something that bound my guy to the part - Code of Honor (Outlaw's) - without Sense of Duty, which I find suicidal sometimes.

We'll see if anything changes. But he looks fun to play right now.

Scout weirdness

I was looking at the Scout template in DF, and in DFRPG. Here are a few things I found odd:

- you can choose a sword, staff, or spear, but not an axe, as your melee weapon. So I can't do a woodsman with a trusty hatchet, but I can do a hunter with a trusty falchion.

- I'm kind of curious why you need to choose disads from two pools on the scout. It makes a lot of sense on templates that have a required subset of disads to make the template work - martial artist, cleric, holy warrior - but seems odd here. Admittedly it's hard to do, but I can see making a scout who is a Loner with No Sense of Humor, with a Soldier's Code of Honor, a Phobia of crowds, and a vow to own no more than what can be carried. That's -50. Are the seperate -15 worth really that mission critical? If you take Bloodlust or Sense of Duty as part of those -15, do you really need some of the rest to make up the points? It just seems arbitrary in a way that forcing a cleric or martial artist to take specific disads doesn't.

- It amuses me that you spent 4x as many points on Shadowing as Stealth. Maybe because I don't run games with Shadowing but it feels less mission critical for any of the suggested types of scouts.


So, obviously I'm making a Scout.

Three quick links for 6/2/2023

- Dredd posters!

Miniature Dredd Posters

- In theory, I like geomorphs. I love looking at them. I never actually use them for dungeons - not since way, way back when I was 9 or 10 years old. I always liked a complete dungeon or making the whole thing from scratch. Still, these are attractive:

Dyson Logos Dungeon Geormorphs 4

- I'm sad reading the numbers and names of the fallen, but it's remarkable that a year has gone by without the last one changing. And sad, that this is remarkable.

DF Felltower, Martial Artists, and "The Path"

DFRPG Companion 2 introduced "The Path" for martial artists.

After a player inquiry, I think yes, it should be fine for Felltower. We'll allow it and see if that's something that works out. It doesn't seem unbalanced when you compare with Shirtless Savage for Barbarians, anyway, so why not? 4 levels of Uninterrupted Fury does seem a bit much, but costs 80 points so I'm not sure it's unreasonable for the cost.