Pulpwood! Mint Condition class: Scholar

What is Mint Condition, you may be asking? It's my term for the new direction that Pulpwood is taking, mostly in terms of classes.

The game is still called Pulpwood!, but to distinguish from older posts, I am going to use the tag 'Mint Condition'. Pretty simple, right?

But for now, I present the first of the three classes, the Scholar.


Scholar

Hit Dice: d6
Skill Points per Level: 4
Favored Save: Wits
Class Skill: Academics

The Scholar is the master of all things research and education oriented. Having spent years of their life improving their minds, they know more than the average Joe could learn in a life time.
Scholars are not only masters of research, but a select few have managed to tap into the arcane energies that fill the world. Some derive magic from ancient texts (called Arcanists), some have unlocked the powers of the mind (called Mesmerists), and even some have created technology that is centuries ahead of its time (called Gadgeteers).
Scholars are a force to be reckoned with, both in the lab and on the field.

Scholar Talents

Arcanist- The Scholar gets access to Powers in the form of magical spells. If he takes this Talent, he can not take the Mesmerist or Gadgeteer talent. In addition, once per day the character can make a Wisdom Action Roll to communicate with Creatures from Beyond the Veil. The character can then ask any question to the Creature, and the Creature will answer to the best of its ability. However, sometimes the Creature doesn't know the info, is not willing to give it up unless the Scholar offers something in return, or is just plain antagonistic. The attitude of the Creature should be up to the GM.

Mesmerist- The Scholar gets access to Powers in the form of psychic abilities. If he takes this Talent, he can not take the Arcanist or Gadgeteer Talent. In addition, once a day per every 4 levels (can use once per day at level 1), the character can attempt to read someone's mind. This is an opposed Wisdom Action Roll against the target. If the Scholar succeeds by a small margin, he will now the surface thoughts and emotions of the target. If he succeeds by a significant margin, he can read deeper thoughts. If he fails, the target senses their mind being tampered with.

Gadgeteer- The Scholar gets access to Powers in the form of supernatural gadgets. If he takes this Talent, he can not take the the Arcanist or Mesmerist Talent. In addition, a character can have a number of 'incidental' gadgets per day for every four levels (one gadget at level 1, two at level 4). This gadget can take any form, but should only replicate tools, such as lockpicks, flashlights, medkits, climbing gear, or anything else. After the tool has completed its use (the door is unlocked, you enter into light, the character is healed, you climb the mountain), the tool breaks and can't be used again.

Item of Power- The Scholar has a magical item or small gadget he found or made. The item holds one Novice Power. The Power can be used a number of times per day equal to the character's Wisdom modifier. However, unlike regular Powers, you do not need to roll to make sure the effect happens (though you may need to make an attack roll if the effect is a damaging one).

Specialist- Your Scholar has become a specialist in the field he works in. Whenever there is a non-combat test where the specialization could come into play, the player adds a +2 bonus to the Action Roll. The player must detail what the character is specialized in upon taking this Talent. This Talent can also be taken multiple times, each time choosing a different specialization.

Example Specializations:
Biology
Astronomy
Occult
Religion
Africa
Chemistry
Engineering

Languages- Your Scholar has spent most of his time learning foreign languages. In addition to the languages you start with, when you take this Talent you gain two additional languages.

Researcher- Your Scholar knows the Dewey Decimal System like the back of his hand. When doing research on something, the Scholar adds a +2 to help in his search for knowledge.

Herbalist- Your Scholar knows the ins and outs of plants, herbs, fungus and what they can do. A Scholar can do an Intelligence Action Roll to determine the possible properties of any plant he encounters. Similarly, he knows how to make basic medicines and salves out of these plants. These salves do small things like heal minor injuries, cure simple poisons and so on. The GM should be the final arbitrator on these kinds of things.

Appraisal- Your Scholar has spent a lot of time learning about ancient artifacts and lore. Though other characters have to find out what an Artifact does through guessing and experimentation, the Scholar can do an Intelligence Action Roll to determine what the Artifact does and how it does it.

Decipher- Your Scholar has learned the ins and outs of ancient Heiroglyphs, runes and dead languges. The Scholar gets a +2 bonus when trying to decipher heiroglyphs or writing in an unfamiliar language,

Success with Talents!

Coming up with Talents was WAY easier than I imagined.

Each class has 10 talents, and then there are 25 General talents to choose from.

Also, the Expert has become the Adept, and he has become the stealthy/sneaky character, who can deceive, investigate, and all that other good stuff. It will be good if you want to play a spy, a gumshoe, a cop, or some other kind of man of mystery.

Here are some changes I made, to give you a peak at how the old classes now fit in the talent structure

1. The Paragon was originally a superhero archetype that didn't really fit the Brains Archetype. He was also my attempt to shoehorn in a clerical character, which kind of sucked.

The Paragon is now the 'Mysterious Power' talent for the Adventurer. Since pulp heroes did not really have too many powers anyway, this will keep them at a good power level without having to fill a specific roll.

2. The Adventurer, Pugilist and Marksman have all been paired down and consolidated into the Adventurer talents. There is Martial Arts  and Quick Reflexes for Pugilists, Dual Pistols and Sharpshooter for Marksman, and Two Fisted Weapon for Adventurers.

You could even make a somewhat Wuxia character with the base Adventurer talents. Take Quick Reflexes, Martial Arts and Mysterious Power, and you've got a man from the Far East who can perform crazy roundhouse kicks and run up walls.

3. The Arcanist, Psychic and Gadgeteer have all been turned into Scholar talents. In addition to letting you use magical abilities, the Arcanist lets you contact spirits and creatures from beyond, the Psychic allows you to read minds, and the Gadgeteer allows you to create one-off gadgets that break after one use.

4. The Scoundrel and the Investigator make up most of the Adept talents.

5. The Pilot, Socialite and Pilot abilities have gone under General talents, for the most part. Some lie in the Adept talents, but not many. Still, you could take the Famous, Rich and Exceptional Attribute (Charisma) talents to create your Socialite very easily.

All in all, I'm happy with it. I have a total of 55 talents that are pretty distinct from each other and can allow for a lot of different kinds of characters.

Stay tuned for more!

Changing the direction of the Pulpwood! game

So, it has come to my attention that I've kind of been going about producing Pulpwood! in a different way than I want to. Like most things, I have been overthinking it, and making it more than it SHOULD be.

After looking at my notes, I have realized that characters are both

1. Not flexible
2. Too combat oriented

Almost every ability revolves around inflicting damage of some kind, with very few actually being skill or narrative oriented. I also realized I am making the classes a little TOO distinct from each other, and some are generally more powerful than others.

So, I'm changing Pulpwood!, but not very much. It will be the same game, but here is what I am doing instead:

1. The class list will be reduced to only 3 class (Adventurer, Scholar and Expert)
2. Magic, gadgets, psychic abilities and superpowers will take on a more free-form approach instead of having a big list
3. A talent system will be implemented

The talents are basically the equivalent of feats, boons, edges or whatever you want to call them. Each class will have a list of class specific boons, and then there will be general boons.

So, do you want to be a Mesmerist? That's a talent. Do you want to have a helper robot (or monkey)? That's a talent.

This will effectively drop the entire Darb system, which was honestly a bit of a headache anyway.

The things I am keeping though are the following:

1. Action Rolls will be unchanged
2. Fortune will drop the Moment of Inspiration effect, but will remain unchanged otherwise
3. Combat, movement and encumbrance will stay the same
4. Skills and attributes will be the same
5. Levels will be the same, though modified to account for Talents

The first order of business is to think up a list of Talents. This will require research, but shouldn't be too difficult. I was thinking 10 talents for each 'group' (Adventurer, Scholar, Expert and General). I was originally going to do 20, but unless I have outside help, I can't really think up 20 for each :X

Hopefully these changes will be for the better! Also, if you have some ideas for Talents, don't hesitate to leave them in the comments!

Review of A Wanderer's Romance

Imagine an ocean world created by the gods, where the largest landmass is only a few dozen miles wide. Thousands, perhaps millions, of these islands dot the oceans, and each can be radically different from its neighbors. Some gods descended to the Earth in mortal form, and became your ancestors. Now, you wander these islands, looking for adventure, discovery and self-fulfillment.

This is the world of A Wanderer's Romance.

Setting

A Wanderer's Romance is a rules lite wuxia RPG written by Cristopher McDowell. In it, you play a martial artist travelling between the aforementioned isles. And that's about it.

The setting is not much, but it gives you what you need: a basic backdrop in which to expand upon. Some games through gobs of useless and heavy setting bits at you, and you have to struggle to fit in your custom-made faction. In this way, the bare bones setting is actually a boon. It also allows you to just use the rules as is, and play in a feudal Asia setting with little hassle.

Mechanics

The mechanics for AWR are extremely simple: you roll two dice, add the appropriate stat(s), and try to beat wither 10, 12 or 14 (depending on difficulty). There are some slight variations, such as the application of the Balance stat, but nothing is too radically different than these basic rules. The stats, and mostly everything in the game, revolves around the four classical elements of earth, water, fire and air.

Since AWE is a wuxia game, you should expect fighting styles, and AWR delivers. They have about 54 offensive styles, and 24 defensive styles, each with 3 levels of advancement. Magic based on the elements is also present, but you won't get the generic 'fire magic = fireballs' thing. Instead, fire magic allows you to instill a strong emotion into someone, along with other similar effects.

Combat is resolved through contested rolls, upon which the defender actually rolls the damage, not the attacker. This adds a good bit of stress to damage, so nothing stays boring for too long.

Writing

The writing is very simple and flavorful. I was never lost at any point, and the small story excerpts really gave you a feel about the world, in that it is both an elegant and dangerous place. McDowell is a great writer in that he does not fluff up the mechanics behind strange language. He also has several text boxes detailing his decisions on rules, so you can see his reasoning behind things you may question.

Presentation

AWR is only 45 pages, but they are a great 45 pages. The calligraphy headers used, and the amazing artwork by Pavel Elagin, really give off a sense of style. The cover itself is just gorgeous to stare at. The only gripe I have is the lack of a character sheet, but seeing as each character does not have much info associated with it, you could fit everything you need to know on an index card. I just think they could have produced an equally great looking sheet, is all.

Final Verdict

Honestly, A Wanderer's Romance is one of the most elegant and tasteful wuxia games I've ever read. It's easy to understand and to teach (great for first time RPG players), and it allows the characters to really come to the forefront. A lot of different types of environments and settings can be culled from the default setting, which is great if you have a hard time keeping plot lines strung along.

AWR is definitively not 'high flying' wuxia, though. I see it more as an elegant samurai story. It's more Ruroni Kenshin than Dragonball Z, for sure. So if you want to check it out, keep that in mind.

I give it a 9/10, with my only real problem being the lack of a character sheet.

Where to Get

A Wanderer's Romance is available for the low, low price of free from the Stargazer Games' website, found here: http://www.stargazergames.eu/games/a-wanderers-romance/

Considering moving Pulpwood away from its status

Yes, I'm still working on Pulpwood!

No, I haven't had much time.

Yes, I'm sorry.

However, there is some news with Pulpwood: I am strongly considering moving it from a development blog to a pure gaming blog.

What this means is that in addition to having updates about Pulpwood! or any other game I am working on, I'd also talk about things related to RPGs: events, game reviews, campaign ideas, and so on. It'll be a less quality Grognardia, basically.

I think for reviews, though, I'd go for mostly smaller press games. There are 7 million reviews out there for Pathfinder, but not many for Remnants, A Wanderer's Romance or Aegis (the first two are great, the former needs to convince me). I'd also post links to interesting fan settings or adaptations, just anything in general that would sway my interest.

It will most likely go into effect soon, so look forward to it (or not, whatever).

Alrighty! I'll see you later.

Well shoot

I finished the pocketmod game, Nephilim, in under 24 hours! There is a link to it in the sidebar under the new 'Games I've Made' heading.

However, it's not TOTALLY a pocketmod. While it does come under 8 pages, the word length is probably too long to fit on a traditional pocketmod. However, you are more than welcome to try.

It is also lacking a character sheet and cover art, along with 'good' layout. I don't have much time to do that stuff (I may do some cover art), but if you'd like to do some layout or something else, shoot me an email.

Also, don't be afraid to leave comments/criticisms/rules questions. This has zero playtesting, so please go whole hog. You'll notice I took a lot of notes from the Storyteller system, with a base in Ubiquity, but it should function just fine.

Anyway, have fun! I hope you like it.

A quick update on progress

I am still around! I actually have some classes written up that I plan to post, but first, I have an experiment:

Sometimes, when I'm faced with a big project, new projects keep flooding my mind. I want to do other things, even though I like all the things I'm doing.

Currently, I have a couple ideas for rules-lite RPGs, and I'm going to do something about them: Make a Pocketmod game

A Pocketmod, if you are not aware, is a small booklet with 8 pages that you can print out on one piece of paper. Some RPGs are this small (Weird West comes to mind), and I'd like to make a game so I can say I have 'finished' something.

So, I'm going to make a modern occult horror action Pocketmod game. In it, you play as Angels and Demons sent to Earth to combat the horrors of purgatory. It will be Lovecraftian, heretical, violent, beautiful and simple.

What it will have
14 races - 7 angels, 7 demons
Magic- very narrative in essence
Equipment- including suggestions for magic equipment, and even vehicles
Combat resolution, skills and tests
A bestiary and setting suggestion
Maybe art, if I get up the gumption to draw


I hope to write this up in about a week or two, and probably post it here. Get excited, because after that, it's back to the Pulpwood! grind.