. . . and we're back

I've been nagged lately by an old idea: bringing a little more Chainmail into my D&D. As any of you who have survived my hiatuses (hiati?) know, this has been my Eleanor. I place the blame for its resurgence squarely with the esteemable Mr Simon Bull, of Delving Deeper fame. In the v5 beta of Book I, he has added "Fighting Capability" to the classes. Yet, the rules for using it won't be available until the Book II beta release.

In any event, I've been thinking about it again, and I wanted to "journal" my thoughts, as much for myself as anything else. As always, though, comment and discourse are welcome.

Use the basic 2d6 "to-hit" table from the Man-to-Man section of Chainmail. It is based solely on weapon v. armor. This is to be used with opponents (whether they be PCs or NPCs) of less than Heroic stature.

PCs will attack on this table according to their Fighting Capability (FC). Thus, a third level fighting-man would attack three times. Note that these are not to be spread among multiple foes. This does not represent individual swings of a weapon. Rather it represents the greater likelihood that a more capable combatant will force a decisive outcome. Thus, even though it might be more than one roll, it still represents a single attack.

Certain bonuses will accrue to the "to-hit" roll itself. In this case, the bonus will apply to only one such roll.

Magic weapons are an exception to this. Bonuses from magic weapons modify, for purposes of "to-hit" rolls ONLY, the wielder's hit dice, thus, by extension, the wielders FC. Damage bonuses,where they are indicated v. specific targets, are applied to all successful "to-hit" rolls.

Magic shields reduce an attacker's hit dice similarly, in turn reducing FC (this effectively results in magic shields "blocking" attacks). Magic armor adds its bonus to an attacker's "to-hit" roll. Note that this may make the wearer unassailable without the availability of "to-hit" bonuses. Hero/Superhero/Wizard FC will attack such magically armored foes in Heroic Combat.

Characters with FCs of Hero, Superhero, or Wizard are all capable of Heroic Combat. Any creature above 3 HD is beyond the capacities of a normal man (being 3 HD or less). Such foes are not attacked using the Weapon v. Armor matrix. The target number to hit these foes will be from the Fantasy Combat Table in Chainmail.

Ok, so those are my initial thoughts. Like I said, this is mainly me journaling where I am in this thought process at this time. Who knows where it will go from here.

I'm Lazy, I'm Not Dead

Just when you thought all was safe in the blogosphere . . .

I'm back.

So, 7ish months is quite a spell. Of course, there's been work. Lots and lots of work. But, once I fell out of the habit of sharing these scattered thoughts, I fell hard. I still have the random thoughts (12 hours a day driving leaves one with a lot of time to think), I just became lazy about posting them. Also, they have been wildly random, even for me. I'll hit upon what I think is a real gem of an idea for a post, then when the weekend gets here and I have time to knock it out, it's gone. Or the interest in it is gone. Or whatever.

Well, let's just dive right in from here, shall we?

I'm on a Dungeon World kick of late. Actually, I'm on a (Whatever) World kick. I bought the pdf for Uncharted Worlds and I'm printing that this weekend. I almost pulled the trigger on that when it was a kickstarter, but I didn't. I haven't backed a kickstarter yet, but I really want to be like the cool kids and do it. Unfortunately, I'm like that virgin that tries to feel better about being a virgin by reciting the mantra "I'm waiting for the right one".  I digress.


I also snagged the Bundle of Holding with all the Dungeon World goodness. I printed Perilous Wilds yesterday. It looks fully awesome on the flip-through. There were some other good looking pdfs in that bundle, too. Grim World looks quite promising, but it is a dual use book and includes the necessaries to use it for Fate. I don't piss ink, so things like that slow down my acquisition cycle.




Speaking of ink. I haven't read Uncharted Worlds yet, but I can make a comment about the physical product. It includes several versions of the pdf, one of which is "Low Impact". I assumed this meant low impact on ink. Maybe it does, but looking through the pdf, I don't see it. There are a lot of pieces of art (which I really like the art, by the way) that would consume enough ink to print at least 5 pages of rules, no exaggeration. I've opened both the "regular" file and the low impact side-by-side, and I can't see a difference that would result in ink savings. By the way, the interior is all black and white. The art has a real 1980's Star Frontiers or Journal of the Traveller's Aid Society vibe. In other words, it totally rocks. Also, and don't quote me on this, but I think UW is based off Apocalypse World, rather than Dungeon World, for what it's worth.

So, there you have it. I'm back. No promises on how regularly, but I'm back. I must say, I missed it. Odd, I know, but there it is.