"O" is for...

Old School RPGs

Yes, the old school thing again. I love them. 3.5 and Pathfinder and newer RPGs are cool and all and i do enjoy them, bust sometimes I just want to throw something together and play and the old school games are less bogged down in the sub-systems and heavy rules that make that difficult with the newer systems. For me, the old school thing isn't just about playing the old versions and their retro clones. It's also about playing new games with old school sensibilities.

These are games that have been built from scratch or partially from scratch but that maintain the basic tenants of the old school RPGs. They are not as heavy on specific details and systems as the new games allowing the detail to come out in the unfettered playability that their compact and elegant rules allow for. You may not find massive lists of skills and modifiers, but are they needed for the style of play you are going for?

Take, for example, Barbarians of Lemuria. This is Simon Washborne's imaginative brain child that combines elements of Conan, Tekumel, John Carter, and other staples of pulp fantasy and science fiction. The system is very smooth and intuitive, allowing the players and the GM to do much of the leg work within the most subtle of guidance from the rules. At it's core, you character has careers. If he encounters a situation that would draw from his skills, knowledge and/or experience in one of these careers, he gets a bonus or at least the ability to make a skilled check. That's it. No laborious catalogs of skills to pour over just do it. BOL is but one example, but still others exist.

While i have not purchased or played all the newer, old school style systems out there, I do have some of and I find that there is pretty much a game for anyone out there. Whether it is X-plorers, Rogue Space, or Stars Without Number, if you are looking for science fiction role-play you will find it. If it's a pulpy romp, try Dicey Tails, the pulp rewrite of Barbarians of Lemuria, a system that works well for the loose and cinematic conventions of the Pulp genre. I wish I could name  more, but I only have so much time and money to spend on exploring systems.

One last system worth mentioning is a favorite of mine that is still alive and well. It faded from mainstream but never went away and continued to be developed by the creators. I speak of the West End D6 System. Revived as a trio of core systems all using the same rules framework, D6 Adventure, D6 Fantasy, and D6 Space really offer you just about anything you could wish for and FOR FREE. Not only are three core genres well represented in these tittles but each is completely cross compatible on a cellular level with one another. What's more, the system has been made open source and so there are numerous third party publications tapping into the system covering a number of different topics, even super heroes.

D6 Pulp - Island of The Tiki TerrorSession Two

When we last left our heroes they had come aboard the tramp steamer they had seen fleeing the island which had just now returned. Coming aboard they were met by the enigmatic Mr. Muse and his armed crewmen. Faced with the sudden realization that they had blundered into the hands of an unknown enemy, they were taken below decks and secured inside a cabin with a view of the events about to unfold on the island.

Locked inside the guarded cabin, Marcus and Loupe set to figuring out a way to escape. They were spurred on in their determination by the sight of a launch taking the three survivors they had rescued to the island. As the considered their escape, Loupe observed, through a pair of binoculars, the hostages being tied up on the beach, and some sort of native idol being placed between them. Above them on the top deck of the ship they could hear heavy activity and machinery in action. They had to move fast.

Opening the portal and throwing a lamp out of it, Marcus went to the door calling out to the guard that Loupe had foolishly squirmed out the porthole and put himself overboard. The guard moved into the cabin to check it out not knowing that Loupe was hidden behind the door, having fashioned a club out of several of the metal bed slats tied together with torn bed sheet. Though Marcus would have been better to attack the guard, it was more believable that Loupe went out the window.

Loupe sprung on the guard but his initial ambush proved little more than an announcement of his presence (Chuck rolled poorly). Marcus managed to get a blow in before the guard became fully aware of what was going on, but he too failed to knock the man out. Unable to use his rifle in close quarters, the guard was forced to engage in a brawling melee with the two heroes until finally Marcus connected with his iron fist and knocked the guard to the floor. They had their freedom.

Snatching up the guards rifle, they set out into the interior of the freighter, making their way toward the pilot house. They managed to wind their way slowly through the corridors and up a couple of decks. When they reached the base of the pilot house, they dispatched two guards posted there and caught a glimpse of what must surely be the rest of Muse's plan.

Mr. Muse's men were busy unlimbering and securing a deck gun. Muse must be planning on using the now captive survivors as bait for the idol. He had said that he had returned with the means to deal with that threat and such a weapon would most certainly due the trick in dispatching the creature as well as the bait. Wasting no more time, the heroes made their way up to the bridge where they quickly and quietly took control.

The captain, a scarred and bearded veteran of English descent was locked in the map room while the helmsman was lashed to his wheel. Loupe and Marcus went out onto the open deck of the bridge, took aim on Mr. Muse and his men and ordered their surrender.

The following scene was an excellent bit of role-play with much spontaneous dialog between Loupe and Muse. Loupe attempted to bluff Muse but Muse proved too cool for that. At one point Muse even showed his calm disdain for the heroes by defying their threats to shoot him when he fished a cigar from his jacket. Puffing away casually, Muse continued his parlay with Loupe. Attempts were made to appeal to Muse's business nature and any higher decency he might have. No matter what they said, Muse seemed undaunted and failed to give the heroes any sort of solid cause to shoot him.

Eventually Muse saw that he had the upper hand on his scrupulous adversaries and set himself to a subtle, but telling monologue. Through his own words he indicated that he was truly after treasure left on the island by ancient sailors and that he planned to use any means to acquire it. It was then, that his hubris got the better of him and he tipped his hat a bit too far, revealing that he had built his fortune from a failed automobile manufacturer to international industrialist by selling weapons to both side during WW1. They had him.

Loupe was from Belgium and had grown up with the stories of the war. Marcus had fought in the war. He had lost an arm and half his face in the war. Muse had shown himself to be a villain and they now had cause, but they were still only two men. Thinking fast, Loupe had Marcus fetch the ships' captain from the map room. The man was British and a seaman of some years. What's more, he had been brandishing a military service revolver. Keeping the captain out of sight, they let him hear Muse's boasting monologue steeling the captain as their ally.

Secure in the knowledge that they had the backing of the captain his command of the sailors, Loupe took a shot to silence Muse. His Mauser rang out and Muse went down, blood spraying from his head. Loupe, not a killer, slumped to the deck as the captain called out to his men to stand down and begin dismantling the deck gun.

The captain ordered a rescue party dispatched and a launch was put over the side. As the heroes milled about, Loupe still numb with having shot Muse, there was a roar heard from the island. The idol was on the move and the captives were still helpless on the beach. Snapped out of his stupor by the sudden call to action, Loupe and Marcus sped to the railing and lept over the side of the freighter into the descending launch.

Hitting the water, Marcus put the launch to full throttle with Loupe perched in the bow, rifle ready. Throwing caution to the wind and setting aside all concerns for tearing out their keel on the reefs, the heroes hurtled to the beach, raking its bottom over the sharp underwater barrier. When they reached the beach, Marcus moved to help the captive while Loupe, having remember the image of the Shaman using a conch to command the idol, sped off into the jungle in search of the natives he was sure were commanding it.

As Loupe tracked the sound of drums and the blowing conch, Marcus found himself under the baleful glare of the Tiki as it broke the tree line. The creature gestured and postured in true island warrior fashion, making a eerie and savage ceremonial advance on the hero who was hastily untying the captives. When the Tiki finished its warriors dance and broke into a charge, Marcus bid the one freed captive run and slung the other two over his shoulders, racing to the boat.

Meanwhile Loupe had found the shaman and the other natives who had been producing the ceremonial music that controlled the killer idol. Firing a shot, he shocked them from their frenzied ritual. the shaman gaped in disbelief as the boy hero ran up and snatched the conch from his hands. Realizing where his bravado had placed him, Loupe suddenly snapped out of the hero's moment, turned and fled with a shrill, boyish cry, the now angry natives in pursuit.

The idol had closed most of the distance between itself and Marcus just as the Iron Devil had returned the captive to the launch. Marcus turned just in time to see the 9ft tall idol launch itself into the air in a grappling lunge. Marcus and the idol tumbled into the surf and commenced to a grappling combat. the idol, clumsy at best failed to connect any real telling blows on Marcus but he had his own trouble damaging the Tiki. It seemed that The Iron Devil might have met his match.

As the idol stood up in the surf, a menacing glow building up in its mouth signaling an impending fiery assault on Marcus, Loupe broke through the trees. Running down the beach he blew the conch, using the pattern of high and low notes he had recorded from the paintings in the cave. The idol froze in the surf, going back to being just a carved statue. Just to make sure, Marcus pushed it over into the surf. The pursuing natives, seeing their supernatural warrior defeated, fled into the surrounding woods under a hail of repelling gunfire from the crewmen on the launch.

In the closing of the session, the treasure was recovered from the island and dispersed throughout the great museums of the world. The conch was destroyed so that the idol would never live again. The Tiki was put to the New York museum. Loupe, still feeling guilty about having shot Mr. Muse, turned himself into the FBI but received a thank you and a "good job" instead of any sort of criminal charges. The FBI seemed relieved at Muses' demise.

All in all, this last session in "Island of the Tiki Terror" was a fun one. The role-playing was better than it had been in the previous adventure and the first session of this one. The character of Muse was fun to play and though he was shot in the head, he's the sort of villain that even the players wouldn't mind seeing come back.

For the next adventure, it was suggested that we play an adventure that took place in civilization. This is fine with me and I've even got a head start if I want to use it. The original introductory adventure was an urban tale titled "The Curse of Stone".

Tune in next time...

-Eli

D6 Pulp - Island of The Tiki TerrorSession One

Island of the Tiki Terror ended up going long enough that we had to break it into two parts. A little less straight forward than Death Webs of the Spider Queen, this adventure had the players guessing and searching a little more free form.

The adventure begins with Marcus and Loupe and a skipper (NPC) out in the south Pacific running a test on a super secret boat design and going over the engine and their latest data below decks when they hear the sound of a chugging steam engine coming toward them. Racing to the deck, they come up in time to see a massive tramp steam barreling down on them, seemingly unaware of their vessel. A quick scramble and they manage to get themselves out of the way, but just barely.

As they stood on deck in disbelief, shaken but otherwise unharmed, they watched the watched the steamer cruise off toward the horizon. Curious as to what had the steamer moving away in such a reckless hurry, they looked to see where it might have come from, following the trail left by its wake and eventually coming upon a solitary, uncharted island.

From their vantage point they could see that it was a jungle-covered volcanic island with three distinct peaks, one of which was still quite alive and active. They could see the sign of a landing and also a few columns of dark smoke trickling up from within the jungle. Figuring there might have been trouble on the island they decided to investigate and took their skiff ashore.

Once ashore they found that the landing sight was a shamble. The remains of a broken and shattered landing craft were scattered all over and signs of panic and struggle were evident by the scuffling in the sand and several trails of footprints from and to the landing sight. Most notable were a trail of large, impressions in the the same pattern as footprints moving off after one of the trails of human-sized prints.

From here the adventure became a series of investigations and encounters. The heroes discovered a lady, a nurse from the expedition, treed by wild pigs and from her learned that there had been an oil prospecting expedition here. The party discovered a tar pit burial ground where something huge had uprooted itself.

At one point they decided to survey the perimeter of the island by boat, looking for survivors and any sign of the trouble that chased away the expedition. While doing this they attempted to communicate with the steamer, thinking it might still be in the area but received only vague, even cryptic responses. As they moved around the island there were signs of an ancient shipwreck as well as an abandoned village.

They found two other survivors, both scientists and one the brother of the nurse they had rescued. They told of native attacks and spoke of a huge monster idol that had attacked them with iron hard wooden fists and fire breath.

They later encountered natives who were hold up in an old, overgrown European style log fort. they stormed the fort under a hail of old cannon balls and at one point an entire cannon was rolled down the hill at them. The heroes were able to successfully parlay for the release of another survivor the natives held captive. The natives offered few clues to what was happening on the island, but there was some insight as to why. It would appear that a guardian had been stirred by the actions of the expedition.

While exploring the periphery of the island they had seen a cave set into the side of a cliff and went to explore it. There they found, deep in the rock, a hidden grotto where wall paintings showed images of the idol and a people that had once lived here. The idol was shown smiting enemies and in one image, leading a group of shadowy figures. There was also a panel that showed a chief or shaman commanding the idol with a conch shell.

The session ended with the return of the steamer and the heroes going out to it to return the expedition members. Coming aboard they found that the expedition's founder, rich industrialist Bartholomew Muse, as well as many armed crewmen. It was clear that things were not so simple as they had thought as the guns were kept on the heroes as Mr Muse answered their questions with his own brand of charm. He revealed that the ship had returned with something that would take care of the "problem" they had encountered and that they had not come to the island to survey it or to take something away, but rather to recover something that had been left. The heroes were then taken below to be made "comfortable".

As we ended on this cliffhanger, the heroes began to try to piece things together (as the camera faded to black). Connecting the dots of the shipwreck and the old European style fort, the were sure that the true motives for this power hungry Mr Muse must be some form of treasure that the ship had been carrying.

Are the heroes correct? Will they escape with their lives?

Tune in next time....

D6 Pulp - This Week's Adventure Is...

The game is scheduled for this Thursday with an AAR to follow.

Stay tuned!

-Eli

New D6 Adventure Pulp Campaign Kicks Off

I've got a soft spot for the pulp genre. Everything from the exotic settings, simple yet gripping plots, the over the top characters and bizarre denizens really gets my creative juices flowing. So, I decided to run another game with a small group (2 players so far) and no real pretensions about a regular, ongoing campaign.

So far, my players are Atomic Chuck and Chrispy. Chuck has created his own version of Tintin named, a favorite character of his, named Loupe. He's armed the little investigative reporter with a pistol, not pad and the snappy catch phrase, "Leopolds Ghost! Evil is afoot!".

Chrispy is reprising his role as Marcus "Iron Devil" Kingsley. Marcus is a WWI veteran and a mechanical genius with half his face covered in a metal mask and a mechanical arm. Think of him as half Tony Stark and half Sgt. York.

 To kick the campaign off and introduce my players to the D6 system, I went with a short little adventure entitled...

The adventure began in true dramatic styling with the heroes already in jeopardy and being chased by the minions of the Black Raja after liberating a statue of the Infant Ganesha from his palace. Teetering on the edge of a chasm, they stood poised to defend themselves when they heard a horrible fracas from the jungle followed by the blood curdling roars and screeches of,

"Blood Monkeys!" their guide and friend Singh Hartha was well aware of the terror that now threatened them.

Fortunately our heroes quick thinking had them over the side of the chasm and into the deep river below where they floated away to safety. The adventure had begun.

The adventure went on with the heroes washing up at the sight of the encampment of Dr Ignatious Pemmingham and his daughter Cordelia. they learn that the doctor and his daughter have been here in this isolated part of the Indian jungle for years looking into peculiarly long-lived Sograpti tribe.

An argument between an older native woman (Prakti) and a young native girl is broken up by Cordelia who drives the woman from the camp, hinting that not all is well in the camp, though the Doctor is most adamant that nothing is wrong. The later discovery of the young girl's freshly killed and withered husk of a body wrapped in a cocoon of spider silk the next morning comes as a shock to all. Investigation into this grizzly killing leads the heroes to an ancient of an obscure Spider God.

Exploring the ruins of this temple shows that despite it's ancient decrepitude, there are folks still using it. Gates are oiled and hinges on door still function. What is worse is that the temple and the jungle around it appear to be home to what the players begin to refer to as SOUSes (spiders of unusual size). They find that one of the buildings of this temple has broken tomb in it that seems to lead into passages below. Not wanting to take chances, the heroes set the webbing in the building aflame, hoping to cook any spiders they might conceal.

They go on to explore the central temple structure, a large building about 3-4 stories tall with a central staircase leading to the top and a ritual structure on top. Most troubling is the discovery that the entire structure seems to be riddled with portal-like holes that lead inside.

Reaching the top of the central building, the heroes discovery an alter stone that is in actuality a concealed opening to a staircase winding down inside. The heroes follow it to find a spider web shaped gate, locked and barring entrance to the interior of the structure. Beyond the gate appears to be an open chamber strewn with generations of webbing. Marcus manages to his the superior strength in his mechanical arm to force the gate open allowing them to investigate.

What they find is a horrific space filled with lurking doom and far too many concealing webs. The remains of generations of prey scatter the floors and an all too familiar hissing can be heard from all about as their eight-legged foes lurk and scuttle, undoubtedly with the heroes' certain death in mind. Quickly thinking, they set this space aflame and retreat back up the stairs, sealing the stone altar over the entrance once more.

As smoke billows from the portals, they can see the eerie shadows and hear the pained hissing and screeching of the creatures trying to make an escape from the inferno on the other side. A cry from the courtyard brings them back to the sight of the original opening they found in the mausoleum building where they discover Cordelia on the ground and beside herself, a bitten native guide dying at her side.

The heroes take Cordelia and the envenomed man back to camp and ponder the possibility that they had not killed all of the spider within the temple structures. Some speculation as to what has been going on with the Sograpti and the temple leads to the revelation of an ancient but supposedly forgotten spider cult. The doctor insists that this cult is now the stuff od legends and boogey stories.

The next morning, they heroes wake to find that Cordelia has gone missing in the night. All her day clothes are left behind and it appears that she set out on her own feet during the night in nothing but her night clothes. Tracking her footprints through the jungle, the heroes lose track of them in  a clearing where they find her nightgown fluttering on a twig. There is no sign of Cordelia beyond this and the heroes begin to speculate of she was kidnapped of if, in fact, she may somehow be the spider that has inflicted the two attacks.

Is Cordelia cursed? Has she been kidnapped by a spider cult? Is this all some revenge plot by the slighted Prakti?

Some investigative work in the clearing reveals the signs that a large spider has moved through the trees here and the heroes follow the telltale marking through the trees until, following the sounds of ritual chanting and music in the glooming evening, they come upon the site of a native ritual.

Hundreds of natives have gathered at hidden ritual site. As the music thunders and whines with horns and drums, the gathered folk whip themselves into an ecstatic frenzy. Cordelia is seen laying, dazed and out of her wits in a cradle formed by the legs of a bejeweled spider statue. A large native guards her.  the heroes decide to wait and see who is leading this ritual, hunkering down beyond the firelight as darkness falls.

As the rituals continues on into the night a mysterious figure appears at the far side of the clearing. It is a women, clad from head to toes in layers of spider silk and jeweled finery. the heroes maneuver themselves so that Loupe is behind the apparent priestess with his pistol, the others positioned to rush in to rescue Cordelia.

Stepping from the jungle, Loupe challenges the priestess who turns to face him. When she does not surrender, Loupe fires on her, hitting her hard but not mortally. Falling to the ground he sees that it is indeed Prakti who calls out to the gathered natives who stand stunned as Singh Hartha and Marcus rush in, dispatching the hulking guard with a few keen strokes of their blades. Prakti, despite her ire, relents under the threats of Loupe and the other heroes.

As the heroes go about regrouping and taking Prakti into custody they hear rustling and other activity coming through the jungle toward the ritual space. Bracing themselves for another possible attack, they are relieved to see Dr. Pemmingham and his armed native workers blustering to the rescue.

In the end this was a fun adventure. The heroes prevailed through mystery and direct threat. Most of the possible combat was avoided by the quick thinking of the players, which I do not mind. Not all pulp has to come at you guns-a-blazing. The villain was not killed but instead was turned over to the local authorities by the heroes when they returned to civilization.

A great time was had by all and I have to admit to a bit of a blush at the raving accolades given the game by Chuck who usually doesn't all that much enjoy being a player in RPGs. I can't wait for the next game and am already working on several other possible adventures .

Enjoy!

-Eli