I've started an informal blog of sorts over in the Yahoo group for this game, explaining some of the development of the game, starting with:
"I bought my first copy of 3rd edition Chainmail (the spiral bound, silver-covered classic) when I was 9 or 10 years old, in 1976 or 7. I picked it up on an impulse when I was in the hobby shop picking out lead figures; at the time I had no idea what roleplaying games were or that many of the people who bought the lead figures I collected used them for that purpose.
I quickly learned the rules and began using them to run large battles involving every lead figure and/or HO scale roman soldier I owned. This was sort of entertaining, but I noticed the funnest games happened when I designated one of the figures to be a hero or wizard, using the fantasy rules in the back of the book, and focused my attention on that figure's exploits. Soon I was playing smaller skirmishes or series of encounters as one of these figures, with a few side kicks, worked his way through the large wooden castle I used as the setting for most of my battles.
Eventually, I discovered D&D and The Fantasy Trip and started proper table top role playing, but I never forgot the sense of adventure of these earlier afternoons spent playing something that really was like a solo, free form roleplaying game focused on miniatures. I have undertaken a variety of game development projects over the years, but recent was inspired to try to capture something of these early experiences by creating a game more closely tied to Chainmail than anything I've previously encountered. And, I wanted it to have some of the goofiness of Tunnels and Trolls. And the awesomeness of 1st edition AD&D. And the coolness of Call of Cthulhu. This was the starting thought."
They are mostly interesting because they are weird. But, I decided there are so many broadly similar games out there that I didn't need to make another. My goal was to stay true to the basic structure, play balance and 'vibe' of 3rd edition Chainmail, expanding its scope without really changing what it feels like to play. Rules light isn't quite the right term; it is more like the game you would have if the creators of D&D had been trying to turn Yatzee into a table top roleplaying game. While playing make believe with their army men. Anyway, whatever its faults it definitely isn't much like whatever you are playing now!
A note regarding the Platemail combat system:
Combat is the heart of many roleplaying games, and is clearly the root of most rules systems in varients of D&D. This is particularly true of Platemail, which is descended from a table-top war game, 3rd edition Chainmail.
Combat in Platemail has a surpsing number of traits associated with several modern games - e.g., the 'meta' combat system of Heroquest, the dice pools of d6 or certain elements of Riddle of Steel. This is not a result of intentional borrowing from those games to assemble a chimera made up of their parts; rather, it is a natural (I felt, inevitable) consequence of sticking as close as possible to the way combat is handled in 3rd edition Chainmail, while letting it evolve into something with unified mechanics across the various rules sub-systems.
The original (3rd edition) Chainmail has 4 separate combat systems:
There are some obvious weaknesses to all this; it is generally clear how to go back and forth between the standard mass combat and fantasy combat systems, but one cannot always easily figure out how to translate the capabilities of a combatant from either of these into the melee combat system, and the jousting system doesn't seem to have any relationship to the rest of the game at all.
However, there are also some noteworthy strengths - in fact, things that I consider improvements on any fantasy role playing game I know. First, the game naturally scales up and down from mundane to very powerful beings without bogging down; that is, it has multiple 'gears' that you can select to describe combat of virtually any scale with a quick, efficient resolution. Second, all of these systems are sufficiently concrete to be interesting but are fast, fast, fast to resolve. In most games I've played, time slows when combat begins, and events that take moments in game time can take an hour or more to resolve in real time. Chainmail never does this. The clash of arms, no matter the scale or power level, is resolved immediately with a high-stakes throw of the dice. These are not mook rules that some games employ to speed action: everyone, including player characters and powerful monsters, are in the same risky, fast moving boat. It is difficult to exagerate how much energy this pumps into combat.
Later, an explanation of how this was evolved to create the 4 nested combat systems of Platemail...
Original D&D (the digest sized books) was a direct outgrowth from Chainmail and, in principle at least, adopted its combat system. Much has been written about how this was supposed to work, though I never understood it despite having role-playing games using Chainmail for several years. The Fantasy combat system and Jousting systems in Chainmail go unmentioned in OD&D and were, to all appearances, quickly forgotten. The Chainmail-relevant stats provided in OD&D suggest that the designers imagined some sort of hybrid of Chainmail's mass combat and melee combat systems - i.e., one is supposed to use the weapon type vs. armor type tables, but make multiple rolls as if you had the fighting capabilities of multiple 'men'. I have seen posts by people who believe they understand it, but have never read an example of combat that actually makes sense and covers all the bases. I suspect it is hopeless, as OD&D never really explained what they had in mind.
The ambiguity of this system quickly became irrelevant because OD&D introduced an alternate system that more or less immediately replaced the Chainmail system, and had little to do with it. This new system introduced armor class as a scalar rating rather than a catagory variable (i.e., now AC 5 is simply better than 6, whereas in Chainmail it had been 'different' but not necessarily better with respect to all weapons). It also introduced hit points, d20 to-hit rolls, damage rolls, and a lot of other things we now think of as 'base' D&D.
When I sat down to write Platemail, I asked myself, 'What if the alternate system had never existed? What if the four combat systems in Chainmail had grown and evolved organically, improving and merging with unified mechanics so that one could seamlessly go back and forth between them?' That is what I set out to create.
My first move was to modify the mass combat system of Chainmail. The original followed a convention in which you first refer to a table, cross-indexing the attacking troop 'type' with its target, and then roll a pool of d6 that is some function of the number of attacking figures and compare them with the indicated target number; the number of dice that equal or exceed this target is the number of defending figures removed from play. It is elegant, fast and more nuanced that you might think because of the large number of catagories of attacking and defending troop types. However, it is ill suited to a fully fleshed out roleplaying game because it is unclear how a character (or monster's) traits are supposed to relate to its troop type (e.g., perhaps a 1st level rogue is 'light foot'. Is he still that when he is 5th level? What if he puts on a mail shirt? What if he attacking with a two handed sword?).
Platemail presents this fast, mass combat system in the form of its 'skirmish combat' rules. In this case, each attacking combatant rolls a number of dice equal to his 'combat pool' - something that initially equals 1 for all 1st level characters but rises at different rates depending on character class. These dice are each modified by a number that depends on the weapon being used (e.g., a large weapon, such as a battle axe, might modify each die by +1) and certain character traits (e.g., a sword master might get a +1 modification). Each die is compared to the target number, which is based on the defender's armor class - typically a number from 3 to 7, but possibly reaching higher if magic armor is worn. The number of dice that equal or exceed the target number gives the number of hits delivered to the defender. Importantly, all d6 rolls have an 'exploding' property where a natural 6 is re-rolled, and if a 6 is obtained again you count the result as a 7 (and so forth until a number other than 6 is rolled). This means it is never impossible to successfully attack a very high armor class with a weak weapon, just very unlikely.
The assignment of bonuses to different weapons and armor classes to various armor types was set to reproduce the balance of powers in the original Chainmail as closely as possible. I.e., a first level fighter with a one handed sword attacking a defender in plate armor will have chances of success similar to a normal heavy foot attacking armored foot in Chainmail. However, the Platemail version contains no categories, so one can introduce any new weapon (or unarmed monstrous attack) simply by assigning it an attack bonus (typically -1 for light weapons, 0 for normal one handed arms and +1 for heavy weapons). Similarly, any new type of armor can be classified by its target number armor class. And, the capabilities of higher level characters or monsters is represented by their larger dice pool.
The end result has a power balance very similar to Chainmail, but explicitly deals with a wider range of gear, characters and creatures by boiling the system down to set of scalar characteristics rather than trying to force all creatures into a catagory. This has the added advantage that these scalar characteristics (armor class, dice pool, attack bonus, etc.) can be carried over to the other combat systems without change...
The man-to-man combat system from Chainmail survives in Platemail as the 'Dueling' combat system. The new version serves the same purpose as the old - to resolve combats between two, or perhaps a few, individuals in circumstances where you it would be satisfying to track the ebb and flow of each turn of combat rather than resolving it all in one 'Yatzee!'-like throw of the dice (as occurs in Skirmish combat). But, there are a variety of important changes and innovations.
Most significantly, the basic mechanics of Dueling combat closely resemble those of Skirmish combat, so it is obvious how a combatant's abilities translate back and forth between the two. A combatant's 'combat pool' of dice are thrown all at once in Skirmish combat, and all are simply compared to the defender's armor class to establish success vs. failure. In Dueling combat, the combat pool serves as a reservoir that is spent one or two dice at a time, with combatants trading blows back and forth. And, a 'die' can be spent simply, on an attack, or instead used to attempt to parry or dodge a foe's successful attack or perform some other special action.
For example, a 3rd level samurai in Skirmish combat would throw all at once (or contribute 3 to the 'pot' of dice for his side of the fight), modifying the results of each for weapons and abilities, and compare the results to the armor class(es) of his foes, tallying successes as hits done. The same warrior in Dueling combat might use his first die to deliver an attack, his second to dodge a thrown spear and his third to parry a blow from the naginata wielded by his vile Ono foe.
The only significant complication arises from the ways weapon properties are described. Weapons have a single modifier in Skirmish (i.e., mass) combat, generally -1, 0 or +1. And, any successful attack delivers one hit. Thus, the modifier is intended to sum up a variety of different things - how wieldy the weapon is, how hard its impact, etc. Effectively, the modifier is simply a measure of how useful the weapon would be in a wild, packed melee. The same weapon used in Dueling combat has several modifiers - a bonus (or penalty) to attack, a parry modifier, a damage modifier (as wounds in dueling combat can have highly variable outcomes), and a 'reach' modifier that indicates the weapon's effect on initiative.
Dueling combat has one more peculiarity that adds a component of personal drama to large fights: 'Singling out a foe'. Just as in Homeric battles and adventure movies, a combatant can attempt a saving throw to single out a foe for dueling combat in the midst of a larger battle. If this attempt succeeds, the foe must either engage in at least one turn of dueling combat with the agressor, or retreat from the general fight. If the marked foe is a trivial figure in the fight, this might not matter, but if he is a leader or otherwise important figure, fleeing demands that his compatriots check morale.
Two mounted knights face each other across a flat, open field, eying each other molevolently. A tumble weed blows across the sceen. Suddenly, their horses rear and plunge, then charge across the plain at each other and....what? Most roleplaying games don't have a good answer in this situation. Jousting, either for sport or combat, is a peculiar activity that isn't well described by most combat systems. Generally, it is not discussed and you presumably resolve it with the normal combat system, leaving all sorts of holes. In sport, you often want to break a lance on someone; how does that work? What if you want to sweep them from their saddle instead of poking them? It seems like it should be possible to unseat your opponent other than by killing or incapacitating him; how would that work? Most importantly, the concept of 'I go/You go' initiative seems ill suited to describing the head on collision of two ambulatory impaling weapons.
In 3rd edition Chainmail, jousting (at least, sport jousting) was treated through its own separate combat system that was its own mini-game with its own rules. Each combatant picked a defensive stance (way of sitting in the saddle) and an offensive aiming point. YOu then cross indexed the two to find the result; all results were deterministic (no dice rolling; no chance of failure; no way of representing character ability) and simultaneous (both attacker's results apply).
In Platemail, the generaly structure of Chainmail's approach can be seen if you squint, but the resolution mechanic has been changed so that an individual character's fighting ability is important. The main goal was to have a system in which your 7th level super-humanly puissant knight wouldn't get unseated by Sir Sneddly of Mook just because of your respective choices of aiming point. In Platemail, each combatant divides his combat pool into a defensive and offensive portion, and then chooses a goal for his attack. Goals might include simply attacking with the intent to do lethal damage, unhorsing, breaking a lance, and so forth. The choice of goal determines the task number (number against which each rolled die is compared to see if it counts as a success or not) for the attack. The defensive task number is always the same. Both combatants then roll all dice simultaneously, modifying each die with relevant modifiers for abilities, equipment, etc.. If your number of successes with your defensive pool equals or outnumbers your opponent's successes with his attack, you have fended off whatever he was trying to do. If the attack yields more successes than defense, it succeeds and its effects are resolved. An example from the text of the game:
"Parcifal encounters Leslie the Fey Knight, a blackguard with odd taste in clothing, while crossing a forest clearing. Hating each other on sight, they spur their horses into a charge and joust. Both are using war lances, wear plate armor and carry shields. Parcifal is a 6th level Hero with a combat pool of 6 dice and his abilities include Agile and Steel Thews. Leslie is less gifted; he is 4th level and his only modifier comes from the Powerful ability. Parcifal decides to spend 3 dice trying to unhorse his foe and 3 dice countering his foe. Leslie goes all-out (4 dice) in an attempt to injure the hated do-gooder. Parcifal’s attack roll is a 2 and two 4’s, modified by his Steel Thews ability to a 4 and two 6’s; i.e., two successes. Leslie rolls a 2 a 4 and two 5’s. His modifier is +1 for Powerful and +1 for the war lance’s attack bonus, +1 for the charge bonus, for a 5 a 7 and two 8’s. Parcifal’s armor class is 6 + 1 for a shield + 1 for Agile = 8. Two successes! Parcifal rolls 3 dice for his counter attempt: 1 4 and 5, plus 3 (for Agile and Steel Thews) = 4, 7 and 8 —also two successes. He fends off Leslie’s lance. Leslie is spilled from his saddle and crashes to the ground in a clatter of plates while Parcifal gallops past, unharmed."
Abstract combat systems, where you might counter a troll's claw attack with your basket weaving skill, are a large, specialized niche of modern game design and have an avaunt guarde feel to them (sp?). But the basic idea was present in 3rd edition Chainmail, in the form of the Fantasy combat system. The notion was that when one hero, wizard, dragon or similarly extraordinary figure engaged in combat with soldiers and other mere mortals, the standard combat system could be used to adjudicate the outcome. But that when two extraordinary combatants locked horns, something else was required. This is a general problem with roleplaying game combat system: what happens when your 'normal' task resultion systm has its dials all turned to 11? Have you engineered it so perfectly that you can capture the balance of power between two dis-similar beings? Or, as seems more likely, do the mechanics, created to handle different circumstances, pre-determine the outcome in a way that seems unfair?
The heroic combat system of Platemail was built to deal with situations where a heroic character should have some kind of shot, but the regular combat system makes it nearly impossible. Here is how it works...
Heroic combat: Many monsters are so large and physically or magically powerful that even a hero has little chance against them using the skirmish or dueling combat systems. But hero- and superhero-level characters have an option: Heroic combat. If your character is lower than heroic in level (i.e., 1st-4th), you may only engage in heroic combat if you fight with a magic weapon.
Heroic combat follows the steps below:Intent: A combatant’s intent is the goal he is trying to accomplish during the turn of combat. This can be as simple as, ‘hurt my foe’. But, it can be more effective (and is nearly always more interesting!) if you have some other intent, such as “trick the Tyrannosaurus Rex into running off a cliff”, or “tie the giant’s shoes together, so he trips”. The referee can reject or modify an intent if it strikes him as unreasonable, but players should be given plenty of latitude to think up something creative. After all, if they are engaged in heroic combat, they probably are up against something that is likely to kill them. Boring intents lead to boring heroic combats; interesting intents lead to interesting heroic combats!
The Heroic combat pool: Always a number of dice equal
to the combatant’s level (regardless of class), or, for
monsters, hit dice or combat pool (whichever is higher). This
pool abstractly represents all the things you might imagine your
character could be trying – hacking with a sword; casting
spells; sneaking about.
Modifiers: The die modifier for a
heroic combat roll can only come from one heroic or superheroic
ability (i.e., mundane abilities are generally not relevant)
and/or one magic weapon or item. And, that ability and/or weapon
must be relevant to the character’s intent. Monsters that have
the intent to simply do lethal damage can use their skirmish
combat to-hit modifier.
Consequences: If the intent was simply to harm a foe, the loser takes hits equal to the margin of victory, and any other effects are resolved using the consequences system. For other intents, the referee adjudicates the meaning of the margin of victory. In general, a margin of success of 1 indicates the intent was marginally accomplished, 2 indicates it was fully accomplished, and 3 indicates it was spectacularly accomplished.
Example: a troop of hearty adventurers exploring a strangely extensive cave system has been run to ground by a foul Bälrog. Their leader, the heroic Magician Glarbag the Magnificent, knows he has essentially no chance of defeating it by just throwing fire balls or other such nonsense. But someone has to do something, so he engages it in heroic combat to give the party time to flee. The Bälrog gleefully accepts, so no roll to single out is required. Glarbag’s intent in the first turn is to tempt it onto a conveniently placed bridge and then exert his wizardly might to collapse the bridge. The character is certainly capable of similarly powerful acts of magic, so the referee allows the intent. The Bälrog just wants to kill the wizard, so his intent is simple. Both combatants roll their heroic combat dice pools – 8 for the wizard and 10 for the vile demon. The demon has an exceptionally high +3 bonus (his skirmish attack bonus) while the wizard says he’ll draw on the power of his magic staff, so the referee gives him a +1 bonus for a relevant magic weapon. Anyone with an eye for numbers would think things look bad for the wizard, but one reason we roll the dice is that all kinds of crazy things can happen. The Bälrog rolls three 1’s, all of which are automatic failures (as for any other roll), three 2’s (also failures) and four 3’s or higher (all of which ‘pass’ due to his bonus), for 4 successes. The wizard rolls three 6’s (!!), two 5’s, all of which pass due to his +1 bonus, and the rest 4’s or lower, for 5 successes. He marginally wins, and the referee rules he’s cracked the bridge, unbalancing the Bälrog…but, the demon can act to either save himself or strike out next turn before really falling. Bälrogs are naturally ill-tempered, so his intent next turn will be to grasp the wizard and pull him over as well, rather than doing something sensible like, say, saving himself. Glarbag isn’t sure what to do, so he says he’ll try to fend the demon off and withdraw. There are no heroic abilities about withdrawing, so the referee rules the wizard gets no modifiers. The Bälrog returns to statistical form, earning 7 passes, and the wizard gets only 2 (the two natural 6’s from his heroic combat pool). A clear win for the Bälrog results in Glarbag being entwined in his demonic whip and pulled over the side and into the deep, presumably never to be seen again…
The first and most obvious difference between Platemail and a familiar D&D incarnation is that player characters don't have attributes (or hit points; something I'll explain later). I had several motivations in ommitting characteristics from Platemail. First, there is no precedence in Chainmail, and so no obvious reason why I would want them to create a souped-up version of my childhood game. Second, characteristics are a game designer's trap - once you start your list of them, you are either emulating D&D or responding to it in some way (i.e., changing the name of your version of wisdom, or turning Strength into three different stats, or combining strength and constitution into one stat). Third, I honestly never thought D&D made appropriate use of stats. So much effort is invested in generating and keeping track of them, yet they don't really have much impact on the game, at least as compared to other things (like your class, level, gear and magic items). And fourth, I wanted players of Platemail to get into a different sort of mindset from page one.
Yet, the 'characters' of original Chainmail really live only in the player's imagination - there is nothing concrete to separate one from another. You could argue there is a simple beauty in this: when a child plays with toys, they are infused with personality, back stories and abiilities without any need for rules or character sheets. Nevertheless, a player character in a roleplaying game needs something that marks him or her as different from the rest.
The most important way this is handed in Platemail is through 'gifts and curses' - a set of traits, abilities, backgrounds and personality quirks that distinguish one person from another. This sort of thing is commonplace in modern games, but I'm not aware of any that handle it quite the way Platemail does. First, the list is a four-color hash of extremes, from godlike or demonic powers to syphilis and everything in between. This is not simply a list of re-labled saving throw bonuses . Second, they are determined randomly, and much about your character hinges on these rolls. The closest comparison I can think of is the character generation process of first edition Gamma World, where those few Mutation rolls made during character generation set you on your way toward triumph or dissaster. This will feel odd to some players in an era where characters are built like robots using a set of resources. That is o.k.; there are dozens if not hundreds of games that work in the usual way. This game works in a differnet way.
The second way in which characters are differentiated from one another is through a more mundane and familiar set of abilities that describe the character's special skills. Some of these are very familiar (thief sorts of abilities). Others are more peculiar (a magical research library or alchemical laboratory). The most noteworthy thing about abilities is that the total number of them is fairly small. Two or three on character creation, up to perhaps a dozen for the highest level, most complex and powerful character you could easily imagine.
So, don't worry that your character lacks a Dexterity score. Who needs a Dexterity score when you can be a syphilitic-cad-demigod-swordmaster with the pious faith to perform miracles?
In addition to taking a different approach to character attributes and abilities, Platemail also treats hit points and damage in a way quite different from familiar modes of D&D. The starting point of the Platemail system was the way in which damage is handled in Chainmail, which is broadly similar to the way damage works in the Warhammer family of table top miniatures skirmish games: normal beings of roughly human scale have a single hit and are killed or incapacitated when the take one 'hit' of damage (equal to a successful attack with any weapon). More powerful beings (heroes, ogres, dragons, etc.) can accumulate multiple his before falling (strangely, some beings in Chainmail can be killed only by delivering a certain number of hits in the same turn - effectively like 4e D&D where healing surges let you reset your hit point clock periodically).
Platemail is a simple evolution of the chainmail system in which the number of hits you can take equals your level (sometimes modified for certain gifts or abilities). In addition, there is a kind of 'death spiral' introduced, where your ability to fight can be influenced by the hits you have taken. This degradation of abilities works in two different modes: for monsters or NPC's in skirmish combat, each hit you take reduces your combat pool (the dice you throw to make attacks or perform other actions in combat) by one. For player characters in any mode of combat or monsters+NPC's in dueling combat (i.e., cases where it you might be willing to sacrifice speed of play for more interesting and varied outcomes) each 'hit' is reduces your hit total by 1 AND calls for a roll on the 'Consequences' table. This is effectively like the critical hit tables in Rolemaster, but simpler. There is a single table and about a dozen things can possibly happen to you, in various combinations. You might be knocked down, pushed back, drop your weapon, take a bleeding wound that continues to cause damage, be knocked unconcious, etc. Variable weapon damage is modeled by having a modifier to the roll on the consequences table for certain weapon types (similarly, some armor types provide modifiers to this roll; i.e., armor effectively reduces damage in addition to making you harder to hit). These modifiers are ignored for NPCs in skirmish combat, as being too fidly to track and slowing play, but always influence how player character damage is resolved. In this respect, the system loosely resembles damage and injury in Tunnels and Trolls.
Recover from damage occurs at 2 rates, depending on the seriousness of the injury you have taken. If a hit is catagorized as a 'wound' on the Consequences table, healing is relatively slow and a character may be out of action for mutliple days; possibly weeks. If the hit is not catagorized as a wound (most of the time unless the hit you took brought you to or near 0 remaining hits), you will recover quickly - minutes to hours.
If you are new to a damage system of this sort, it can seem a little scary: 'how am I supposed to survive combat if i have only 2 hits!' But keep in mind the balance between damage done by attacks and hit capacities of characters is quite similar to conventional (pre 4e) D&D, where weapons do d4 to d10 per blow and characters can take d4 to d10 per level in damage — on average, it works out to one blow per level, and the rest is just book keeping. Platemail retains this dynamic without the book keeping (other than sorting out what 'Consequences' you have suffered from an injury).
Magicians in 3rd edition Chainmail are interesting in two respects: they are some of the most powerful figures on the battle field, and they come closest to being described in ways that would eventualy characterize D&D classes. There is a finely divided gradiation of them - 6 different levels of increasing power - and their level influences the spells they can cast, how easily they can cast them and how powerful they are in combat. In reading this section of the rules, it is easy to imagine the steps that were taken to shape the game into the roleplaying rules we all remember (or still play!).
But some things about the way wizards worked in Chainmail was lost when the game evolved into D&D. First off, they became much less powerful, presumably in the interests in play balance. Second, their menu of spells was greatly extended but also padded with many having moderate effects (rather than the dramatic things they were capable of in Chainmail). You could argue that this trend has only progressed further with time, as later generations of D&D and more recently evolved games mute the power of magicians until they are more like mundane people with a few tricks up their sleeves rather than special people who can tap otherworldly powers.
When I sat down to create Platemail, I decided early on that I wanted a game in which Magicians are fleshed out player characters, but ones that still have this sense of great power and danger to them, even the low level ones. The design philosophy was that an inexperienced magician might have his or her limitations, but the magic spells they know do not. Even a weak magician can at least try to do stupendous things. But, with equally great risks of things worse than simple failure!
My first move with creating Platemail was to decide how a magician's level related to their spell casting ability. I decided to make a break with all the versions of D&D I know (and most other level based games) by creating something that feels more like Call of Cthulhu: a magician can attempt to cast any spell he has learned, and he can attempt to learn any spell he can find written down or get someone else to teach him (possibly someone large, demonic and gooey...). Therefore, knowledge of spells is a great commodity and a character of any level would covet the text of some long-forgotten powerful spell. But, there is a catch: spells are cast by rolling a pool of d6 equal to your level, repeating each turn until a number of 'passes' (modified rolls greater than some target number) equals the spells' level. If your modifiers are low (i.e., you lack powerful gifts or magical items), this might take a while. During this accumulating roll, ever natural 1 is a potential problem - when the number of natural 1's exceeds your own level, you start taking them as hits of damage. So, a weak caster attempting a difficult spell will often exhaust himself and need to stop before completing it. Or, if obstinate, might kill himself in the attempt. Unless he can find some powerful item to aid him... This creates an interesting dynamic where any magician of any level has the potential for earth-shaking power, but runs great risks. A magician with a gambler's personality is not likely to survive long.
The second important thing I turned to was the spell list. I wanted it to reflect things I love about magic systems in long-cherished games, to be true to my original material (Chainmail and early editions of D&D), and to have a breadth of powers and effects that is interesting and potentially game changing. Five different names for fire ball or magic missile do not interest me. I would rather have one spell for that sort of thing and four more that do all sorts of wild things - stealing people's dreams or creating an illusionary palace or changing the landscape to confuse or trap your foes.
I started by adopting all the spells in 3rd edition Chainmail as-is. Then, I mined a wide range of favorite games for the jewels of their spell lists - Call of Cthulhu, Stormbringer, Dragonquest, Basic and 1st edition Advanced D&D, 1st edition Chivalry and Sorcery, and, perhaps surpising to some, the board game Divine Right. This game, and its fan supported material made since it went out of print, include some inspired world-building and magic items and spells. For example, I pulled from this a collection of curses that are straight out of fairy tales, each more interesting than the last. The end result is something I'm proud of: a spell list that pulls you into the game and makes you want to create adventures that revolve around acts of magic.
Many of the most powerful and interesting spells are collected into their own group, 'Great Magics', including spells that mold small kingdoms into enchanted lands where the creator has the powers of a demigod, necromantic nightmares that create hordes of walking dead or an animated zombie the size of an office building assembled from thousands of bodies stolen from a battle field. That sort of thing.
Finally, the spell list contains a long, detailed set of priestly magical effects, usable only by magicians who have a set of abilities approprite to a cleric. These are molded around concepts of christian sacraments and miracles and result in priestly characters who have a strong medieval church sort of feel.
Next, magical items...
I have always felt that the heart and soul of D&D (whatever edition you fancy) has not been the rules - those flexible, often forgotten bits of tissue paper - rather, it has always been the rich list of monsters, magic spells and magic items. Count the pages in the three volumes of 1st edition AD&D: most of the material, and the overwhelming majority of what people pay attention to, consists of lists of these three things. I believe this is essential to the game's enduring popularity because it has always felt like a huge pile of goodies for the players and DM to explore. Like a gigantic collection of toys.
This line of thinking was foremost in my mind when I sat down to make the list of magic items available for Platemail. I wanted the list to be big - like, really big - and full of idiosyncratic, interesting things.
First, I assembled lists of things that are modest in power and similar to the sorts of gear you would expect many players in a high fantasy campaign to carry - principly magic gems, Amulets and alchemical potions. These are the little 'bennies' you might hope to find in almost any treasure chest you've managed to pry open.
Next, magic weapons and armors. What I wanted to avoid here was the notion that a magical weapon or suit of armor would carry a 'grade' of such and such a bonus. I've always hated the dynamic of 'trading up' from +1 to +2 to +3 and so on. It is one of the main forms of irritating munchkinism. So, I decided right off that magic weapons and armor always carry the same, relatively modest, arithmetic bonus, but are special in other ways. They permit anyone to engage in Heroic combat (to be described later), and thus are qualitatively, rather than quantitatively better. And, many carry magical enchantments that resemble spells, or are unique in some way.
Next, scrolls and tomes. Scrolls serve a functional purpose like other minor magic items; they are a modest 'power up' that expands the use of magic by the players who have them. Tomes are something else - unique objects that vary from obscure and pointless to themost powerful things in the game. They are the seat of magical knowledge, and therefore magical power, and so you can imagine them being the focus of much attention by players.
Lesser and Greater magic items are effectively permanently embodied spell effects, and are as diverse and variable in power as the spell lists.
Most fun to create was the list of severa dozen Artifacts - unique magical items that have no obvious connection to spells a magician might cast. Some are modestly powerful but odd; others are game changing in their potential influence. Many are taken directly from my odd other influence in this game design project - the board game, Divine Right.
Taken together, it is a large, complex list not unlike the pages that inspired it, from the 1st edition AD&D DMG. I was hoping to make something that yould just leaf through at random and come up with an item that serves as the thread for an adventure or a whole campaign.
One thing I wanted to encourage in Platemail was the notion that player characters and important NPCs could create special places - castles, magical towers, enchanted groves, pocket baronies, and so foarth, and to support that not just with a few roleplaying suggestions, but with concrete, easy to follow rules. An example is the heroic-level ability, 'Tower':
Arch-wizards and similarly powerful magical beings often create a ‘sorcerous tower’ imbued with a variety of special powers. (Anyone with the resources can build a tower and call himself a sorcerer; we are speaking here of something more mysterious and powerful). Sorcerous towers always include a Laboratory, a Library and a Pentagram (as the spell of that name), are protected by the Ward spell, and are imbued with 3 additional powers equivalent to a Greater Magic Item (chosen at the creator’s discretion and with the referee’s approval; for example, a sorcerous tower might be invisible or capable of teleporting). Most wizards also choose to fill a sorcerous tower with additional traps, henchmen, zombies, etc. The Sorcerous Tower ability reflects the investment of space, time and other resources into the creation of a sorcerous tower.
Another form of magical space that a player character might encounter or create is the enchanted or holy place. A general description from the rules book:
Enchanted or holy places: There exist a variety of magically powerful places. Some can be created by magicians (e.g., using spells such as Magic Wood). Others are intrinsic parts of magical realms. Others are mysterious in origin. All have spell-like powers that may be similar to one or more arcane or priestly spells; others have powers or effects with no parallels in the annals of known spells. A ‘holy’ place provides spell-like benefits of a religious nature; the priestly spell, ‘holy place’ can create such a place. In general, any magician aligned with the spirit of the place (e.g., a priest in a religious holy ground) doubles his level with respect to all spell casting rolls and saving throws related to magic.
A spell from the magic book that provides one example of one such enchanted space ('CL' in these spell descriptions is the 'casting level'; it is loosely like spell levels in D&D, but the scale is based on Chainmail and is more compressed; i.e., a CL 5 spell in Platemail might be an 8th or 9th level spell in AD&D):
Call Forth the Devil’s Playground
The caster causes a satanic temple to grow out of the ground. This temple persists until physically destroyed, dispelled (as an enchantment) or banished by a miracle. This temple acts as a holy ground for diabolical being (i.e., spell casting level is doubled) and the caster recovers one hit of damage per turn while within its walls.
CL: 5 Range: Sight Save: No Duration: Permanent
Magicians in Platemail have access to extrodinary and sometimes bizzare powers, well beyond those you will find in the spell lists of moderate-level wizards in more familiar games. As an extreme example, I present below a description of an order of magicians - The Black Hand - one of their most powerful spells - Create Colossus - and the description from the stat block for the beast itself. I chose this example both because it is super cool and because it provides an example of some of the material I mined from the board game, Divine Right. The Colossus is not intended as a monster for the party to fight in a knock-down-drag-out fight. It is a monstrosity that strides slowly across the landscape destroying armies. Your only hope in its face is similarly potent sorcery, or a hero armed with some artifact:
The Black Hand is a mysterious and powerful necromancer that resides in the Tower of Zards — a horrible prison to Black Hand’s foes. Every prisoner freed from the Tower has emerged insane. This name also applies to his small team of magical minions (although it is not always clear when one is dealing with a minion and when one faces the Hand himself…or perhaps it can be more than one person at once). The Black Hand controls several fell creatures described below. They are powerful in war, though no ally will stand to march in the same column with them. The Black Hand is not known to have ever created or summoned more than one of their creatures at the same time, although one cannot be sure whether this is from choice or some limit to his power.
Create Colossus: The Black Hand may assemble this disgusting giant from piles of battle dead. See the Beastiary for its statistics. The Colussus may only be created when the Black Hand has prolonged access to a recent battlefield. Once formed, it may move up to 200 kilometers from its birthplace, though only at the direction of its creator. The Colossus is a truly monstrous being, capable of crashing through whole armies of mortal soldiers (though it is relatively useless in assault against fortifications, as it simply breaks apart if it attempts to batter a stone wall). The only individuals who may stand against it are powerful sorcerers or heroes bearing the Talisman of Dispel or the Sword of Wizardry (described in the section below on Artifacts). The Colossus is also vulnerable to the Firestorm of Greystaff, the Whirling Vortex, and Mirage of the Eaters of Wisdom. The Colossus can step across rivers, but cannot pass through deep lakes or the sea. It persists so long as its creator focuses on controlling it (unless it is destroyed, unlikely though that is).
The Colossus is a gargantuan giant, over a 100 meters tall, necromantically assembled from the bodies of a recent battle field by the dark sorcerers of The Black Hand (see the book of Magic for details). Almost nothing could stand before this horror in combat — perhaps a similarly large fairy-tale sized giant or an ancient dragon. Humans faced with the Colossus must flee turn to powerful magic. In addition to its brute physical abilities and the vitality common to all undead, any mortal who views the colossus from any range must check moral with a -2 modifier or flee in terror, also gaining a temporary madness.
One of the things I wanted to do with Platemail was to make the magical effects associated with religion feel more religious and less like just a spell list for another kind of sorcerer. One way this was done was through carefull selection of spells for Priestly magic. More important, I think, was the creation of a separate system of 'miracles', which can be performed by a character of any class, provided they are devout in their beliefs. Here are some representative snippets of descriptive text that give a flavor for how this works:
Miracles are super-natural acts or events that might resemble spells in their effects but are not achieved through arcane or even priestly magic. They are achieved through faith and are accessible to characters of any class, provided they have the Devout ability, or a more powerful ability of a similar kind, and are not living in a state of sin, according to the tenets of their faith. Miracles are performed by attempting a standard saving throw vs. a task number that depends on the power and grandeur of the miracle...
A few of the simplest acts of faith...
Courage of the Righteous: The successful supplicant is able to resist or recover from terror or madness, through the support of his god.
Prayer for Forgiveness: This is the only common act of faith that can be attempted by a character living in a state of dire sin. A successful prayer for forgiveness will give the supplicant an insight as to the penance or sacrifice that is required to return a sinner to his god’s good graces. Without the aid of a priest’s confession, this prayer is required before someone in a state of sin can again attempt other miracles. This prayer may only be attempted once per month; i.e., if you fail your first attempt you must wait a month to try again.
Prayer for Guidance: A successful prayer provides the character with insight as to how he might achieve some goal.
A few more powerful ones...
Confound Magical Forces: Arcane spells cast at the character, or one under his protection, automatically fail, for the duration of one encounter or adventure event.
Cure Minor Disease: A victim is completely cured of one generally non-fatal disease, such as black bile or phlegm (though any accumulated damage from that disease must still heal normally).
Defy Evil or the Undead: The character repels an intrinsically evil being, such as the undead or a demon. If the attempt is successful, the being in question must equal the number of ‘passes’ in a countering saving throw or flee as if it had failed a morale check. Even if this saving throw succeeds, the being cannot closely approach or touch the character.
A very powerful miracle...
Call Back the Dying: A believer who has died within the last hour, but who is generally intact, returns to life and in stable, though still injured, condition (i.e., whatever caused his death will not immediately claim him, but he still must recover normally from cuts, etc.). This miracle cannot be performed on someone who has received last rites, been buried by a priest in hallowed ground or who has been severely disfigured (decapitated, burned to a crisp, etc.). This miracle does not defy God’s laws because it is a form of healing those who almost-but-not-quite died. Recalling a soul that has passed on to judgment in the afterlife is a blasphemous abomination left to depraved necromancers.
you don't have to build it by hiring engineers and choosing gatehouses and so on so forth? (source)
The rules provide enough information that you could do something along those lines, at any level where you had the money and resources to start chipping away at it. And, the magic system is sufficiently detailed and flexible that you could eventually mimic the things provided by this ability. The reason it is exists is that, in my experience, players become frustrated by the fiddly details of hiring massons and tallying the costs of bricks and all the other things that would naturally go into constructing and enchanting your sorcerous tower. I thought that, just as a high level fighter might be handed the leadership of a large troop, and a high level priest might have authority over wide reaching church powers without having to roleplay years of political ascent, why not cut to the chase: 'you want your high level sorcerer to have his Isengard: BOOM! Now you have it; let's play!'
I've been working my way through your documents. So, one's dice pool is pretty much always equal to one's level, with modifiers to the individual dice? That's cool, I generally approve of omnicompetence.
Where did you get the spell Call Forth the Devil's Playground? I just saw that in a fan rewrite of the Fantasy Trip the other day, so I figure you guys got it from the same place. (source)
Yes, your dice pool equals your level in most cases, except in combat where it equals your 'combat dice pool' (there is a table early in the main rule book that indicates how this varies with level and class). The notion is that if you are making a saving throw or trying to perform some random action you might fail at, it is your level that matters. If you are fighting, your class matters as well (warriors are more competent than magicians). The exception to this rule, which holds everywhere else in the game, is Heroic Combat. If you get yourself into heroic combat, you can use your full level worth of dice, regardless of class.
As for the connections to the modified version of TFT, they have the same author 🙂. But, the spell originally comes from Call of Cthulhu.
I haven't had a chance to playtest yet (although I'm working on that, and I'll give you a writeup when I do), but just on the first glance the Consequences table is pretty brutal. It's a major advantage for NPCs who don't have to roll on it, as nearly as I can tell. (source)
That wasn't the intent. An NPC automatically loses 1 die from its combat and saving throw pools, so it is an automatic death spiral for them. PC's and important NPC's won't hit penalty dice often until their remaining hits are low (i.e, many of the consequences are things like losing an action, being pushed back, etc.). Nevertheless, it is perhaps a bit too harsh. I'll think about softening it while I'm under the hood doing edits.
Just a short question, I rolled my first Character who had Brave, Filthy Rich and ... Leprosy (a very interesting Combination)! Leprosy give -1 to most dice pools, but on first level you only have one die, does he not get to do any actions until level 2 (besides non-rolled actions), is the minimum dice pool 1 or does the Action Difficilty go higher instead? (source)
Hmmm, a dilemma that hadn't occured to me (though it should have!). I think the flaw should be changed so as not to create this problem; for the time being, I suggest you give him 1 die in his pool so you can play.
If you roll Demigod as a gift/curse, can you select a high-level ability with prerequisites? Some of the high level abilities are improved versions of lower-level ones, but they require you take the lower-level version first, which is superseded. So, I'm curious as to how that works. (source)
The intent is that you can pick any ability, regardless of pre-requisites, if you get the Demigod gift. [...] balance and moderation are not really part of the Platemail mindset. I think you should just write up a character you like and proceed. He'll probably be dead in an hour anyway.
Also, a first level magic-user casting a spell has a one-in-six chance of dropping dead. That explains why they're a rare breed but isn't that a bit drastic. A level 2 magic-dude has twice the chance of losing a hit which puts him in a death spiral with death inevitable one turn later... Is that right?
The problem here is not intrinsic to the way wounds work, but is a flaw. The issue is that the '0 hits remaining' row on the Consequences table contains 'P' (penalty die) as a consequence. This doesn't necessarily lead to un-makable saves if you started with more than 1 hit and didn't have any earlier 'P' consequences. But, if you have a single hit and are reduced to 0, you either have this inevitable outcome or something worse. So, I'll fix this by limiting penalty dice in some way (likely a good thing, as the damage system is too harch as it is for other reasons as well).
Finally getting around to reading this. Looks like fun!
I have a couple of questions, though:
Some of the gifts and abilities specify that they only work on "saving throws" or "contests", others don't. For example, Agile is "+1 bonus to missile attacks... parry attempts, initiative, and ability or saving rolls involving manual dexterity..." (Actually all mundane abilities use the "ability or saving rolls" language.) But Acute Hearing says, "+1 modifier for any saving throws involving listening or noticing sounds," and Commanding Voice says, "+1 modifier to any ability rolls involving Leadership". And Amore, Love, and Loyalty use the language, "all actions, attacks, saving throws, etc." Is it intended that these restrictions be taken literally, or am I reading too much into this and really all theses bonus applies to the same type of rolls?
The reason I'm confused is that Saving Throws are defined as rolls to "avoid an imminent thread or overcome some obstacle". So I'd tend to read the above as meaning that saving throws are rolls to avoid something (with "overcome some obstacle" meaning "avoid being blocked by that obstacle"), while "ability rolls" are rolls to actively achieve something. So Acute Hearing wouldn't help you actively eavesdrop on somebody, but it would help you hear the click of a pressure plate and leap out of the way. While Commanding Voice would help you order a platoon to take an objective, but not order them to take cover. The problem with this is that, while it's a nice rules division, it sort of sucks for those abilities to apply only half the time. Why doesn't Acute Hearing help you eavesdrop?
And besides, the rest of the rules seem to ignore this definition of Saving Throw, since they keep specifying actions that have nothing to do with avoiding, but still take a saving throw. For example, in a duel the aggressor makes a saving throw to force a singled out target to fight them one on one. And magic items take a saving throw to activate. It seems like for most of the text "Saving Throw" is treated as a synonym for "roll your level pool against a target number of 6", regardless of what it's for.
(And also, if I interpret it this way, I'd guess that "actions" means both ability rolls and saving throws, but then "actions, attacks, saving throws, etc" makes no sense.)
The second question: Do the reaction penalties from Hideous and Goblin Blood stack? That would mean every half-orc gets a -4 to reactions - that's pretty harsh.
Is the -4 move from Midget included in the Hobbit's base move rate? If not, Hobbits actually move 11 m per round, adjusted by armour, which is again pretty harsh.
Is a weapon damage bonus applied in skirmish, or only dueling?
Glad you are giving it a go! Some quick answers:
Interestingly this is very much in line with the original Chainmail rules. You roll once in that game just to determine order of play (basically what becomes initiative in D&D) and from there, take turns.
In Man-to-Man combat you use the rolled order of above, however Weapon Class (ie. reach and speed) generally determines attack order and number of attacks per round.
I've downloaded and skimmed Platemail, but haven't read it in depth. It just seems interesting that you appear to have rolled it's systems back towards the original inspirational rules, just from reading the above.
Yes, this was very much the design intention. Chainmail (3rd Ed) was the first game I owned (other than monopoly...), and I spent 1-2 years playing it either solo or with a friend, using Elastolin plastics, lead miniatures, 1:72 scale plastics, Briton's knights, and/or plastic dinosaurs. I did a few big battles in classic wargamer mode, but quickly shifted to using it as a skirmish combat system, with lots of fantasy elements and a lot of thinking about the back story, who the individuals were, etc. It was basically a proto-roleplaying game, probably not unlike the initial steps taken by the Gygax/Arneson group in the years before D&D was written. This experience is at the root of what I like about roleplaying games, so with this project I was trying to create what might have happened if D&D evolved from Chainmail without such radical changes in rules.
A few did bits from the spot rules, providing a taste of Platemail's approach to some of the more perplexing elements of role playing game design:
Encumbrance? Some games have elaborate rules for encumbrance. This game has only one: If players insist on their characters carrying or wearing unreasonable amounts of gear, do something mean to them.
Minor skills: Ever wonder whether your character knows how to swim, ride a donkey or wash his own socks? Neither do I. Your character knows all sorts of common, minor skills. Write them on your sheet if you wish. Or don’t. Or perhaps decide you don’t know some of these things just for fun. The stentorian voice of THE RULES is mute on these issues.
This evening I sat down to create a 'by-the-book' player character for Platemail. I decided to make a 3rd level character, as one might do if you've succesfully talked your game master into letting you create someone who could survive more than 20 minutes of play. He turned out qute interesting, just from the luck of the dice:
Slortin the Vile
Race: Human Class: Wizard Level: 3
Abilities: Literacy, Ancient language, Crafty, Familiar,
Alchemist, Perception, Scholar
Gifts and curses: Demonic,
Side-kick, Love (half sister)
Hits: 3 Combat pool: 1
AC:
3 Movement rate: 20
Morale modifier: 0 Reaction modifier: -2
(+2 to evil beings)
Gear: Mysterious robes, a book of
spells, a stout staff, various sorcerous ingredients, and 21
silver shillings
Arcane spells known: Awake the dead (3);
Black binding (3); Charm (1); Clutch of Satan (3); Summoning
(var.); Lightning (var.)
Slortin is the twisted child of a nun who was bewitched and seduced by the devil. His serpent-like pupils and stark white hair mark him as the spawn of hell. He devotes himself to the quest for sorcerous power and has already assembled a collection of rogues, assistants and soldiers to do his bidding. Yet, his love for his human half-sister (mother was not actually a very good nun…) might yet provide a path to redemption. Or not. Slortin’s familiar is a small, black ant eater. But it is really very clever. Really.
Ak Jael Bar, apprentice to Slortin the Vile
Race: Human
Class: Wizard Level: 1
Abilities: Literacy, Ancient
language, Agile; Scholar; Priest
Gifts and curses: Patron
(Slortin the Vile); Craven; Rage!
Hits: 1 Combat pool:
1
AC: 4 Movement rate: 20
Morale modifier: 0 Reaction
modifier: 0
Gear: Mysterious robes, a book of spells, a
stout staff, various sorcerous ingredients, and 13 silver
shillings, a dagger
Arcane spells known: Blur (1);
Clumsiness (1); Control (2); Seek the Safe path (1); Ward (1);
Wizard Light (1)
Not a fully independent character, Ak Jael Bar is the sidekick and devoted apprentice to Slortin the Vile. Ak Jael Bar is a slightly built, demure young man from a distant desert kingdom filled with secret wisdom. Unfortunately, he didn’t bring much of it with him, though he is, technically, a priest in a religion he finds difficult to explain to others. He is notorious among his small circle of acquaintances for his timidity and fear in the face of danger. But, when struck he flies into deranged violent ranges of self protection, and has been known to black out and wake up hours later lathered in blood…