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Infrequently updated, here you can get the latest news about the Lost Heroes RPG project
I love Fudge. I love that lovely bump in the probabilities, making it likely to roll near your character’s actual trait. But I wanted to do something different. I actually want a result, from my fudge dice, that was randomly linear.
So I’m working on character creation for Lost Heroes and I’m putting into the system this idea I had a while a go. Essentially Magic-using characters are burdened with “Magic Rules” or rather consequences that go off when they use magic.
But when the player is picking the conseqence for their character, I wanted it to be randomly selected.
So I hit apon the idea of using a number of tables. Roll on one table/column, then the next and then next and then create a consequence from the three random elements. (Technically this is called Morphological Forced Connections apparently).
In my example:
| Column A |
Column B |
Column C |
| Limb |
Animal |
Remains depending on how powerful the effect |
| Head |
Material |
Remains for x
days |
| Body |
Impossible |
Until it grows back or dies off |
| Nearby Object |
|
|
So a player may roll on column A, get “Limb” and then on column B, get “Material” and then finally on column C and get “Until it grows back or dies off”. The player then use this as a constraints to come up with a consequence, for example: “A characters Limb transforms into a Material and remains Until it grows back or dies off”.
But I can’t use a standard 4dF (four fudge dice) as this one mean most people would get something in the middle of the column, every time.
So I asked on Fudge’s yahoo page and the answers were great!
The one I liked the best came from Tim Hall:
I’d just roll fudge dice of different colours, and make each die
significant rather than adding them up. 2 dice give 9 options, 3 dice
gives 27, 4 dice 81 and so on.
So two Fudge dice would give you a sequence of values like this:
-1, -1
-1, 0
-1, 1
0, –1
0, 0,
etc.
This gives a very simple linear gradient from 0 to 9. It’s simple and it’s visual and it also constrains me to limit to either 3 or 9 or 27, etc.
But Mike Harvey suggests another interesting technique. Using 5dF, but treating anything greater than 2 as 2 (and anything less than –2 as –2). This gives a surprisingly linear gradient. (I plugged it into anydice if you want to see it visually).
If you look carefully at the 4dF probability table and “squint your eyes”..
.
18.519% +2 or more
19.753% +1
23.457% +0
19.753% -1
18.519% -2 or less
…notice that these steps are very close to even 20% increments. Close enough for horseshoes or FUDGE!! That there’s a linear d5! In fact you can get even closer rolling 5dF:
20.988% +2 or more
18.519% +1
20.988% +0
18.519% -1
20.988% -2 or less
(Original yahoo groups thread here)
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Okay, taking a breather. 9500 words. I honestly don’t know if that’s a lot or not as I normally don’t track it as a measure of anything. I could write a 1000 words one night, only to cut half out the next day when I re-read it. But I’ve been spending the last few evenings since mid-January writing up a system for Lost Heroes and I’m really in the midst of it now.
I was procrastinating a lot but now I understand why, I’m feeling a little overwhelmed by the task I’ve set myself. I had thought it’d be a matter of writing up a few notes about character creation, going through Book of the Gods and listing Gifts and Faults but I’ve been collecting ideas for Lost Heroes for years and I’m trying to bring it together as a cohesive whole. And it’s daunting. Not even that but I’m not including the combat system I had devised, as I want to get all the other elements like powers and character creation settled first.
And I’m not helping myself as I seem to be distilling everything I’ve learned about running and using Fudge into the text. But I think this piece of work will be much more accessible to players than Book of the Gods.
Daunting is the right word. I always viewed 0.19 as an iteration, not the final product. I’m still looking to a next version where I merge setting and rules in one (and possible across 5 “books”, one core book and four pantheon supplements). What am I setting myself up for?
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I’m still a bit of a old curmudgeon with some new techs and I haven’t really got on the PDF/ebook reader train yet. I still prefer to read books in hard copy, as in on paper, bound. But here I am writing a free RPG but only giving it out in soft copy/digital format.
There is of course loads print-on-demand (POD) services. So I decided to try and print a copy of my Lost Heroes RPG: Book of the Gods. The idea would be that I could provide a link to the POD so that others get a paper copy, if they so wish.
So I logged on to lulu.com and starting making a project. It was pretty easy to create a PDF and upload it as the contents of the book. But you have to upload or create a book cover. I had already created a cover that I was proud of it (though probably anyone with a bit of skill do something much better), but I could not re-create it in the online editor. So with a bit of messing I created a PNG image to be used as the cover.
It all looked good online and so I ordered a copy.
This is what I got a few days later:
No cover!
It took a while to get support (several weeks), partly my fault in not reading the instructions correctly though. But once I was talking to someone, it got sorted quickly. As it turns out my PNG file had a transparent background, which didn’t show up on the online editor. The support guys admitted it was their problem, so they said upload a new cover, one that doesn’t have a transparent layer, and they’ll print a new copy for me.
And so I then received this:
I think it looks cool though there is some unexpected yellow fuzz on the front cover (may not be visible in the photo). The costs are actually on lulu.com if you want to check them, but it cost me about 18 euros, not including delivery charges. They do have a centre based in the UK so thankfully not ordering it from the US. Also the inside was all in black and white so that’s cheaper. Colour is much more expensive.
What I learned from flicking through my book in hard copy? Well I suck at layout, but I knew that already. Big pictures that fill the page work better than small pictures (I’m assuming if I used columns small pictures could work). More pictures, probably less text. Also, as my wife pointed out, my name isn’t on the cover anywhere and it’s not readable on the binding.
While it’s cool to hold an actual bound book in my hands, I don’t think it’s worth me offering it as an option, yet. I have much work today, but it was a useful learning experience and when I start doing play testing this year, it’ll be useful prop to show players.
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After my short review of the new (2010) Clash of the Titans movie, I started thinking about how this compares to the world of Lost Heroes and how you might use it as the basis of a roleplaying campaign or adventure.
Of course you could just take the setting and world of the movie and use Lost Heroes to flesh out some of the under used stuff, like the other Olympian Gods. But for the sake of this exercise, we want to stick as close to canon or at least the spirit of the Lost Heroes world as we can.
Lost Heroes is based on the modern world, not on the pseudo-ancient Greek setting the movie seems to inhabit. But that’s not a problem though. My second play test run of Lost Heroes was ran in a psuedo Celtic period instead of a modern day setting. So we have the same setup here. As long as we don’t worry about historical accuracy, we just assume it’s a mix of ancient Roman and Greek culture, society and history. We’re basically giving ourselves permission to be more loose with the history and make up stuff we don’t know.
But this is also where Lost Heroes starts to diverge from the God-happy world of Clash of the Titans. Lost Heroes is about mythic heroes, but they are lost to the mundane world. Assuming the people of this time believe and worship Olympian Gods (or at least they did before they started revolting), they may be more favourable to Chosen of the Olympians than other Chosen. But still normal mortals, who hold all the social power, such as the King and Queen of Argos, will still see them as freaks and outsiders. (Maybe this explains why Perseus has a shaved head and no beard, a mark of shame?). You could argue that Clash of the Titans is set in the Golden Age of heroes, the time of Aeon according to the Greeks when Zeus created the Golden Race of men. But that time, a fragile time, would eventually disappear, replaced by a more real history without the overt footprints of the gods. Stating it starts in a “Golden Age” changes the expectations of the setting. The movie, at least visually, attempts to be more gritty and dark and that would be easier to establish with the default world rules of Lost Heroes with it’s binding Veil and Passion Bleed. The Chosen, despite being recognised as the warriors of the gods, would live with a burden on their shoulders and ordinary mortals would not trust them and probably try to drive them away.
The gods would not just sit idly!
We need to also shake up the Olympian Gods themselves to align them with the Lost Heroes versions. While Zeus does rule the council, he is not the dictator as presented in the movie. He is stern but a good leader. Certainly the other Gods would have more say in what happens and would be more involved in the action to come. For the Olympians, the Game of the Gods involves causing a situation to occur when reserved Zeus is impelled to act to keep the balance.
The relationship between the mortals and the gods would be more mysterious too. The gods do not depend on the prayers of mortals to survive, but events in the mundane sphere have some sort of casual affect on the divine sphere (and seemingly vice-versa), not easily interrupted by us humans (ah the Enigma of the Gods!). The Olympians themselves would try to manipulate the actions of mortals subtle to generate political situations in Olympus. The revolt of the mortals against the Olympians may have been instigated by a god or if it wasn’t, some of the gods would encourage it to their own ends. Hera, wife of Zeus, Queen of the Olympian Gods, has been known to put all of Olympus in danger to get at Zeus in any way.
It’s questionable if we should keep the good-evil dynamic of Zeus and Hades. It’s quite Christian, liking Zeus to the Christian God and Hades to the Devil. In Lost Heroes, we already have the Angelic Choirs fighting the Great War with the Devil and his legions. The actual relationship between Hades and Zeus is more complex. Hades rules the dead and all that the ground contains and is pretty strict on what’s his and what’s not. He rarely if ever interferes in the world above and when he feels the need, he goes to Zeus to do so (normally when someone steals his property, i.e. raising the dead). He doesn’t hate his brother Zeus but Hades motives are strange. Death is a dark mystery no-one wants to probe too deeply and so Hades is a mystery the other gods barely understand or want to. We’d need a stronger explanation for Hades to want to strike out at Zeus or the other Olympians. Perhaps Persephone, the wife of Hades, is kidnapped by some wily mortals (with the secret help of some of the others gods) as she was leaving the Underworld to return to Olympus (she normally spends half her time in the Underworld and the other half in Olympus with her mother Demeter). Hades would demand Zeus to strike the mortals down and return Persephone, but for some reason Zeus can’t or refuses to (perhaps they are too well hidden). Hades is the one Olympian who is actually loyal to his wife and that could drive him to anger. While there is no Kraken mentioned in Lost Heroes, Hades would certainly have his share of monsters in the Underworld. The most terrifying would be Thanatos, a shapeless abstract monster that is trapped in the Underworld, i.e. Death itself. Indeed the Underworld is actually a prison, holding the defeated Titans imprisoned. Imagine Hades threatening to unlock Tartarus!
Once Hades stated his intentions, some gods would take sides. Athena would stand by Zeus, Hera might side with Hades, continuing her vengeance against Zeus. Poseidon might take the opportunity to take Zeus’ place by siding with Hades. The politics of a potential divine civil war in Olympus would give many story-adventure seeds and provide a wonderfully dramatic backdrop to the campaign.
But the Olympians do have existing external enemies that could also be used. The Giants once fought a war with the Olympians and nearly won, now they are spread across the world in hiding, planning their vengeance. What about the Titans? The Titans that remain on Olympus and Earth and fallen gods, their light dimmed. But the ones trapped in Tartarus raging against their shackles scare the Olympians even now and there is Typhon, a god more powerful that all the Olympians, created by Gaia in vengeance, waiting in the Void for his time to return. I think any of these would make a more scary enemy than a single giant Kraken. And that’s not without looking to other pantheons, something which the Clash of the Titans movie didn’t seem to have a problem with.
Is Argos the only mortal city in Clash of the Titans?
In the movie there is really only the city of Argos, ruled by King Cepheus and Queen Cassiopeia. This would have to be the starting point of the game. It’s appears to be totally dominated by mortals, no Community (no supernatural creatures living among the populace) except for the beautiful Io, no Divine Family. Even the mad guy who riles up the starving public to return to the worship of the gods is mortal, his power is his madness and obsession.
The movie is wholly centred on Argos, if Argos fell the gods in the movie would lose all their prayers/powers. That wouldn’t be the case in Lost Heroes though, but certainly Argos is important. Also, in the movie, it says that you can travel to Mount Olympus and even the Underworld from Argos. This would not be the case in Lost Heroes. One must enter the Sea of Dreams first and from there enter the Lands of the Dead to find Hades’ Underworld. Though possibly the Sea of Dreams might appear as desert that they had to cross (and where they fought giant scorpions). Is it possible that Argos is not a real city at all, but a Island on the Sea Dreams or a Fairy Realm (a realm that cross both the mundane world and the Sea of Dreams)?
We are lead to believe in the movie that the actions of the gods are driving people from their homes to Argos. So which came first? Did the humans start revolting first or were they driven to it by the gods indifference or Hades interferences?
I suspect that many of the soldiers, after battling harpies and even Hades at one point, could be considered Valiant Mortals. After Hades appearance in the castle, possible the trauma of the Queen’s death, the King may even be a Valiant Mortal. Certainly it feels like the Veil is getting a bit raggy in Argos. Which is dangerous for all, because Darklings might push through and Nightmares might have a look around. The angry reaction of the populace to the solders going on this quest to find the Stygian Witches (the Graece in Lost Heroes), could be exaggerated by the effect of the Veil.
Bloodlines, the Cursed, Valiant Mortals, Magic Practitioners and True Chosen, what a cast!
Putting aside the original myth of Perseus, Perseus is a classic Chosen. His mother was raped by Zeus (Zeus does that a lot) and so Perseus is a Bloodline (or a Demigod in the movie). He doesn’t know this, nor even realises it until he faces Hades in Argos for the first time. This would be his awakening. But once it’s revealed Zeus and the other gods feel him too. The reaction of Perseus is also classic Bloodline. Most Bloodlines despise their divine parents. Their mortal families become targets to the gods and Perseus case, they were killed by Hades. Despite this, the gods continue to give Perseus gifts, such as the magic sword, the winged horse and coinage to get across the river Styx. Zeus even lends him lightning at one point. Zeus also tries to convince Perseus to come to Mount Olympus. This is very much how the relationship a Bloodline might have with their Patron. The King’s reaction to Perseus would also be expected, throwing Perseus in a cell.
But it would seem that Perseus’ awakening is the forming of the Divine Family. Io appears, a cursed mortal. She claims to have watched over him all his life. The Cursed are normally not used as player-characters and her standoff-ish nature would be quite indicative of being just an non-player-character. (FYI there are a few flavours of the Immortality curse in Lost Heroes, and Io seemed to have the better one).
Then the soldiers, who are all probably Valiant Mortals, follow Perseus on this mad quest. So the initial Divine Family is formed, tasked with stopping the Kraken (or perhaps some other monster or threat). Later, we have a “Jinn” join the family. These Jinn are nothing like the Angelic Jinn in Lost Heroes though and I’m not sure how to work that in. It might be best to think of these Jinn as being simply Magic Practitioners who have, over the years, become cursed and have bodies of rock and stone rather than fallen Angels.
There is also the underused characters of Ozal and Kucuk, two guys who at the last minute decide to join the soldiers as hunters and who claim to know how to fight monsters. I suspect they may be Travellers, mortals who can travel between Shard Worlds and these two seem drawn to party but refuse to enter the Underworld.
Then there is Acrisius/Calibos, father of Perseus. We see Hades offer power to Calibos to kill his son. Calibos accepts and so he is a True Chosen of Hades. Despite the horrible disfiguration and his deadly task, Calibos is definitely not a Soulless. He accepted a choice, it was not forced on him by Hades. Also the giant Scorpions that rise from his blood, that’s a nifty power. He would certainly make a good regularly returning bad guy in a game.
A quest!
With a city under threat, a beautiful princess (Andromeda) to save and a quest to be made, sounds like we have an excellent starting point for a campaign! There are some excellent story-seeds along the way, many secrets to reveal and some wonderful monsters to fight!
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Warning, I paid no thinking if this post contains spoilers, so read ahead at your own risk!
I don’t get out to the cinema as much as I did before we had kids, so I generally catch up on movies on my birthday and Christmas, by giving my family a list of movies, available on DVD, from the year I haven’t seen. Easy presents. And so I finally got to see Clash of the Titans last week, one of my Christmas presents.
First off, I will say that this is a bad movie. There is no getting away from it. I didn’t really expect anything else. But it’s about mythic heroes and Greek Gods! I’ve got to find something in this movie I like, right?
Well my own Lost Heroes is about mixing up different mythologies, with Odin’s warriors fighting Olympian monsters or along side Ares’ centaurs. But I still found it jarring within the first few minutes of this movie, a Kraken (a Norse monster) is claimed to come from Hades, though I’ve been informed since that this is in the original movies. I put that aside while watching, giving it a chance.
What I did like was the monsters: the harpies, the kraken itself, the witches, the giant scorpions, Charon, the Jinn and the Medusa and the ensuing battles between the heroes and the monsters. (FYI, the witches, harpies, Charon, Jinn and Gorgons are all in Lost Heroes!).
But everything else felt like a missed opportunity. Take the Olympian Gods themselves. Why are they all wearing armour, though none of them ever take to battle? It felt like the Gods had been made more masculine. Why does the whole plot resolve around just Hades and Zeus? Apollo is featured in the deleted scenes, but he just comes off as a brat (rather than the beautiful youth I’d imagine him to be). Poseidon seems sheepish, despite being the God of Earthquakes. And where was the intrigue between the other Gods? Surely Hera might align herself with Hades to bring down Zeus? Why doesn’t Athena don her armour and go to battle against Hades to protect her father?
On a side note, why does Perseus have a shaved head? He looks like a US marine in roman armour. All the other male characters have long hair and fancy beards. Couldn’t figure that out. I’d imagine in that sort of culture, having your head shaved and beard cut would be a mark of shame. Fun fact, Spartan men would have half their beards shaved off as a punishment.
And all the characters were moaning about how awful and unfair the gods were, blaming them for the lack of fish, the plague, poverty, etc. and how they should revolt against the bad gods. I kept thinking is that these problems are not the Gods fault, but are social and technical problems. We, the audience, were never shown the tyranny of the Gods, except that life was hard back then. Not that I had a problem with a humanity battles gods theme. In fact, it appeared to be the opposite as half-way through the movie, Zeus refused to destroy the human army that had laid siege to Olympus, because he loved them too much! Zeus got off on their love, not their torment.
What it felt like was a pilot to a really cool fantasy-hero TV series, a gritty and darker Hercules or Xena. Or rather what those two series would look like if they had been created after the movie 300. Because in a TV series, the different gods could be explored and their complex relationships and politics exposed a bit more.
And I’ve just read a sequel is in the works: Wrath of the Titans. Might be fun.
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Nice article on Ann Dupuis over at indiepressrevolution.com:
Ann Dupuis is a studious-looking, soft-spoken woman with piercing eyes. You may have encountered her in the Grey Ghost Press booth at GenCon over the years, selling books with names like Terra Incognita, Another Fine Mess, and Deryni Adventure Game. She also sold those funky dice with the plus and minus symbols on them so many of you are now familiar with. An unassuming person selling a niche product: easy to miss in the chaotic sensory overload that is the GenCon Dealer’s Room.
Ann Dupuis is also the founding mother of indie gaming.
I have to say that Ann is really cool and I’ve had a few dealings with Ann over on the fudge list and with my Reboot adventure. So it’s great to see her get some kudos! 
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I got some great feedback from 1km1kt.net on my “Book of the Gods” which I plan to keep in mind. It boils down to three points:
- Lack of Play Advice
- Missing Quick References (tables, lists, etc.)
- Too much all at once/overwhelming
Nearly all of these faults are due to the way I split the writing of the setting from the writing/design of the rules. I think ultimately Lost Heroes will benefit from this, but v0.19 as a standalone setting book doesn’t.
My plan next now is continue what I was doing and do my mini-survey of the current popular free builds of Fudge and then produce a “lite” rule system for Lost Heroes. But this will contain the “Quick References” missing from Book of the Gods so the basic system may be light, but it my be quite long.
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What we need right now is the sound of Angels or the bellowing of Giants, maybe some bewitching music of the Gentry or the battle cries of Valkyries. You’ll have to use you’re imagination I’m afraid.
I’m please to announce that I’ve put the first public release of Lost Heroes RPG: Book of the Gods online. You can download it from here.
“Lost Heroes RPG: Book of the Gods” is the setting of Lost Heroes. I made the decision a long time back to split up the writing of the setting from the design and implementation of the rules (have a gander over past blog entries for more info). Though once the two are done to some satisfactory level I’ll probably bring back together in one. This version, v0.19, is not as good as it could be, but I’m hoping by putting it online, I can kick myself to up the game.
Lost Heroes RPG is a free roleplaying game. It’s set in the modern day but the players take on the characters of the Chosen who are the champions, lovers and children of the Gods. Book of the Gods, contains six unique pantheons of Gods which include Angels and Demons, Tuatha Dé Danann and the Fomorii, the Greek Olympian Gods and the Norse Aesir Gods.
Your comments and criticisms are welcome.
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I’ve been sitting on a draft of “Lost Heroes RPG: Book of the Gods” for over two months, since coming back from the holidays. I’ve gotten some encouraging feedback, but I’ve just not done anything with it. I even have a list of changes I want to do myself, certainly some chapters and sections need a re-write, my wife pointed out some grammar issues, such as my use of “they” in place of “his” or “her” leads to some peculiarities and so on. I could go on about coming straight back from the holidays into the tiring new school year and sudden approaching deadlines.
But, in all honesty, if you want to complete something, you’ll find the time, somehow. It all boils down to procrastination. Perhaps I am too tired, perhaps I’m simply afraid to put it online. Well the only way I’ve found to beat procrastination, is to do something. Force it. So, as per the title of this post, I’ve made a decision.
I’m going to put the current draft (with some minor changes) online in the next week. I’ve started tidying up the webpage and thinking about how best to present it, but by this evening or tomorrow it’ll be online for all to gaze apon.
I probably didn’t pick the best moment to do this though. Next Saturday is Gaelcon, the best Irish gaming convention, (though I haven’t planned to go sadly this year) and just announced yesterday is the Charity RPG bundle from DriveThruRPG (a worthy cause, I’ll be buying a copy…), $25 for over a $100 worth of RPG PDFs!
Anyway, a decision is made and action must be taken.
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I keep having thoughts about what I want to get from the system, but the more I think about it, the more it gets fuzzy and, well, complicated (but in a good way I think).
Let me explain. People love roleplaying systems that appear simple and elegant but offer up potentially limitless (or more than easy to handle) complexity. That the system everyone aims for, easy to get into but endlessly flexible. But what is not necessarily obvious is that they also what a system that plays well. And you can come up with any sort of funky simple system, but it may not work when it gets into strangers hands.
So I dwelt on this problem for a while and decided that when I put together the “lost heroes” system, I’ll lob in all the ideas I can or want to include. Fill it up and having it overflowing with much of muchness. Because it’s easier to cut away than add later once you put something in the public (and the sad thing is, I picked this little piece of wisdom up from a reality TV show). The plan then is to play test it, either in person with friends or possible online over at the Fudge IRC chat room on otherworlders.org, cutting back on what doesn’t work until I have something that, well, does.
The system is going to be ostensibly Fudge. And there has been some recent free systems based on Fudge, like Marvellous Superheroes and Fudgepark2/SLUDGE that have come to my attention. (I plan to digest them for ideas! Muhahahahahah). And quite recently a new iteration of Now Playing in The Unexplained from Carnivore Games. So a nice little trove of stuff to dig through.
Thankfully much of the pieces of my system are already there or I’ve done work on them in parts. I still foresee a lot of work getting everything together in a system that appears coherent and aligns with the intents of the setting.
- One of the core parts of the system will be Fudge Passions. This is a system I developed to replace Fudge Points but more importantly as a way to link supernatural powers to characters emotions and environs. Something that makes the powerful lost hero characters part of the world.
- And then there is Story Hooks. This is tied to Fudge Passions but also to other ideas that have been knocking about in my head for years. I started them before I had heard of Fate and in many ways they are similar to Aspects but not as powerful as Aspects in play but are more malleable in the long term.
- I also wanted to do something about conflict and be able to turn any roll of the dice situation into a form of combat. TDO Combat is my first attempt. It suffers in that it’s hard to understand from the text, yet I know what I want from it. It pulls in ideas from Riddle of Steel and Shadows of Yesterday games, the old Fudge Factor and discussions from the old FudgeList. It provides a criteria for when to do “combat” and when just make a single roll, handling group and one-on-one combats and should be applicable to most types of situations from chases and battlefields to political gatherings and socialising.
- Another little titbit, but much more recent, was some thoughts on making Magic Characters interesting. It’s quite generic in that you could add it to any system: Magic Character Add-on. In principal it’s a way to turn a character who can do magic to a magic-based character. The difference is subtle, but IMHO important.
- And finally, at least publically, is a blog post on what I call The Big Pile of Skills Problem. Your character isn’t just a big list of skills you know and I really like idea of “professions” a character has. It’s more defining/descriptive though more abstract and harder to design for.
So I hope you’re now getting the impression of how much of a mix-bag the system is going to be.
Of course, if your more interested in setting-specific bits of the rules, I’d recommend checking back over some of these older blog posts, [1] and [2], for some idea what characters you can play and what sort of powers they may have.
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