Chaot

Very true for Elric and Corum, but I think the Maelstrom system would fit in nicely in a Von Bek story or maybe even in an Hawkmoon story.

I'm very happy to hear that you're keeping your options open. While there are advantages to publishing through Chaosium, I would assume that there are also serious advantages to moving elsewhere as well.

I was pleasantly surprised when I saw the thread and I chalk it up to D20 glut and RPGNet Opens love for alternative than mainstream games. Plus, not only is there a bit of support for BRP and Mongoose over there, Unknown Armies is a favored son and Rolemaster is nostalgic.

I couldn't remember exactly how you did this part. I ended up tying up the POW rolls together as one roll. For difficulty 1 it was POWx5%, difficulty 2 was POWx4%, 3 was POWx3%, 4 was POWx2% and 5 was POWx1%. I wonder what the difference in probability is between the two methods? There are some Maelstrom fans and some Arion folk over at RPGNet. I heard about it over there. I think I haven't followed up on it because the original works so well. I would be interested in eventually taking a look at it though.

Howdy QB, I remember those days well. Two BRP heads in a sea of D20. And I'm eternally grateful for you turning me onto on to one of, if not THE, best free form magic system out there. Originally, I was just sticking to magic systems published specifically under Elric!/SB5 and hinting at some of the Mongoose stuff but I think Maelstrom would be a great fit for Moorcockian magic if it were framed right though.

Questbird is wise and certainly the resident expert in using Maelstrom magic with BRP. Truly a subtle, powerful and flexible system. Have you had a chance to look at the Maelstrom companion, QB? It's been on my list of things to pick up, but I haven't gotten around to it.

It's able to cover a lot of ground in the twelve pages it has dedicated to rules and such. The rest of the some 80 odd pages are dedicated to Devil's Gulch and its surroundings. Devil's Gulch doesn't go into near as much detail on running a western as Aces High does. What it does do is provide a skeleton for a game as well as introduce some really cool character types and rules as well as a fleshed out setting to place adventures. Devil's Gulch + BGB does equal a complete [weird] western game. Aces High is a great book as well and one would be hard to go amiss consulting both to run a [weird] west game.

Thanks Boss! As I was reading through it again the book has been floating around the house. I walk into a room and my seven year old daughter is going through it. She was particularly taken by The Spider-Like Thing. Her over all assessment is that it looks like a 'very cool dice rolling game book.' So that makes the three of us. If I ever get around to a weird west game, this book is certainly going to be an influence. There are a few NPCs in there that I might yoink for other games on general principal. Just because they're neat. I hope you enjoy it! An odd thought and first thing that came to my mind when they talked about the Weird West profession power sources. Since The Good Book acts as a staff, it stands to reason that it might also get a 1d6 damage bonus. I mean, look at that Preacher man there. You just know he's busted some deadite's jaw with his holy book. It looks like Troy also wrote In Search of Trollslayer, which is another book that I have but haven't read. I'll have to pick it up again. Edit: Hmm, sorry the pictures sideways. I have it rotated at my hosting site, but it looks like those edits don't follow to img codes.

Had a chance to give the book a proper look. First off, the writing is clear and direct. I have a very simple mind, so this is a very valuable thing to me. The book is covered in art and the layout is great. It all goes towards a very finished feel. There's a fold out map insert with the town layout and a drawing of the town. On the back is an old timey broadsheet. Character creation starts out with a list of Professions. The BGB name is there beside the suggested name changes and skill swaps. Cowboy becomes Drover, Noble becomes TinHorn or Dude. All nice touches that add flavor to characters and tailor the BGB nicely to the genre. I should note that the game leans heavily on the BGB allowing normal character generation, new skills, new equipment and an overview of 'the COde of the West' to take up about six pages. There is an additional six pages dedicated to the generation of 'Weird West' characters, which is were some fun mechanic stuff is. Because Devil's Gulch takes this approach, it's able to pack a lot of suggestive stuff into those pages. Devil's Gulch adds Hexmasters, Medicine Men, Preachers, Snake Oil Hustlers and Mad Scientists as special professions that utilize Powers systems. In fact, the only Powers system from the BGB not represented is Psychic powers. Snake Oil Hustlers utilize Mutations and Mad Scientists use Super Powers. At first I was a bit taken aback by this approach, but I've come to think the way it is instituted is rather brilliant. One watershed I have on a weird west game is how easy it is to run something like this... In the case of Devil's Gulch, this is actually an example listed under Mad Scientist. It would be a Clockwork Automaton created using the Sidekick power. I think Devil's Gulch does a good job in roughing out how the Powers should be used without bogging itself down into detailing out all of the specifics. Devil's Gulch presents a Powers system as a guideline and leaves a lot of room for decisions to be made between the GM and the Player. Sanity rules are here, and tied into using the Powers for the weird professions. Should a PC fumble a roll regarding their Powers system (casting roll, resistance roll, skill roll, etc.) the Sanity system kicks in. It's a nice touch and I like how some of the consequences would seem to shake out. For example, I would think an Hexmaster, who's main power deals with the Magic system, would be tempting sanity more than a Preacher, who's system revolves around the Sorcery system. There just tends to be more die rolls with Magic than Sorcery. A similar artifact would exist if one tied Psychic skills into the game as well. This is not a big thing, but a nice touch. The only things I would possibly add to weird west characters is a Gunslinger type who could augment their skill with pp and thus performing impossible feats and maybe a Whisperer or Medium to pull in those Psychic rules. That leaves about sixty pages of other content. The book details eleven locations in Devil's Gulch (and more in the surrounding area) and over 30 NPCs. The NPCs all have artwork attached and are written to be easily utilized. Not too much information to be overwhelming but not too little to be dull or lifeless. Almost all of the NPCs have potential secrets attached to them. There are two scenarios in the book. The first one incorporates the possibility of bar fights, jail breaks, hangings, gunfights, roaming through badlands, standing on holy ground, stake outs and hostile ranchers. The second one is a mystery surrounding a 'Medicine Show' and is delightfully evil. I've never actually run a western before, though on occasion I get the hankerin to try. This book definitely feeds into that desire.

I've had this book for a while but I really haven't gone through it. I just now picked it up to flick through it quickly. Man, it's beautiful. Thomas Boatwright's art makes this book feel like Hellboy in teh Weird West, which can ONLY be a good thing. Seriously. Look at that. Look at these guys. Just awesome stuff. Also, merging the Bible and magic staff rules is inspired!

Yeah. The Rules Compendium was my first love and I still greatly enjoy games with that rules set. In my case I had a group that was exclusively D&D and a group(s) that covered T&T, MERPS, Marvel FASERIP, D6 Star Wars and even some Stormbringer (though I didn't fall in love with BRP until I happened to pick up the Elric! book). With the D&D group, we all switched over to AD&D because the rest of the group argued that it was advanced. Obviously much better than that standard RC rules set. Though I wouldn't have been able to articulate it like this at the time, I was unhappy because I feel the AD&D rules needlessly complicate the D&D rules set in an attempt at realism. Instead, it gave a false sense of greater emulation through the numerous additions to the rules. In contrast, while the RC had it's oddities it also had a simplicity and a speed of use that more than made up for it's issues. Classic Fantasy hits the mark though. It makes all the right nods at D&Disms while addressing the issues that commonly came up when dealing with D&D class and level.

You mad genius! Not too effective I'd think. Remember, they quickly conquered Pepperland. It took the Fool, the Monster, the Mystic and the Musician a spirit quest through the Seas to bring down Max. They had the help of the trickster Jeremiah Hillary Boob as well. I have an overwhelming desire to shoe this in to Shattered Hopes, by the way. Seems like it would fit nicely.

This is so true. Classic Fantasy is the system I wanted way back when I was stuck with AD&D.

What I miss? Letting the players distract each other as I figure out what the hell's going on. Player's coming to consensus eats up a lot of time. Normally, I try to stream line that down so the game momentum doesn't suffer. With a single player the action moves fast and it can sometimes be a challenge to keep up. Single players do not have as many resources as a group of players do. What might be a simple task for three players can turn into a serious challenge for one player. Also, multiple players mean that it's likely there will be more ideas floating around the table. One player can only have so many ideas. This can really make itself felt when there's a situation and the player is just not in the right mindset to approach it. What's great about a one on one game is how much stuff you can get done. Focus on story and character goals. Make sure you've NPCs to spare. Take breathers so you can get your head in order.

Michael Moonrock! I love it. Very appropriate. Sometimes he seems a bit of a moonrock. Moorcock's most famous creation is a fellow who people call the anti-Conan. An inhuman albino sorcerer, Elric is the product of a decadent civilization. Where Conan relies on his wit and thews, Elric relies on the pacts of his ancestors and the whim of his moods. Conan is born of simple means, Elric is the 428th Emperor of Melnibone. The Stormbringer book is a fantasy game based on the writings of Moorcock and Moorcock's concept of The Eternal Champion. Ken St.Andre was originally involved in book and the early Stormbringer editions reflect his mad, frantic and humorous vision. Then Chaosium streamlined the rules and published a book called 'Elric!' which was easily my favorite version of the rules. This took some of the extremes out of Stormbringer, in my opinion allowing for a game that supports high powered play that can be sustained long term. After that, Chaosium published a fifth edition of Stormbringer which relied on the Elric! version of the game rather than the early Stormbringer version. I think everyone should try an early Stormbringer game. It is an insane amount of fun. Characters are quick to roll up, which is a good thing and character balance is non existent. Which is a fine thing because death waits at every turn and will take your devil lizard riding Pan Tangian cultist as soon as your primitive barbarian from Oin or your tongueless beggar from Nadsokor.

Ha! I love it. Serious gaming potential there. One clarification. The Unknown East sorcery system uses the term rune or some mystical connection to an archtype. It's a holdover from runequest. Instead, the system is more of a freeform spell system. That being said, if you're grooving on casting by carving runes then there's a great Runic magic system in the Bronze Grimoire! There's also some serious support for a character like this in the monograph The Green. They call it glyph casting and have eight or nine spells tied to nature. They also do some great work with creating potions. Might be something to look into. I think you have the makings of a great character there. Certainly unique taking the Plant Lords as your main conceit!

What about dropping the good folks at Darcsyde a note for an interview on their Corum book? darcsyde at darcsyde.org

That's pretty smart right there. I rely on the 'flipping through while watching the lower left hand corner and the pictures' method. Granted, I tend to navigate gamebooks by flipping through them and looking for landmarks. In general, I'm very happy with the BGB. The titles drive me insane though. The font is so close to comic sans that it burns my eyes and it looks like when it was laid out the titles were blocked by the text blocks so that the bottom of the titles were cut off. I'd very much like to see a font change and title fix.

I think it's neat to have BRP represented like this. It might be enough of a nudge to get people who enjoy the other HeroLabs systems to give BRP a chance. I'm also interested in seeing how they handle bundling the whole of the BGB into the software. I'm tempted to pick it up just to see how they handle it.

Mike, have I got the sight for you. RuneQuest: War of the Lance This is such a great site. It's Dragonlance mapped to RQ3 and it's full of lovely gems. For further inspiration on rules I would look to Rod's Classic Fantasy. It's a brilliant book that marries D&D to BRP.

This is from the same group that brought us the Mythic GM Emulator? What's the product like? I may be very interested in picking this up.

Please do tell about the Mythic Creature Crafter!

If you came to me and said that this was the character you wanted to play and how do we make this happen? The poison stuff is easy enough with the Potions and Natural World skills. The other stuff we would have to hash out to find the best fit. There are two basic approaches I would think. One option would be to go with the Unknown East magic system and give the magician the sphere of Earth and either the rune of Enhancement or the rune of Summoning. That would give you a wide latitude for defining magical effects that fit within the framework of your earth mage. Alternatively, we could handle it with summonings and spells. There aren't a lot of earth based spells written up, but I think this is due in large part to the idea that magic in the Young Kingdoms is a sort of corruption of Chaos. Magic consists of tiny holes the Dukes of Entropy are poking through the manifest will of Law that is reality. GURPs Magic (2 ed) has some great earth and plant based spells that would be very easy to port over to the Elric! sorcery system. Also, there are some elementals stated up in the core book. If this were my game I would gladly let you stat up (for approval) some minor elementals you could summon. A third option I would raise is being a friend of the plant lords. A lot of the stuff in your examples, extracting poison by brewing potions, the bramble blockade, sound to me to be in the realm of the Plant Lords rather than Grome's purview. I would suggest we took the work done on the Elemental Paths from Magic of the Young Kingdoms and make a Plant Lord path based on the same idea. Instead of using the GURPs spells as spells, the would become special abilities. Instead of using summoning spells with would put something together for your character to invoke the aid of the plant lords. Rather than looking at it as having too many possibilities, I like to think of it as examples that provide guidance on how to institute unique ideas. How's that?

Great questions really, and I think the answer is that you need to trust your gut. You know how you play BRP, so the answer I give might not work well for your table. Not really helpful, is it? Here's what I do, in a very general way. First, I look around at published sources and see if I can't find some inspiration. I also look at the powers systems for special abilities. There are some touches I like to keep. Creatures who have no soul have no POW. Creatures with animal cognition have fixed intelligence. Incorporeal spirits are Pow and Int with some skills and powers attached. Stuff like that. Then I adjust or assign as follows. Stats 1-3 is incredibly small or weak. Cats and smaller are ones. Three is the very bottom end (and rather extreme end) of human size. A three would be a young child or a very tiny hobbit. 4-6 is pretty frail. 7-9 is just under average. 10-12 is the norm. 13-16 is above average. At 17-20 you're dealing with very impressive specimens of human form and intelligence. Above that and you're venturing into superhuman. Skills With skills, I break it down as follows. 30% is a basic foundation in the skill. 30%-60% is experienced. 60%-90% and you're dealing with a veteran of the skill. 90%-120% and you're with a master of the skill. Above 120% and your dealing with ever impressive levels of mastery. I generally have player start with a few skills over the 100% mark. Their opponents are generally in the 30%-60% range. Gives everything a nice, epic feel. But that's not always how I really play. Mook rules are great. They speed things up and side track a lot of the tedium of tracking NPCs. Unless the creature or NPC is really important, they tend to be a thumbnail sketch. Generally looks something like this for a complex thumbnail sketch. 30% 1d6 damage. 1d4 armor 10hp three key skills special ability

Thanks for the offer, boss. I do appreciate it, but I've sworn off play by posts for the time being. I find whenever I participate in a game online, life gets complicated and I either am way to slow in posting or drift off all together. These days I'm strictly tabletop.