While playing in my solo OSE game I decided I was going to make some changes to the weapons in the game, which is compatible with both OSE and B/X. The core rules have all weapons doing a d6 damage, which I think works well but it's more fun to get to roll the different polyhedral dice. I think that's one of the places D&D originally introduced power creep with polearms doing a d10, and then trying to find ways to inflate character hit points to compensate ever since. 

It never made much sense to me that a spear would do d6 damage but add a small hook and suddenly it was doing d10 damage. Similarly swords should be back at the d6 baseline unless being used in two hands, and spears should be much closer to polearms. 

I removed the 'slow' quality from weapons. That was added to help balance out the high damage they gave certain weapons, which now isn't necessary with the maximum damage reduced to d8. In it's place I'm adding a 'reach' quality which gives the initiative to someone with a longer weapon. 

Finally, I made some adjustments to what kind of weapons halflings and goblins can wield. This makes more sense thematically as well as reducing the damage output of a common low level monster which helps with the problem of 1st-level character survivability without inflating all the numbers like we see in later editions. I think biggest change here is a 3 foot character can't use bows the way larger characters can. They can still use slings, which I like for the David and Goliath quality it encourages. I might let a PC discover a custom made "Tiny Bow" which uses the same stats as a sling, but I don't think a character who is 3 feet tall could use a 4-6 foot tall bow and get enough draw length to fire arrows at the same range for the same amounts of damage as other PCs.

Starting Character Age for B/X D&D Games

Did anyone playing AD&D use the ability score adjustments on page 13 of the DMG for character aging? We never did, because we never really played long enough for the character to age. They also described a process where there was a lot of adding and subtracting and it just didn't seem all that straight forward. Looking at it again, if you did all the math ahead of time for each age bracket this  might be interesting options for B/X D&D players who make 3d6 (or 4d6) in order characters. By choosing the age of your starting character you can adjust their ability scores.

There'd certainly be an incentive to play a middle-aged or older Cleric or Wizard -- which is more in keeping with certain fantasy fiction.

Young Adults:  -1 WIS, +1 CON

• Elf —100 to 175 years old
• Dwarf — 35 to 50 years old
• Halfling — 22 to 33 years old
• Human — 14 to 20 years old 

Mature: +1 STR, +1 CON

• Elf —176 to 550 years old
• Dwarf — 51 to 150 years old
• Halfling — 34 to 68 years old
• Human — 21 to 40 years old 

Middle Aged: +1 INT, +1 WIS

• Elf —551 to 875 years old
• Dwarf — 151 to 250 years old
• Halfling — 69 to 101 years old
• Human — 41 to 60 years old 

Old: -2 STR, +1 INT, +2 WIS, -2 DEX, -1 CON

• Elf —876 to 1200 years old
• Dwarf — 251 to 350 years old
• Halfling — 102 to 144 years old
• Human — 61 to 90 years old 

Venerable: -3 STR, +2 INT, +3 WIS, -3 DEX, -2 CON

• Elf —1201 to 1600 years old
• Dwarf — 351 to 450 years old
• Halfling — 145 to 199 years old
• Human — 91 to 120 years old 

Don't Move! Surrender Rules for RPGs

In RPGs the situation that I've found the least satisfactory with any rules system I've used is where an NPC tries to stop the characters at gun point. This almost never resolves in a manner that pleasingly emulates the sort of genre source material I'd like it to.

What I'm considering is the following sub-system:

• The target and adjacent allies must not have made an attack or chosen to defend the previous round (eg. Surprised, Helping injured ally etc)
• The attacker's action is to call for surrender (Freeze! etc) and can not move or make any other action including an attack
• A call for surrender can target a close group of adjacent targets (Nobody move! etc)
• IF the attacker's maximum weapon damage adjusted by Charisma bonus is higher than the target's hit points adjusted by their Wisdom bonus, the target is subdued and can take no actions as long as the attacker does not take an action other than continuing to keep them subdued.
• The attacker can make subdued targets move ahead of them at their walking speed (assuming the target can move that fast)

The only way a character can be a bad ass and try to run or grab their attacker's weapon is if they had MORE hit points + wisdom but voluntarily "surrendered".

Combat Fatigue, Weakness and Wounds for B/X D&D

This morning I saw Aaron had posted about the lack of Combat Fatigue rules in D&D and how the hit point system doesn't do a good job of emulating a change in fighting ability over the course of a combat, or even adventure.  100 hit points or 1 hit point makes no difference in how likely a character is to hit and do damage.

I agree with him. His commenters saying that adding a complicated sub-system for tracking fatigue points is undesirable though, and I agree with them too. What we want is to keep the game simple and streamlined, and provide an option for anyone who wants to include some sort of rule for character fatigue or decreased fighting effectiveness due to wounds etc. in the game.

Here's what I'm proposing:

Combat Fatigue, Weakness and Wounds
A character or monster can not cause more damage from a physical attack than its own hit point value.

Example1: A wounded fighter with 3 hit points rolls a d8 for damage with their long sword. They also get a +1 bonus on damage for their high Strength attribute. However due to their hit points being 3 any value higher than that is counted as a 3.

Example2: A kobold charges the Wizard with it's spear. It rolls a d6 for damage but it only has 4 hit points so it can inflict a maximum of 4 damage against the Wizard.

This system has no additional points to track while representing a limited amount of 'combat fatigue', 'wounds' and weakness / inexperience. When character are at higher levels or not at low hit points the system fades into the background. It applies to both players and monsters and reduces some of the 'swingy' nature of combat making fights with weaker monsters easier to apply tactics to at lower levels.

It also changes some of the basic D&D combat tactics. Instead of ganging up on Orcs one at a time to remove them from combat (good D&D tactic, bad combat emulation) the party would alternately be wise to reduce all the orcs to low damage output by spreading their attacks around.

Let me know what you think. I thought of this on my walk to work this morning and haven't had a chance to try this in a game. :)

How to Make a Monster PC

Allied monsters who players might want to bring on an adventure are usually handled by creating a new Race and/or Class… but why not just use the easier and more obvious solution: just play the monster from the monster section. Here's how it works...

A monster in B/X D&D is equivalent to a character of the same level as it has hit dice. A monster counts as 1 level higher for each asterisk it has for special abilities. So a Centaur (HD: 4) is equal to a 4th level character and a Vampire (HD: 7**) is equal to a 9th level character. This will help players and DMs decide what monsters can join parties of various levels.

Monster characters begin a 0xp and gain levels as a Fighter. However they don't gain extra hit points from Fighter levels until it's a higher level than their monster Hit Dice (and asterisks). Example: A Centaur would gain an extra d8 hit points at 5th level, while a Vampire would gain an extra d8 at 9th level.

The character uses it's Monster HD or Fighter level for to hit numbers  and saving throws -- whichever is better.

They use either their monster AC, or calculate their AC for armour worn. A shield is always +1 AC.

They may make ONE attack a round using either a weapon or one of their monster attacks.

And that's it! They don't have attributes, or need special tables for their racial class, powers etc. Just use the monster entry. Now there's an easy way to play Centaurs, Ogres, Wood Golems, Living Crystal Statues, or Flumph!

Weapon vs Armor Tables for B/X D&D

I never used the Weapon vs Armor tables in the AD&D Player's Handbook. Mostly because I find the chart really overwhelming with all 44 rows of weapons and 9 columns of armor. I also didn't know what to do when characters were fighting monsters that didn't have "weapons" and "armor" per se.

However, if we limit the number of weapons to the 19 in B/X D&D, and only include 4 columns for armor (Plate, Chain, Leather and Unarmored) it becomes a bit more manageable. And if instead of being a chart of modifiers we apply them to the numbers from the attack matrixes... we end up with a chart showing what you need to roll to hit the different types of armor using the different weapons.

* Tooth & Claw use Dagger

Raise target number by 1 if target has a shield
Add Character's adjustment for Dexterity to target number

Bonuses to Attack Rolls
Add Monster's Hit Dice (without bonuses) to attack roll
Add Character's adjustment for Strength to melee attacks and Dexterity to ranged attacks

Fighters and Demi-Humans get +2 at 4th, +5 at 7th, +7 at 10th and +8 at 13th level
Clerics and Thieves get +2 at 5th, +5 at 9th, +7 at 13th and +8 at 17th level
Magic-Users get +2 at 6th, +5 at 11th, +7 at 16th and +8 at 21st level

Note: 20 is always a hit, 1 is always a miss

* * *

These are all the same numbers from AD&D and B/X - I've just presented them differently. 

It's a bit more detail than I've been using lately... but I have to admit I do like the choices in weapons making more of a difference and Plate armor generally offering better protecting than the 16+ to hit number it has without any of these modifiers being used.

It now makes sense to use a Warhammer if you're going up against an armored opponent (this would have been true in the middle ages) and there's even a reason you might decide to punch, kick or headbutt an unarmored enemy rather than use your weapon.

What do you think? Would you use the Weapon vs AC numbers now?

Initiative and Weapon Size

In Original D&D and similar retro clone RPGs the weapons all roll the same dice to see how effective they are in combat: one six-sided die. While I like the simplicity of this, I've always felt this gave little incentive to use larger weapons. Why carry a Great Sword when a dagger is just as good? Why spend money on a Battle Axe when a wooden club is every bit as effective?

This led to all sorts of new rules over the years where weapons do varying amounts of damage (a rule I still like), affected different types of armour in different ways (which makes sense… but fiddly), or had different speed factors affecting initiative (again, logical but very fiddly).

Here's a simple rule for weapons in an RPG.

Initiative
Longer weapons make attack rolls before shorter weapons.
Weapons of equivalent length roll for initiative.

But since we don't want everyone to now run around in tiny winding corridors with ridiculously long polearms, we'll also include this rule:

Close quarters
Combat in narrow hallways, stair cases, thick forest / jungle, or other crowded spaces reverse the initiative order: shorter weapons make attack rolls before longer ones. Additionally any long two-handed weapons (Polearms and Great Swords) can not be used effectively and can only attack once every 2nd round.

They're still dangerous weapons, but they aren't as fast as something smaller and more wieldy in a confined space.

Even relatively unobstructed locations can have close quarter areas. Clever players will choose where to stand and fight to benefit their choice of weapon.