Hit Points, again

Ya so I still haven't committed rule to paper about the whole starting HP thing.  I am even less certain about the whole taking stat damage when you have no agency.  I like the ideas but I see them taking the game away from a d20 realm and into other directions.  I mean hit point in D20 are pretty flexible and can take a lot of abuse - point being that you can play around with player hit point progression wildly and still recognize the system (although as D&D went along it did become noticeable that something was happening here.)  Still I think having HP bypassed so easily could be easily abused or misused.

I did have a thought this morning on the HP topic from another angle.  What if all 'damage was stat damage?Spell casters in Beacon use HP to cast spells, perhaps all character types should be given the choice to use HP to avoid taking stat damage when they get hit.  This wouldn't really change things because most players would choose to take the HP loss over the stat damage so it would work mostly the same way.  It wouldn't be likely that a player would choose their character take stat damage over losing HP because stat damage is so hard to regain.   It wouldn't change healing magic which remains for restoring HP spent on damage avoidance (and not spells) - but it would align the two experiences of magic use and damage avoidance and clarify how HP work in Beacon - as a pool of fatigue/luck/skill/will - and it would be interesting if/when someone actually decided to choose to take a hit on their stats in order to stay conscious and achieve a task.

I hope I can get in some play-testing again soon because I think these ideas really need to be worked through in the field and run by some players instead of just percolating on the blog.

Hardcover Flame Princess

Its funny but I was going on about how much I liked Lamentations of the Flame Princess and wished I had a hardcover.  I mean I've got the free PDF and I've seen some of the art on the web but I felt that this game would not really cut it as softcovers in a box for me personally.  I hear it is a very nice box set - but then again I have the Moldvay D&D box set and I feel the same way about that.  Heck the first RPG I had was had the StarFrontiers box and it was great - but it was still soft cover.  I think box sets are great (especially for starting out) and I'm glad I have mine - but they don't inspire me.  Maybe it's mental fallout from when I got my first AD&D Players Handbook but a hardcover means the game is for reals.  I felt that if I played some LotFP it should be a for reals kind of game.  I also think it would be awesome looking.

Well then how could I not put my money where my mouth went when I heard that there was a Indiegogo project to publish some hardcovers.  I could not pass this up so I quickly pledged for a copy.  Now I can't wait to have that Lamentations of the Flame Princess hardcover - with all the art and no doubt beautiful - sitting on my shelf.   Or better yet, being used to fight off zombiefied players when the shit really hits the fan.

I'll also get a PDF version with art because they are so damn useful, and why the hell not.

I can't see this not getting funded but if it doesn't I'll hold you all responsible.  So if you want an awesome hardcover Lamentations of the Flame Princess Book then go here and get you one.

OPD back for 2012!

It's another year past already and the One Page Dungeon contest has been announced for 2012.  I really love this contest because everyone is a winner; the folks who win, the folks who get to exercise their minds making up some awesome crap and therefore win, you and me who get a whole pile of great RP material in a useful format and so also kind of win!  Ya its great, winners all over the place for the win.  I haven't decided if I'm going to do an entry this year but I had a blast doing one last year so I'm inclined to do another this time.

Go here for the details:

One Page Dungeon Contest 2012

Haven't forgotten

I know I haven't yet gotten the minor update posted that I promised back in March.  I did update the PDF to include an overview (you can grab it on the Get Beacon page) but I didn't have time to do the text changes and minor rules fixes I wanted to do.  Sorry, I got busy.  I am still working on it and hopefully it's done soon, but don't let that stop you from grabbing a copy of the PDF and running you some Beacon games.