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Swordtember 2023
  • Here are the rest of my first six weapons:

    The Dagger of Tichanto the Fallen

    Chaotic dagger +1,INT 7 EGO 5, COM empathy, POW control undead

    Control Undead: the wielder makes a Turn Undead check as a cleric of equal level; a result of turn indicates the undead are halted and awed; a result of destroy indicates the wielder has exerted control over the undead and may command them at will.

    There was a schism in the church of Saint Fiacra that ended with a rogue priest, Tichanto, and his inner circle buried alive under the stones of the church itself.

    Entombed and overcome with thoughts of vengeance, Tichanto consumed his fellows while they lived. When he died, he became a Ghast and his entombed followers Ghouls.

    Ever Tichanto yearns to escape his imprisonment and avenge himself but the consecrated grounds of the church have so far held him fast. That power, he has perceived lately, has started to weaken. Now, he prepares.


    Fire-Belcher Flamberge

    Chaotic longsword +1 / -1 vs dragons, INT 10 EGO 7, COM draconic, POW detect gold & gems / fire breath

    Fire Breath: as breath, 30’ cone of fire, deals 1d6 damage per level of the wielder; one use, recharge by submerging the sword in great heat and flame for one hour.

    This was once a gift from the great red wyrm, Xathrivrem the Belittler, to the leader of his cult, the anti-paladin, Kilperic. On Kilperic’s death, it was said the sword was buried at his side but rumor says the sword was secreted away by one of his lieutenants who have persisted in their dragon worship and continue to plot on behalf of Xathrivrem.


    The Brass Staff

    Lawful quarterstaff +1, INT 7 EGO 4, COM empathy, POW weal or woe

    Weal or Woe: once per day, while the staff is held in the light of a sunrise, the wielder may ask one question that will be answered truthfully with a response of either weal (it is good) or woe (it is ill).

    This staff, fashioned entirely in brass, was once housed in the temple to a Sun God. When the temple was razed, the staff was lost.


    Dawnbringer

    Lawful morningstar +1 / +2 vs undead, INT 7 EGO 7, COM empathy, POW detect undead / continual light

    This weapon was forged for the war against the dread necromancer, Bailtang, and wielded by the patriarch, Gonalen.

    After the cleric’s death, the weapon was housed in the church of Saint Fiacra, consecrating its grounds, until it recently, mysteriously disappeared.


    The Fingers of Death

    Lawful arrow +2 / +4 vs undead, INT 3 EGO 3, COM none, POW none

    Only a single quiver of these arrows were ever made during the wars against Bailtang the Necromancer. During the final assault on his grim fortress, the arrows were spent and presumed lost. One, however, has since been recovered from a war memorial so there is yet hope the rest may be found.

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  • forums.hexed.press Swordtember 2023

    It’s that time of year again! Last year I gave Swordtember a go but I fizzled out. This year, I’m trying it again but I’m going to extend it to any weapon and I have dubbed it Weaptember! I’ve posted my first batch of weapons to Patreon (they’ll go public on Friday). Anyone else giving the challeng...

    Anybody else giving Swordtember a try this year? I am giving it ago, despite failing miserably at it last year. One wrinkle for me: I'm not limiting myself to swords. I hereby dub it, Weaptember!

    As it is also #WIPWednesday, here's the write-up on my first weapon:

    Gorger, the Club of Blebazabu

    Chaotic great club +2 / +4 vs Law, INT 9 EGO 8, COM empathy, POW illusion generation / detect law

    This was the war club of the demon, Blebazabu, lost somewhere on the prime material plane. Legend places it at the bottom of a steep crater hidden under a sea of ice.

    Though the great demon cannot leave his abyssal abode, it is said his servants are ever seeking for the club. Woe betide the world should they find it!

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    During my marathon pointcrawl across the country, I had a Gamemastering epiphany: everything should have a cost!

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    Ye Ancient Marriage of Dolmenwood and Midderlands
  • Are they compatible in a special way? I don’t hear midderlands mentioned much these days. I’m not very familiar with it. What’s the elevator pitch?

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    7 Maxims of the OSR
  • This was already posted.

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  • deorum.vercel.app Deorum | Fantasy characters gallery by Azgaar

    Your source for customizable unique fantasy characters for D&D and worldbuilding projects

    A new generator by Azgaar!

    > Embark on an epic journey with Deorum – your source for unique fantasy characters for D&D and worldbuilding projects > > Discover over 1600 customizable characters, each featuring a stunning portrait and a detailed biography. Our images are rooted in a set of 120 beautifully hand-drawn portraits, multiplied to over 10000 variations through AI generation, and expertly curated for the highest quality. > > Personalize your chosen character to your heart's desire and bring your stories to life. And the best part? All characters are free for non-commercial use, with a cheap commercial license available. Join the community and start your next adventure today!

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    rewarding roleplay with mechanical benefits? healing haikus and such
  • I had the thought of replacing the resource cost of spells in a system like an into the odd hack or knave hack with creativity.

    How well this works is going to be very table dependent. If everyone playing are creative dynamos, they will go crazy with a system like this-- whether it goes too far or not will be on you as the GM. If only some of the players excel at this sort of thing, it will create an imbalance between a set of haves and have-nots: those who can muster up the haikus, insults, etc. and reap the benefits and those who can't. I tend to think that unless you carefully craft the effects and cap them in some way, it can get out of hand either way to the detriment of the experience as a whole.

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    Has anyone here played MÖRK BÖRG? Would love to hear your thoughts
  • I played in a one-shot at PAX East. I haven't played it as a campaign. If I were to run it, I would lean into the doom and the calendar and the like. As with other OSR games, I would set up an overall scenario that player-characters could be easily plugged into rather than a personalized narrative. I don't think MB would be my first choice if I were setting out to referee a campaign but I think it absolutely can work and, if I loved MB, I would not hesistate to run a campaign with it.

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  • I found a copy of "Three Hearts and Three Lions" set out on a stoop yesterday. Someone's trash is now my treasure!

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    Reminder: Please Downvote Only to Flag Inappropriate Content
  • It is! I may reach out that way.

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    Reminder: Please Downvote Only to Flag Inappropriate Content
  • If you disagree, I think that's what the reply button is for-- state your disagreement and have a discussion (keeping it civil, of course). Just driving by and downvoting does not add anything, in my opinion.

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  • Hey Gang,

    I'm seeing an uptick in downvoting to, I presume, express displeasure. Please don't. If a topic doesn't speak or appeal to you, move along, please don't downvote it. Please use the downvote button for content that doesn't belong here because it is inappropriate.

    Thank you and game on!

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    Saw this posted to Mastodon and I thought it was worth sharing.

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    Kavlov's Sanctuary (OSE Version) Live Play!
  • I streamed a post-mortem of the game earlier today, if anyone’s interested.

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    Alterrnative to Vancian Magic for OSR Games
  • Interesting! Thanks for the write-up!

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    Alterrnative to Vancian Magic for OSR Games
  • Can you describe Law I a bit more? Also, got any practical examples of spell-casting that used this system?

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  • Last night I ran a one-shot based on one of the scenarios from Kavlov's Sanctuary! Everybody had fun (at least that's what they told me so it must be true, right? 🤐 🤣) and it was nice to finally do a live play-- though I absolutely had some nervousness going on. If you're interested in any of the prep that I did, I streamed some of that earlier yesterday.

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    hexed.press Deliverables for XP - Hexed Press

    Loot, what is it good for? Treasure, even in its most basic form as coinage, isn’t an end in itself (unless you’re a...

    Been thinking about loot for xp this weekend.

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    mythicmountainsrpg.substack.com Review: "Dungeon Crawl Classics" - By Goodman Games

    If you grok the DCC attitude and vibe, you won't be able to play this game and not have fun.

    DCC is OSR-adjacent enough that I thought this was worth cross-posting.

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    How I use the module The Witch of Underwillow - an excellent way to start a campaign!
  • Really? Glad that I haven’t run across it!

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    DAE make their own book covers?
  • I have not but you’re tempting me!

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    What's you favorite/best starting village/town/city in a published module/adventure/something else?
  • What should a town in a West marches campaign even have in it?

    • a relatively safe place to rest
    • resources (hirelings, equipment, etc.) and trade (have to unload those paintings we dragged out of the dungeon somewhere!)
    • access to information, factions, and potential patrons
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  • I saw this posted on Mastodon. It’s an interesting listen. If you were thinking about using the ORC license, it may give you pause.

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    Yesterday, I streamed a live conversation with blogger and creator, Prismatic Wasteland! We talked about his Ennie-nominated supplement, “Barkeep on the Borderlands,” along with a bunch of other topics.

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    Generate free heraldry
  • I created a couple of coats of arms for myself. This is tool is going to be very handy for me as I will definitely be building a bunch of these for my micro-setting.

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  • azgaar.github.io Armoria

    Heraldry Generator and Editor by Azgaar

    Stumbled upon this yesterday and it was just what I needed. While I could have mucked around and done it myself, this is much faster. There don’t seem to be any strings attached— roll up some random coats of arms, tweak them to suit, and go!

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    Moral and legal implications of rehosting blogs for preservation?
  • I think once you publish, the cat’s out of the bag. You can take it down on your end but I don’t know id there’s some right to force others to destroy it too. I think the digital world twists this a bit but, in an analog sense, if I clip something out of a magazine article and, some time later, the author retracts it. That had no authority on me if I want to reference it in an article that I write.

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  • hexed.press Coming to Kickstarter in August: OSE Conversion of Kavlov’s Sanctuary from The Dungeon Key and Me! - Hexed Press

    As The Dungeon Key announced this morning, I am working with them to convert their Mork Borg adventure, Kavlov’s...

    Just posting a head's up: I'm working with The Dungeon Key to convert their Mork Borg adventure to OSE. There's a bit more at the link. Super excited about it!

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    Affinity Suite Resources for #TTRPG
  • Thanks for sharing the link!

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    Final Hours for Village on the Borderlands Kickstarter
  • It got funded so I’ll look forward to seeing thoughts on it when copies emerge in the wild!

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    Let's Read the Dolmenwood Game Preview!
  • Of all time? Not sure but it’s definitely the longest one I’ve done in a LONG time.

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  • youtube.com Let's Read the Dolmenwood Game Preview!

    Dolmenwood is hitting Kickstarter in less than a month! Necrotic Gnome has posted a sizable game preview in advance of the campaign. Let's check it out!Show ...

    I spent 3 hours (!!!) earlier today reading through the Dolmenwood game preview book. It was definitely an interesting read! I like the setting and the rules seem to be very close to OSE, naturally. If you’ve read through the rules, what do you think?

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    arena.athas.org Final Revisions to the Old School Essentials Dark Sun Conversion

    How is it going everybody? I just completed the revisions to the whole OSE Dark Sun conversion. This is a series of improvements and restructuring and additions to all booklets to make the conversion more appealing to both players and DMs who want to play a Dark Sun Campaign.To begin with, the Conve...

    cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/1435113

    > It features very well written and designed PDFs for: > > - Genre Rules > - Dungeon Master’s Guide > - Psionics and Magic > - Monster’s Manual > - Character Sheet

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    forums.hexed.press Affinity Suite Resources for TTRPGs

    Dot Grid Page Seems like we have several users of the Affinity Suite of tools. Could be good for us to have a topic to share what we’ve built. I’ll kick things off with just a simple sheet of dots on a page. I use this to fill empty space in other printable designs for note taking. To use this docu...

    Jason Stahl was kind enough to share a couple of templates that he made for the Affinity suite of products, useful to those of us toiling away on TTRPG projects. I've linked to the forum post that contains his links. I will be adding my own hex-map template (once I essentially remake it since the current one is a MESS). If you have any resources to share, drop them here, drop them there, but drop them somewhere so we can spread the knowledge and help each other out!

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    Los Angeles, CA's Secret Lizard Folk Mega Dungeon
  • Are these related to the C.H.U.D.?

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  • Posted to my blog:

    > Part of the charm (torture?) of old school D&D is gleaning at hints of play that appear in various nooks and crannies of rulebooks, supplements, and adventures. Here's one that I randomly ran into while reading module X1, "The Isle of Dread".

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    The End of Thousand Thousand Islands!!!!
  • It’s probably a good idea, for situations like this, to post both sides. Here’s the statement from Munkao.

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  • forums.hexed.press Moral and legal implications of rehosting blogs for preservation?

    Putting my thoughts here for feedback before sharing with larger forums. What is this communities opinion on saving and potentially rehosting (breaking copyright) of RPG blogs, posts, etc. in the potential event of that contents host going down? We’ve had a lot of talk here about the enshittificati...

    This was posted to my forums and I thought it was an important enough topic to deserve more attention:

    >What is this communities (sic) opinion on saving and potentially rehosting (breaking copyright) of RPG blogs, posts, etc. in the potential event of that contents host going down?

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