Wednesday, December 30, 2009

Ritual Magic

I've been thinking quite a bit about ritual magic systems for DnD style gaming. I think it could be something that could be tacked on to the magic systems that are currently in use.

First the player would have to learn a ritual. This could be via training, ancient texts, or even god given (a DM could "give" a ritualistic caster one free ritual per level - automatically learned, or let the player develop them with DM approval).

After learning the ritual - the spell caster would have to perform the ritual. This could involve special components, a lengthy invocation with lots of chanting and such, and it could employ sacrifices (gold, oils, food, living creatures, etc...) to the Gods, demons, spirits, etc... Certain rituals may only be valid if performed on a certain day, or time of day, or during one season only, etc.. You may also have to perform the ritual at a certain spot, or in a holy church or location, etc...

The ritual would create a magical effect that lasts for a specified amount of time. It could be permanent, or it could last for a specific amount of time. Or it could end upon a specific circumstance being achieved. For example if the character is seen, or is touched by light, or by moonlight, or if the character eats or drinks anything, etc... the effect is gone.

I've heard about ritual magic systems being used for the Carcosa game. I didn't order a copy of this game though because none of my players are into the sword and planet thing. I wonder if they are similar to this idea or completely different.

Although I really like clerics in ODD and 2nd edition. I've always thought that the vancian magic system for clerics is a bit strange - considering you are petitioning the god for very defined effects that you can then cast later just like a wizard. Maybe an alternate cleric class could be developed that utilizes rituals along side traditional cleric type abilities. I guess this style of cleric could pray to one god only or to a host of gods. I think each setting would have to adapt the system around their cosmology.

Cleric (alt)
HD, experience progression, and attack table identical to your favorite ruleset.
Turn Undead (unchanged)
Ritual Magic

Next up: a list of possible rituals and ideas on how many rituals you could have "active" at a time. Maybe some thoughts on whether there would be Levels of rituals or if they would all be the same level.

Stuck in the Middle with You!

And nobody is going to lose an ear :)








Tuesday, December 29, 2009

Playing by Post-It Note












Monday, December 28, 2009

My Current PBEM Campaign



Rules: Castles and Crusades. Pretty much un-modified.



Number of Time Zones: (4)


Why am I doing this?

Blame it on boredom, perhaps...

But maybe I just needed a place to rant about gaming. My tabletop gaming has trickled down to a handful of sessions a year now. Long gone are the days where I used to play dungeons and dragons EVERY DAY. The pulling responsibilities of my life, the scattering of my friends/players across the globe, and various failed attempts to get new gaming groups together have nearly spelled the end of my gaming career. In the last five to ten years I thought I was probably going to quit gaming at least once a year. Thus the title, Gaming on the Precipice....

Instead of quitting, in the last two years I've started using play be email (PBEM) gaming as a way to get some gaming back into my life. Initially, I started playing in Risus rules, or free-forms, or home-brew games. I played in sci-fi games, spy games, mutant apocalyptic fantasy games. But still the strings of my heart kept pulling me back to my first gaming love - dungeons and dragons.

I wanted to play "by the rules" but I found 2nd edition to be a bit too complicated for PBEM.... so I went looking for rules-light versions of DND. I found castles and crusades, and labyrinth lord, and swords and wizardry - I ended up using castles and crusades for my first dnd PBEM campaign. Though this search I found out about the OSR and started to dig into it like a miner searching for gold. I was impressed by this new-found wellspring of creative energy, thoughts and ideas, and a bunch of folks that like to play games the way that I do.

My plan for this blog is to discuss rules-light DND gaming. I'd like to discuss the OSR from the context of a player who is more of a mid-schooler who is/was stuck in between the new school (WOW based gaming) and the old school. I'd like to talk about other gaming systems and what I've learned by using them.

I have a lot of ideas so expect a lot of posting. Maybe I can draw in a couple of followers. Maybe I can get another tabletop game started... maybe it will use a retro-clone as its rules-base. God knows it won't be 3.0, 3.5, or 4.0!!!