Another handful of links from about the internet. More can be found on the previous list found here. The original inspiration for all of this - weaver.skepti.ch End of Week links. You can find even more links on the weekly blogroll on r/OSR or a roundup of non-blog news on Third Kingdom Games roundup.
d4 Caltrops went on a roll giving us d100 tables for Spellbook Surrogates & Ritual Research, Starting Equipment: Backstories & Seeds, Fairy Tale Weaknesses and Magical Footwear
d66 Kobolds writes on how Any Source Is Gameable
Coins and Scrolls gives us Legal Spells in Endon - on the law in magical societies
Eldritch Fields gives us Lamentable Blades: swashbuckling combat house rules for LotFP/OSR games.
A Web of Hooks: Quest Connections in a Sandbox Megadungeon Region on Silverarm Press.
07 March 2022
05 March 2022
Scale and Hexes, a round-up of posts.
tl:dr; there is a *lot* of adventuring in a single 10k hex, this post is a round up of many wise sources.
This - Scale & Sublimation - was the jolt I needed to get going on this post. This is a round up on the theme of getting the sense of scale right - how much stuff should be in a hex - rather than the mechanics of running a hex-crawl. For the mechanics of hex-crawling Hex-based Campaign Design by Welsh Piper is one of the core references, lots of additional useful posts in the sidebar.
I based a good chunk of my 'take' on "In Praise of the 6 Mile Hex" from Hydras Grotto. In my own set up I had significant challenges switching between my 'realm scale' 13 kilometer / 10 mile hex to my fine grain 1.3km / 1 mile hexes but I finally got them resolved.
Siena's 6-Mile Hex on Coins & Scrolls is helpful for getting a sense of scale. They also have a whole series on creating a hex-map of which part 3 is particularly good for getting down to populating individual hexes.
Continuing on the theme of scale, Spriggans Den writes "how large does a setting have to be?" noting how much is encompassed by 1000 x 1000 miles.
Tao of D&D writes about scale on the ground to help realistically size content.
For another perspective on the scale of things see this magnificent analysis of the logistics of medieval caravans through the lens of the loot train battle from Game of Thrones season 7 by A Collection of Unmitigated Pedantry.
A useful rule of thumb for adapting hexes for vertical relief is Naismith's rule - "Allow one hour for every 3 miles forward, plus an additional hour for every 2,000 feet of ascent."
Retired adventurer has a sub-system for populating content within hexes assuming a hex divides into 6 triangles (by connecting the corners through the centre).
Great Hex-crawl lessons learned from Nine and Thirty Kingdoms
Some more thinking on Searching a Hex by Stirges Suck with a fine grain procedure.
For more Thalian Musings compiles hex-crawl resources on blogs and on youtube
This - Scale & Sublimation - was the jolt I needed to get going on this post. This is a round up on the theme of getting the sense of scale right - how much stuff should be in a hex - rather than the mechanics of running a hex-crawl. For the mechanics of hex-crawling Hex-based Campaign Design by Welsh Piper is one of the core references, lots of additional useful posts in the sidebar.
I based a good chunk of my 'take' on "In Praise of the 6 Mile Hex" from Hydras Grotto. In my own set up I had significant challenges switching between my 'realm scale' 13 kilometer / 10 mile hex to my fine grain 1.3km / 1 mile hexes but I finally got them resolved.
Siena's 6-Mile Hex on Coins & Scrolls is helpful for getting a sense of scale. They also have a whole series on creating a hex-map of which part 3 is particularly good for getting down to populating individual hexes.
Continuing on the theme of scale, Spriggans Den writes "how large does a setting have to be?" noting how much is encompassed by 1000 x 1000 miles.
Tao of D&D writes about scale on the ground to help realistically size content.
For another perspective on the scale of things see this magnificent analysis of the logistics of medieval caravans through the lens of the loot train battle from Game of Thrones season 7 by A Collection of Unmitigated Pedantry.
A useful rule of thumb for adapting hexes for vertical relief is Naismith's rule - "Allow one hour for every 3 miles forward, plus an additional hour for every 2,000 feet of ascent."
Retired adventurer has a sub-system for populating content within hexes assuming a hex divides into 6 triangles (by connecting the corners through the centre).
Great Hex-crawl lessons learned from Nine and Thirty Kingdoms
Some more thinking on Searching a Hex by Stirges Suck with a fine grain procedure.
For more Thalian Musings compiles hex-crawl resources on blogs and on youtube
02 March 2022
Geography as destiny - emergent world-building from maps
tl:dr; emergent world-building by pushing your fantasy world onto Map-to-Globe and giving it a spin to get a new perspective
After rediscovering the Map to Globe tool I have, in coherence with the current internet memesphere, been pondering my orb. I dumped out the world maps for my home campaign and had another look at them on the globe in rotations centered on different pieces of interest. The key thought driving this was assuming seas are the main long-haul roads between nations and cultures, is there anyone who ought to be talking or interacting with each other that I have currently left out?
For any fantasy world, there will of course be flyers, dwarf under roads, portals and other mystic and magical ways that geographic distant can be bent. but assuming the usual ~ 5% of the general population has a class and some small portion of that have significant magical abilities, most people and trade is going to go by water or land so where is next to where for the most part remains relevant.
Starting with the world map from Azgaars Fantasy Map generator
Then wrapping that onto a globe with Map to Globe.
After rediscovering the Map to Globe tool I have, in coherence with the current internet memesphere, been pondering my orb. I dumped out the world maps for my home campaign and had another look at them on the globe in rotations centered on different pieces of interest. The key thought driving this was assuming seas are the main long-haul roads between nations and cultures, is there anyone who ought to be talking or interacting with each other that I have currently left out?
For any fantasy world, there will of course be flyers, dwarf under roads, portals and other mystic and magical ways that geographic distant can be bent. but assuming the usual ~ 5% of the general population has a class and some small portion of that have significant magical abilities, most people and trade is going to go by water or land so where is next to where for the most part remains relevant.
Starting with the world map from Azgaars Fantasy Map generator
Then wrapping that onto a globe with Map to Globe.
28 February 2022
Shiny TTRPG links #57
Links for this last day of February. More can be found on the previous list found here. The original inspiration for all of this - weaver.skepti.ch End of Week links. You can find even more links on the weekly blogroll on r/OSR or a roundup of non-blog news on Third Kingdom Games roundup.
Captain Ahab's Leg suggests an interesting alternative initiative in Implementing the initiative mechanic from "Men of Iron"
Making the Most of Your TTRPG Collection by Richard Green - top advice for all those of us suffering from book-goblinism.
Silverarm writes About Damn Times: A Campaign Event Table
Prismatic Wasteland writes Calendars, Not Just Maps
Grumpy Wizard has good suggestions in Player Character continuity is not a big deal.
The Alexandrian writes Random GM Tip: Backup PCs
d66 Classless Kobolds writes about Meta NPCs - Reusing My Favorites Across Game Worlds
Captain Ahab's Leg suggests an interesting alternative initiative in Implementing the initiative mechanic from "Men of Iron"
Making the Most of Your TTRPG Collection by Richard Green - top advice for all those of us suffering from book-goblinism.
Silverarm writes About Damn Times: A Campaign Event Table
Prismatic Wasteland writes Calendars, Not Just Maps
Grumpy Wizard has good suggestions in Player Character continuity is not a big deal.
The Alexandrian writes Random GM Tip: Backup PCs
d66 Classless Kobolds writes about Meta NPCs - Reusing My Favorites Across Game Worlds
26 February 2022
Juggling hex scales between map creation tools (Azgaar, Watabou)
tl;dr: bitter lessons learned of switching between hex-scales on two awesome online tools
Working with different hex-scale maps has turned out to be something of a surprising headache for me so I am going to outline where I got to in the hope of saving someone else the strife. Very short version - there are two magnificent easy-use tools out there that are effectively at two different scales and using them both at the same time took me a while to get my head around. Azgaars fantasy map generator works well with 6 mile hexes, Watabous fantasy city generator works will with 1 mile hexes. It takes a bit to mesh the two so here is my homework on doing it.
First, we have a 1 mile hex dropped over a city from Watabou. Most of my current home campaign to date - 2 years of play - has happened within the city walls of Thenya.
Working with different hex-scale maps has turned out to be something of a surprising headache for me so I am going to outline where I got to in the hope of saving someone else the strife. Very short version - there are two magnificent easy-use tools out there that are effectively at two different scales and using them both at the same time took me a while to get my head around. Azgaars fantasy map generator works well with 6 mile hexes, Watabous fantasy city generator works will with 1 mile hexes. It takes a bit to mesh the two so here is my homework on doing it.
First, we have a 1 mile hex dropped over a city from Watabou. Most of my current home campaign to date - 2 years of play - has happened within the city walls of Thenya.
23 February 2022
d20 Small Viable Blogging Tasks
Responding to Grumpy Wizards piece 'where do I start'- on how to get rolling on various projects, I thought I would share my own recipe for cranking stuff out for this blog.
For me I started this blog as a place to write up my hypotheses on the data I was scraping together. I figured that was the sufficiently different niche this blog would occupy.
In the first days I set myself an 'every 2 days post something' rhythm. That turned out to be a lot, especially when I started to fold in more time consuming things like reviews and lessons learned. So I eased back the schedule and set myself a different rhythm.
Now the thing that gets me started is the giant slush-pile. I find myself awake in the middle of the night. Time wasted if I just scroll through the internet but time well spent if I knock even a few dozen words off one of these post ideas
C. Kinch gave a top tip on his Send Three & Fourpence podcast - based on getting hobbies done as a father - of identifying what your 20 minute task is. Assuming you can get that small a chunk of time to yourself, how can you push the stone along in that time?
So - a meta-type table: d20 typical small blogging tasks:
1 - read a book I've got, scribble review notes on envelopes saved for the purpose
2 - type up those notes into one of my review templates
3 - photograph the book, upload it and create the post blank
4 - get the notes from the review template into the post
5 - fill out any missing bits
6 - cold-eyes read a review to find typos, other issues & fix them
7 - do some data crunching, make the graph that shows the interesting points
8 - frame up the post with the graph, the major points, get formatting right
9 - re-read and clean up the argument to make sense to people coming cold to it
10 - write a couple of entries on a random table
11 - mess about with an online tool to bulk out said tables
12 - mess about with a tool and save the screenshots
13 - clean up the screenshots, make a graphic for a post
14 - do a blog challenge - create the post, get the links right
15 - schedule posts, read the slush-list to pick next ideas
16 - brainstorm future post ideas, jot a few points for each
17 - scour the 'draft posts' for forgotten content
18 - take an old post idea, flesh out the points, recut it to make a full post
19 - read the osr blogs, save interesting stuff to the weekly list
20 - prep a weekly list post
For a similar take on generating content for campaigns see "Plot creation: lessons for DMs from 10 years of Nanowrimo"
For me I started this blog as a place to write up my hypotheses on the data I was scraping together. I figured that was the sufficiently different niche this blog would occupy.
In the first days I set myself an 'every 2 days post something' rhythm. That turned out to be a lot, especially when I started to fold in more time consuming things like reviews and lessons learned. So I eased back the schedule and set myself a different rhythm.
Now the thing that gets me started is the giant slush-pile. I find myself awake in the middle of the night. Time wasted if I just scroll through the internet but time well spent if I knock even a few dozen words off one of these post ideas
C. Kinch gave a top tip on his Send Three & Fourpence podcast - based on getting hobbies done as a father - of identifying what your 20 minute task is. Assuming you can get that small a chunk of time to yourself, how can you push the stone along in that time?
So - a meta-type table: d20 typical small blogging tasks:
1 - read a book I've got, scribble review notes on envelopes saved for the purpose
2 - type up those notes into one of my review templates
3 - photograph the book, upload it and create the post blank
4 - get the notes from the review template into the post
5 - fill out any missing bits
6 - cold-eyes read a review to find typos, other issues & fix them
7 - do some data crunching, make the graph that shows the interesting points
8 - frame up the post with the graph, the major points, get formatting right
9 - re-read and clean up the argument to make sense to people coming cold to it
10 - write a couple of entries on a random table
11 - mess about with an online tool to bulk out said tables
12 - mess about with a tool and save the screenshots
13 - clean up the screenshots, make a graphic for a post
14 - do a blog challenge - create the post, get the links right
15 - schedule posts, read the slush-list to pick next ideas
16 - brainstorm future post ideas, jot a few points for each
17 - scour the 'draft posts' for forgotten content
18 - take an old post idea, flesh out the points, recut it to make a full post
19 - read the osr blogs, save interesting stuff to the weekly list
20 - prep a weekly list post
For a similar take on generating content for campaigns see "Plot creation: lessons for DMs from 10 years of Nanowrimo"
21 February 2022
Shiny TTRPG links #56
Interesting links from across the TTRPG blogosphere. More can be found on the previous list found here. The original inspiration for all of this - weaver.skepti.ch End of Week links. You can find even more links on the weekly blogroll on r/OSR or a roundup of non-blog news on Third Kingdom Games roundup.
Really interesting "5e monster manual on a business card" - all the rules of 5e monster design crunched out by Blog of Holding. Datalicious!
Building from that Plastic Polyhedra gives us Running 5e as OSR: Monsters by HD not CR
Coppers and Boars writes some views on alignment in There is no light side of the Force
Still time to get in on Downtime in Zyan as mentioned on Chaudron Chromatique.
Thoughts on CKIII: Royal Court by A Collection of Unmitigated Pedantry - an interesting lens on the actual day to day business of being a king.
Really interesting "5e monster manual on a business card" - all the rules of 5e monster design crunched out by Blog of Holding. Datalicious!
Building from that Plastic Polyhedra gives us Running 5e as OSR: Monsters by HD not CR
Coppers and Boars writes some views on alignment in There is no light side of the Force
Still time to get in on Downtime in Zyan as mentioned on Chaudron Chromatique.
Thoughts on CKIII: Royal Court by A Collection of Unmitigated Pedantry - an interesting lens on the actual day to day business of being a king.
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