An Example Age of Heroes Creature

I've made a number of comments about working on my Bestiary, and this post is for Roequard who asked to see what one of the write-ups look like.

So here it is. It's a draft of the Goblin Chieftain, a not uncommon foe in our campaigns by any means. I converted it to PDF and from there to PNG so it's a bit blurry, hasn't had its final edit (I just completed this draft today), and is likely rather cryptic given all the game speak specific to Age of Heroes in it.

I picked it due to a lack of references to special rules and abilities, well beyond the morale effects anyway.

Looking at this I notice that I use a lot of white space, which certainly increases my page count. This for example takes up an entire page and most entries take up a half page.

On the other hand I think it results in a clean appearance so I'm sticking with it.

Up to My Elbows in Creatures

Been busy, putting most of my free time into working on the Bestiary section of the rules. So not much time for posting on the blog.

I had originally intended for that section to be short and sweet. maybe a dozen pages. As usual I couldn't keep it from growing beyond that. It's currently up to 25 pages, and I'm about half done I think.

The goal is to provide a good overview of what's possible in the system, while breathing some life into the various creatues so that enounters are more than just a stack of hit points to be degrades as is all too common in the gaming world. I hope to make each entry a springboard and inspiration for entitre adventures. Likely didn't succeed, but what the heck.  Worth the try.

Age of Heroes Status

Work continues on getting my homegrown rules into a form that I can use for Lulu.

I'm basically in the last section of the rules proper with 191 pages complete. This last part is the Bestiary, a short selection of sample creatures and people. It's going well, and even with my limited time I think I'll finish it up well before the end of the month.

I suppose I should admit that the last section isn't really the last section. Rather it's the last section of rules. There be a pages talking about what goes into a campaign setting. But that's just a couple of paragraphs so who cares.

Also after the rules are done, I have plans for appendices that will have a few items in it including some extensive designer notes. But that's for later. I'll order my first hard copy before the end of the month without the appendices. It will be used for final play test and one more proof reading.

The Shattered Hobby

Came across this blog post on Roll for Initiative today bemoaning the current state of the RPG world.

Have to say that I agree more than disagree. Too many games, often with very similar systems- none of which are really supported.

And thus there's little reason to buy into them. I already own such systems as BRP, HERO, and so on. And I can adapt them as easily to a setting as any designer, and do so to my own taste and not theirs.

And even better- I can continue to make adventures and expansions for them. Something the game companies no longer do.

As a result, to catch one's interest a RPG publisher would have to offer something new- but they don't. Instead they give us Fudge yet again or maybe yet another version of D20. And we yawn. And we keep our money.


The disagree part?

Small things. I think the OGL made much of the fragmented market possible and removed the entire OSR crowd from the hobby along the way.

I also think the Edition wars matter, be they for D&D or HERO System. Someone sticking with a edition abandoned by its publisher no longer needs anything from the publisher. The result is a publisher who has lost not only one of their best customers, but one of their best salesman as a result.

I doubt the hobby will recover, until it near dies. Shouldn't be long now.

Magic Items are Campaign Defining

Continuing to work on my homegrown rules in my spare time. Currently I'm well into the magic item section.

Basically the intent is to give examples of how some things are done in the game system, and provide a spark for imagination. The latter isn't really all that important considering that the system isn't intended for beginners, but for my own groups.


The nature of a campaign defines what sort of magic items are suited to it. A historical dark ages game without magic would reject any items while a 'magic paves the city streets' setting would require them by the hundreds.

My campaigns tends to be rather magic poor. Most characters can expect to get a minor item or two if they live long enough. Only a few will obtain an item of true power. And to be honest the core rules are written more for this sort of campaign than any other.

Despite that, it's important to give enough examples to cover a good range of possibilities. It's interesting however that the list of example items will likely be longer than the entire list of magic items that players have actually earned in my campaigns.