Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Storming The Wizards Tower
Storming The Wizards Tower
a lumpley game
Especially for:
Meg, Elliot, Sebastian;
Jordan, Chris, Dominic, David, Dani,
Josh, Dylan, Nick, Spencer, Parker, Luranna
Contents
4 • Introduction • Setting Up to Play
6 • GM • Creating a Home Town
20 • GM • Creating Adventures
26 • GM • Creating Monsters
38 • GM • Leading Character Creation
40 • Players • Creating Characters
42 • Players • Descriptions & Details
48 • Rules • The Basics
50 • Rules • Rolling the Dice
58 • Rules • Battle
78 • Rules • Characters Over Time
86 • Rules • Creating More
92 • Rules • Cards Instead of Dice
• Introduction •
• Setting Up to Play •
Storming the Wizard’s Tower is a game of communication. Where in
other games you might move your pieces on a board, or play cards onto
the table, in this game one player describes the board, and you describe
your pieces, where they are, and how they move.
You use your imagination, but that’s not where it stays. You have to
communicate what you imagine to the other players, so that they can
include it in what they imagine. The result of all this imagining and
communicating is a lively conversation, a fun free-for-all about what the
imaginary characters in the game do, where they go, and what challenges
they overcome.
The GM
When you and your friends decide to get together to play, the first thing
to do is choose who’ll be the GM.
“The GM”
In lots of roleplaying games, one player takes on a different set
of responsibilities from the rest. In Dungeons & Dragons, this
player’s called “the Dungeon Master,” or DM for short. But role-
playing games came along that don’t feature any kind of dungeon
at all, so the term “Game Master” came to replace it. The GM isn’t
always the game’s master, really, either, but the term stuck and
I’m using it for this game too.
• 4 • Introduction • Setting Up to Play
Even though they use the same term, the GM’s job varies from
game to game. To learn what the GM does in Storming the
Wizard’s Tower, read on!
The GM preps for each session of play. Choose someone who’ll commit to
creating things for the game in her free time, when you aren’t playing.
The GM is the referee. The GM has to know the rules pretty well and has
to be impartial in applying them. Choose someone who’ll learn the rules
and who has a strong sense of fair play.
The GM doesn’t get to control and play a single character, but has to be
all the non-characters and monsters in the game. Choose someone who
doesn’t mind letting other people take the spotlight.
The GM has to make sure that everyone gets a turn and that everyone’s
ideas get heard, and then has to challenge everyone. Choose someone
who can hold everyone’s attention when that’s what has to happen.
The Time
A session of Storming the Wizard’s Tower lasts usually 2-3 hours.
A whole game consists of many, many sessions. The first session is fun
enough, but the game really kicks in after the first couple of sessions,
when everybody has their feet under them.
A whole game plays out over three levels, or phases of play. Level 1 is
called Fighting Monsters. Level 2 is called Storming the Wizard’s
Tower. Level 3 is called Slaying Dragons.
Level 1, Fighting Monsters, will last at least 5 sessions, and might last
as many as 10 or 15. The rules for levels 2 and 3 are still in development,
so this manuscript contains the rules for only level 1.
The Dice
This game calls for a whole lot of dice, in specific colors. Each player needs
6-8 white dice, 6-8 green dice, 4-6 red dice and 4-6 blue dice, and the
GM needs, oh, twice that many. When I run the game, I bring bricks of
36 small-sized 6-sided dice, a brick per color. They’re Chessex brand, and
you can order them online or ask for them at Greenfield Games.
If you don’t have the dice, don’t worry! You can play the game with a
double deck of regular playing cards (that is, two decks shuffled together)
instead. The rules are all but identical. See Rules • Cards Instead of
Dice for the details.
I think that by the end of creating an adventure, you’ll have a pretty clear
sense whether you’ll enjoy running the game. I hope you will!
Your home town should be, just now, at a generally positive sort of status
quo. Happy, relatively secure, growing, healthy.
Creating a home town means drawing two maps, writing four paragraphs,
creating four to six character types, and making six lists. You’ll need blank
paper for maps, town sheets and character type sheets, and a pencil. If
you’re feeling artistic, you might want colored pencils or markers to do
your maps up nice.
If you don’t want to make a home town of your own, or if you don’t have
time, you can use one of the example towns at the end of this section.
For your first map, choose some section of your imaginary version of
Africa, Asia or Europe. Sketch coastlines, mountain range, the mightiest
rivers, inland sea, island chain, vast desert, steppe, savannah or wood-
land. If you want big empires, you can mark zones showing their centers
and boundaries. Somewhere interesting, make a mark for the location of
your town.
Notice how empty this map is! Make yours empty too. You’ll fill it in over
the course of the game.
Ellemheld is on the east coast of a large island. It’s got a good harbor.
The sea is calm and narrow – Ellemheld’s on the side of the island facing
the mainland. The island has many small kingdoms on it, some no bigger
than a single walled town and the surrounding farms, and it has lots of
wild land too. Ellemheld is ruled by a duke, it’s an important town in the
local kingdom.
Follow your imagination and add things that are interesting, fun and
mysterious. Ruins of former civilizations? Volcanic chasms, bottomless
swamps, mist-shrouded islands?
Make lists of suitable arms, gear, maps and spells. You can use my lists
and edit them to suit, or you can make your own lists afresh.
• 10 • GM • Creating a Home Town
List a dozen or so people who already live in your town or the surround-
ings, by name.
If you really want to, you can make a new spell list, or even an entire new
list of magical domains. I recommend that you wait until you’ve played at
least a few times before you undertake that, though.
For stat recommendations, say “don’t choose this if you have either
a low ___ or a low ___,” or “...if you have both a low ___ and a low
___.” Remember that a player might well roll poorly for any of the stats.
If all of your character types say “don’t choose this if you have a low
strength,” you’ll want to add a character type for people who DO have a
low strength.
For belongings, say “choose 3 from [this list], 3 from [this list], 1 from
[this list or this list], and 1 from [any list]. Also choose 1 townsperson.”
Finally, for character ability, the easiest thing to do is choose one of the
abilities that players can buy for their characters with XP (for which see
that section). You can also adapt monster abilities, if you want to, or even
make up your own abilities from scratch.
You can choose from my example character types if you want, instead
of doing all the work yourself. I think you’ll find some pretty cool ones.
Rename them to fit into your town.
Again, you need four to six, and make sure that you have at least one
suitable character type for any given mix of stats.
After only a few sessions of play, you and all your players should feel that
the town’s a real place, solid and lived in. You may not know what’s behind
every door and under every hedge, but you should feel confident that if
you have a character go and look, something is there, and you’ll find out
what.
Ellemheld is on the east coast of a large island. It’s got a good harbor.
The sea is calm and narrow – Ellemheld’s on the side of the island facing
the mainland. The island has many small kingdoms on it, some no bigger
than a single walled town and the surrounding farms, and it has lots of
wild land too. Ellemheld is ruled by a duke, it’s an important town in the
local kingdom.
Ellemheld is a prosperous sea-trade town. Copper, tin and coal comes from
all over the island to Ellemheld’s harbor. Ships carry it in loads across the
sea, and come back with silver, amber, and beautiful furs. Ellemheld has
a castle – solid oak palisade walls around a stone stronghold – to protect
us from the sea-raiders who come down the coast.
the same gods, a civilized religion, and its high priestess is an important
advisor to Duke Ellemheld. There’s also an older, more wild religion that
still survives here, especially among the farmers and the people who live
on the fringes of the forest. Sometimes people from the forest come into
town, on business with the duke. They’re made welcome, but not really
trusted.
Character types
See Rules • Characters Over Time for ability descriptions.
Guardian
One of the elite warriors guarding Ellemheld
Don’t choose this if you have a low strength.
Choose 3 arms, 3 gear, 1 map or spell, 1 from any list, and 1 person.
Ability: Hammerhands
Princess or Prince
Your father is Duke Ellemheld
Don’t choose this if you have both a low command and a low strength.
Choose 3 arms, 3 gear, 1 map or spell, 1 from any list, and 1 person.
Ability: Tactician
Druid
You know the ways of magic and nature
Don’t choose this if you have a low arcane or a low perception.
Choose 3 gear, 3 spells, 1 arms or map, 1 from any list, and 1 person.
Ability: Wild instincts
Priestess or Priest
You are a scholar of magic and wisdom
Don’t choose this if you have both a low command and a low perception.
• 14 • Example Town • Ellemheld
Choose 3 maps, 3 spells, 1 arms or gear, 1 from any list, and 1 person.
Ability: Initiation
Reeve
Ellemheld’s problem-solver and overseer
Don’t choose this if you have a low perception or a low skill.
Choose 3 gear, 3 maps, 1 arms or gear, 1 from any list, and 1 person.
Ability: Empathy
Maps
Architectural drawings
Childhood memory
Familiar spirit
First-hand account
Legends, lore & myth
Magnetic compass
Spellbook
Star charts
Trade & travel map
Treasure map
• The Horsehall •
The wealth of the Horsetribe is, of course, its horses. They’re tough,
surefooted and fast, responsive to their riders, and not shy in battle. The
Horsetribe trades them and exchanges them as gifts to cement alliances.
The horsehall itself is a wooden palisade wall with six longhouses inside
it, arranged around a central fire pit and standing stone.
The Horsehall is the royal village, where the queen of the Horsetribe
lives. Only about a hundred people live here, her family, her own personal
warriors and their families, her harpers and her priests. Everyone who
lives here has a voice in the tribe’s council, although the children and the
younger warriors are expected to defer to those older, wiser and more
experienced than they.
Character types
See Rules • Characters Over Time for ability descriptions.
Young Warrior
You are a member of the Horsetribe’s queen’s personal warband, one of
the finest young warriors of your people.
Don’t choose this if you have a low strength or a low skill.
Choose 3 arms, 3 gear (and you must choose a horse), 1 map or spell, 1
from any list, and 1 person.
Ability: Mounted Warrior. If you’re horseback, in every round of battle
your horse gives you your choice of 1 red, 1 blue, or 1 green die.
Harper
You’re a scholar of the Horsetribe, a keeper of its history and its lore.
Don’t choose this if you have both a low command and a low perception.
Choose 3 gear (and you must choose a harp), 3 maps, 1 arms or spell, 1
from any list, and 1 person.
Ability: Tactician.
Swordmaiden
You’re a blessed priestess-warrior, favored by the ancestors of your
people and the goddess of battle.
• 18 • Example Town • The Horsehall
Ranger
You serve and defend the Horsetribe’s queen by scouting and hunting
the ranges of her domain.
Don’t choose this if you have a low perception or a low strength.
Choose 3 arms, 3 maps, 1 gear or spell, 1 from any list, and 1 person.
Ability: Sword skill: Parrying.
Horsebound
You’re a princess or prince of one of the tribes, living at the Horsehall to
serve the queen and fulfill your tribe’s obligation to her.
Don’t choose this if you have both a low endurance and a low percep-
tion.
Choose 3 gear, 3 maps, 1 arms or spell, 1 from any list, and 1 person.
Ability: Social Training.
Arms People
Broadsword (2red) Arland, the queen’s healer
Chainmail (2blue) Farrel, the horse-priest
Cudgel (2red) Ula, the winter priestess
Handaxe (2red) Kenn, the Lawteller
Longbow (3red, 2-handed, bulky) Treva, a swordmaiden
Shield (2blue) Caoimhe, the queen
Shortbow (2red, 2-handed) Caolan, the swordmaker
Shortsword (1red) Eadbald, a foreign trader
Sling (1red, 2-handed) Brietta, a crafter
Spear (2red) Or invent one
Staff (1blue & 1red, 2-handed)
Default
Gear Otherwise, everybody gets common
Climbing gear (rope, hook, spikes) clothing, including shoes and hat
Dagger (1red) (gear), lunch & trail snacks (gear),
Fine Clothing flint steel & tinder, torches if called
Healer’s kit (bandages, salves) for (gear), and local lore (map).
Hooded Cloak
Jewelry
Provisions
Pry bar
Maps
Childhood memory
Familiar spirit
First-hand account
Legends, lore & myth
Spellbook
Star charts (memorized)
Trade & travel map
Treasure map
Spells
A guiding shadow
A warning vision
Arrows of flame
Bath of healing light
Lightnings at command
Luck for warriors
Passage unnoticed
Sensitivity to magic
Shelter of vines
Strength of ten
• GM •
• Creating Adventures •
Before every session of play, including the first, you need to create an
adventure.
There are a couple of example adventures at the end of this section, and
you can use one of them if you need to, but I strongly recommend that
you create your own.
Creating an Adventure
1. Create a monster. Follow the rules for making monsters in the next
chapter.
2. Make up a little backstory about how come it’s a problem for the
• 20 • GM • Creating Adventures
PCs’ home town now, when it wasn’t a problem two weeks ago. A few
sentences should do it.
3. Create new, related monsters to match your backstory. Follow the rules
for creating related monsters.
4. Keep going until you’ve created monsters totalling 11 or more XV. Stop
before your adventure totals 20 XV. (Adventures 20 XV and bigger belong
in level 2, not level 1.)
5. Write a sentence or two about what treasures the characters might find
during the adventure.
For instance, (1) I create a serpent of water and metal. I write that (2)
the miners in town are refusing to work, because something down there
in the mine (the serpent) killed one of them and bit the leg off another.
It’s come into the mine because the miners opened a passageway into its
aquatic underground lair. Now it’s laying eggs in the mine and enslaving
the mine’s luck-spirits – so I (3) create two more monsters, the pools of
slime it lays its eggs in and the mine imps it’s mesmerized. With several
pools and a couple of groups of mine imps, (4) the whole lot comes to 12
XP. I figure that (5) the only real treasure in the adventure will be the mine
serpent’s carcass, of magical metal; everything else they’ll find in there
surely belongs to a miner or a miner’s family. Finally, (6) I draw a map of
the mine, and mark the mine’s location onto the map of the town.
Backstory
Your little backstories can be simply logistical, like the one about the mine
serpent. If you like, though, you can bring some real story in, involving
human conflicts and moral choices. Here’s an example:
Up in the highlands above town, the Hillclans’ feuding has gone really bad,
and it’s threatening to sweep down the river. It’s already messed up the
wool trade (the home town gets all its wool from the Hillclans). Here’s
what’s behind it: Thargood, a Hillclan king, let his son kidnap and forcibly
marry the daughter of Breka, queen of a neighboring clan. Normally this
would just be regular clan feud behavior, ultimately creating blood peace
between the clans, but Breka snapped. She’s summoned the Goddess of
Vengeance (a 10 XP fire and flesh monster aligned with the Spirit World),
and now the clans aren’t feuding, they’re exterminating one another.
• 21 • GM • Creating Adventures
Gradually reveal the wizard to be behind more and more of the
threats to the town, and have the PCs encounter more and more
people who know about and fear the wizard.
Pace it so that right about the time the group reaches level 2,
they realize just how big a problem the wizard is, and that there’s
no real solution but to storm the wizard’s tower.
Treasure
You need to consider two kinds of treasure: minor treasure like coins,
trade goods, and useful gear; and substantial treasure, which includes
magical items and materials, the opportunity to play new types of
characters, and alliances between the characters and powerful people in
the world. You need at most one substantial treasure for each full 10 XV
in your adventure, and minor treasures for the remainder – for instance,
a 15 XV adventure requires 1 substantial treasure and 5 minor treasures
– so shoot for that.
Maps
Create maps like crazy.
When you create an adventure, create a master map to keep secret and
use for yourself. You can mark anything you want on it: hidden things,
ambushes, traps, secrets, notes to yourself – the works. Make sure it has
on it everything you’ll need to know.
Now, some of your players will have maps listed on their character sheets:
travel maps, architectural drawings, childhood memories, you know the
ones. You can use your master map as a reference to create these simpler
maps for them.
When you create a map for a player, remember the information it’s
supposed to convey, and go short on everything else. A map of a copper
mine, for instance, might show all the tunnels as straight, when your
detailed map shows their twists and turns. That’s because the map’s
intended to tell you when to turn left and when to turn right, NOT what
the tunnels are actually like. Same with a travel & trade map – it’s likely
to have numbers next to the roads to show how long they are, but be
utterly out of scale.
For the more arcane maps, like legends and memories and first-hand
accounts, just be prepared to make stuff up. You have the things you
need to communicate written out in front of you – the monsters and their
backstory, plus your own detailed master map – so all you need to do is
decide how to communicate them.
You can create some maps at the beginning of the adventure and give
• 22 • GM • Creating Adventures
them to the player right off, like “he points to the place on your travel
map where he saw the attack. Here’s your travel map, here’s where he
points.” Others, you can wait until the player uses it to create it. “You have
a childhood memory of this place? Well! Okay, here’s what you recall…”
When a player has her character consult a map, you’re allowed to say
no, too. “Nope, sorry, there’s no way you’d have a childhood memory /
architectural drawing / first-hand account of this place.” That’s a fair call
too.
Maps and adventures are linked. No matter what maps a player’s character
sheet lists, you shouldn’t create (or want to create, or need to create) a
map before you’ve created the adventure that calls for it.
Show, don’t tell! Use the townspeople, especially the ones listed on the
players’ character sheets. Put the problems in their mouths and their
actions, directed to the players’ characters, not directly from you to the
players:
Instead of working, the miners only sit around the town whispering with
each other. They think that Arguld (the one with his leg bitten off) is bad
luck, so they won’t even talk to him. The healer’s doing her best with him,
but when she’s alone with you [turning to one of the players] she says, “so
do you think he really is bad luck?”
Keep going like this, involving the players’ characters at every step, until
you’ve revealed just how serious the threat is, and how nobody’s going to
be able to solve it but them.
The more adventures they get under their belt, the more their reputation
will spread. Here are some people who can do things, who can protect
you, who can fight monsters and win. Use this to bring forward adven-
tures ranging wider and wider around the town – by the end of level 1,
the players’ characters wont be the heroes only of their own home town.
They’ll be the heroes of the whole district. They’ll be taking on monsters
who threaten not just their town, but all the neighboring towns as well
– and ultimately, it’ll be up to them to take on the wizard in his tower.
Anyway, after you’ve shown them the problem, step back and let the
players lead. Always be asking – what do you do? Where do you go? Now
what?
1. Something new is going seriously wrong for the town. Unchecked, it’ll
ruin us.
The miners won’t work, because something down there killed one of them
and bit another’s leg off. The trade in amber and wool down from the
highlands has dried up, because the Hillclans are butchering one another.
Something attacked the first copper barge out of the town in spring,
representing 4 solid months’ of the town’s wealth, and sank it in the river
in Swamp Folk lands.
2. The players’ characters are obviously the people in town upon whom
dealing with it falls. Who else, the miners? They won’t even go into the
mine. The fishwives? The barge-polers? The old men? If the players’
characters won’t take care of it, no one will, and it’ll keep getting worse.
• 23 • GM • Creating Adventures
Remember that the players’ characters aren’t zeroes, aren’t nobodies
hoping someday to be somebody. They’re already the standouts in the
town. They start the game bright, brave, and capable, and become
moreso.
Sometimes the path from the threat to the town to fighting monsters is
just naturally short and straight. The thing biting the miners, for instance,
that’s not complicated. Go down there with torches and a map, hunt around
until it attacks you. But sometimes it’s not, there’s a little mystery, things
to discover, twists and turns along the way. Sometimes they’ll discover
that the problem isn’t – or isn’t just – what it seemed to be:
Men in Iron Armor have been raiding the Swamp Folk for slaves. They
sacrificed one of their daughter-queens to transform her into the Mother
Crow. The Mother Crow attacked and sank the barge, as she will attack
all outsiders who come into the Swamp Folk lands. She does not care,
plain does not care, that the PCs aren’t slavers, and frankly neither do the
Swamp Folk. Her only possible act is to attack and kill outsiders.
Unless they fight and defeat her, she’ll sink every copper barge they send
down the river, ruining the town.
Mystery
When an adventure includes a mystery, it’s not always obvious
how to run it. You need to give them all the cool information
you’ve created, but you also want to preserve the mystery and
create suspense. Here’s how, some things to do and things to
don’t.
Don’t! It’s a bad way to play this game. Instead, go now and read
the four foundational rolls in the chapter about dice. Whenever
you feel like you haven’t planned enough, read them again. If
you just play those rolls straight, especially the perception and
arcane rolls to notice and discover things, and the perception
and command rolls for interacting with people, they’ll give the
players the information they need, seamlessly and under their
control. That’s precisely what those rules are designed to do: let
the players, not you, solve the mysteries you create.
4. So yes, they do their best to solve the problem, defeat the monsters,
and deal with the threat to the town.
You don’t care how, or even whether, they find out the Crow Mother’s
backstory. You don’t care how, or even whether, they find her to fight her!
• 24 • GM • Creating Adventures
That’s their problem. All you know is, if they can’t figure out some way to
make her stop, she’ll keep sinking copper barges. As GM, that should be
cool with you, you shouldn’t mind one way or the other.
Practice saying it with me. “Hey, so the Crow Mother sinks all the town’s
copper barges from now on and the town falls into ruin? Cool with me.
Cool with me!”
Example Adventure
The Adventure of the Wolfwalkers
Two children have been stolen from the Horsehall: Carrol, 4, and Gwri,
7. Carrol is the queen’s cousin’s nephew, and Gwri is the son of a Horse-
bound princess of the Storktribe. They were returning from the low apple
orchards with Carrol’s mother, Brietta, in the dusk. Brietta suffered a
terrible mauling by tooth and claw, and crawled under the roots of a tree
for shelter; nobody found her until this morning. (This would be a good
opening scene: one of the players’ characters finding Brietta.) Arland the
healer says that perhaps worse than her torn flesh is the wound to her
spirit, her raw terror and fear for the children.
It turns out they’re real. It’s surprising that they’re up here in the hills, not
down in the moors, though.
Here’s what happened: the wolfwalkers did steal a child from the moor
people. So one riverwife of the moor people braved to confront them face
to face, and offered them the children of the Horsetribe instead, for the
taking.
The wolfwalkers make the stolen children into new wolfwalkers. They put
the stolen children into their hollow trees – that’s their “hearts,” their
human bodies. Their hearts are still alive; removed from the trees, not
destroyed, they’ll revert to human children.
See Rules • Rolling the Dice and Rules • Battle to see how this
adventure might play out.
Encounters
All of the monsters in this adventure appear among the example monsters
in GM • Creating Monsters, starting on page 38.
• 25 • GM • Creating Adventures
Treasure
The adventure’s worth 18 XV total – a lot! – so I need to think about a
significant treasure and 8 minor treasures.
For the significant treasure, I’d dearly love to create a new character type
for treasure, “raised wolfwalker.” See Rules • Creating More for how I’d
do that. But I don’t know what the characters are going to do so I’m not
going to count on it. I could also give them a moor person new character
type or an alliance with the moor people, or maybe the wood from the
hollow trees has magical properties. Or, since the wolfwalkers are bound
by their word, they might even bind and keep one. How cool would that
be?
For minor treasure’s, there’s the gratitude of the moor people, the queen
and her cousin, and the accumulated goods of the wolfwalkers’ previous
victims.
Map
The map for this adventure is on page 79. There’s not much to it!
• GM •
• Creating Monsters •
An earlier version of these rules, adapted to old-school D&D, appears in
Fight On! magazine volume 2.
They’re all called “monsters,” indiscriminately, but you create every kind
of threat this way, including traps and dangerous locations.
Natural materials
1. Bone / horn / teeth (3 endurance)
2. Fire (1 endurance)
3. Flesh (2 endurance)
4. Gas (1 endurance)
5. Glass (1 endurance)
6. Ice (2 endurance)
7. Metal (4 endurance)
8. Shadow (1 endurance)
9. Stone (4 endurance)
10. Water (1 endurance)
11. Wind (1 endurance)
12. Wood (3 endurance)
For your monster, choose endurance from either material, or else choose
an intermediate value.
• 26 • GM • Creating Monsters
Select abilities freely from both of your materials’ lists, plus the list avail-
able to all materials. If you like, roll to select abilities (with a d4, d6 or d8,
depending on the list). A good way to get started is to roll the first one or
two abilities, then choose the rest.
• 27 • GM • Creating Monsters
1. Attack (Blast) 5. Jagged 2. Intangible
2. Attack (Burn) 6. Knock down 3. Knock down
3. Dazzle 4. Swarm
4. Frighten Metal
5. Intangible 1. Armor Wood
6. Swarm 2. Attack (Cut) 1. Armor
3. Attack (Impale) 2. Attack (Bludgeon)
Flesh 4. Big 3. Big
1. Attack (Brawl) 5. Bind 4. Bind
2. Attack (Grapple) 6. Jagged 5. Strangle
3. Big 6. Swarm
4. Frighten Shadow
5. Mesmerize 1. Drain Available to all
6. Poison 2. Frighten materials
7. Stealth 3. Intangible 1. +1 damage checkbox
8. Swarm 4. Mesmerize 2. +1 white die
5. Stealth 3. Additional attack
Gas 6. Swarm 4. Additional special move
1. Attack (Blast) 5. Suspense
2. Drain Stone 6. Terrain
3. Intangible 1. Armor
4. Poison 2. Attack (Bludgeon)
5. Strangle 3. Big
6. Swarm 4. Knock Down
Ability descriptions
+1 damage checkbox: The monster gets an additional damage
checkbox.
Attack (various): When it attacks with this ability, the monster rolls
2 red dice against its target. Specify the attack’s range now, when you
create the monster.
Improved effect: It gets additional red dice, for +1XV each, to a maximum
of 6 red dice.
Big: As in, really big. This monster gets 2 additional damage checkboxes,
+1 red die, and +1 blue die.
• 28 • GM • Creating Monsters
Improved effect: For +2XV, it’s really, really big. It gets another additional
damage checkbox, another +1 red die and another +1 blue die.
Bind (special move): The monster has some way to freeze, chain,
entangle, paralyze, or hold its foes in place. This can be physical, magical,
or psychological. It gets 2 green dice toward grappling its target, with a
binding strength equal to its success.
If the player wins the roll to escape, the character is free for the next
round. Otherwise, reduce the binding strength for the player’s hits, and
the character goes into the next round still bound. The player can roll
again in setup, instead of making any other setup move. If the player wins
the roll now, great, the character’s free; otherwise, again, reduce the
binding strength. The player keeps rolling – in action, in followthrough, in
the next setup, and so on – until the character finally escapes.
Improved effect: For each +1XV, it gets +1 to its side of the perception
roll, to a maximum of perception vs 6.
Drain (special move): The monster gets 2 green dice for a stat drain,
which happens in followthrough. If the monster hits a character with it,
it temporarily weakens her, reducing one of her stats by 1. Specify which
stat now, when you create the monster. The duration of the drain depends
on the monster’s success, 1 round for 1 hit. 4 hits = until the end of the
adventure. If the character gets drained down to stat=0, she’s out of the
fight.
Frighten (special move): A monster with this ability is scary. The first
time a character attacks it in battle, the player needs to make a command
setup roll vs 3 in setup, before her regular setup move. If the player wins
the roll, she gets her setup move and continues as usual. Otherwise, she
can still attack the monster, but she loses her setup move, and each hit
she fell short costs her a white die for the entire duration of the battle.
If a character flees from a scary monster, the player gets +2 green dice
toward escaping.
Improved effect: For each +1XV, it gets +1 to its side of the command
roll, plus an additional green die for its special move and an additional
green dice for the flee bonus, to a maximum of command vs 6 and 4 green
dice.
• 29 • GM • Creating Monsters
Intangible: The monster is utterly immune to most normal weapons and
physical attacks. Magic weapons and spells with physical effects might or
might not hurt it, and more clever tactics may be highly successful, case
by case, according to your call.
No improved effect.
Jagged: Monsters with this ability have sharp, spiky protrusions that can
cut those who get too close. Whenever a character attacks the monster,
if the monster’s defense beats the player’s attack, the character takes 1
damage in followthrough.
Knock down (special move): The monster gets 2 green dice toward
knocking its target over. At your option, can count any of its red hits as
green hits, instead of counting them for its attack. For its target, being
knocked down is a regular tactical constraint.
• Submit. Have your character do what the monster wants. You get 1xp
for each of its green hits.
• Resist. Make a command roll vs its green hits. Each hit you fall short
costs you a white die for the round.
Improved effect: If the monster has more than one attack, for +1XV all of
its attacks are poisonous.
Improved effect: For each +1XV, it gets +1 to its side of the perception
roll, to a maximum of perception vs 6.
Strangle (special move): This monster has some way to get into your
lungs (gas, liquid, vines) and interfere with your breathing. The monster
gets 2 green dice for the attempt. If it hits a character, it does no damage,
but in the following setup the player has to make a strength, endurance,
or skill setup roll (as appropriate) vs its success, in lieu of a normal setup
move. Each hit the player scores over its success gives her one of her
white dice for the round; otherwise, the character can’t act at all. Each hit
the player falls short inflicts 1 damage.
• 30 • GM • Creating Monsters
There’s lots for you to detail up-front, right now. What’s the bad thing?
(It can be a rules thing, like a tactical constraint or extra damage, or it
can be all in the game’s fiction, like “the characters all fall asleep” or “the
character is suddenly transported back to the natural world.”) Do all the
players have to roll, or some of them, or just one? Which stat do they roll?
Are they rolling against one another (like “whoever rolls the fewest hits”),
against some number already in the battle (like “the roll has to beat the
monster’s attack”), or some arbitrary number (like “everyone who rolls 2
or fewer hits”)?
You can even forego the additional stat roll and have the badness depend
on something else that might or might not happen. “If the monster rolls
3 or more sixes amongst its hits,” for instance, or “if any character steps
up onto the platform.”
This ability is for when you already have a vision for something like this for
your monster. If you don’t, if you’re just idly considering, better to choose
a different ability.
No improved effect.
Improved effect: For +1XV, it gets to make both an attack and a special
move against each enemy it can reach.
Terrain: The monster’s not a monster but a place. Say which stat
the characters can use to traverse it. Strength to hack through vines,
endurance to cross vast dunes or swim through a tunnel underwater,
skill to go along a narrow slippery ledge, perception to navigate a maze,
etc. The monster’s damage checkboxes are called traversal checkboxes
instead, and it gets two rows: individual traversal and group traversal.
The monster gets a number of individual traversal checkboxes precisely
as it would get damage checkboxes. Then, by default the monster gets
twice as many group traversal checkboxes.
Improved effect: For +2XV, it gets three times as many group traversal
checkboxes as individual traversal checkboxes.
For the players, marking traversal checkboxes means that their characters
make progress through the terrain. If a player marks individual traversal
checkboxes, that means that her character alone makes progress; if she
marks group traversal checkboxes, that means that her character helps
• 31 • GM • Creating Monsters
the entire group make progress.
• Going for the first extra white die is more XV-efficient than
improving an ability, usually. Going for the second extra white die
might be, it depends on your intent.
Weakness
Give your monster a weakness:
1. Can be contained
2. Emotionally attached
3. Harmed by something innocuous
4. Inanimate
5. Sees red
6. Slow-moving
7. Subject to outside forces
8. Very stupid
9. Vulnerable to an attack
10. Weak spot
Can be contained: If the characters can figure out how, they can contain
the monster. Decide now at least one way they might realistically do it. In
play, be open to other ways, if they make sense.
Examples: a giant wolf that’s the devoted pet of the Storm-king’s little
son, a wizard’s guardian spirit, an undersea troll-mother who loves her
brutish son.
Examples: a monstrous bull and anything red, a craven ghoul who can’t
stand being stared at, a bestial giant lulled by sweet music.
Subject to outside forces: The monster’s not entirely under its own
power, not entirely capable of carrying out its own will. If the characters
can manipulate the forces it’s subject to, they gain power over it.
Very stupid: Just about any attempt to trick or misdirect the monster
will succeed. The characters can use this to their advantage, as a tactical
constraint or outside of battle.
Weak spot: The monster has a spot on its body where it’s vulnerable.
If a character knows about it and tries to hit it just there, that counts
as “fighting while ___,” so the player should declare and roll in setup
accordingly. The player does damage for her action’s success – her green
• 33 • GM • Creating Monsters
hits – as well as for her attack.
So, play your monsters hard and fair, but don’t allow yourself to
prefer that they win or prefer that they lose.
For instance, it’s tempting to give every monster you can the
swarm ability. It’s a great ability! But really, give it only to
monsters who can swarm. A four-armed giant should get to make
four attacks per round, it should’t get to swarm.
Description
Write a paragraph describing your monster, including its place in the
adventure. For most monsters, all you need is a sentence or two describing
it physically, another sentence or two describing its habits, and a third
sentence or two about how it’s threatening the town or how it relates to a
monster that is. However, if you’re doing quirky, limited, tricky, or unusual
things with the monster’s abilities, be sure to describe them too.
When you create a trap as a monster, fully describe how to trigger it and
how to disarm it.
Example monsters
Wolfwalker
A nightmare beast-person, 5 feet tall, hunched but powerfully built, with
a wolf’s muzzle and terrible claws.
Materials: Teeth, Shadow; Endurance: 3
Abilities: Attack (rend), improved x2 (+2 XV)
Intangible (hide their hearts in hollow trees, only fire hurts them)
Stealth
+1 white die (+1 XV)
Weakness: Can be contained (they’re bound by their word)
Damage: □ □ □
White: 6
Red: 4 (rend)
Blue: 0; Green: 0
• 34 • GM • Creating Monsters
Mine serpent
A big aquatic snake made out of glossy metal and slime.
Materials: Metal, Water; Endurance: 4
Abilities: Armor, improved x2 (+2 XV)
Attack (cut)
Big, improved (+2 XV)
Jagged (+1 XV)
Weakness: Weak spot (pry apart its scales, the slime of its inner body
pours out)
Damage: □ □ □ □ □ □ □
White: 5
Red: 4 (cut)
Blue: 6
Green: 0
Setup: none
Followthrough: Jagged. Attackers who don’t beat its defend take 1
damage.
6 XV
Nefr Seba
A sorcerous reflection of a stunning woman, visible in a beautiful glass
mirror from another land.
Materials: Glass, Shadow; Endurance: 1
Abilities: +1 white die, improved (+2 XV)
Dazzle (her beauty), improved (+1 XV)
Drain Command
Mesmerize
Weakness: Emotionally attached (to her mirror)
Damage: □
White: 7
Red: 0; Blue: 0
Green: 2 (drain) or 2 (mesmerize) (only one per round)
Setup: Dazzle. Command roll vs 3; characters who fall short lose white
dice. Command, not perception, just because.
Mesmerize. A mesmerized character chooses to give in (for XP =
success) or resist vs success.
Followthrough: none
4 XV
Summer Drake
A flying fire drake, slight and beautiful, greedy for shiny things.
Materials: Fire, Wind; Endurance: 1
Abilites: +1 damage checkbox, improved (+1 XV)
Attack (blast)
Dazzle
Weakness: Sees red (helplessly attracted to shiny things)
Damage: □ □ □
White: 5
Red: 2 (blast) (attacks everyone)
Blue: 0; Green: 0
Setup: Dazzle. Perception roll vs 3; characters who fall short lose white
dice.
• 35 • GM • Creating Monsters
Followthrough: none
2 XV
Creating related monsters
When you’re creating an adventure, you create a set monsters related to
each other by the same one backstory. Here are different ways you can
create them, depending on the backstory’s details.
Here’s a monster to go with the mine serpent. I chose metal and rolled
wind, so I decided to make a mine spirit:
Corrupt Breath-of-the-mine
Breath-of-the-mine is a lucky spirit who brings fresh air to the miners,
now enslaved by the mine serpent.
Materials: Metal, Wind; Endurance: 3
Abilities: Armor
Attack (batter)
Knock down
Swarm (+1 XV)
Weakness: Very Stupid
Damage: □ □ □
White: 5
Red: 2 (batter)
Blue: 2
Green: 2
Setup: none
Followthrough: Knock down
2 XV
The choose-both method
The reason to roll for materials at all is to spark your creativity when
you don’t have a monster in mind. When you do have a monster in mind,
there’s no need to roll. Just choose!
• 37 • GM • Creating Monsters
Drain endurance
Intangible (can be hurt only by fire)
Knock down (+1 XV)
Poison (+1 XV)
Weakness: Vulnerable to fire
Damage: □
White: 5
Red: 2 (blast)
Blue: 0
Green: 2 (knock down)
Setup: none
Followthrough: Knock down and poison both.
3 XV
• GM •
• Leading Character Creation •
You’ve created your town, you’ve created your first adventure. It’s time to
get the rest of your group together and start play.
But first
Read through the rest of this book, if you haven’t. You need to have a
pretty good grasp of how the dice work, in and outside of battle, for
instance, even to help the players make their characters. Making char-
acters is quick enough that you’ll probably be playing in half an hour, so
you’ll want to be, you know, ready for that.
You can skim the chapters about what happens between adventures
– you’ll need to know that stuff after you play for real, a skim will do
for now – but read the chapters about what happens in play good and
carefully.
Making characters
Introduce your town. Hand out your town material, at least the maps,
the character type sheets, and the lists. Don’t hand out your written
paragraphs, anybody who reads them is just taking up time, but tell
everybody what they say. It’s better if you just tell them, but if you prefer
to read the paragraphs out that’s okay too.
• 38 • GM • Leading Character Creation
• The players’ characters live in the town, they aren’t strangers, drifters
or outsiders.
• The players’ characters aren’t lowly nobodies, they’re the town’s boldest
and most capable. It’s natural for the town to turn to them for help.
• The town isn’t isolated, it’s connected to its neighbors, and they to
theirs, and they to theirs, ultimately North to South and East to West over
three entire continents.
Fill up the character sheets. Hand character sheets around. Lead the
players in working through them, point by point, following the rules for
making characters:
Be sure to ask questions and fill in details about the people they’ve listed
on their character sheets, too. Those people are an important part of your
Share the game. This is true when you lead the players in making their
characters, and it’s true from now on. Being the GM means that, like,
you’re bringing the ball to the game. Even though it’s your ball, it’s not
your game. It’s everybody’s! Give everybody their fair turn to play.
When everybody plays together equally, knowing and following the rules,
it doesn’t matter that you have different responsibilities than they do.
You’ll all have fun, and you’ll create exciting adventures together that you
can enjoy and be proud of.
Roll a die for each stat, in order. Write the number on the line, not in the
box.
1. Find your highest number. In the box, write 6. If you have a tie, choose
one.
2. Find your lowest number. In the box, write 3. If you have a tie, choose
one.
3. Go through the rest of your stats. If the number on the line is a 1, write
3 in the box; if it’s a 2 or 3, write 4 in the box; if it’s a 4 or 5, write 5 in
the box; and if it’s a 6, write 6 in the box.
Sometimes you’ll get a weird set of rolls. That’s fine, just follow the rules
in order.
From now on, by the way, “your stat” means the number in the box,
and “your stat base” means the number on the line. You use only your
stat, only the number in the box, in play, but you use your stat base, the
number on the line, when you make changes to your character.
• 40 • Players • Creating Characters
You’ll have the opportunity to play other character types too later on, so
no need to agonize.
Just copy down all the information for your character type: how many of
which kinds of things you get for belongings, and your character ability.
Choose your character’s name from the list of names, and say a few
general details about your character: how old, male or female, maybe a
few words about looks, family, home, or duties.
You can spend as much of it as you want now, before you put your
character into play. Save the rest to spend later.
If you have more than one character, you get to choose which char-
acter you’re going to play, adventure to adventure. You can wait to choose
until the GM has shown you the threat to the town.
• Players •
• Descriptions & Details •
These are sort of basic lists of many of the things that’ll generally be
available to you. However, the specific lists of the things that are actually
available to you are up to your GM to create. If you choose something
from your GM’s lists and it’s not described here, ask your GM for details
about it. If you want something from this list, but it’s not on your GM’s
lists, you can’t have it!
Arms
Battleaxe (3red, 2-handed)
Breastplate, helmet & greaves (2blue)
Broadsword (2red)
Chainmail (2blue)
Crossbow (2red, 2-handed)
Cudgel (2red)
Flail (2red)
Greatsword (3red, 2-handed)
Handaxe (2red)
Heavy Crossbow (3red, 2-handed, bulky)
Longbow (3red, 2-handed, bulky)
Mace (2red)
Polearm (3red, 2-handed)
Shield (2blue)
• 42 • Players • Descriptions & Details
Gear
Climbing gear (rope, hook, spikes)
Dagger (1red)
Fine Clothing
Healer’s kit (bandages, scissors, liquor, salves)
High Boots
Hooded Cloak
Jewelry
Lantern
Leather Coat (1blue)
Lockpicks
Mirror & lenses
Money
Provisions
Pry bar
Spectacles
Thick gloves
Maps People (level 1: townsfolk)
Architectural drawings Healer
Childhood memory Priest
Familiar spirit Priestess
First-hand account Magistrate
Legends, lore & myth Thug
Magnetic compass Guardsman
Spellbook Elder
Star charts Weaponsmith
Trade & travel map Trader
Treasure map Crafter
Or invent one
Spells
A guiding shadow Default
A warning vision Otherwise, everybody gets common
Arrows of flame clothing, including shoes and hat (gear),
Bath of healing light lunch & trail snacks (gear), flint steel &
Lightnings at command tinder, torches if called for (gear), and
Luck for warriors local lore (map).
Passage unnoticed
Sensitivity to magic
Whenever you double up armor or weapons that way, the first one gives
you its full dice, and each additional one gives you only one die. For
example:
Chainmail plus a shield: 2blue + 1blue = 3blue.
Chainmail under plates, plus a shield: 2blue + 1blue + 1blue = 4blue.
A broadsword plus a dagger: 2red + 1red = 3red.
A dagger in each hand: 1red + 1red = 2red.
A leather coat plus a staff: 1blue + 1red & 1blue = 2blue & 1 red.
If you have only two hands, you can’t double up beyond your two hands’
worth. You can carry more weapons than you can use at a time, of
course, but even if you have them, you still can’t use them all at once.
For example:
A greatsword plus a shield: not legit.
A longbow plus a dagger: not legit.
A shortsword, another shortsword, and a crossbow: not legit.
Descriptions & Details: Gear
Tools do two things.
First, they let your characters do things they couldn’t do otherwise. For
instance, a pry bar lets your character force open a door or lever up a
big stone; lockpicks let your character pick locks; provisions let your
character eat on long journeys.
Second, they give you an extra die or two to roll when you have your
character use them. For instance, if the GM decides that you should make
a strength roll to force open the door, a skill roll to pick the locks, and an
endurance roll to survive the journey, the pry bar, the lockpicks, and the
provisions will give you an additional die or two.
The general rule is, if your character’s using it for what it’s good for,
you get two dice, but if your character’s using it for something it’s not
intended for, you get only one die.
Childhood memory
Can serve as a (not great) substitute for legends, lore & myth. If your
childhood is directly relevant to your current adventure, can serve as
a perfectly good substitute, and also a perfectly good substitute for
first-hand accounts, architectural drawings, maps, familiar spirits, and
whatever else, as well as a source for green dice for all kinds of percep-
tion, arcane, even skill or command rolls.
Familiar spirit
• 44 • Players • Descriptions & Details
A guardian ghost, a companion spirit, your ethereal self, the eyes in the
back of your head. Make a command roll to set up any perception roll; its
hits become green dice.
First-hand account
Someone told you specifically about this. Green dice for perception,
arcane, and possibly skill or command.
Magnetic compass
Magnetic compasses, like you’d expect, tell you what direction’s what and
they give you green dice to keep from getting lost.
Spellbook
A spellbook holds your spells and gives you 1 green die whenever you
cast one of them. A spellbook can be a book or scroll or whatever, but
it can also be a potion, staff, wand, amulet, fetish, tattoo, familiar spirit
(which may or may not also be a familiar spirit as above), salve, ritual,
relic, whatever.
Star charts
Star charts don’t just tell you where the stars are. They chart the stars’
influences on the world, and by observing the stars and comparing them
with your charts you can see what immediate influences are prevailing
against them. They act as a spellbook for casting sensitivity to magic,
and you can use them to discover magical effects even if you can’t cast
the spell. Furthermore, you can use them as a travel & trade map of the
spirit world.
Treasure map
A treasure map is better than an architectural drawing for showing hidden
things – it’ll have notations on it like “do not step on the protruding brick”
and “shine light into the alcove to reveal the keyhole” – but not as good
as a trade & travel map for getting you there.
A guiding shadow
The spirit world. Medium: entity; effect: revelation.
Range: self.
□ _ _ _ no miscast
Revelation: □ □ □ □ □ □ decision points
When you cast the spell, tell the shadow what you’re seeking. It will lead
you toward it, giving you guidance at any decision points you come to,
A warning vision
The gods. Medium: vision; effect: revelation.
Range: self.
□ _ _ _ no miscast
Revelation: □ impression □ □ □ □ □ +detail
For example: Impression: “you get the impression that there’s some-
thing circling you in the darkness.” Details: “it’s a pack of 4 creatures
(1), like wolves but your vision shows you teeth and claws made of
brass(2). They’re protecting their territory (3).”
Arrows of flame
The elements. Medium: material (fire); effect: attack.
Default range: nearby
□ _ _ _ no miscast
Range: □ an arrow’s flight
Damage: □ □ □ □ □ □ damage
Each damage hit does 1 damage to someone within range. Divvy out the
damage as you choose.
Passage unnoticed
The wilds. Medium: changes; effect: deception.
Range: self.
□ _ _ _ no miscast
Deception: □ □ □ □ □ □ subjects
Each hit prevents one person from noticing you passing nearby, once.
The spell doesn’t end until you’ve affected all the subjects you can.
Sensitivity to magic
The senses. Medium: sensation; effect: revelation.
Range: nearby.
□ _ _ _ no miscast
• 46 • Players • Descriptions & Details
Shelter of vines
The household. Medium: plant; effect: protection.
Area: nearby; default duration: no time; default protection: none.
□ _ _ _ no miscast
Duration: □ 1hr □ 12hr □ 24hr
Protection: □ alarm □ hinder (-2white) □ prevent
For the spell to have any effect, you must put at least one hit in both
duration and protection.
Alarm: the shelter of vines will alert you to anyone’s approach. Hinder:
the shelter of vines gives -2 white dice to anyone trying to fight their
way in. Prevent: the shelter of vines simply prevents anyone from
coming in.
Strength of ten
Self-transformation. Medium: change; effect: stat bonus (strength)
Range: self; default strength bonus: none; default duration: no time.
□ _ _ _ no miscast
Strength bonus: □ +1 □ +2
Duration: □ □ □ □ rounds
For the spell to have any effect, you must put at least one hit in both
Strength bonus and duration.
Descriptions & Details: People
When you choose a person, it’s your responsibility to describe your
character’s relationship with that person. Choose one of these:
Blood brother or sister;
Comrade at arms or partner;
Close childhood friend;
Cousin;
Daughter or son;
Estranged sibling;
Former comrade or partner;
Parent;
Rival;
Sibling;
Student;
Teacher;
Wife or husband.
• Speak in your character’s voice. Use your hands, face, voice and words;
act like your character would.
• Ask the GM what your character sees, hears, smells, tastes or feels.
• Ask the GM whether your character would know anything about [what-
ever you’re interested in].
• Look for opportunities to roll dice. For instance, choose a map or a tool
from your character sheet, one that you think might help your character,
and say that your character consults or applies it.
Choose freely! The only limits are the basic rules for how you should treat
other people: take your turn, let other people finish, treat what they say
with respect, don’t go on too long, make suggestions but don’t insist upon
them, don’t shout, stuff like that.
• Speak in the voice of someone (not a player’s character). Use your face,
hands, voice, and words, like an actor.
• Tell a player what it’s like for her character to do something. Tell about
what the character senses and experiences.
• Answer a player’s questions, if it’s something the player should know or
the character would know.
• Respond to what the players’ characters’ do, from the point of view of
the world of the game. Say what happens because of what the players’
characters do, because of what they say. Tell about doors crashing shut,
birds startling into flight, fire leaping up, people drawing closer.
While you’re doing those, here are four things to always do too:
• Look for opportunities to have a player roll dice. Learn the dice rules
and bring them into play a lot. Don’t wait for battles or big action. Roll
dice when a conversation goes tense, when someone consults a map
(especially an obscure one), whenever you can think of interesting ways
for things to go well and go poorly.
• Keep your monsters in mind. Can they see what’s going on, and how
do they react? Where are they while this is happening, and what are they
doing?
• Let the players play their characters. You can tell them what their
characters experience, but never ever tell them what their characters do
or how their characters react. That’s theirs.
• Let what happens, happen. Don’t try to control what comes next, or
especially, especially what comes after that. Don’t plan plot points, future
scenes, or any kind of story at all. Just think like the world of the game
and whatever logically comes next, that’s what comes next.
And you too need to follow the basic social rules of courtesy and gener-
Think of how they do it in movies. Cutting from one scene to another and
back makes both scenes more exciting, and makes sure you don’t forget
where anyone is or what’s going on everywhere.
• Rules •
• Rolling the Dice •
The GM should always be looking for opportunities to roll dice. The best
way to spot the opportunities is to know what the dice do, and the best
way to learn what the dice do is to see how they work.
A basic roll
The GM never rolls dice, except when there’s a battle between the char-
acters and one of the GM’s monsters. Even then, the GM will make fewer
rolls than any other player.
When a player rolls dice, she always rolls for one of her character’s
stats.
GM, consider calling for a roll whenever the character does
something that calls for arcane (knowledge, intuition, memory,
philosophy, magic), command (willpower, presence, strength
of character, determination, self-possessedness), endurance
(stamina, resiliance, shrugging off injury, hunger, pain or
discomfort), perception (alertness, awareness, insight, reading
people), skill (training, talent, manual dexterity, using tools
well), or strength (raw physical power).
The player rolls all the dice at once. I love the sound of a big batch of dice
hitting the table.
For instance, suppose that I’m the GM, and Meg, a player, says “my
character uses her pry bar to force open the door.” That’s a strength roll,
so Meg takes dice for her character’s strength, 5. Her character’s using
the pry bar for its intended purpose, so I tell her to add two dice; now she
has seven in her hand. She rolls them: 1 2 4 4 4 5 5. She pushes the 1
and the 2 away, and counts the 4 4 4 5 5. She got 5 hits.
So far so easy; that’s the basic roll. Interpreting the roll is where it starts
to get interesting.
Four Foundational Rolls
Here are four rolls that you should use every time they’re appropriate.
You’ll quickly learn them by heart.
Again, the GM never makes these rolls, although the GM will often call for
them. Outside of battle, the players do all the rolling.
• For your first hit, your character detects it. The GM will tell you what
your character detects.
• For your second hit, your character identifies it. The GM will tell you
what it is and what it means.
• For each additional hit, your character notices an additional detail about
it. The GM will tell you what the details are.
Of all the rolls, this is the one that the GM will most commonly call for
out of nowhere. After all, the GM’s the one who knows when something’s
there for your character to notice.
GM, use your knowledge of the adventure, your maps, and the off-screen
activities of your monsters to decide when to call for this roll.
I’m the GM. I’m playing with my friends Meg, Elliot and Sebastian. Their
characters are hunting some monsters who’ve carried off two of the
“You can find their tracks,” I say, for his first hit (detect). “There are three
of them. They’re like wolf prints, but bigger, and the things are 2-legged,”
for his second (identify). If he’d rolled more hits, I’d have more details
to give him: the children were alive and struggling, probably unharmed;
the creature who wasn’t carrying a child kept stopping to look around;
they intentionally kept their pace slower than they needed to, so they
wouldn’t outpace the characters; and they left the tracks on purpose to be
followed. Since he rolled only 2 hits, the group won’t be forewarned about
the ambush that’s coming.
This roll is a ritual; it serves to let everybody know to pay attention, now
it’s happening. It has a rules effect only sometimes – if they’re facing a
monster with stealth, for instance, or if any PC has danger sense or wild
instincts – but you should call for it even when it won’t have any rules
effect. It’s a good habit to get in.
• For your first hit, your character has or gets an impression. The GM will
tell you what your character’s impression is.
• For each additional hit, your character knows or learns a true, concrete
detail. The GM will tell you what the details are.
It’s always the GM’s call whether you get to make this roll, but if you think
you should get to make it, say so.
GM, use your knowledge of the adventure, its backstory and its monsters,
to create your answers. Your monster writeups in particular are full of
information that’ll be useful to the players. When a player makes one
of these rolls, hold in mind the nature of the map the character’s using
(including none) and consider all the information you have to share.
Choose information that suits the map, then give it to the player in a form
the map would use.
“Well, I’ve seen them now,” Sebastian says, “and I have legends, lore and
myth on my sheet. Do I know anything about these things?”
If he’d rolled only 1 hit, I’d give him an impression, something like this:
“you can’t think of anything specific. Maybe they’re called wolfwalkers?
And maybe they’re immortal? Or just really hard to kill?”
• 52 • Rules • Rolling the Dice
But he rolled 4 hits, so I owe him three good details. “You do know some-
thing about them,” I say. “They’re called wolfwalkers in the stories.” That’s
a gimme, I don’t count their name as one of the details I owe him. Other
circumstances, maybe I would. “According to one story, they keep their
hearts safe in hollow trees, so they can’t be killed.” That’s one detail.
“No wonder,” Meg says. “It’s not like we weren’t hitting them.”
“Another story tells how a brave riverwife burned one on a pyre and killed
it that way.” That’s two details. “But here’s an interesting one: they aren’t
natural creatures -”
“They aren’t,” I say. “The legend is that in the bad times, the river folk
didn’t have enough food for all their children. So they put all the extra
children on a raft and floated it away, and those children became the
wolfwalkers and returned to them.” That’s the third detail I owe, so I stop
there. If he’d rolled 5 hits I’d’ve told that when the wolfwalkers came back,
it was to steal children, whom they made into more wolfwalkers. I guess
they’ll have to find that detail out the hard way.
As GM, your job is to give the players free rein and follow where they go,
not to lead their characters by their noses to the monsters’ doorstep.
When you create an adventure, you don’t create a string of clues, and
you don’t plot out how the players are going to tackle the problem (yuck,
boring!). This makes this roll extremely important – it’s your very best
tool for giving the players the information they’ll need.
Since you aren’t leading them by the nose, it’ll occasionally happens that
the players start to flounder. When it does, it’s very fair for you to say,
“hey, you’re floundering. Anybody you want to go talk to? Any maps you
want to consult?” Odds are that, yes, there’s someone they want to ques-
tion, or there’s a map someone wants to consult. Using this roll and the
roll for conversations, you’ll certainly get to tell them something they’ll
find useful, something that will let them pick a direction they want to go.
Charged conversations
Whenever your character gets into a conversation with someone who
might turn out to be an enemy, or whom your character doesn’t trust,
you roll your Perception. Count up your hits and hold onto them. Over the
course of the conversation, spend your hits to ask the GM questions, one
by one. You can:
• Ask if the person’s lying;
• Ask if the person knows more than she’s saying;
• Ask how the person feels about it;
• Ask what it would take to make the person feel a particular way;
• Ask what the person intends to do;
• Ask what the person wishes your character would do.
The GM has to answer you truthfully. The GM’s character might lie to your
character, but the GM must not lie to you.
If the GM gives you an answer to the best of her foresight, and it turns out
to be false, you get to immediately ask a replacement question, for free.
Meg, Elliot and Sebastian’s characters have come into a village of the river
folk at nightfall, having evaded the wolfwalkers. They ask for, and are
given, a warm meal (mudfish and gruel, with cress for flavor) and a place
We don’t get far! In this riverwife’s voice I’m saying vague, generally
concerned things – “two children stolen, well that’s a horror, may the gods
protect us all from such fate” – and Elliot interrupts.
Elliot’s character and the riverwife talk a little more. Elliot keeps trying to
have his character lead the conversation around to what she knows, but
she keeps evading him. Finally he spends his last hit. “What would it take
to make her feel safe talking to me?”
He scowls.
You can make this roll when your character has a conversation with
another player’s character, too. In that case, ask the other player the
questions, not the GM. The other player should answer truthfully.
Of course, that probably means that the other player’s made the roll same
as you, so she’ll be asking you questions too, and you should answer them
truthfully.
Controlling others
Whenever your character uses intimidation, authority, inspiration, or
manipulation – whenever your character tries to control what someone
else does – you roll your command. Count up your hits and tell the GM
that you hold that much sway over the person. You don’t get to spend
your hold, this time; instead, time and action will use it up:
• When the person commits to an action you want her to take, that uses
up 1 hold.
• When time passes, that uses up hold: 1 hold when an hour passes, the
next when 12 hours pass, the next when 24 hours pass, and if a week
passes, that uses up whatever hold you have left.
Once your hold’s all gone, the person’s free to do as she likes, and you
can’t roll command against her again for the rest of the adventure.
GM, you’re obliged to go along with the results of this roll, fairly and with
good will. When the person commits to an action, she really commits, you
know? She’ll give it a serious, good faith go.
Don’t nitpick the player’s hold away, don’t invent challenges to her
commitment to weasel out, and don’t stall.
Meg, Elliot and Sebastian’s characters are still in the riverwife’s hut;
Elliot’s just found out what it would take for her to trust his character. He’s
scowling.
“Well, good enough,” she says. “I slam my fist on the table. ‘Come on,
now. You know more than you’re saying and you’re going to tell it, right
now.’”
Meg’s holding 1 over the riverwife, so I have to have her go along with
Meg’s character until one of those things happens. “She’s really scared,”
I say.
“She’s so scared her hands are shaking, and she barely says it out loud:
‘we made a deal with them.’”
“Nope, I owed you one action committed, and that was it,” I say. “She
won’t say any more. She takes your empty bowls, then she pulls her shawl
over her face and sits in the far corner, shaking.”
(“Well it’s obvious to me,” Sebastian says. “It’s the deal that has the
wolfwalkers stealing our children, not theirs.”)
If your group wants to use this roll when one player’s character tries to
make another player’s character follow orders, you can. It’ll work fine.
However, as a player you get an option that the GM doesn’t:
When another player makes a command roll to hold over your character,
go along with the roll, using up her hold as normal, just as long as
you choose. If at any point you want your character to defy the other
character’s orders, though, you can. The other player gets her remaining
hold back in the form of bonus dice: if she has her character right away do
something against yours that calls for her to roll – like attack! – she gets
to include those dice, and that’s the end of it.
Some time later, Meg, Elliot and Sebastian’s characters have cornered
“Arg,” says Meg. “You better do it. I’m going to roll command.” She does,
and gets 4 hits. “Ha,” she says.
Sebastian reads the rules carefully – I’m happy to pass him the book and
point them out, I’m very interested to find out what he’ll choose.
“Fine,” he says. “You want to attack me? Okay, you’ll get 4 bonus dice if
you do. But I’m not burning down that tree until we have our kids back.”
“Well,” says Meg, “I’m not going to attack you. But you’d better be right.”
Sometimes it makes the most sense to draw checkboxes before the roll,
like these. Each hit on the roll fills in one checkbox, left to right, and that’s
how you know just what the character accomplishes:
How far can you carry it? □ a few steps □ □ to the wall □ □ □ all the way
up the ladder
Making checkboxes like these a great way to go. They clarify what’s
happening and you can reuse them whenever similar circumstances come
up in the future. When I GM the game, I keep a section of my notebook
just for them.
Most of the time, rolling the dice should mean an opportunity for some-
thing cool. Some of the monsters’ powers have the player roll to try to
avoid something bad, but with no possibility of getting something good.
Otherwise, though, you should keep those kinds of rolls, eh, kind of rare.
When you do call for a badness-only roll, there are a couple of fun and
interesting ways to handle it. You can require 5 or 6 hits, and if the player
falls short, each hit short becomes some kind of badness: a penalty, a
bonus to the enemy, an addition to the hit requirement of the next roll,
lost time, or whatever makes sense to you. You can instead require no
hits, but impose this roll’s hits as a cap to next roll’s: if the player gets
3 hits on this roll, she throws away any hits over 3 she gets on her next
roll.
Example 1: This is back when Meg, Elliot and Sebastian’s characters have
been ambushed by the wolfwalkers and have just managed to escape from
the battle.
• 56 • Rules • Rolling the Dice
“This is bad, they’re just going to jump on us again,” Meg says. “We need
a safe place.”
“Sure, a cave under a big rock, it looked like it opened up inside,” I say.
I’m just making this up, but it goes perfectly well with how I’ve described
the landscape, so it’s all good.
“You’re going to have to really book it if you want to get there before those
things catch you,” I say. “Let’s call it Strength rolls all around, you need
2 hits each.”
“Got it,” Meg says. “Got it,” Elliot says. They both look at Sebastian, who’s
shaking his three dice in his hand, looking unhappy. (But you already know
he got it, since I already told you about them in the cave.)
Example 2: This is in the cave, after they’ve managed to get their fire lit
so they have a moment to collect themselves.
“Oh hey, I just remembered,” Elliot says. “Did you get hurt?”
“Just 3 damage,” Meg says.
“I’d rather save it,” Sebastian says. “You have a healer’s kit, right? How
does that work?”
“Make a skill roll, add two dice for the kit,” I say. I make up a line of
checkboxes:
“So I’d need 6 hits to heal all 3?” Elliot rolls his skill +2 for the gear, 8 dice
total, and I’ll be, he gets 6 hits.
“Ha!” he says.
(If you like, you can use that same line of checkboxes for
nonmagical healing in your game, or you can make up your own.
Choose case by case, to suit the circumstances.)
Example 3: They decide that the way to get out of the cave without the
wolfwalkers attacking them is to dig and squeeze through its very narrow
back opening. “Great!” I say. “Endurance rolls for everyone!” I draw a line
of checkboxes. “Who’s first?”
Do they hear you? (no hits: yes they do) □ skill roll vs 3 □ skill roll vs 2
□ skill roll vs 1 □ no they don’t
Elliot goes first. He gets 4 hits on his endurance roll, so he doesn’t have
to make a skill roll.
Meg next. She gets 2 hits on her endurance roll, so she has to make a skill
roll and get 2 hits on it or they’ll hear. She gets 3 hits on her skill roll.
Joining Battle
GM, it’s your job to say what the battlefield is like, tactically speaking,
where everyone is in it. Answer the players’ questions, and remember
your discipline. Make the battlefield tactically interesting, don’t just favor
your monsters all the time.
Tactical features are usually physical things, landmarks, like who’s behind
a wall, who has to fight uphill, who’s flanking whom, who’s up in a tree,
who’s well back behind the break raining arrows in. They can be intangible,
though: is one side well-rested with full bellies, and the other exhausted
and hungry? Is one side well-armed and disciplined and the other a rabble
with sticks and rocks? Those are tactical features of the battlefield.
Read the example battles that follow to see how this works.
Players, it’s your job to say what your characters do in the moments before
the battle joins. You can also ask the GM about the tactical features she’s
mentioned, of course.
After battle joins, it plays out in rounds. Some battles last only a single
round, some last several. Few should last five rounds or more, but
occasionally one will.
A Round
Each round of battle has 5 steps:
1. Declare yourself
• 58 • Rules • Battle
5. Regather yourself.
GM, for each of your monsters, say who it’s attacking. If it has a special
move, say also who it’s making its special move upon.
ĀȀ̀ЀԀࠀ܀ *Ȁ̀+ༀᨀ᐀
$̀܀ഀԀȀȀȀ ऀ̀܀ȀȀȀ
&ᔀᔀ,
Ḁᨀᄀကᨀ᐀ᄀ ఀഀༀԀ̀ഀ̀ༀကഀᄀԀ
ఀഀༀԀሀ̀Ā̀ጀ᐀̀ऀ܀ጀᔀ܀Ԁ
-ԀᴀԀ᐀ᜀሀ̀ἀကᨀԀ̀%̀ጀᔀ܀Ԁ +ༀ"ሀ̀ἀကᨀԀ̀%̀ഀԀᜀ +ༀᨀ᐀ሀ̀ἀကᨀԀ̀%̀ᄀഀԀԀ᐀
ᘀကഀᄀԀሀ̀Ā̀ጀ᐀̀ऀ܀ഀԀᜀ
ЀࠀԀᔀᔀༀऀᨀ᐀ᄀ ᠀̀ഀ̀᠀ +ༀ"̀ᜀᰀᄀԀ̀.̀܀ഀ̀ༀ"̀᠀̀ကԀᨀഀ̀ᜀԀᴀԀ᐀ᜀ
ऀ̀܀ȀȀȀ ᤀᨀᬀԀ̀ഀᜀԀഀऀ
ЀԀ̀ࠀ܀ഀᔀᔀሀ̀ༀᰀᰀ᐀ᜀ +ༀᨀ᐀̀ऀ܀ༀༀԀऀऀ̀.̀܀ഀ̀ༀᨀ᐀̀/̀ကԀᨀഀ̀ༀ"
ကᨀऀሀ̀ጀ᐀̀ऀ܀ഀԀᜀ̀ഀ̀ጀᔀ܀Ԁ
ᤀကԀഀ̀ᜀᨀༀԀ ᴀഀ̀܀ഀ̀ᔀᔀᨀԀऀ
ᤀഀԀԀ᐀ሀ̀ഀༀ᐀Ԁ̀
%̀ऀࠀԀᔀᔀጀ" ᠀̀ഀ̀᠀
ఀᔀ܀Ԁሀ̀ഀᰀഀ Ḁᨀᄀက̀ἀကᨀᔀԀ̀̀
ЀԀ̀ࠀ܀ഀᔀᔀሀ̀ࠀԀഀༀԀࠀᨀ᐀
ကᨀऀሀ̀ጀ᐀̀ऀ܀ᄀഀԀԀ᐀ 0Ȁ̀Ḁᔀᔀἀࠀ܀
#ကԀഀ ᠀̀ഀ̀᠀ $܀ȀȀȀ ऀȀȀȀ
ऀ̀܀ȀȀȀ !ऀԀ̀ༀᨀༀᔀ $̀܀"Ԁ̀ᜀᰀᄀԀ
ᤀ̀ကᨀ
ༀ᐀ऀഀᨀ᐀ऀ 1᐀ᜀ܀ഀ᐀ༀԀ̀ഀᔀᔀ̀ᨀᴀ̀ഀԀ2܀ᨀഀԀᜀ
ᤀကԀഀ̀ᜀᨀༀԀ ЀԀ̀ࠀ܀ഀᔀᔀሀ̀ऀ"ᨀᔀᔀ
ကᨀऀሀ̀ጀ᐀̀ऀ܀ഀԀᜀ̀ഀ̀ጀᔀ܀Ԁ
ᤀഀԀԀ᐀ሀ̀ऀ%̀ᔀ
ഀ̀ऀࠀԀༀᨀᔀ ऀȀȀȀ
&Ԁᜀሀ̀ἀԀࠀ᐀
ఀᔀ܀Ԁሀ̀ഀᰀഀ ᘀऀ̀̀ऀࠀԀᔀᔀ 4̀"Ԁऀ̀ԀᴀᴀԀༀ
᐀ᜀ̀ကԀ᐀ȀȀȀ ЀࠀԀ᐀ᜀ̀܀ഀ̀ကᨀ̀ऀ᐀̀ᨀ
1᐀ༀ̀ᨀ̀ऀԀᴀᴀԀༀ
Ѐ܀ༀ"ᨀ᐀ᄀ̀ᨀࠀ܀̀ ᤀကԀഀ̀ᜀᨀༀԀ
'ကᨀԀሀ̀ऀഀԀ᐀ᄀက ऀȀȀȀ
ऀ̀܀ȀȀȀ &Ԁᜀሀ̀ἀԀࠀ᐀̀%̀ጀ᐀ऀ܀
ఀᔀ܀Ԁሀ̀ഀᰀഀ̀%̀ጀ᐀ऀ܀ 3ᬀԀ̀̀ᴀᔀᔀἀࠀ܀ 4̀ကࠀࠀԀ᐀ऀ
Ѐ܀ༀ"̀ᨀࠀ܀̀ ᤀഀԀԀ᐀̀(ᨀᴀ̀᐀)ሀ
ᔀ̀%̀ጀ᐀ऀ܀
᐀ᜀ̀ကԀ᐀ȀȀȀ
ᤀကԀഀ̀ᜀᨀༀԀ
Ѐഀᰀᨀ᐀ᄀ
ЀᰀԀ̀ऀ̀ᴀഀ
̀ᴀᨀᄀကᨀ᐀ᄀ̀(᐀̀ጀ᐀ऀ܀Ԁऀ);̀
ऀࠀԀᔀᔀༀऀᨀ᐀ᄀ;̀ഀ̀ကԀഀ 5Ȁ̀Ѐᨀᔀᔀ̀ᴀᨀᄀကᨀ᐀ᄀ6
$̀܀ഀԀȀȀȀ
Ѐᨀᔀᔀ̀ᴀᨀᄀကᨀ᐀ᄀ
ऀ̀܀ȀȀȀ
ᤀ̀᐀̀̀ကԀ̀᐀Ԁ7̀ഀ܀᐀ᜀ
ကԀ 'ᨀ9ഀᜀ8ऀ
ऀ̀܀ȀȀȀ :ἀԀഀ
#̀܀ᴀ̀ကԀ̀ᴀᨀᄀက -᐀8̀ᄀ̀᐀̀̀ကԀ̀᐀Ԁ7̀ഀ܀᐀ᜀ ఀᔀԀ̀Ḁᔀἀ
There’s no order to this step, and nobody’s required to commit before they
know what everyone else intends. In his game Sorcerer, Ron Edwards
calls this “free and clear,” so I’ll do the same. Declare your character’s
intentions, and you’re free to revise them if someone else says something
that demands it. You do have to commit! Once you go on to step 2, you
can’t revise your character’s intentions anymore. No fair waiting to see
how well the monsters roll to decide which you’ll attack.
Some monsters and characters have abilities that affect what happens in
setup. Be sure to apply them. When an ability contradicts the basic rules
here, follow the ability.
Start by taking white dice equal to your strength. Add red dice for your
weapon and blue dice for your armor (your weapon and armor should
already say how many of each). These dice are your hand.
Red dice are for your attack, blue dice are for your defense, and white
dice, for fighting overall, contribute to both. You might also roll some
green dice, if you’re making a special move as well as fighting.
Do you want your character to just plain fight? Great! You get to
Plain •
or shout out warnings? Great! You’ll take some red, blue, or green
dice and pass them to the other players, to reflect the advantage of your
character’s action. To find out how many dice you can pass out, roll your
command. Each hit lets you pass out one die. You choose which color
– red, blue, or green – and you choose which player to pass it to. That
player adds it to her hand.
• 60 • Rules • Battle
else? Great! Make a perception roll – it’s a perception roll because your
character needs to pay close attention, needs to avoid getting distracted
by the plain business of fighting. Each hit lets you add one green die to
your hand. Green dice are for the success of your special move.
Tactical Features •
features? Great! Make a skill roll. Tell the GM what your character’s doing
and how many hits.
GM, it’s your job to take the character’s action and the player’s skill hits
and interpret them into dice to put in the player’s hand. Here are your
options:
If it would let the character make a move she couldn’t normally, the
player’s hits now cap her roll in step 3.
If it would take away an action someone else would normally get, the
player’s hits now directly reduce theirs in step 3.
If it would give the character a general advantage, the player’s hits add
red or blue dice (whichever’s appropriate) to her hand, one for one.
Take green dice equal to your arcane. Add more green dice for your
spellbook, if any, and add blue dice for your armor, if any.
You get no white dice and no red dice. The blue dice are for your defense,
• 61 • Rules • Battle
and the green dice are for your special move, which is to cast the spell.
If for some reason you need to make a roll in setup, you can. The outcome
might prevent you from casting your spell, but the mere fact of making
the roll doesn’t.
something else
Take green dice equal to your appropriate stat – the GM will tell you which
stat. Add more green dice for any appropriate tool your character’s using.
Add red dice for your weapon, if your character can hold a weapon while
doing what she’s doing, and blue dice for your armor, if any.
You get no white dice. The red dice are for any opportunistic attacks your
character might be able to make. The blue dice are for your defense, and
the green dice are for your special move.
If for some reason you need to make a roll in setup, you can. The outcome
might prevent you from making your special move, but the mere fact of
making the roll doesn’t.
GM, use the same standards for deciding which stat that you use when-
ever you call for a roll:
Arcane for knowledge, intuition, memory, philosophy, magic;
Command for willpower, presence, strength of character, determination,
self-possessedness;
Endurance for stamina, resiliance, shrugging off injury, hunger, pain or
discomfort;
Perception for alertness, awareness, insight, reading people;
Skill for training, talent, manual dexterity, using tools well; or
Strength for raw physical power.
And use the same standards for giving dice for a tool, too: if it’s what the
tool’s for, usually two dice; otherwise, usually one die.
If you’re the GM
You’re the GM •
GM, you don’t have to make any decisions or any rolls for your monsters.
Just gather up the dice listed on your monster sheets, white, red, blue
and green. Make an individual pile for each monster, so you can roll them
separately.
Gather ‘em quick and step in to help any player who needs it.
Once a player’s gathered up her hand of dice, adjust them for the tactical
features of the battlefield. Do no make up any tactical features now. Go
strictly by the ones you’ve already described. It’s perfectly fine to have
entire battles where you don’t give anyone any tactical feature dice, when
nobody takes advantage of the tactical features you’ve described.
Pass by any players who have just made skill rolls to have their characters
manipulate the tactical features of the battlefield, too. They already have
their tactical feature dice.
Generally give two dice, except when you’ve already established that this
particular tactical feature is worth one or three. Never give more than
four.
Step 3
If someone has multiple tactical advantages, go ahead and add them up,
but to a maximum of three red dice and three blue dice.
Everybody rolls! It’s like thunder, that many dice hitting the table all at
once. I love it.
Go through your dice. Discard all the 1s, 2s and 3s, as usual. Group your
dice by color. White dice at the center, red dice to one side, blue dice to
another side, green dice to a third side.
Your attack equals all your white hits plus all your red hits.
Your effort equals all your white hits plus all your green hits.
If you don’t have any hits of a particular color, that’s fine, just count 0 for
that color. Most notably, if your character isn’t fighting, you don’t have
any white hits, so you’re relying on your blue, green, and possibly red dice
exclusively.
If your attack beats your target’s defend, your character hits her target,
Damage, Success •
For each incoming attack, if your defend beats your attacker’s attack
against you, your character’s attacker can’t land a good blow and deals
0 damage.
If your effort beats the highest attack against you, your character
accomplishes her special move, with success equal to the difference.
If your attack beats your target’s effort, your character stops her target
from accomplishing a special move, giving your target 0 success.
If you’re trying to compare your numbers and there’s nobody who rolled
against you in the relevant way, just compare your number against 0. If
you’re making a special move and nobody’s attacking you, for instance,
compare your effort against 0. Your success equals your effort minus 0.
You follow? To deal damage, roll better attack (white + red) than your
target’s defend (white + blue). So to avoid damage, roll better defend
(white + blue) than your attacker’s attack (white + red). To make a
special move, roll better effort (white + green) than the highest attack
against you (white + red). So to stop someone’s special move, roll better
attack against them (white + red) than their effort (white + green).
The purpose of all these colored dice and the what-beats-what
is to make every combination of outcomes possible. Inflicting
damage, avoiding damage, accomplishing a special move,
preventing another from accomplishing a special move – each
time you roll, you might do all four, none of the four, or any
combination inbetween.
• 63 • Rules • Battle
Once everybody’s sorted, counted, and compared their dice, go on
to step 4, followthrough.
GM, it’s your job to say what happes between the characters and
monsters.
Damage •
Everyone who took damage, mark damage checkboxes on your character
sheet. Left to right, starting in the “still fighting” row; once the “still
fighting” row is all marked, go on to the “endurance roll” row.
If your character’s out of the fight, the GM can’t do her any more harm.
However, the GM is allowed to have her come to, later, in a place and
under circumstances entirely of the GM’s choosing. Your only protection is
the other players: if their characters are able to take yours with them, or
stay with yours, then she’ll eventually come to and be with them.
GM, your monsters don’t have “still fighting” and “endurance roll” rows,
just checkboxes. When you check the last checkbox, the monster’s
defeated for good. You can choose whether it’s killed, disabled, driven off,
or what, but no matter what you choose, it can no longer be any kind of
threat to the players. It’s all done.
Special Moves
Special Moves •
Spellcasting
Spellcasting •
If your character’s casting a spell, now is when it happens. Follow the usual
rules for spellcasting in the next chapter, except that instead of spending
your hits on the spell’s effect, you get to spend only your success – your
green hits minus the highest attack against you.
5, regather yourself.
The players’ characters don’t have to kill all the monsters dead to win the
fight. All they have to do is deal with the monsters successfully, so they
won’t be a problem again in the future. That might mean killing them, of
course, but it might mean driving them off, trapping them somewhere
safe, seizing command of them, or anything else.
If the monsters win and the characters run away or all get killed, then the
monsters remain a problem and the players get no XP.
An Example Battle
Remember the game I’m running for my friends Meg, Elliot and Sebastian?
Let’s go back and see that ambush.
I’ll use the players’ names exclusively here in the example. In real play,
whenever I address myself directly to a player’s character, I use the
character’s name, and whenever I’m talking about real-world things like
character sheets and dice, I use the player’s.
“The wolfwalkers’ tracks are getting clearer, you’re quite close to them
now. You’re picking your way down along a rocky, jumbled place where a
river used to run, and everybody make a perception roll!”
“Well you didn’t exactly catch them. More like they’re jumping down on
you from the rocks above.” I go straight into declaring myself: “One’s
attacking each of you. The one on you, Meg, gets 4 extra red dice because
of your perception roll.”
“I’m going to lunge and grab the one on him, haul it off of him,” Meg says.
“Can I do that?”
“I need to get out of this while Meg’s distracting it. I’ll try to get up onto
the rocks?”
“No problem. You’re going to, like, defend yourself while you’re with-
• 65 • Rules • Battle
drawing? Or just drop your weapons and run?”
“Makes sense. Make a perception roll, take the hits as green dice.”
“I’m going to watch them carefully while I fight,” Elliot says, “maybe learn
something?”
“Cool,” I say. “Make a perception roll, take the hits as green dice.”
Meg gets 3 hits on her skill roll, so the wolfwalker attacking Sebastian’s
character will lose 3 from its attack. Elliot gets 3 hits on his perception
roll too, so he grabs three green dice. Sebastian gets 4 hits on his, so he
grabs 4 green dice.
We fill up our hands.
Meg: 6 white, 3 red, 3 blue.
Elliot: 6 white, 2 red, 3 blue, 3 green.
Sebastian: 3 white, 1 red, 2 blue, 4 green.
Meg’s got 4 white hits, 2 red hits, and 2 blue hits. Her attack is 6 and her
defend is 6.
Elliot’s got 3 white hits, no red hits, and 3 blue hits, 1 green hit. His attack
is 3, his defend is 6, and his effort is 4.
Sebastian’s got 3 white hits, 1 red hit, 1 blue hit, and 3 green hits. His
attack is 4, his defend is 4, and his effort is 6.
For the wolfwalker attacking Meg’s character, I’ve got 4 white hits and 4
red hits. Its attack is 8 and its defend is 4.
For the wolfwalker attacking Elliot’s character, I’ve got 4 white hits and no
red hits. Its attack is 4 and its defend is 4.
For the wolfwalker attacking Sebastian’s character, I’ve got 3 white hits
and 3 red hits. Its attack would be 6, but Meg’s character’s interference
brings it down to 3, and its defend is 3.
“No blue dice for them, huh?” Meg says. “This shouldn’t be so bad.”
I decide to start action with my highest attack. “The one you’re ignoring,
Meg? It tears into you with teeth and claws. You take 2 damage.” (Here’s a
place where in real play I’d’ve used Meg’s character’s name, not Meg’s.)
“You hit it. You get a solid chop right into its back. It doesn’t seem to
care. Sebastian, you hit it too – it was attacking you, now it’s much more
• 66 • Rules • Battle
interested in Meg – anyway you hit it too but same thing. No blood, no
pain, no damage. You manage easily to get out of the fighting and up
onto one of the big rocks, though.” (Here’s another place I’d use the
characters’ names.)
Elliot’s been comparing the remaining dice for himself. “Looks like I’m a
draw,” he says.
“Yep,” I say. “You keep it off you but you can’t land a blow – not that
it would care – and you’re too busy fighting to notice anything but the
obvious.”
“A fighting retreat would mean a perception roll for green dice,” I say.
“You can just cut and run if you want, but you’d probably roll fewer dice
anyway and they’d mostly be green. And, like, there are two of them on
you, Meg, and one on you, Elliot, and I’m sure they’d be plain delighted if
you rolled mostly green dice.”
“I can cover you out,” Sebastian says. “Let’s see. How badly would I be
misusing Shelter of Vines to cast it around those things to keep them
in?”
“Sounds good to me,” I say. “If Meg and Elliot both successfully withdraw,
you can cast it inside out around the wolfwalkers like that. Oh by the
way, you get 2 blue dice for the tactical advantage of being up above the
fighting.”
“Great!”
Meg nails her perception roll for 4 hits, so she grabs four green dice. Elliot
gets 3 hits on his perception, so he grabs three.
We fill up our hands.
Meg’s got 3 white hits, no red hits, 1 blue hit, and 3 green hits. Her attack
is 3, her defend is 4, and her effort is 6.
• 67 • Rules • Battle
Elliot’s got 6 white hits, no red hits, 2 blue hits, and 1 green hit. His attack
is 6, his defend is 8, and his effort is 7. (He points to his dice, beaming.)
Sebastian’s got 2 blue hits and 3 green hits. His defend is 2 and his effort
– his spellcasting – is 3.
For the first wolfwalker attacking Meg’s character, I’ve got 4 white hits
and 1 red hit. Its attack is 5 and its defend is 4.
For the second wolfwalker attacking Meg’s character, I’ve got 2 white hits
and 2 red hits. Its attack is 4 and its defend is 2.
For the wolfwalker attacking Elliot’s character, I’ve got 5 white hits and 1
red hit. Its attack is 6 and its defend is 5.
Meg’s attacking 3 (attack) to 4 (defend), defending 4 (defend) to 5
(attack) and 4 (defend) to 4 (attack), and making her retreat 6 (effort) to
5 (highest incoming attack).
Sebastian’s not attacking or defending, but he’s casting his spell 3 (effort)
to 0 (highest incoming attack).
“Yep,” I say. “Meg, one of the two attacking you gets in a swipe with its
claws for 1 damage, but you both manage to put some space between you
and them. Sebastian, how’s that spell?”
“Well,” he says, “it’s okay, I think. I’m going to make the miscast roll -”
he rolls a 5, no miscast, and sighs relief. “That’s good. I’ll put one hit in
duration, so the shelter will last an hour – otherwise it lasts no time – and
two hits in protection, so it’ll hinder them. It says they get -2 white dice,
but I hope it gives us a chance to escape instead?”
“You have about one minute,” I say. “They’re tearing at the vines to get
out. Oh and by the way nobody gets any XP for this.”
“This is bad, they’re just going to jump on us again,” Meg says. “We need
a safe place.”
“Battling” Terrain
Traversing hostile terrain uses the same basic battle rules as fighting
monsters. For the GM, the exact same rules: the GM creates the terrain
as a monster. It gets 5 white dice by default, and it gets to attack, defend,
and make special moves, same as any monster does.
For the players, if you declare in step 1 that your character’s fighting to
cross the terrain:
In setup: When you gather dice into your hand, don’t necessarily take
white dice for your strength. Instead, the GM will tell you what stat will
give you your white dice: strength to hack through vines, endurance to
cross vast dunes or swim through a tunnel underwater, skill to go along a
narrow slippery ledge, perception to navigate a maze, etc.
Furthermore, you get red dice from maps or gear, if any applies, not from
• 68 • Rules • Battle
your weapons. You still get blue dice from your armor.
Now, when you damage terrain, you get to choose which of its traversal
checkboxes to mark: individual traversal, which represent your own
character’s progress alone, or group traversal, which represent your
entire group’s progress together. GM, track individual traversal separately
for each character who needs it.
If you mark all of its individual traversal checkboxes for your character,
your own character’s through it. The terrain monster stays in the fight
against the other characters, but can no longer attack or do special moves
against yours. The other characters will have to get through it too before
it’s really done.
If you mark all of its group traversal checkboxes, or if every player marks
her full set of individual traversal checkboxes, the entire group is through
it and it’s well and truly defeated. It’s out of the fight for good. The group
can cross it again in the future with no battle, and everybody gets XP.
Otherwise, a terrain monster hits you if its attack beats your defend, and
it does its special move on you if its effort beats your attack, no different
from any other monster.
“Traversing the forest calls for perception,” I say, “so that’s what you’ll roll.
But also you’re going to have to make skill rolls to keep quiet; otherwise
the guardians will be able to find and attack you. I mean, if you don’t want
them to find and attack you, that is. You in?”
They’re in.
In the real world, I very rarely put my players’ characters up
against terrain with no attack abilities. Almost all the time, I
give my terrain attacks, or else pair it with other monsters
with attacks. Encounters where the monsters can’t hurt the
characters, only stymie them over and over, can really suck the
energy out of a session.
“All right. You make your way down into the woods. They’re tangled,
wet, mucky, with rattling dead cane and hanging willows. Silent, except
the occasional calls of the wolfwalkers, even the river sounds like it’s
creaking, not burbling. Almost at once it’s trackless, with just gray mist
rising up between the trunks and cane. You’re helping each other through,
right? Who’s leading?”
“Great. The woods are attacking all of you. It’s not like an attack, it’s just
the stinging cane and the mud and the tripping roots and the thorns and
so on – it does no damage but will count against your attempts to stay • 69 • Rules • Battle
quiet. Anyhow, setup?”
“We can hear the river, right?” Elliot says. “Let’s follow the sound until we
reach it, try not to get turned around.”
“That’s a skill roll to take advantage of a tactical feature, for red dice?”
“If I cast a guiding shadow, will that give me red dice?” Sebastian asks.
“I’ll charge,” she says. “That just means that I’m focusing on getting
through, right? I’m not literally charging through the woods.”
“Right,” I say.
We roll, sort, and count up our dice. Bad rolls all around!
Meg’s got 1 white hit, no red hits, and 2 blue hits. Her attack is 1 and her
defend is 3.
Elliot’s got 2 white hits, 1 red hit, and 2 blue hits. His attack is 3 and his
defend is 4.
Sebastian’s got no white or red hits, 1 blue hit, and 1 green hit. His attack
is 0, his defend is 1 and his spellcasting is 1.
Fortunately for them, I’ve got no white hits, 1 red hit against Elliot only,
and 1 blue hit. My attacks are 0, 1 and 0, and my defend is 1.
“Wow, terrible,” I say. “Okay. Elliot, you’re able to lead them into the
woods down toward the river. The mist makes the going treacherous but
you make some progress. 2 progress, to be precise – 6 will bring you to
the river, and you need 12 all told. Sebastian, the spell?”
“Not great,” he says. “I’ll make the miscast roll -” he rolls a 4. “Well,
okay,” he says. “The spell goes off next round, not this round. I’ve got 1
checkbox is all.”
“Fair enough,” I say. “Now, skill rolls to stay quiet while you go. You need
• 70 • Rules • Battle
more hits than the woods’ non-damage damage, so that means you each
need at least 1 hit.”
Meg gets 2, Elliot gets 3, and Sebastian gets 1. Good enough! “The calls
of the wolfwalkers doesn’t change. They don’t realize you’re here,” I say.
“Round 2!”
“We’re still following the sound of the river,” Elliot says. “Do I roll again?”
“Nope,” I say. “Now that it’s an established tactical feature, it’s worth 2
red dice to you, no roll required.”
I consider this. “Sure,” I say. “You’re all using it, you all benefit.”
“I’m going to brace,” Sebastian says. “I don’t want to mess up that skill
roll.”
Meg: 4 white, 3 red, 3 blue.
Elliot: 6 white, 3 red, 3 blue.
Sebastian: 4 white, 3 red, 3 blue.
Meg’s got 1 white hit, 2 red hits, and 2 blue hits. Her attack is 3 and her
defend is 3.
Elliot’s got 4 white hits, 1 red hit, and 1 blue hit. His attack is 5 and his
defend is 5.
Sebastian’s got 3 white hits, 2 red hits, and 1 blue hit. His attack is 5 and
his defend is 4.
I’ve got 1 white hit, 1 red hit against Elliot and 1 against Sebastian, and 1
blue hit. My attacks are 1, 2 and 2, and my defend is 2.
“You make it to the river,” I say, “and follow it downstream.” I mark off 7
more group traversal checkboxes – there are only 3 left. “The trees are
getting older, they’re old, big brittle willows and half-submerged oaks. The
barks and howls of the wolfwalkers are loud and clear down here – make
those skill rolls. I still can’t catch a break so you still need only 1 hit.”
“Round 3,” I say. “Oh and Sebastian your spell goes off.”
“Yes. It’s like a crow, the shadow of a bird, cast on the mist by no light. It
tips its head at you like ‘where?’” • 71 • Rules • Battle
“Cool,” he says. “Lead us to the wolfwalkers’ hearts.”
“You aren’t following the sound of the river anymore so no 2 red for that.
Sebastian, you get 2 red for the guiding shadow. What’s your setup?”
Elliot’s got 4 white hits, 1 red hit, and no blue hits. His attack is 5 and his
defend is 4.
Sebastian’s got 4 white hits, 2 red hits, and no blue hits. His attack is 6
and his defend is 4.
I’ve got 3 white hits, 1 red hit against Meg and 1 against Elliot, and no blue
hits. My attacks are 4, 4 and 3, and my defend is 4.
I mark off the last 3 group traversal checkboxes. “The shadow flies low
to the ground into a ghostly grove of dead trees, all cracked open and
whispering. The guardian wolfwalkers are so close by that you can hear
them breathing when they aren’t calling – they must be right outside the
grove. Skill rolls. Meg, you need 2 hits, because the woods’ attack beat
your defend by 1.” I cross my fingers, and Meg rolls only 1 hit. Elliot rolls
1, and Sebastian rolls 2.
“Oh, yes,” I say. But I don’t say it for the reason they think! I say it
because I know something about the guardian wolfwalkers that they don’t
know – but that Sebastian’s about to guess...
• 72 • Rules • Battle
• Such arms as they might
bear in the Horsehall •
• The Adventure of
the Wolfwalkers •
• 73 • Rules • Battle
• Rules •
• Spellcasting •
When your character casts a spell, roll your arcane (plus a spellbook, if
you have one) and spend your hits on the spell’s effect.
For instance, let’s say that you get 3 hits on your roll to cast Luck for
Warriors:
Luck for Warriors
The household. Medium: luck; effect: advantage (red
and/or blue dice).
Range: self; timing: per round.
□ _ _ _ no miscast
Advantage: □ □ □ +2red
Advantage: □ □ □ +2blue
When you cast the spell, assign your advantage hits to
+2red or +2blue. Thereafter, in battle, each round spend
one – exactly one – of your advantage hits to add 2 red
or 2 blue dice to your roll. The spell ends when you’ve
spent them all.
Because you got 3 hits, you get to mark 3 of those boxes. You might mark
the “no miscast” box – if you don’t, you have to roll for a miscast. You
might mark some “+2red” boxes – each one you mark gives you 2 red dice
in your next battle. And you might mark some “+2blue” boxes – each one
you mark gives you 2 blue dice in your next battle.
So let’s say that you play it safe. You mark the “no miscast” box, one
“+2red” box, and one “+2blue” box. You don’t have to roll for a miscast,
and you get 2 red and 2 blue dice in your next battle.
For another example, let’s say that you get 2 hits on your roll to cast
Shelter of Vines:
Shelter of Vines
• 74 • Rules • Spellcasting
When you mark boxes in a line, always start from the left and go right-
ward. Thus, to mark the “within sight” box and have the lightning reach
your distant enemy, you’ll have to spend 2 of your hits on range: 1 for the
“an arrow’s flight” box and a second for the “within sight” box.
This leaves you 2 of your hits to mark in the “damage” boxes, to harm
your enemy.
So, after you’ve cast Luck for Warriors once, it looks like this:
Luck for Warriors
The household. Medium: luck; effect: advantage (red
• 75 • Rules • Spellcasting
and/or blue dice).
Range: self; timing: per round.
□ □ _ _ no miscast
Advantage: □ □ □ +2red
Advantage: □ □ □ +2blue
When you cast the spell, assign your advantage hits to
+2red or +2blue. Thereafter, in battle, each round spend
one – exactly one – of your advantage hits to add 2 red
or 2 blue dice to your roll. The spell ends when you’ve
spent them all.
And if you cast it a second time, change it to look like this:
Luck for Warriors
The household. Medium: luck; effect: advantage (red
and/or blue dice).
Range: self; timing: per round.
□ □ □ _ no miscast
Advantage: □ □ □ +2red
Advantage: □ □ □ +2blue
When you cast the spell, assign your advantage hits to
+2red or +2blue. Thereafter, in battle, each round spend
one – exactly one – of your advantage hits to add 2 red
or 2 blue dice to your roll. The spell ends when you’ve
spent them all.
When you cast a spell, you have to make a miscast roll for each “no
miscast” box that you leave unchecked, and you suffer the consequences
of each. Now you have the potential to make up to 3 rolls on the miscast
table.
For instance, suppose your character’s cast Bath of Healing Light twice
already in this adventure. She casts it again and you get only 2 hits on
your roll:
Bath of healing light
The household. Medium: light; effect: healing
Range: nearby; subjects: variable.
□ □ □ _ no miscast
Healing: □ □ □ □ □ □ damage
Each hit in healing heals 1 damage from 1 target. Divvy
out the healing as you choose.
Only 2 hits!
Well let’s make it easy: your two fellow players’ characters each need
1 damage healed to stay in the fight. So you spend your 2 hits there: 1
damage healed for friend number one, 1 damage healed for friend number
two. You leave all 3 “no miscast” boxes unchecked, so you have to roll 3
times on the miscast table. You roll ... a 5, a 2, a 5.
Look them up on the miscast table: the 2 drains 1 from your arcane until
• 76 • Rules • Spellcasting
the end of the adventure, but the two 5s do you no harm. Whew! That
could have gone worse.
Miscasting a spell
Miscasting in battle
Roll a die:
5-6: No miscast.
4: The spell goes off in followthrough next round, not this round, but
you can do other stuff next round.
3: The spell will take two full rounds to cast. If you want to do some-
thing else next round, you’ll have to abandon the spell.
2: Casting the spell drains 1 from your arcane until the end of the
adventure.
1: The spell hits you for 1 damage, in addition to its effects.
Miscasting outside of battle
Roll a die:
5-6: No miscast
4: The spell will hang uncast in the air around you for fifteen minutes or
so, then go off.
3: The spell will require you an hour’s solid effort to cast. If anything
interrupts you for more than a minute or two, you’ll have to abandon the
spell.
2: Casting the spell drains 1 from your arcane until the end of the
adventure.
1: The spell hits you for 1 damage, in addition to its effects.
If you abandon the spell, you still have to add a “no miscast” box for this
casting.
At the end of the adventure, erase all of the “no miscast” boxes you’ve
added to your spells, leaving only the first one each.
• 77 • Rules • Spellcasting
• Rules •
• Characters Over Time •
Characters are dynamic. As you play, your characters will develop and
improve, and you’ll get to create and play new characters as well. Here’s
how.
Healing
Pretty much as soon as your characters start taking damage, you’re going
to want to find ways to heal them. There are a variety of ways: magic, like
the Bath of Healing Light spell; first aid using a skill roll, like the example
in the earlier chapter; submitting to the care of a healer; time. Here are
how these latter work.
Between adventures, suppose that your character has time to rest and
recover, and the support and care of her home town, including its healers.
Clear all of your damage checkboxes.
However, if during the adventure you took damage in even one single
“endurance roll” checkbox, that means that your character suffered
a significant wound with lasting harm. Your character must skip one
session’s play in order to recover. Create a new character. If you already
have more than one character, you can choose another characters to play
instead, if you want.
In the middle of an adventure, if your character has time and access to
a healer’s care, you can have her clear some of your character’s damage.
Make an endurance roll. Submitting to the healer’s care lets you clear as
many damage checkboxes as the hits you roll. Clear them in reverse order
• 78 • Rules • Characters Over Time
In-town Sessions
Every few sessions it’s fun to have a session without an adventure, just to
develop the town, its people, and their relationships. GM, be sure to give
every PC some spotlight time, alone or in groups.
These sessions are worth XP too. You get 1 XP for your character if you
have her:
• Pursue some personal interest or ambition;
• Work for the material good or defense of the town;
• Explore some new region near the town; or
• Have personal conversations with some people close to her.
But these sessions aren’t worth any treasure or group XP.
Multiple Characters
If you have more than one character, you get to choose which character to
play, adventure to adventure. After the GM has introduced the adventure
by showing you the problems it’s causing for the town, choose which
character you’re going to play.
If one of your characters is sitting the session out to recover from serious
wounds, don’t choose her, of course.
For in-town sessions, don’t choose one character. You’ll get to play each of
your characters for a scene or two (except the ones sitting out to recover,
as always).
Treasure
There are two kinds of treasure here at level 1. The first kind is minor
treasure. Minor treasure is simple money, trinkets, trade goods, useful
gear, the familiar kinds of things that come and go from everyone’s lives.
Minor treasure is measured in 1s – the GM might say “there’s a gorgeous
beaten silver horn worth 3 treasure,” for instance, or “they’re just cut
glass, pretty as they are, worth 1 treasure the sackful at best.”
As a group, you can spend your minor treasure on whatever you need.
1 treasure will buy anything from any of the standard lists, when it’s
The GM will create the substantial treasures your group gets. GM, you’ll
find the rules for this in the Creating More chapter.
Experience
When your character fights a monster, you get XP, experience points.
Keep track of them on your character sheet. Make simple marks in the
boxes to show the XP you gain, then completely fill in the boxes to show
the XP you’ve spent.
Spending XP
Spend 1 XP to buy something from the standard lists: arms, gear,
maps, spells, people. On your character sheet, just mark that you’ve
spent the experience point and add the thing.
Spend 5 XP to increase a stat base by 1 – the number on the line,
not the number in the box! You improve your stats by improving your
stat bases:
Stat base 1 = Stat 3
Stat base 2-3 = Stat 4
Stat base 4-5 = Stat 5
Stat base 6 = Stat 6
If you have a stat base of 6, you can spend 15 XP to make that stat
heroic. Now the stat base is H and the stat is 7.
Spend 5 XP to buy a stat ability. To buy a stat ability, though, your stat
base for that stat has to be at least 5.
Stat Abilities
Arcane Abilities
Alignment (plus learn 1 domain)
Creating Spells (plus learn 1 domain)
Combat Magic (plus learn 1 domain)
Learning Domains (learn 2 domains).
Command Abilities
Initiation
Iron Intention
Tactician
Daunting presence
Endurance Abilities
Ironhide
Tireless
Surviving extremes
Iron will
• 80 • Rules • Characters Over Time
Perception Abilities
Wild instincts
Empathy
Sensitivity to magic
Danger sense
Skill Abilities
Quickness
Counterstrike
Social Training
A Weapon Skill
Strength Abilities
Feats of strength
Hammerhands
Knockdown
Intimidating Presence
Arcane Abilities
Alignment (plus learn 1 domain)
Creating Spells (plus learn 1 domain)
Combat Magic (plus learn 1 domain)
Learning Domains (learn 2 domains).
Whenever you buy an arcane ability, your character learns the rudiments
of working with one of the magical domains (two, for Learning Domains).
Choose which domain now, and keep track on your character sheet of the
domains your character knows.
The magical domains are blood, the elements, the household, self-trans-
formation, the senses, the spirit world, and the wilds.
Alignment
Buying Alignment means that your character has aligned herself closely
with one of the magical domains. She’s defining her magical life by lining
it up with the qualities of that domain.
So first, choose the domain. Choose one of the domains your character
knows.
• The ability to communicate with entities who share your aligned domain,
even entities who have no way to communicate normally.
• 1 free hit to your side of any roll involving something of your aligned
domain. This includes spellcasting rolls and everything.
You can buy alignment again in the future, but that changes your
character’s alignment, it doesn’t add alignment to a second domain.
If you’re considering buying this ability, ask the GM to tell you how
creating spells works, or look ahead to the Creating More chapter.
Combat magic
Buying Combat Magic lets your character cast spells while fighting.
• In setup, roll your arcane. Each hit gives you a green die.
• In action, your success equals your white + green hits, minus the white
+ red hits of the highest attack against you.
Learning Domains
Buying Learning Domains simply lets your character learn how to work
with two magical domains, of your choice.
You can buy this ability as often as you like, until your character knows
all the domains.
Command Abilities
• Initiation
• Iron Intention
• Tactician
• Daunting Presence
Initiation
Initiation is priesthood. Buying it means that your character’s been
initiated as a priest or priestess into the service of a god, gods, or
pantheon.
It lets you use your Command instead of your Arcane for any purpose
aligned with the household or the spirit world, including casting spells and
getting powers. For instance, you can cast the spell A Guiding Shadow (a
spell of the spirit world) and roll your command instead of your arcane.
You can also buy arcane abilities if your command base is 5 or more
(which presumably it is), even if your arcane base is only 1.
Iron Intention
In setup, make a command roll. Each hit gives you a red die. Replaces
charging.
Daunting Presence
In setup, make a command roll. Each hit gives you a blue die. Replaces
bracing.
Tactician
In setup, when you rally your comrades, each command success gives you
two dice to hand out instead of one.
Endurance Abilities
• Ironhide (+blue die)
• 82 • Rules • Characters Over Time
• Tireless
• Surviving extremes
• Iron will
Ironhide
Ironhide gives you an extra blue die, always.
Tireless
Whenever you make an endurance roll outside of combat, in addition to
the effects of that roll, hold onto your hits. They become bonus dice to
your next roll.
Surviving Extremes
Surviving extremes lets you hold your breath for a really long time,
endure the dead of winter without shelter, hold on to a red-hot iron, and
things like that.
Perception Abilities
• Wild instincts
• Empathy
• Sensitivity to Magic
• Danger Sense
Wild Instincts
In setup, if you aren’t making any other roll, make a perception roll. Each
hit gives you your choice of a red or a blue die.
This replaces bracing or charging, and it also gives you red or blue dice
if your character’s casting a spell or doing something else instead of
fighting.
Empathy
Buying Empathy lets you roll perception before you make a command roll.
Your perception hits give you bonus dice to the command roll.
Sensitivity to Magic
Buying Sensitivity to Magic lets you make a plain perception roll to detect,
identify, and reveal details of magic, as though your character had cast
the spell of the same name, but with no possibility of miscast.
Danger Sense
Before joining battle, make a perception roll (this ability adds conse-
quences to the perception roll ritual). Your hits become bonus white dice
to your first round’s action. You get them even if you wouldn’t normally
Skill Abilities
• Quickness
• Counterstrike
• Social Training
• A Weapon Skill
Quickness
Buying Quickness gives you two moves in setup. You can brace AND
charge, or whatever two setup moves you choose. It doesn’t give you two
attacks.
Counterstrike
If your defend is greater than your attacker’s attack (not just equal to it!),
in followthrough you do 1 damage to your attacker.
Social Training
Buying Social Training lets you roll skill before you make a social roll, like
the perception roll for charged conversations or the command roll to give
someone orders. Your skill hits give you bonus dice for the social roll.
Weapon Skills
You can use weapon skills whenever you’re fighting with the appropriate
weapon. You can buy as many weapon skills as you like (for 5 XP each, of
course):
Sword skills
Lightning Blade – in action, you get a second sword attack at the same
target. Roll two full sets of red dice.
Parrying – a sword gives you a blue die in addition to its red dice.
At One with the Blade – all swords of any type, not just greatswords,
give you 3 red dice.
Mastery of the Art – any stick, broom or boat oar in your hand counts
as a sword.
Shieldbreaker – when you fail to hit your enemy in battle, if your red
+ white hits include two or more 6s, your character breaks her enemy’s
weapon or armor (GM’s call).
Archery skills
Fast Shot – in action, you get a second shot at the same target. Roll two
full sets of red dice.
Trick Shot – a trick shot normally requires a perception roll in setup, for
green dice. Now, instead, you get green dice equal to your skill, no setup
roll required. (A trick shot is any shot you intend to accomplish something
other than, or in addition to, damaging your target.)
Shield skill
Shield Wall – as your setup move, say who you’re going to protect. You
• 84 • Rules • Characters Over Time
can protect as many people as you want, provided that their own actions
aren’t going to bring them out from behind your shield. In action, every
blue hit you roll counts as a blue hit for each of them as well.
Strength Abilities
• Feats of Strength
• Hammerhands
• Knockdown
• Intimidating Presence
Feats of Strength
In setup, you can manipulate the tactical features of the battlefield with a
strength roll instead of a skill roll. Examples include shooting your arrows
much farther than normal; lifting, moving, or toppling features of the
landscape by main strength; throwing your enemies down or lifting your
allies up.
Hammerhands
Hammerhands gives you an additional red die, always.
Knockdown
When you hit your enemy in battle, if your red + white hits include at least
one 6, in followthrough your character has knocked her enemy down.
(Being knocked down is a tactical constraint, as normal.)
Intimidating Presence
Buying Intimidating Presence lets you roll strength instead of command
for social rolls. This includes rolling to control other people by giving
them orders and rolling in setup to rally your comrades, but not mental
or emotional rolls like rolling to resist a monster’s mesmerize or fear
abilities.
A new character type. Create it as you did the original character types
for your home town. Make it follow naturally from the events of the
adventure. If no new character type comes naturally, choose a different
kind of treasure to create.
Example:
Wolf-raised
You get 3 maps, 3 spells, 1 arms or gear, 1 from any list, and 1 person.
Character ability: Sixth Sense. In setup, if you aren’t making any other
roll, make an arcane roll. Each hit gives you your choice of a red or a blue
die. This replaces bracing or charging, and it also gives you red or blue
dice if your character’s casting a spell or doing something else instead of
fighting.
An alliance with someone powerful. Have the players add the powerful
person to their group sheet. Make it follow naturally from the events of
• 86 • Rules • Creating More
Example:
The group can always find shelter and sanctuary with the river folk. Anyone
who comes to them in the name of Meg’s character, Elliot’s character, or
Sebastian’s character, they’ll take them in, hide them, protect them, heal
them, feed them – whatever they require.
Weapons or tools that grant abilities. Choose any of the stat abilities,
adapt a monster ability, give a straightforward stat bonus, or create a new
ability of your own.
Since a significant treasure should benefit the group, not just one char-
acter, try to invent these so that the characters in the group can share
them, or so that several of the characters get related weapons or tools
at once.
Example:
A dagger made from its iron tooth, which gives the bearer the counter-
strike ability.
A mail shirt made from its scales, which gives the wearer +1 defend in
battle (not blue dice!).
Example:
5 fire drake eggs, packed closely in straw to keep them warm, glowing
with their warm inner light.
The duke is so impressed with you that he makes you his special wardens,
granting you title to estates and the right to tax and muster the people
The undersea kingdom, which once menaced the town’s ships, now
considers the town a worthy partner in trade. The town is suddenly rich in
beautiful coral, pearls, and the sunken treasures of ancient civilizations.
Creating New Spells
The GM can create spells by herself, or in conjunction with a player – in
that case, the player creates the spell in outline, and the GM creates its
details.
Players
You can buy a power that allows your character to create new spells.
Without that power, your character can’t create new spells.
When you have the power and your character creates a new spell, here’s
what to do:
2. Choose what the spell creates and what effect, from the ones listed for
the domain. Choose in either order, based on what you want the spell to
do.
Annah wants a defensive spell. The Wilds doesn’t include direct protection
spells, but it includes advantage spells, so that’s what I choose. I decide
that it creates changes.
I write “this spell gives the caster a defensive advantage by changing her
skin to be as hard as solid oak.”
4. Give your choices and your description to your GM. Your GM will create
the spell the rest of the way and give it back to you.
GM
If you’re creating a spell to give as treasure or to play a part in an adven-
ture, go ahead and follow steps 1-3 as though you were a player, above.
Choose any domain that seems right.
• 88 • Rules • Creating More
When you have domain, creation, effect and description, either from a
player or of your own, continue here:
Choose checklists:
As you play the game and see how things work, you can start to create
your own new checklists.
A spell should always have at least 6 boxes available, and it should usually
have exactly 7. Some spells are more flexible; they can have more than
7 boxes.
Sometimes a spell has only one range, for instance; instead of giving it a
range checkbox, just say what its range is.
The checklists don’t tell the whole story. Write a description to tell the
rest. You can follow the examples of the starting spells.
• Use two decks of cards shuffled together. Don’t include the jokers.
• Give everybody a copy of the card mat, opposite. The GM will need more
than one so have some extras.
• Whenever the rules call for you to roll dice, have the dealer deal you that
many cards, face down. Turn them face up all at once.
In battle, use the card mats. When you would normally take dice of a
certain color, have the dealer deal the cards into the appropriate section
of your battle mat. Cards in “white” for white dice, cards in “red” for red
dice, cards in “blue” for blue dice, and cards in “green” for green dice.
Keep the piles separate when you turn them up. Count red cards as hits
and ignore black cards.
• Some abilities call for you to notice how many 6s you rolled amongst
your hits. Count 10s, jacks, queens and kings as 6s. Only if they’re red,
• 92 • Rules • Cards Instead of Dice
of course.
• Red •
• Blue • • Green •
• White •