Brave New World
Fantasy Craft Tested at the Game Table
"If magic is unrestrained in the campaign, D&D quickly degenerates into a weird wizard show where players get bored quickly... It is the opinion of this writer that the most desirable game is one in which the various character types are able to compete with each other as relative equals, for that will maintain freshness in the campaign ..."
—E. Gary Gygax in The Strategic Review #7, April 1976
The biggest impact I have seen is playing two adventures of Fantasy Craft so far is no magic being used. No spells cast and no magic items found.
Even when I played AD&D 1E the magic-user would normally cast one of the spells he'd purloined from his master's tome of magic (ventriloquism was a particular bummer of an attack spell to randomly roll). But the Fantasy Craft core rulebook has only one caster class, the mage, and one other class that uses magic regularly, the priest. The other classes have few or no magical abilities. My group has neither a mage nor a priest.
And, hearkening back to an earlier style of AD&D play, Fantasy Craft doesn't assume that characters must have a set amount of magic items per level. Some characters can cultivate contacts or buy land and buildings or a number of other options and never use a magic item. Even in AD&D 1E nearly every character that survived eventually gained some type of permanent magic item. Not so in Fantasy Craft.
Characters can certainly quest for magic items if they wish to do so. But nothing in the rules assumes a character must do so to be effective.
I really like this change. It makes a Fantasy Craft world more like the Middle Earth level of magic rather than the current D&D standard of magic all the time and everywhere.
And Kruvil, the world of the Prismatic Steel campaign, is still full of magical wonders. Magic from the stars shaped civilization and infuses the world. But it isn't so common that it simply becomes a tool of wandering adventurers or something that is bartered in magic stores.
Instead, 2nd level characters pool Reputation and buy an inn and set up a secondary business to run out of it. Others go back to fighting in gladiator battles during downtime for fame (Reputation) and fortune (silver).
Next month I'll talk more about adventure building in Fantasy Craft but I do want to briefly mention one thing. I like the use of a more modern RPG design of setting the adventure up in scenes rather than encounters. I've watched a lot of TV shows and this format really resonates with me and has made adventure building easier. I also don't miss the standard of slogging through ten or so encounters for each level.
The players have really taken to using Subplots as well. But I'll have to discuss that in a future column. Speaking of players....
Nearly Perfect Players
"I think it's safe to say that neither of our campaigns would be much fun if our players sucked rocks.
If you ask film and TV show directors what they prize above all else, nine times out of ten they'll say "a great cast." If you have great actors, you can turn humdrum material into something enjoyable and excellent material into something spectacular. Similarly, if a DM has great players, his or her job becomes a LOT easier."
—Chris Perkins
It's been a few months since I've talked about players. Recent posts on rpg.net and a recent column by Chris Perkins at www.wizards.com prompted me to return to the topic most important to me in regards to gaming.
I've said it before and I'll say it again. The players matter most in gaming and anything the gamemaster does from world building to adventure crafting should take the players into account first.
I sometimes forget that you the reader can't see the group I game with. The stereotype that a bunch of overweight white guys sit around a table gaming just doesn't apply to the group I'm in (I'm an overweight white guy but the whole group isn't!) and I don't think it should be the norm in a better world.
I've gamed with a gay black guy, an armless white guy who played cards with his feet, and a former Iraqi soldier even though we served on different sides during the first Gulf War. The majority of my games and all of my recent games include both female and male gamers. My most recent games include more than one ethnicity. Some gamers have college degrees and work in offices; others are blue collar workers or college students. I game with fellow Christians, with non-Christians, and with gamers not enamored at all with Christianity.
This rich mixture of humanity, if mutually respected, can be stirred into a potent brew of amazing storytelling and derring-do adventure if the GM and the players work together. In Fantasy Craft, differences in belief inside the game are represented through a game mechanic called alignment, similar to D&D and Pathfinder's version, but usable in a much broader and less restrictive way.
Fantasy Craft Alignments
Fantasy Craft presents alignment in two options. One option simply provides a framework for beliefs in the game with no supernatural elements. The second option, activated using a Campaign Quality called Miracles, fills alignment with the potential of unlocking magical power.What is alignment? The good versus evil and chaos versus law of D&D could be alignment. But that is only one option. The four elements of air, earth, fire, and water could instead be alignments for one world. Or yin and yang. Or light and dark. Moon and sun and stars. Et cetera. Any grouping of beliefs can be devised in Fantasy Craft to provide storytelling grist and tension through alignment.
Fantasy Craft provides a framework for briefly defining alignments but not leaving them vague. For example, rather than debate what good truly means, or what evil truly means, the GM and players can define the basics themselves and flesh the alignments out in more detail as the game unfolds.
This mutual work of defining alignment will work best if the GM and interested players work together, creatively blending different real-world experience to create a fictional belief system. This system can then be used to enhance their shared fictional story and adventures.
For the Prismatic Steel campaign I devised an alignment system of colors keyed to celestial events. As the campaign unfolds, I look forward to working with interested players in further shaping and defining the alignments of the Color Roads.
Miracles of the Color Roads
Alignments in the world of Kruvil are based on the color of prismatic steel—either blue or green and are called Color Roads. The core difference is that followers of the blue path believe magic traveled from blue metal into the blood and followers of the green believe magic infuses nature itself. Blue Bloods look for signs in the sky and seek control over their environment. Green Touched live in harmony with the wilds and stay physically strong.Gray Shades refuse to acknowledge that either path is correct: both could be wrong or both could be right. Black Striders believe the void between the stars in the night sky is an omen of doom for many but a promise of power and domination for them.
Color Roads are a common part of most people's lives, but many people pay little heed to them in day to day activities. Anyone living in a tight knit community will attend some type of meeting or service of their Color to stay in touch with those who hold similar beliefs and to be part of the social norm.
As institutions, the Color Roads own land, field armies, and wield great power. With the vacuum left by the crumbling empires, the Color Roads rushed to fill them. An adventurer could do worse than align himself to a Color Road and walk it to a life of power and influence.
If a character aligns himself to a Color Road he becomes a Walker and automatically sets himself up to opposition from the other Color. This opposition can be as slight as public debate to as serious as full-scale warfare. Aligning with a color aligns an adventurer with the universe, for both good and ill.
Walkers of a Color Road command miracles. When a Walker first identifies himself, no one is sure whether they simply command a strong set of beliefs or some supernatural power. Walkers with powerful convection can change reality with belief in their Color Road.
Ordained practitioners of a Color Road are dubbed Runners. They coronate kings, hold services (usually weekly), and officiate at weddings, funerals, and birth celebrations. While a Runner could excommunicate a monarch, that monarch would likely switch allegiance to the opposite Color, so religious and secular power maintain a balance. As Runners move along their Color Road they may gain temporal power including holdings, servants, and soldiers and all the temptations that power brings.
| Color | Walker Name | Runner Title |
| Black | Black Strider | Dame (female), Master (male) |
| Blue | Blue Bloods | Father (male), Mother (female) |
| Gray | Gray Shade | Seeker |
| Green | Green Touched | Alpha |
| Color | Paths |
| Black | Curses, Darkness, Death, Destruction, War |
| Blue | Fire, Fortune, Light, Secrets, Metal |
| Gray | Air, Deceit, Knowledge, Travel, Wilderness |
| Green | Beasts, Curses, Metal, Nature, Strength |
| Color | Skills |
| Black | Athletics, Prestidigitation, Ride, Tactics |
| Blue | Investigate, Perception, Search, Survival |
| Gray | Blend, Bluff, Disguise, Sneak |
| Green | Acrobatics, Athletics, Resolve, Survival |
| Color | Ritual Weapon | Avatar |
| Black | cavalry axe | chaos beast |
| Blue | mace | naga |
| Gray | pick | pegasus |
| Green | boar spear | wolf, vargr |
| Color | Opposed Alignments | Celestial |
| Black | Gray | void |
| Blue | Green | stars |
| Gray | Black | sky |
| Green | Blue | moon |
Next Month
Crafting a great Fantasy Craft adventure. Unbound magic and campaign qualities to follow and more on the experience that is playing Fantasy Craft. "We are rainbows in the dark" (Color Road saying),
Charlie
