Anti-Canon

I don't plan to include a full 'History' section in Legends of Alba. Currently this is about as much as I want to include: 

Before ever there was Alba…

There were The Ancient Great Wyrms. 

They claimed the realms of Sky, Sea & Earth from the elemental chaos.

Aeons ago,

Beira The Giant shaped these isles from the bare rock with her great hammer. 

So began a hundred thousand and more Winters.

Generations ago,

Uamhasach, that grim hero of mortal kind, broke the rule of The Foo’ar. 

Only the stones recall how the tyrant giants were bound in slumber beneath the hills.

A hundred years ago,

The invasion of The Lizard Legion was answered by Aoife The Radiant. 

It was She who found The Hammer of Beira and, under it, united the Clans.

Today...

The Hags gather. 

The Covens Call.

And The Legends come again.

It's meant to be just enough to provide inspiration but not so much that you'd trip yourself up trying to remember it. Yes: This is throwing it onto the Ref/GM and their group to fill in the blanks, but I tend to do this anyway. It's not only one of the things I enjoy most about RPG's, it's also better for me personally and the way I prep and run games. I'm more likely to remember something I've made up myself or that a player has come up with at the table than the 'canon' for someone else's imaginary world history.

But just because I don't plan to include it in the book doesn't mean I don't think about it. I think about it A LOT! In my version of the setting, the Ancient Great Wyrms are still about as strange dragons. I like the idea that Beira's origin actually lies in our own modern world, which she somehow escaped. Personally, I suspect that Uamhasach has more blood on his hands than the term 'hero' perhaps allows for. And more recently, I've been imagining a sort of timeline for the invasion of The Lizard Legion in which Aoife actually starts out in allegiance with them. 

Some of these have made it to my table, others might never, but thinking about them brings the setting to life for me and ensures it's a place that I'm interested in and keep wanting to come back to. In a long running game, that's essential for the Ref/GM. So that's why I like to keep it vague when it comes to setting, because making it your own is what will make it stick.

-Till next time!

Integrating Player Character Backstories

I started running Vaesen with one of my RPG groups recently and, while overall the support for GMs in the core book is not bad, there was one area where it seemed very poor. Each Player Character has a Dark Secret that complicates their life. There are some prompts to help players come up with their Dark Secret, but after that the book basically tells them not to worry about it, and the GM will work it into the game. In this 200 page book there is a short paragraph on 'Dark Secrets in Play', giving some very general advice that doesn't get far past the concept of "yeah, you should have the Dark Secrets come up during play". Not terribly helpful.

D&D 5E has this same problem. Players are encouraged to come up with a Backstory and to "work with the DM" so that it can be worked into the game. But there's not much support for the DM as to how they're actually supposed to do that. I've always found it tricky. Sometimes there are obvious ways to make it work, but as soon as you're having to introduce new elements (characters, places, things or events) it can start to clutter up the game, slowing progress and killing momentum.

But the promise of a PC's backstory coming up has so much potential - when it works it really works. Players are so much more engaged and it truly takes the game farther in the direction of collaborative storytelling. So how can we as GMs fix this?

The way that Myths work in Mythic Bastionland is that each Myth has 6 Omens. These take the place of Wilderness Encounters: Whenever something would happen, you don't roll for a Random Encounter, you encounter the next Omen of the nearest Myth. It allows the Myths to play out organically, but still in a satisfying arc because you're encountering them in order. It's a really flexible system, and in play feels a bit like the NPC questlines in a Souls game. I think this would be a great engine to drive PC backstory arcs.

I'm going to use the Backgrounds from the 2014 Player's Handbook to quickly pull together a backstory for an random example Character: A sorceror named Reena, who is a Forest Gnome with the Hermit background.

She lived in seclusion as the caretaker of an ancient ruin or relic. Her Ideal is Free Thinking (believing that inquiry and curiosity are the pillars of enlightenment). Her Bond is that she entered seclusion to escape from the ones who might still be hunting her, whom she must someday confront. Her Flaw is that now she has returned to the world, she enjoys its delights a little too much.

The 2024 backgrounds are great but wow, I really miss these background tables from the 2014 PHB!

We've got a Character on the run from a group she must someday confront. If this were a real Player Character, I'd be inviting the player to tell me a little about who that could be but for this example I'm going to generate a Cult from Sly Flourish's Lazy DM's Companion. So Reena is on the run from The Paper Masks : A wasp-worshipping cult who serve The Yellow Queen. So maybe Reena's sorcerous origin is linked to this cult. Whatever the reason, it sounds like a confrontation with them would be the climax of this arc. So the Omens might be something like this:

1. A faint buzzing can be heard, only by Reena. It sounds close, but there's nothing there. 
2. A traveller, dead at the side of the road. Huge welts cover their skin, they were stung to death by giant wasps.
3. A village fayre, in lively celebration of The Yellow Queen, who has provided a great feast in exchange for their subservience.
4. A faint buzzing, heard by all, getting louder as a group of giant wasps attack.
5. A ruin conceals a terrified pair of scriveners, who have escaped The Yellow Queen's palace.
6. Paper Mask assassins now hunt the party. They try to remain hidden until an opportune moment to strike. Their target is Reena.

Knowing the end point and working backwards was helpful. I looked back to the backstory for inspiration, and tried to have each Omen do at least of the following:

• Challenge an Ideal
• Test a Bond
• Provoke a Flaw

I think there's some potential here for a procedure for integrating character backstories naturally into the game!

That's it for now, till next time!

Tabletop Scotland 2026

Our third year at Tabletop Scotland! In previous years we've attended all three days, this year we went for the Saturday only and wow: There's a lot to see when you only have a day to get round everything! Plus I was actually running a game this year so, really, we only had about half a day to find our favourite new games. So it was a very different vibe to previous years where we've taken our time to try and see everything, not been too fussed about a long wait for food or a queue for the toilets, etc. But we still managed to find some cool stuff!

Lo! Thy Dread Empire, by Tanya Floaker is a narrative wargame and tactical RPG with a killer tagline: "The Skeleton War against The Death Cult of Capitalism". The grimdark artwork by Julia Nevalainen is incredible and the text of the game is uncompromising, angry, and funny. When I picked up the book Tanya briefly explained to me that the game contains a ruleset that allows you to run large-scale pitched battle combats in your RPGs. It does contain this. It does a great job of this. But that's burying the lead. For me the juice of this book is the second half, detailing the Factions of the game's assumed setting in which Capitalism has progressed to its natural conclusion and literally destroyed every living thing, leaving only the dead to fight back. These are just excellent, and I love this book!

I also picked up the extremely cursed book Spine by Backwards Tabletop, which I've not delved into yet but really looking forward to. I honestly can't remember where I first heard about this game, it could have been the Yes Indie'd podcast, maybe Dice Exploder, maybe Bastionland, who knows? Maybe I've always known about it...

Natalie and I went in together on Elements of Power by Heartborn Studios. We bought Escape from Tibbles Tower from them last year, which was great fun, and had since picked up their Flippin' Dinosaurs game. Elements of Power is a skirmish game where each side takes control of 3 or 4 unique 'hero' type minis and battle it out. You can use any minis for it, but the starter box comes with its own, so I'm looking forward to painting them up and playing this with Natalie.

Also: I ran a game! This was my first time running a convention game, so I was a bit nervous in the couple of hours before. But I'd done plenty of prep, including subjecting my regular gaming group to a practice game (thank you so much again if any of you are reading this!), and I was really excited for the chance to run Mythic Bastionland again. 

About the game itself, there's some great advice on the Bastionland blog for running Mythic Bastionland one-shots but the myth I was most keen to run for this game was The Tournament: Which sees a Tinkerer turning up to challenge the Knights of the Realm against a company of clockwork Knights of his own creation. As written, the myth would see the knights being called back from their questing every so often to compete in the next round of The Tournament, which would work great in a longer game with several sessions, less so for the one-shot. So I decided to compress it down into a three-day event, add some more activities inspired by Old Man Lucy's Tournaments for Mythic Bastionland, add a bit of intrigue between the other competitors, and set the whole thing within the Tournament festival grounds. I was a little bit concerned that my players might be disappointed at being denied the full hex-crawling experience, and I would've argued that drama within Holdings is just as big a part of the game as wandering round the wilderness bumping into myths, but I didn't have to. They had a blast squaring off against the Clockwork Knights, sabotaging their shifty creator, and digging into the courtly drama. My players were great as well (thanks to any of you that might be reading!), none of them had played before so they were all excited to get into the role of their knights, and they engaged with the material generously. 

So overall the game went well and I was glad I gave running a convention game a go! I'd say something I'd encountered before when running Mythic Bastionland that I ran into again for this game is that I definitely struggle with the arithmetic of dealing damage between Guard and Vigour and subtracting Armour. It sounds simple but at the table I find it fiddly. I think my brain just prefers adding things than subtracting them, haha!

That's all for now, till next time!

RPG Character Psychology

I've come across the work of the psychologist Carl Jung only really in passing, and most recently through Sharon Blackie's writing. Progress on the game is slow, sporadic and unfocussed just now. In the haze my thoughts drifted to the concept of archetypes, which can be a helpful storytelling tool. I dimly recalled the concept of the Jungian archetypes, and realised that I didn't actually know what they were. After a bit of reading, I think they provide some useful ways to think about designing RPG Characters.

If you're not familiar with Jungian archetypes, there's a lot of writing about them on the internet. The summary I have open just now is from Positive Psychology.

What I found really useful is that for each archetype we get: What they represent, their approach, their desires, fears and challenges they may face. 

Designing the Paths for Player Characters in Legends of Alba, I'm thinking a lot about game mechanics and, honestly, getting a bit worn down by them. But once I started thinking about the Paths in these terms, (what are they actually about?) I felt more energised about them.

The archetypes don't map directly to the Paths but elements of them do, and that's been helpful to get down some touchstones and notes about the 'spirit' of each Path.

Warrior - Archetypes: Caregiver, Innocent, Orphan

Fights as part of the Chief's warband to protect their Clan. They defend the people around them and the values they believe in through physical strength. They're down to earth, folk relate to them, and they tend to put the needs of others first. They don't fear death, instead fearing failure, loss and being the ones left behind. Risks for Warriors come from rushing headlong into action and not considering their own needs. Question: What do you fight for?

Hunter - Archetypes: Explorer, Hero 

Roams the wilderness, provider and protector both. However a life in the wilds put them at risk of losing touch with the communities they serve. Values independence, tends to put their own needs first, and relies on their honed skill, keen senses and sharp reflexes. Fears complacency and the danger unseen. Question: What stalks you from the dark shadows of the wilds?

Bard - Archetypes: Sage, Jester, Lover, Creator

Maintains the Clan's collective memory by knowing the histories and tales. Interested in folk and relationships. Wants to be the centre of the attention and put a new spin on an old tale, fears being hated or worse, forgotten. Values knowledge, the arts and making connections. Bards risk folly in the pursuit of perfection, preservation of the past and revelry in the present at the expense of the future. Question: What will you leave behind?

Druid - Archetypes: Magician, Ruler, Rebel

Upholds the Law of The Land, the balance between nature and civilisation. Fears the wasteland and the ambition of rulers. Wants to use a light touch, solve problems before they exist, and find the perfect solution. Not afraid of challenging authority, though as wielders of their own power in the form of magic they risk falling to the same corruption as those who rule. Values planning, subterfuge and the natural world. Question: What does the Law of The Land mean to you?

-Till Next Time!

Doing Stuff With D6s

Since the post about Player Character Progression I've been thinking about how to handle 'Class' (or Paths as I'm thinking of calling them) for Legends of Alba.

In 5e I always like the idea of a Class having access to a dice pool which they can manipulate to do their Cool Stuff. A Bard has Inspiration Dice. A Battle Master Fighter has Superiority Dice. The Psi sub-Classes have Energy Dice. As a player I find it fun to have a resource that's unique to my Character. I also like specifically that it's Dice rather than Points. You can use Dice to physically keep track, whereas Points tend to be tally marks on a Character Sheet.

I also really like the idea of each Class having it's own little minigame around their unique abilities. I was really impressed by how this was achieved in You Will Die in This Place. I'm not certain I'm up to a design challenge as involved as that, but I have been thinking along these lines.

So far the core rules of Legends of Alba only require a D20. Chances are that anyone who owns a D20 also has a healthy store of D6s. So what if Characters in Legends of Alba had some D6s they could use to do stuff?

Warrior

Combat Dice. You have a pool of three Combat Dice (D6). When you take an Attack Test, you can spend a Combat Dice to roll it and add the result to your score. You regain spent Combat Dice at the start of each day.  

Hunter

Skill Dice. Choose one of the following Skills: Beast Taming, Navigation, Stealth, Tracking. While you are in the Wilderness, anytime you would take a Test where one of these Skills would apply, you may instead roll a Skill Dice (D6). On anything but a 1, you Succeed.

Bard

Story Dice. You have a pool of three Story Dice (D6). When an ally who can hear you takes a Test, you can give them a Story Dice to roll and add the result to their score.  

Druid

Spell Dice. You have a pool of six Spell Dice (D6). At the start of each day, roll all of them. Group them by result into Singles (one of a kind), Doubles (two of a kind), Triples (three of a kind) and Quadruples (four of a kind). You may use a set to cast a Spell from the corresponding list.

I'd be quite keen to try this out. It keeps the Paths pretty light in terms of rules and they feel evocative enough. It also opens up room for progression and a design space for further development. There's some stuff here that requires further development already (e.g. a spell list for the Druid)!

Till Next Time!

Legends of Alba: A 5E Player's Guide

A couple of months ago I wrote about Custom Backgrounds, what a difference they can make to 5E games, and what they might look like for the Legends of Alba setting.

I've since written Legends of Alba: A 5E Player's Guide for use in my home games. I'm pleased with how this has turned out and very grateful to my players for their engagement and encouragement.

Having run two separate groups through this guide, one for a campaign, one for a one-shot, it's made a huge difference to the feeling of the game. The Characters that have emerged are Legends of Alba Characters, and have hit the ground running. This is Mythic 5E!

I've not much more to say that's not in the guide so I'll keep this one short.

Till next time!

Player Character Progression

I've been thinking about how to handle Player Character progression in Legends of Alba. My initial inclination had been to pretty much ignore it. This stance mostly came from my personal preference (as a player or a GM) for low-level play. A group of Player Characters are equal to the challenge of, say, half a dozen bandits. If those bandits are backed up by a heavy hitter, an ogre or a ferocious beast, the PCs are going to have to get creative. Facing a dragon head on is certain death, but defeating one is definitely possible: You'll need to make the most of what's on your character sheet but you also need a plan.

I desperately want to avoid what I've seen in plenty of 5E games where PCs get up to Level 10+ and it's  as though each Character is lugging around a heavy chest full of highly situational, minor, or otherwise forgettable 'ride-along' abilities. The game feels heavy, and everything takes ages. It actually breaks the core loop of the game in which the GM describes the situation, the players describe their Characters' actions, then the GM narrates the result. I've been in the situation as a player myself where, between the first 2 steps, when the GM throws it over to the players "What Do You Do?", I'm looking down in panic at this Character sheet crammed with abilities and bonusses and asterixis and page references thinking "What can I do?". I've stepped out of the fiction of the game. For Legends of Alba, I want to stay in the fiction as much as possible.

So why am I thinking about progression? I've had a chance to play a few different systems over the last year: Mork Borg (through Cy-borg); Into The Odd (through Mythic Bastionland); and Break!!. All three of them take a different approach to progression:

Mork Borg, as you'd expect, is super minimal. The rules for progression take up less than half an A5 page! There's actually a decent chance your Character gets worse when you level up, because of course there is. It's Mork Borg! Are you actually expecting your Character to live long enough to level up?!

Into The Odd doesn't really have progression, but Mythic Bastionland sorta does. Knights have Glory, which is more a reflection of their standing in the world than a mechanical benefit. I quite like Glory (keeping it in the fiction). They might get more Guard through scars. They also age, which usually sees young Knights improve as they reach maturity but with their Virtues failing as they cross into old age. I liked what this brought to the story of our game and its very fitting for a game about Knights in which part of being a Knight is considering your legacy.

Break!! has progression through the Callings, which are that game's take on classes. They go as far as Level 10, and although each Calling uses a different advancement table, they all get something each Level. Usually it's an Attribute increase or select an Ability from their Calling. 

So it's been interesting trying these out, seeing how they went down around the table and catching up with my players during and after games about it. I think most players in my group would look for some progression if they were playing a system for anything more than a couple of sessions. I know as well that players definitely notice the shift of how light a Mork Borg Character is to a 5E one. Hardly surprising - these are totally different games. These games that have lighter Characters don't expect you to be with a Character for long, so it's no problem if they feel a bit thin or one-dimensional and if a player is not writing pages of background lore for their Character between sessions. But it's made me think about what sort of experience is Legends of Alba closer to, and it's closer to 5E than I thought. I want players to invest in their Character, use them an an anchor to the setting, and go on a weird long mythic journey with them. 

So I'm starting to think more along the lines of something like Break!! (also looking to Shadowdark though I've not played that one yet!) for progression in Legends of Alba. 10 levels is plenty, and alternating level up rewards between getting a new ability and 'number go up' feels like a good starting point. So I've been messing around with a few ideas in that vein, and will post them here if I get them into a decent shape!

-Till next time.

Armour in Alba

 Talking about Armour today!

Along with Weapons, which I made some changes to the rules for recently, Armour is part of a Character's wargear. Wargear isn't a formal term in the game (maybe it should be!) but if I'm playing an RPG in which my Character is expected to do some fighting, I want to know what they fight with, and how they protect themselves.

As with Weapons though, the Iron Age (-ish) setting has an impact on how I want to handle this. While Armour is a thing - an important thing - in Legends of Alba, your Character is not a Knight in full plate. A fully armoured Character in Alba might wear a helm, chainmail shirt and carry a shield, but probably only starts out with one of these. So I want Armour to be itemised, and to have a cap on how much a Character can equip. Three slots seems reasonable: You can wear a helmet on your head; you can protect your body with mail or padding; you can carry a shield.

In Other Games

So what does armour do? I've been thinking about examples from different games, e.g.

In 5E games, Armour makes you harder for your enemy to hit. Or rather, to land a telling blow. AC incorporates both Dexterity and Armour to account for a fast Character dodging the blow; or a heavily armoured Character being hit but protected by their armour. I like this system but it requires enemies to be rolling against the Characters, which is not a thing in Legends of Alba.

In Into The Odd style games, and Mork Borg, Armour reduces incoming damage. This makes sense but having played with this mechanic I don't really like it. It never feels good to be subtracting from a number you roll and it makes a low damage roll - already a disappointment - even worse. Both of these systems have quite brisk combat compared to 5E but the impact that armour can have on bogging it down is actually one of the reasons I haven't used either of those games as the basis for Legends of Alba.

In 24xx games, any equipment can be Armour. If your Character would take damage, you can always describe how something in your inventory is broken or lost to avoid the damage completely. I like how straightforward this is. My only issue with it is the implicit survivability of Characters with deep pockets. The rule of common sense is an important part of 24xx games but personally I'd want to be a bit more specific about this.

Looking outside of RPGs, wargames often allow for an Armour Save. If your Warhammer 40K Space Marine has Power Armour, he avoids damage on a roll of 3 or more on a D6. It might just be familiarity but I do like this and have thought pretty seriously about just doing this for Armour in Legends of Alba (e.g. Characters have a base 6+ Save, that improves by one for each item of Armour they wear). But I don't like the introduction of this extra step to combat with the Armour Save. It also introduces of a completely new concept of 'saves' more generally: If a Character gets an Armour Save, can they get other types of Saves? I'm trying to keep this rules light, so no thank you.

In Legends of Alba

Here's the current rules for Armour in Legends of Alba:

Armour

Protects Characters from Wounds. When a Character suffers a Wound, they may instead break an Armour [A] item they have equipped and ignore the Wound.

Broken Armour must be repaired to be used again.

So of the options mentioned above it's mostly a constrained version of the 24xx approach. 

How much of a drag is it to have your equipment break? It's easy enough to repair equipment at a Settlement but you'd be without it till you reach one. That could lead to some interesting decisions, or just be annoying. Something to focus on with playtesting.

Why are we breaking armour at all? Well, this piece of equipment has taken a blow that otherwise might have killed you. How likely is it to be in a decent state after that? When I was a teenager I once cycled out in front of car and went head first into the windshield. Luckily I was wearing my helmet, so I was fine. My helmet was not. I certainly wouldn't have wanted to rely on it to protect my skull from a second impact. So it seems more of a stretch of the imagination that your armour is completely fine after a battle, than completely trashed and in need of repair or replacement. 

Other Ideas

A slightly more forgiving version of this would that instead of breaking your Armour to avoid the damage, you 'Check' it but putting an 'X' next to it on your Character Sheet. You can't use Checked Armour. When the fighting stops, you check your gear: Roll a dice for each Checked item. The roll could be based on the item's quality or a flat value, but on a Success you'd refresh the item by removing the 'X' from it on your Character Sheet. A Failure would indicate that, on inspection, you find the item too badly damaged to rely on. It's now Broken, as above. I don't mind this, but as with the Armour Save discussed above it's an extra step, so it's going to have to fight for its place.

A slightly different direction to go with Armour is to lean into how it almost functions like HP (protecting you from life-threatening damage) and have each item of Armour contribute +1 to a stat e.g. Defence (or Guard?). Whenever you'd suffer a Wound, you subtract from this value. If you're at 0 Defence and suffer a Wound, that's it, you suffer the full effect of the Wound. Your Defence would recover either after the battle, or as part of making camp (as you rest and repair your gear). 

I quite like the abstraction of 'Defence'. Your Character has some protection from harm, but this will get worn down the more they rely on it and, the longer a fight goes on, the more chance there is they'll be seriously hurt. It adds an extra stat, yes, but there's no rules or procedural overhead. This actually provides some scope for cutting rules because with Defence I could maybe be do away with the different types of Wound (Minor, Major, Mortal) and just have them all be bad?

The idea of 'Defence' stat also allows for things other than armour to protect your Character. For instance a Hunter's Sharp Reflexes might contribute +1 to this value, or a Druid might be able to conjure a Spirit Ward to achieve the same effect.

Hmm this is definitely one to think about!

-Till next time!

The Clans of Alba

The word clan carries a lot of unwelcome baggage. Historically, in Scotland, it's a better metric for dividing people than uniting them. Nowadays they're a cultural relic, with as much fiction remembered as fact, if anything is remembered at all. So I want to talk about what I'm talking about when I talk about Clans in Legends of Alba.

This is All Made Up

Before I ever started working on Legends of Alba, I was on a sustained deep dive into Scottish folklore, trying to get to the roots that surely lay beneath the Christianised tales that made it into the books. After a year or so I started to realise that this is an almost impossible task. Or at least, it's certainly one that sits more appropriately in the realm of academia than the kind of armchair archaeology I'm up to here. So I put this fixation on finding "The Source" to one side and tried instead to pull what I liked from I'd learned and write about that. 

For the folklore side of it, the actual "Legends" of the Legends of Alba, this has already provided many hours of fun, suspenseful and silly gameplay in my games. For that alone it's already been a huge success.

So I've stayed with this approach, doing enough research to get inspiration, then using that as a jumping off point, when it came to the Clans. So this is not by any means how I think it actually was. This is all fiction inspired by how I imagine it could have been.

Bound by Oath, Not by Blood

This is probably the most important thing - so important I put it second in the list. Clans are not families, they are communities. They exist because Alba is a harsh and dangerous place to live and folk survive more successfully if they work together. And folk work together more effectively if they share common values. These are the virtues that bind the members of a clan together. Concepts like honesty, justice, generosity, courage, wisdom, integrity: Ideals that facilitate community. Each Clan holds one of these as sacred, and this forms the basis of the oath that new members swear to join the Clan. 

Birth does not guarantee a place in a Clan, commitment must be demonstrated and the place must be earned. If a person is born into a Clan whose ideology does not match their own, that's a strong motivation to set out on their own and find their people, with no ill will on either side. So if the Clans are any sort of family, they're found family.

Chiefs Are Not Born

Each Clan is ruled by a Chief. The process of appointing a Chief varies from Clan to Clan but just as above, where being born into a Clan does not guarantee your position therein, being born to a Chief does not give you right to rule.

Chiefs Do Not Rule Alone

While the Chief has final say on all matters of Clan business, there's a common wisdom that a Chief is only as good as the Council they keep. Amongst the Chief's advisors might be found:

Clan Nobility (with titles varying between Kingdoms), living and working among the folk of the Clan, ensuring the Chief stays well in touch with their needs, and that the folk in turn feel safe, heard and valued.

The Archdruid, leading the Clan's Druidic Circle, providing spiritual guidance, acting as a conduit between the folk and the land on which they live, and upholding the unwritten Law of The Land.

The Storyteller, responsible for promoting the bardic arts, by which the Clan's deeds are immortalised for future generations. They speak with authority on Clan history, as well their standing and relations with other Clans. 

The Storemaster, linking hunters, farmers, miners, loggers and anyone else who brings resources into the Clan. They ensure that there's always enough to go round, and enough put away to see folk through the hard Winters.

The Warlord, leading The Chief's warband in battle. In peaceful times they are devoted to improving the stronghold's defences, training warriors, and co-ordinating scouting missions to stay one step ahead of approaching threats. 

The Clans Are Just Folk

Well, if everybody holds the same values and agrees on everything, and there's no nepotism, and the Chiefs always keep and listen to good council, then this must be a utopian society where nothing bad ever happens, right? Wrong! Everybody in the Clan, whatever their role, is a person. Everybody is capable of greatness, of upholding and exemplifying the virtues of their people. By the same token, everybody is also susceptible to ambition, corruption, cowardice, hubris, or any of the many vices that make life messy, that make a story interesting, and that make the Clans of Alba an essential part of the game. Against the surreal backdrop of The Otherworld and The Legends, it's the mundane dramas between people make the thing feel real.

At least, that's the hope.

-Till next time!

Custom Backgrounds

We're at an exciting time in my local gaming group, talking about starting a new campaign! There's a few options on the table, one of them being to run something in the Legends of Alba setting again. The rules I've been writing for the setting could do with some (a lot?) of playtesting before diving into a long-term game with people, so we'd be looking to run it in 5E again.

As a player in 5E games, I've been impressed by how big an impact Custom Backgrounds can make on getting into the mindset for a setting. So I've been thinking about writing some Custom Backgrounds for Legends of Alba!

...And immediately ran into trouble, haha. In 5E the backgrounds usually represent a profession, what your Character did for a living before becoming an adventurer. This is relevant in LoA, but so is a Character's Homeland and Clan. And then I start thinking about Species and how they fit into it all, and it'd probably be a good idea to review the Equipment list and make sure players don't end up with tools that would either not exist or serve no purpose in an Iron Age setting, and suddenly the task of writing some fun and evocative Custom Backgrounds has become completely lost in the weeds of noodling with the Character Creation system for 5E. Time to simplify things.

What's in a Background? 

Here's what you get from a background as per the 5.2.1 SRD :

• An Ability Score boost (either +2/+1 or +1/+1/+1) and a choice of 3 Abilities to spend them on
• An Origin Feat
• 2 Skill Proficiencies
• 1 Tool Proficiency
• Equipment

I'm trying to cram a Homeland, Profession and Clan into there.

Let's take Clan out of the mix - the benefits of being in a Clan are mostly non-mechanical. I could offer Heroic Inspiration for players going out of their way to honour the Oath of their Clan. OR have it replace Alignment...

So that leaves Homeland and Profession. Can we split a background between those?

Homeland

• Ability Score boost
• Origin Feat

Profession

• 2 Skill Proficiencies
• 1 Tool Proficiency
• Equipment

That maps pretty neatly IMO! I'm slightly concerned that I've taken an aspect of the 5E Character Creation system, already one of the most granular and fussy ones out there, and subdivided it further. But there's an intention to this. It is really important for Characters in Legends of Alba to start the game with a tie to the land itself. Alba makes it's mark on Characters, just by living there, and having that on the Character sheet will help convey that connection to players. Similarly the Professions are not just providing Characters with tools for adventuring. The Clans of Alba are each a community, and if Characters are to get anything from those communities, they need to bring something to the table. Some downtime helping out the local smith, or foraging in the nearby woods, or sharing stories round a hearth fire is more valuable to most communities than gold, and such acts will be rewarded in kind.

So that's it, problem solved. Now I just need to write these backgrounds!

-Till Next Time!

I can forge weapons for you...

Brightsmiths

Smiths who learned their trade in The Otherworld can imbue mortal weapons with power. Bring them a Smithing Stone and they'll do it for the love of the craft.

Smithing Stones

Found in The Barrowdeeps, the power of these stones can enhance mortal weaponry. Seek a Brightsmith to fortify a weapon with a Smithing Stone.

Example Stones and their effects on a fortified weapon:

• Hardstone: Add MIG to Attack Bonus
• Sharpstone: Add AGI to Attack Bonus
• Clearstone: Add AWA to Attack Bonus
• Spiritstone: Add CHA to Attack Bonus
• Flamestone: On causing a Wound, all nearby enemies suffer a Wound as well.
• Brightstone: On causing a Wound, also blinds enemies who saw it for one Round.
• Coldstone: The attacked enemy can’t move for one Round.
• Venomstone: On causing a Wound, the target suffers an additional Wound next Round.
• Lightningstone: On causing a Wound, make a Ranged Attack against an enemy you can see.
• Thunderstone: On causing a Wound, enemies next to you are flung in a direction you choose. 
• Bloodstone: Attack with help, then take one fatigue.
• Thornstone: Attack an enemy, gain +1 to Attack Bonus vs the same enemy next Round (stacks).
• Moonstone: Weapon gains the Ranged [R] property.
• Shadowstone: Wounds cannot be avoided using Armour.

Creature Feature: The Kelpie

If the tales are to be believed, Scotland is lousy with Kelpies. It's one of the most widespread mythical creatures: We have rivers, lochs and coasts all over the place, said to be haunted by a Kelpie.

Hippocampus and fish, Fantasy animals (1596–1610)
by Anselmus Boëtius de Boodt. (public domain via Rawpixel)

Often there's not much of a 'story' to go along with The Kelpie, wherever it might appear. They're usually a cautionary tale, a warning to steer clear of dangerous rivers, strange horses, strange men. The 'classic' Kelpie ploy is for it to appear as a horse at the side of a river, waiting for someone who needs to cross. When they do, the horse kneels down, inviting its victim to climb onto its back. No sooner have they done so, than they find themselves stuck fast to The Kelpie's back. It takes off into the river, dragging the victim down with it. Some variations have The Kelpie as a kidnapper, taking the victim to The Otherworld. Others have it as a murderous beast which consumes its victim, leaving only their lungs, which float to the surface in evidence of their fate.

I have come across a few stories that stuck out though:

Taming The Kelpie, which I heard on the excellent House of Legends podcast, read by Daniel Allison. It's a beautiful take on The Kelpie as not so much a malevolent force but a primal, essential one. In the story, a poor ploughman loses his plough horse to old age during a rough Winter. Without his horse, he's left destitute, unable to make a living. But through a series of favours he performs for a Hag, he gains the means to tame a Kelpie, securing his livelihood indefinitely. But he cannot bare to see such a creature - magnificent and wild - bound to his service, and releases it.

"The Kelpie" in Peter Berresford Ellis' Mammoth Book of Celtic Myths And Legends treats the creature as a singular being: The Kelpie, Each-Uisge, lord of the deeps. He's very impressive, but also gives off vibes of a conceited Fey Prince. In the story, The Kelpie falls in love with a mortal woman, and kidnaps the heirs of every Chieftain to bargain for her release to live with him in his domain under the sea. Understandably, she is not keen on this deal, and with some magic of her own tricks The Kelpie during the Saimhuin festival.

Then there's a couple of legends around The Stone of Morphie in Kincardineshire, which I read about in The Lore of Scotland by Westwood & Kingshill (never far from my desk). This is an origin story for the stone, suggesting it's all that remains of the House of Morphie. The Lord of Morphie had somehow managed to bind a Kelpie to his service through an enchanted halter, and forced the beast to drag the heavy stones which were used to build his castle. One of his human servants, took pity on the Kelpie and removed the halter. The Kelpie, now free, took off to wreak havoc and revenge on The Lord of Morphie, destroying his castle.

So these were some of the inspirations for writing "The Water Horse" as a Legend for Legends of Alba. I ran an early version of this in D&D 5E and it was a really memorable set of encounters, with a satisfying final confrontation and resolution as one of the Player Characters got to decide the fate of The Kelpie. So this is the updated version intended for use with Legends of Alba.

***

The Water Horse

The torrent owes nae debt o' thanks

Fir bursting free it's shackled banks

Augurs

1. A crumbling broch, flooded with silt grey water. Youngsters, drunk on salvaged whisky, plunder the treasures of Brightstone (see below), ruined stronghold of The Trueanvil clan.
2. A raging grey river blocks the way. The Kelpie, as a silver-haired lord, offers to calm its flow for a safe crossing: A trap. D6 Silt Bogles lurk in the shallows.
3. A woeful stonecarver bargains with a grumpy mare, overburdened with salvage from Brightstone. He carries the iron bridle that once bound The Kelpie, broken and irreparable by mortal craft.
4. Horses graze by a silted riverbank, The Kelpie among them as a silver-maned stallion. Any who sit on its back become instantly stuck as The Kelpie carries them off to its domain.
5. Druids from the nearest Stronghold, marooned in their boat as Silt Bogles torment them from a driftwood skiff. The druids know of a secret entrance to The Kelpie’s domain.
6. The Kelpie, as the trampling river, floods the Legend Hex. The river spreads, flooding one hex per day, towards the nearest Stronghold, to be dragged down into The Kelpie’s domain.

Cast

The Kelpie, Each-Uisge, Vengeful Shapeshifter

C25, Trampling hooves [M], silken voice.

Toiled for centuries in service of The Trueanvil Clan, now hates all mortals.

Silt Bogles, misfit subjects of The Kelpie

C10, Silt clod [R]

Launch ambushes from the river, retreating if they lose the upper hand.

Oskar Trueanvil, Woeful Stonemason

C10, fine clothes

Released The Kelpie out of pity. Regrets it.

Treasures of Brightstone

D6	Item	Tainted by
1	Whisky barrel	Greed
2	Golden cup	Sorrow
3	Exquisite cloak	Hubris
4	Carved idol	Guilt
5	Restorative tonic	Cruelty
6	Clan brooch	Avarice

***

If you've read this far, you might be wondering where the Silt Bogles came from. Bogles are a specific type of thing in Legends of Alba and might even get their own post some day but they're in the category of Weird Little Guys that I like to feature in adventures. Some goblins to The Kelpie's Jareth .

Till next time!

Weapons & Attacks

When it comes to rules, my general approach with Legends of Alba has been to build up from a rules skeleton, rather than starting with a fleshed out template and cutting back. So anything that gets added has to earn its place. I'm looking at Weapons and Attacks today.

Celtic Weapons, Edinburgh (public domain)

Characters get Weapons (and Armour) from their Clan, and up till this point there's just been two attributes: Melee [M] and Ranged [R]. But as I've been writing up the Clans I've been kitting out some of them with great weapons, some get paired weapons, others start with a shield. Mechanically there's no distinction between these loadouts and this doesn't feel right to me. At the very least there should be some advantage from using both hands to hold weapons, since you have to sacrifice the potential for wielding a shield to do so. So I added a third Weapon attribute, Two-Handed [2H].

But what sort of advantage do you get for a [2H] Weapon? I thought about a couple of different options:

• A Special Bonus (e.g. +2) for Attacks made with a [2H] Weapon. I didn't like this because this would be in addition to whatever Talent Bonus you're using to make the Attack, and this is a very early stage to be introducing messy stacking modifiers.
• Similar to the above, but the Bonus is determined by a die assigned to each Weapon (e.g. a sword might roll a D6 and a warhammer might roll a D10). I didn't like this for the same reason as above, with the added niggle that you're already rolling a D20 for the Attack, so added more random variance seems bad.
• Attacks made with [2H] Weapons are considered to have Help (so roll to D20 and pick the highest). I didn't like this because now [2H] Weapons can't benefit from setting up creative advantages with terrain or their allies in combat, which is more what Help is supposed to represent.

Playing Break!! recently I was reminded that Attack Bonus in that game is essentially its own stat, which gave me an idea: What if Attack Bonus was defined by Weapon? Completely separate to Talent? I had to think about it a while because I'm changing the core rules of the game here to accommodate a Weapon attribute in a game where combat is not the main focus.

However it is important. There monsters both mundane and magical in Legends of Alba so fighting is going to be important and necessary. And I know for a fact that as a player I'd be baffled if my Character was actually at a disadvantage if they wielded a greatsword vs a knife and shield.

So here's how Attacks and Weapons are laid out now. As you can see a few more attributes have crept in, might delete later.

Attacks

A Character risks life and limb in an attempt to Wound an enemy. Attacks are resolved as Tests.

The Attack Bonus is defined by the Weapon.

The Challenge is defined by the enemy.

Success Wounds the enemy. A Wound is enough to kill or incapacitate most enemies.

On a failed Test, the enemy Wounds the Character (there's a separate procedure for this)

Weapons

Each weapon defines the Bonus to be applied when a Characters attacks with it (e.g. [+3]).

Bastard [B] weapons can be wielded one-handed, or with both hands to improve their Attack Bonus by 1.

Melee [M] weapons can only target enemies next to the attacking Character.

Ranged [R] weapons can target any enemy the attacking Character can see. Characters only suffer Fatigue or Wounds from failed Ranged attacks if their target also wields a Ranged weapon.

Two-handed [2H] weapons require two hands.

Thrown [T] weapons can be used as Ranged weapons but must be recovered before they can be used again.

Example Weapons:

• Dagger [+3][M][T]
• Battleaxe [+4][M][B]
• Spear [+4][M][B][T]
• Longbow [+5][R][2H]
• Paired Blades [+6][M][2H]
• Greataxe [+7][M][2H]

D&D 2024 Thoughts

When the new Player's Handbook for D&D 5e was released in 2024, my wife and I began incorporating it into our games almost immediately, and moved fully over to the 2024 ruleset as soon as we could.  I find the 2024 core books to be, overall, a big improvement. They don't 'fix' 5e: I have my own personal frustrations with the system, but it wasn't broken. The biggest improvement, in my opinion, is in layout, presentation and organisation. These books provide a better onboarding experience for new players to the game, they are easier to use at the table, and they inspire me to play and run the game.

A beautiful book

Having had over a year with the system now, I wanted to use this post to talk about a couple of changes from the most recent edition vs the old: Something that's been lost and something has almost worked for me but not quite.

What's Been Lost?

Traits, Ideals, Bonds & Flaws were, to me, one of the best features of Character Creation in 2014. They helped guide towards a simple set of statements hinting towards a 'vibe' for your Character. As a player, I'd often look to these if I was unsure how my Character would react to a given situation. They made sure that your Character was not a blank slate, that you had something to hold on to for role-playing inspiration. They were more important to me than backstory. As a player, I was surprised and disappointed these were gone.

On the other hand, as a DM, I'm not sorry they got cut. Since they were tied to the inspiration system - DMs were supposed to reward players for inspiration for taking action that leant into these traits - I was constantly forgetting about it. Now that I think about it, I'm not surprised, DMs have enough to think about without keeping 4 things in their head for each Character at all times in case a player triggers one of them. For a standard table that's 16 things. No way, haha.

If I were to bring these back, I'd either put it totally on the players to make 'bids' for inspiration based on their traits. For example, if a Character with the Flaw "I can't keep a secret to save my life, or anyone else's" overshares during a tavern conversation with a new friend, their Player might ask if they could inspiration for saying something they shouldn't.

Alternatively but still keeping the onus on the player, I'd be tempted to treat them more like purviews from Break!!. In this case, players would get advantage or disadvantage on Skill Checks where their traits were applicable. So if a Character has the Personality Trait "Nobody stays angry at me or around me for long, since I can defuse any amount of tension.", the Player could point to this and ask for advantage on the Persuasion roll to calm down that hot-headed City Watch Sergeant.

Almost But Not Quite

One of the things that really bugged me about the 2014 PHB was that the Ability Score Increase you got at Character Creation was tied to Race. I'm all aboard with the move to Species for the 2024 books and was glad to see the Ability Score Increase was gone. If I choose to play a Dragonborn it shouldn't be for that +2 Strength and +1 Charisma (or whatever it was), it should be because I want to play a Character that looks a bit like a dragon and can breathe fire! I feel a lot more free to focus on the fiction now when choosing a Species for my D&D Character.

But the problem is not gone, it's just been shifted. The Ability Score Increase is now tied to Background instead, and I don't like this much. The Backgrounds already come with the Gear, Skills, and a Feat to represent your Character's pre-adventuring career, does the Ability Score Increase need to be here as well? I don't think so. In my experience it has mostly just led to a lot of annoying cross referencing to make sure that I'm not messing up my Character's stats by choosing to play a Paladin who is a reformed Criminal.

I sometimes stop and ask myself if the numbers matter that much. But, when it comes to D&D 5e, when the Character I build is more than likely going to be with me for the entirety of whatever adventure or campaign I built them for, I'd say 100% yes. I know I am going to be making so many Saves and Skill Checks with this Character, so a +1 on any of the 6 Ability Score modifiers is a really big deal.

My fix for this would be to lose the Ability Score Increase altogether and alter the standard array to 17, 14, 14, 12, 10, 8, since that's where most of my Characters end up anyway.

Till next time!

Some Intentions for 2026

I'm not really one for New Year's Resolutions but I am one for the practise of goal setting. I try to set up my life so that time is spent doing the things I want to do. I've got a few streams of hobby activities on the go and balancing them all is a big challenge that I constantly struggle with (second only to the far greater challenge of finding and/or making time for hobbies at all). So in this post I'm just going to lay out some things I want to do:

Tabletop/RPGs

• Keep the local groups going
• Schedule more ad-hoc tabletop games
• Learn a new game
• Keep developing Legends of Alba
• Put something on itch.io (for free/pay what you want)
• Run a game at Tabletop Scotland

Writing

• Get back into The Writing Habit
• Blog weekly
• Submit a portfolio to Uni of Glasgow

Mini-Painting

• Clear WIP
• Paint a Frostgrave warband
• Paint my Rascaltown Goblin
• Paint Krethusa

So that's step one: Intentions set. As with most things in life any plan is better than no plan and this is a sort of a plan. While I'm writing these here in part for some accountability - it'll be interesting (hopefully!) to look back on this post at the end of year and see how things have held up - I'm also very much just laying out my thoughts as they sit in my head just now. There's a good chance I've forgotten something important. There's a good chance one or more of the things above won't seem important a few weeks from now. So another intention is that I don't want to give myself too hard a time if things don't work out or my intentions change. We'll see how we go and try to have fun because that's what hobbies are for.

Till next time!

An Adventure Site for Break!! RPG

I run a fortnightly D&D game for a group of 9-12 year olds (they might actually be 10-13 year olds at this point - time flies!). Our current adventure was running out of steam so I decided to wrap it up early and suggest a few different RPGs. They were all really taken by the art for Break!! RPG, so we quickly settled on that for our next game! I’ve run a short adventure for Break!! once before and had a blast with it, so I’m excited to be coming back to it.

I wanted to use the opportunity to have another go at using the tools in the book to create an adventure, to get more used to them. So this post is an adventure site I've made for the adventure using pretty much only the tools in the book.

The jist is that an ancient temple has been taken up as the stonghold of a skelemaster. The characters might be drawn here as a result of encountering the skelemen forces patrolling the area, or they might have learned about the treasure to be found at the temple's inner sanctum. The site also features a teleportation 'puzzle': Hard to reach areas can be easily accessed by teleport gates from a central location; the catch is that the gates require activation stones to function, and some of them are missing!

The Temple of Arches

• A crumbling obsidian shrine used by the Dragon Elders in times past.
• Nothing grows here, the whole site is a desolate ruin.
• Now the lair of a newly arisen Skelemaster, Ser Dracomere.

Villain: Ser Dracomere

• Imperious but deluded Skelemaster (p406) once a Dragon Knight of this temple.
• Believes himself the rightful ruler of the surrounding area (his realm).
• Uses the temple as a stronghold to enforce and expand his authority.
• Wears a black stone pendant in the shape of Umbra Draconis (opens door to 3)
• Armed with
• Dragon Glaive (Master-Arc Combination Weapon)
• Drakescale Plate (Heavy Armour, Magnificent)
• When dealing with strangers he:
• Demands fealty, seeing all as his subjects.
• Is interested in any intelligence on threats to his realm.

Wandering Encounters

• Locations 1-4: 4 patrolling Skelemen
• Locations 5-8: 1 Tiny Unhelpful Cloud (generated by the Skelemage's misery)

The Temple of Arches

Locations

1) ENTRANCE

• Remains of a gatehouse, stone ruins sunken in the dry dirt
• Ambush: Bones everywhere, 6 Skelemen waiting to ambush any who approach
• Access: Stairs at the base of the central black tower to 2.
• Access: Across the campus to 4.

2) DRAKESTONE TOWER

• A glossy black triangular Tower with stairs carved into the sides.
• At the top is an exposed platform, no wall or battlement. A stone arch faces each of the gates at the points of the triangle. Each archway has space for a circular stone at its apex. Inserting the Brightstone, Darkstone or Twilightstone allows anyone to teleport to the corresponding gate by walking through the arch.
• Access: At the midpoint of the stairs there is a handsized impression of Umbra Draconis, the last dragon, carved into the stone. If the Dragonstone (worn on a pendant by Ser Dracomere) is inserted here, a stone panel slides up to 3. (the interior of the Tower)
• Access: Via arch to 5. (The Brightstone is inserted)
• Access: Via arch to 7. (The Darkstone is missing (see 4))
• Access: Via arch to 8. (The Twilightstone is missing (see 6))

3) UMBRAL SHRINE

• Sacred inner sanctum venerated by the Dragon Elders of old.
• Torches burn with dark light, the smell of pinewood burning, the shrine is built around a drake skull.
• The treasures and riches of the Dragon Elders (now Ser Dracomere’s) are hoarded here.
• 5 Gems and 50 Coins
• Holy Icon (p180) in the shape of a purple draconic circlet.

4) RUINED TOWER

• Crenelations of crumbling battlements like broken teeth, all that remains of this fallen tower.
• A green mist hangs ominously inside the perimeter, no one can breathe in the mist (Suffocated p457).
• The Darkstone is hidden amongst the debris.

5) BRIGHTSTONE GATE

• A circle of runes glowing with green light surrounds the gate.
• Leaving the circle triggers the alarm bell at 6.
• Interfering with the runes from within the circle can break the enchantment.
• Access: via battlement to 6.

6) THE HIGH TOWER

• Watchtower used by the skelemen under Ser Dracomere's command.
• 1 miserable Skelemage and 2 Skelemen on guard here. 
• Skelemage: Rank 2 Boss with Sage's Staff (p59) and Eldritch Explosives (p63)
• Alarm bell here can be triggered from 5 and 7.
• A chest beneath the alarm bell contains The Twilightstone.
• Access: via battlement to 5.
• Access: via battlement to 7.

7) DARKSTONE GATE

• A circle of runes glowing with green light surrounds the gate. 
• Leaving the circle triggers the alarm bell at 6.
• Interfering with the runes from within the circle can break the enchantment.
• Access: via battlement to 6.

8) TWILIGHTSTONE TOWER

• Floating tower, a faint purple glow pulses beneath it. 
• Near the gate, a spiral stairway leads down into the tower.
• Inside is the hall of Ser Dracomere. He pores over an outdated map of his realm, tracking movements of intruders.
• The mana crystal keeping the tower aloft is suspended in a shaft of purple light. Removing it will cause the tower to fall.

That's all for this one, till next time!

Warrior, Hunter, Bard, Druid

One of the design goals I've set myself for Legends of Alba is a single resolution mechanic. A lot of TTRPGs have a completely separate resolution system for combat. I want combat to be a feature, but I don't want it broken out into its own thing as I think that puts an undue emphasis on it and slows the game down.

At the minute the resolution for LoA is handled by Tests. There are 4 Ability Scores - called Talents - which are: Might, Agility, Awareness & Charisma (or Spirit, names are still changing).

When it comes to fighting, characters would use their best stat, representing their fighting style. My thinking there is that this allows for player expression in describing how their character fights. But it requires a little explanation to get to.

Separately though, not represented anywhere in the rules for the game, I have four character archetypes in my head when I think about LoA : Warrior, Hunter, Bard, Druid.

"The Chief Druid" from "Mona Antiqua Restaurata", 1723 (public domain)

I always liked how Knave 2E describes its Ability Scores in relation to Character Classes (though it doesn't feature Character Classes at all!). So for example it'd describe Strength as The Fighter Ability, Dexterity as The Thief Ability etc.

Bumbling around online I came across Warrior, Rogue, Mage which uses goes a step further and just using those 3 class names as the Ability Scores. I felt something click. Is it more intuitive if I just use those 4 archetypes as the Ability Scores? Let's see!

The point I'm trying to get to is a minimal set of stats that would allow us to resolve the broadest range of situations that might come up.

It'd be crazy to try and list everything that might come up. So I'll take a look at other games that use Skills and see how these match up.

I play a lot of D&D so it's always an easy benchmark for ideas like this. D&D uses skills to represent a broad range of challenges that Characters might face during a fantasy role playing game. So can we map D&D skills to our 4 archetypes?

• Warrior: Athletics, Intimidation
• Hunter: Acrobatics, Stealth, Perception, Survival, Investigation
• Bard: Sleight of Hand, History, Deception, Performance, Persuasion 
• Druid: Arcana, Religion, Nature, Insight, Medicine, Animal Handling

We kinda sorta can! It's not an even spread, the Warrior is a bit light but that was the one I was least concerned about. Tests of physical might come up often enough.

So how would I describe these as abilities? What's the remit of each?

• Warrior Tests are for feats of strength, endurance, and martial skill.
• Hunter Tests are for awareness, precision and for moving quickly and quietly.
• Bard Tests are for performance, negotiation and guile.
• Druid Tests are for intuition, willpower and communication with nature.

I think that works. The Druid is tricky. My idea of what a Druid is in this setting is clear in my head but hard to describe. My intention with the point about communication with nature is for things like settling a frightened beast, judging if the dark clouds are signs of incoming storm, identifying plants... and I'm already having to be careful here. Generally I don't want players to be rolling to see if their Character knows something. That's something the player and GM agree as questions come up based on the Character's Homeland, Heritage and Service. So the question of "Can I tell if this plant is poisonous?" shouldn't really be answered by a Druid Test: If they're a Blacksmith from a different Kingdom, then it's a no; but if they're a Forager then it's a yes.

My Druid example of predicting incoming weather also sounds dangerously more like a special power the Druid has than an ability which every Character possesses to a greater or lesser degree. And that highlights probably my main concern with using class names is that these bring baggage with them from other games. Players might expect that because they have a high Warrior stat they should be getting abilities like Second Wind or Action Surge. As demonstrated I've already found myself thinking along those lines.

That said: I quite like this. I'm not sure if I like it enough to say this is the way I'm going but I wanted to use this post to put the idea out there and get me thinking about it.

Till next time!

Tabletop Scotland 2025

Our second year attending Tabletop Scotland and a fantastic time was had!

I got a sneaky peak at a preview copy of Carved in Stone, the upcoming Pictish source book from Stout Stoat. I've been following this project since 2021 so to see it this close to it's release in November was really exciting as it's been a big inspiration for Legends of Alba! 

My wife got a full colour drawing of her Legends of Alba character, Mitha Seawolf, done by Tanya Roberts at Blue Bottle Ink. Tanya was there all weekend doing drawn to order commissions! Lovely person to have met and her work is awesome!

Between us we came away with a bunch of new games and books, here are my highlights: 

Doomsong by Caesar Ink - God is dead, the apocalypse looms! This one drew me in with it's grim line art, Mordew vibes and Choose-Your-Own-Adventure style character creation system. I've had a chance to try out the character creator and can confirm it's great fun! The book actually includes sheet music for the Doomsong, or you can sing the other doom song.

 

Goblin Country by Biscuit Fund Games - GM-less, diceless RPG where you play as the Goblin camp plotting against the human settlements for a change! Character Creation is a playbook style, with representing a goblin archetype characterised by a set of Weak Moves (unhelpful action
s you can perform to gain 'tokens') and Strong Moves (helpful actions you can perform which require and use 'tokens'). Really like this as a design space to explore!

Rising Star Championship Edition 2025 by Dog Petrol - this was a bit of a gamble to try out something a bit different! It's a co-operative RPG where players help a rising sports star achieve their goals. So you might play as the star, or their coach, or their number one fan. The catch is that you each take turns playing as the Heel - their rival trying to mess everything up! It's a small book but it's got some really helpful examples, and great random tables for prompts, including some for making up your own weird sport! A great candidate for a one-shot if ever I saw one! 

Tabletop Scotland is such a great event that we'll definitely be back next year. I said it last year and missed the boat but I'm also going to try and be more organised this time round as well to get myself signed up for running something! We'll see how that goes!

Till next time!

Mythic Bastionland Without Knights?

I’ve been running games in the Legends of Alba setting since January last year. Under the hood of these ostensibly 5e games though, the engine that has been doing the real work has been the World Prep and Travel procedures from Mythic Bastionland. These are excellent - they’re lightweight and evocative and I find them intuitive to run. The game has been at its best when the player characters have been journeying between destinations on the Kingdom map, encountering the Augurs of the Legends, seeking out Hags for advice, or negotiating clan politics. Seek the Myths, Honor the Seers, Protect the Realm… where have I heard that before?

The Mester Stoor Worm,
from my copy of "The Lore of Scotland",
Westwood & Kingshill

Taking stock of where I’m at with Legends of Alba as a project, I’m reconsidering whether this setting might best be expressed as a ‘module’ for Mythic Bastionland. If I wrote up the Clans like Knights, and the Legends as Myths (which they pretty much are already), would that ‘just work’?

Let’s see. What needs to change?

Clans instead of Knights

Player Characters are called from the clans to answer the Legends. The clans are also effectively the NPC factions that the Characters will be dealing with. Clans are ruled by Chiefs. Druids advise the Chiefs in terms of The Law of The Land, Bards chronicle and spread word of a Chief’s deeds, while Warriors lead their warband. 

 Knights in MB are expected to uphold their Oaths, which elevates them from the vassals but places a burden of responsibility upon them. There’s a great line in the book that they ‘rely on their arms, but are expected to know the customs of peace’. 

The clans of Alba meanwhile are all about finding the balance between civilization and nature. They are dependent on their harsh but beautiful land for survival. They also walk a line between prioritising the self and the community, embodied by the Chiefs, whose ambition can get the better of their sense of duty. 

Hags instead of Seers

The Seers are one of my favourite parts of MB, but are more morally ambiguous than the Hags of Alba. Both fulfil an important role - a hermit that players can seek out for information that not everyone has access to. But while the Seers are intended to provide an optional extra level of conflict to the game (their motivations are not always aligned to the PCs), the Hags of Alba embody the link between mortal folk and The Otherworld, as they have one foot in each. Like Seers, they are able to glimpse the past, present and future, making their advice tend towards the cryptic. But what they offer is Truth to those who seek it, and they aim to steer mortals towards equilibrium with the land and, by extension, The Otherworld.

Just Works?

So if we take Mythic Bastionland and swap Knights, Seers, Myths and The City for Clans, Hags, Legends and The Otherworld, do we get Legends of Alba? And are those two meaningfully distinct? To the first, I think so. To the second, I hope so! I had a go at writing up one Clan and one Legend just to try it on for size. It was good fun, so at the moment I’m thinking it would be worth writing more. If I can get up to 12 Clans and 12 Legends, that’d be enough for a test game I think! 

 Till next time!

Ancient Power Vacuum

An era of ancient history I find endlessly interesting is The Wars of the Diadochi: A time of big battles and even bigger egos. Alexander The Great conquered the known world and then died suddenly and mysteriously, leaving no one in charge. The following decades saw his empire tear itself apart as his Successors pressed their claim to rule. It's a time of skyrocketing ambition, doomed nostalgia, desperate survival, hero-worship and emulation, murderous intrigue and truly massive pitched battles. There's no holds barred. There's everything to play for, everything to lose and, of course, so much is lost.

Alexander Sarcophagus, CC James Carnehan
https://www.worldhistory.org/image/2918/alexander-sarcophagus/

A power vacuum is a great situation for an RPG isn't it? It's volatile, charged with potential energy and possibility for impactful change. Whether it's the main focus or a background element it gives players unprecedented opportunities and interesting choices to make, which is always valuable!

The Wars of The Successors provides some great inspiration for who might step forward when the Ruler of the Realm suddenly drops out of the picture.

I have the Throne

The thing about a seat of power is that, once someone is sitting in it, it's very hard to move them if they don't want to be moved. Antipater had been appointed as Regent of Macedonia And Greece, ruling the home countries while Alexander was off conquering the world. In other words he was sitting in the seat Alexander might have been expected to one day return to. The seat that now had many envious eyes on it.

I have the Right

The members of Alexander's Companion Cavalry (his honour guard) each considered themselves First Among Equals, bearing a sense of entitlement that they might succeed their King. In the case of Perdiccas, this stemmed from his tenure as second in command, having served Alexander since the beginning and been gifted with his signet ring. Surely such a clear favourite had the right to rule?

I have the Heir

Roxana's life as a Persian Princess had already taken a sharp turn when Persia was conquered by Alexander. At the time of his death she was married to him and pregnant with his child. She'd travelled with him on campaign and made both enemies and friends among his Generals, those who now squabbled over the empire. She knew her unborn son could not be ignored.

I have the Body

What better way to cement your claim to the crown than by burying the old King? In one of the more wacky plots of this period, Ptolemy stole Alexander's body to have it brought to him in Egypt for a proper funeral.

I have the Army

The Silver Shields were the veteran infantry, hardened soldiers of Alexander's long campaign of military subjugation. Whoever could call on them wielded not only a fearsome weapon of war, but their famous reputation to match. They were also a liability, being a turbulent bunch who, when it came down to it, valued the treasure they'd won in their 40 years of warfare over any ideas of loyalty (No judgement here, that's a lot of treasure!).

I have the People

I don't have a historical example to point to for this one (maybe it says something about this time period that 'the people' suffering under all this fighting are seldom mentioned? If ever?!) but a people's champion would certainly be an interesting addition to the mix here either as a sympathetic candidate or (another) villainous one!

That's it for now, till next time!