The Robgoblin

A late second entry for Beyond Vancian Magic, that came to me while sick and watching kids movies. Freeform casting. That's not unique. But how about... you can cast anything you like. But you have to be able to express it in rhyming couplets. Maximum number of syllables per line is equal to your casting ability – level, or something else, as you see fit. Interpretation up to the referee, who should be consistent with the player's intent and their power levels. More able casters should be able to use their increased number of syllables to create more powerful or more precise effects. At second level,  Be gone/Long one  will dispel a snake. Lightning, thunder, all around/Soon the rain will hit the ground  may summon a thunderstorm, but needs a powerful magician. And portable illumination at first level? That needs imagination. The obvious one is.... Rather scatological.

Eldritch Fields requested 1d6 celestial phenomena for the OSR Discord's 2024 Secret Santicorn 1 . Also, the Goblette (Goblina?) has reminded me that it was, in fact, her idea that the Christmas elves should form a trade union. So whoever's drawn that one... the credit is not due to me. 1. All three moons - the Red, White, and Black - are full. All that stuff that happens on a full moon? It happens eightfold. The tides are so high that ships are sailing on the market square. All wolves are werewolves , and all men bitten are turned. All emotions are heightened (roll 1d12 instead of 2d6 for reactions and morale). Wilderness encounters at night have a 50% chance of being rolled on the table for daylight. 2. Meteor storm. The emphasis here is on storm. The sky burns bright with bolides. Find cover, and quickly; it'll sound like a cross between hailstones the size of grapefruits, and the biggest thunderstorm you've ever heard. Find cover quickly. Soft objects - livestock, ...

As I mentioned in my last post , I've been messing around with the Thief. Actually, I've been thinking about character classes generally, and that includes the Magic-User. Magician. Mage. Wizard. Whatever you like to call them. Which ties neatly in with the December RPG Blog Carnival theme, Beyond Vancian Magic . I'll be honest, I actually quite like Vancian magic on magic-users 1 , although I do still need to read some actual Vance to fully appreciate the nuances. But the classic old-school D&D magic-user suffers a little, in my view, from trying to make everything  a spell. Why is that a problem? Well, when everything is a spell, everything depends on being able to cast spells. Hence the question of what use a Magic-User is without any spell slots. Later editions of the game solve this with zero-level spells that don't require any resources. That's certainly one way to solve the problem. Not necessarily a good  way, but definitely a  way. Another is to have th...

 As is tradition, I've been redesigning the Thief 1 . Probably nothing novel, I may or may not post it the end. But I'm drawn to a 2d6 skill system. Why? Partly because of the pleasing bell curve effect - a novice might succeed, a master will almost always succeed. And that eases itself into allowing some advanced thief abilities, i.e. the notorious ' climbing upside down and horizontally, voice skills such as mimicry and ventriloquism, and other skills of deception '. Yes, I have thoughts in that direction. But there's another reason. Building on Dyson's d6 and 2d6 Thiefin' for Basic Dungeons & Dragons ,  the 2d6 range lends itself to adding ability modifiers to the roll. Specifically, for a roll-high 2d6 system: A 1-in-6 chance requires a roll of 10 or higher 2-in-6 requires 9 or higher 3-in-6 requires a 7 or 8 - there's no clean way to get a 50/50 outcome on 2d6 4-in-6 requires a 6 or higher 5-in-6 requires 5 or higher Why are those numbers import...