Something I've noticed is, somewhere in the manual I think I read something about Trapped Treasure, but in the dungeon generation pages there's no seeming relation between the unguarded treasure or the result in traps, are you supposed to ask the oracle if the treasure IS the trap?
Hi there, thanks for your comment. So, I actually rephrased the bit early in the book regarding 'room traps' and 'treasure traps' - these are now defined as 'simple traps' and 'complex traps', with complex traps requiring thieves tools to disarm. In general, I'd say anything linked to opening a door or chest would be classed as complex. A pit, a hinged trapdoor, a rope attached to an alarm bell etc are all simple traps. I leave this up to the GM to determine, based on the description of the trap and the fiction.
With trap/dungeon generation, unguarded treasure appears on the discovery table and traps appear on the danger table. On delving deeper you can get danger+discovery together, so that would be one hardcoded way to link the two.
Outside of this, you can also interpret unguarded treasure in different ways.. i recently had a room in a crumbling crypt in which my PC found a gem as unguarded treasure.. i decided this was lying amongst the rubble and i wasn't suspicious of a trap. If a treasure makes you suspicious of a trap based on the fiction, I'd definitely ask the oracle.. whilst playing solo I often do this when my character is right in front of the treasure and I say that is him actually checking for traps (1 turn passes), that reflects what would happen at the table with a real GM. Both my character and I find out if there is a trap at the same time.
I would rule that a character skilled in dungeon exploration or thievery should always automatically discover a trap, but I often use the oracle or an attribute check to determine if they can disarm it depending on the fiction (e.g. He cuts the wire connected to the wall - does this disarm it? (Likely Odds) if it doesn't, I'll give him a chance to roll out of the way of whatever trap springs). It keeps a lot of the tension present whilst playing solo.
You can certainly ask the oracle about potential traps on treasure hoards owned by monsters.. but the likelihood will again depend on the type of monster etc.
I hope that helps somewhat? Let me know if I misunderstood.
Hey! I skimmed pretty much everything except the spell lists, and have not really caught much on my end so far except maybe one typo and a potential mistake with one of the tables:
1) I see 5-6 next to the moderate potions section so I am confused on that piece.
2) I see most the of the verb and noun tables are in alphabetical order but on the third noun table, this pattern stops on entry 24. It looks like some entries after that are a repeat of earlier entries. Is this intentional?
I also have some questions for clarifications on my end. Some of these might just be a matter of applying common sense, or even just creative use of the oracle, but may or may not be worth elaborating on in the text somewhere if there is room in the text and/or time before your 1.0 release.
!) Do you track water and thirst?
3) How do you determine how far is a creature during the start of an encounter?
3) In the Alchemy section, the potion example is specific to healing potions. Is the same template used for other potions?
5) Runestones and writs can only hold one spell correct?
Hey, thanks again for your comment. You've actually picked up on a huge copy paste mistake there. All the tables are put together in excel and then copied in.. I'll definitely get that fixed straight away, especially as its such an important table!
the 5-6 next to Moderate Potions is supposed to be 2-6. As in, roll d6 to find out if you've found one of the simple potions or if you get to roll d66 on the larger table. I think i need to make that more obvious.
For the clarifications:
I generally handwave thirst and water. One group I know include it as part of a Ration, which seems to work well enough. I think anything beyond that and it starts to defeat the simplification idea behind forge.
I don't, actually. I generally insert the creature wherever I initially imagined it to be. But I think there's a good argument for adding encounter range onto the bottom of page 37.
I admit that the variable potency of crafted Potions probably works best for healing Potions and poisons, but I think it's also interesting if someone tries to brew a potion of fly, but they end up with levitate.. or if they were trying for a potion of strength and ended up with giant strength. I think this will definitely require some GM thinking. Alternatively, you can ignore variable potency for Potions where it's a bit ambiguous, and just roll d4 on complication/added bonus.
Correct, runes and writs all contain a single spell, however that spell may be cast multiple times, based on how many spells a character can cast per day.
I have a fair few other fixes that i need to make, in addition to those above, however I'm hopeful that I'll be able to upload v1.0 by the end of the week.
Quick question regarding potions that can be found as treasure. For those involving special effects (potion of water-breathing as an example), would it be around 1 hour such as what is stated in the alchemy section or would it be the same duration as the spell? Figure it would be the former but was not sure if that applied only to potions brewed by the character vs those found randomly as treasure.
My intention was that all potion effects should last 1 hour, as it makes it significantly easier to adjudicate. I've actually added the following note to the potions section under treasures, as I also thought it wasn't immediately obvious - "Potion effects, if temporary, last 1 hour (poison is potent on a blade for two hits, or up to 1 hour before drying up – save with advantage vs the 2nd hit)".
I'm getting closer to v1.0. I've revamped the Wilderness section, which now includes a half-page set of terrain-based feature tables, with splits for water, plant and land features. I've tried to keep them as concise as possible, but results like "Dust bowl", "Creek" or "Wildflowers" should be enough to send you in the right direction! Terrain feature is also now tied into the expanded wilderness discovery table too.
I've added some tables for resources - types of stone, wood and metals (e.g. for trade or construction/item crafting), as well as a section on plants (both poisonous and edible) which can also be used as a "what was found on a foraging attempt" roll. On the whole, I'm much happier with the wilderness section - it feels packed, without being bloated.
I've also added a page that goes into detail about incorporating followers into your game, as well as breaking down mechanical differences between hirelings, mercenaries and companions.
Do you think you are going to release those additions before the 1.0 release or are you going to hold off and release everything at once in the final release?
Hi again! I've decided that it would be best if I released it with all the new additions/changes in advance of a V1.0 release (V0.9.7).. just so that if there any any obvious mistakes they will get captured. Hope you enjoy it!
This is definitely the best set of rules that I have seen so far for an osr/nsr rpg that also integrates a framework for solo gaming. Without a doubt going to be my solo rpg of choice for quite some time since this game fundamentally contains rules from some modern osr/nsr rule sets that I love (Such as abstract distance) with all of the fundamental procedures you need to solo this type of game (especially dungeon generation).
As far as feedback, if possible, I probably would add maybe one more page for the wilderness section that would contain some expanded examples for the discovery’s you can find. That being said, this is pretty much just a nitpick since, for example, if I needed a specific landmark, I can roll for that in one of the games you mentioned as attributions (such as maze rats or the upcoming knave 2e). This would also give you that nice two page spread to make it consistent with some of the other sections in the book.
Hope more fans of solo gaming discover this game so that it gets the attention it deserves.
Hi there, thank you very much for your kind words and feedback!
I do agree that the wilderness section could be fleshed out slightly - my goal is to try and include everything needed to run a solo game, all in one book. Plus you are definitely right about the two page spread layout.
I am conscious of not making tables too prescriptive, as I find that tends to hamper imagination, however I totally get that others may feel differently. As you say, I think expanding the wilderness discovery table one level deeper (similar to the dungeon discovery table) will be a step in the right direction, without overdoing it.
After seeing the recent Dolmenwood PDF, I was also thinking that I could add a table or two expanding on foraging in the wilderness too, such as example plants and herbs (e.g. edible, inedible/poisonous). I'll have a play around and see what looks good. I do need to be careful, as I want to give people the tools to easily create their own game worlds, rather than force feed them made up plant names from my own setting :)
Thank you again for your comment - collaboration is key to creating the best product!
Im really happy with this system! Genuinely! Its become my go-to for solo.
Because youre looking for feedback, id suggest a dedicated section on hirelings, just for the sake of having those rules available on the table of contents.
As it stands now it seems they are only mentioned in passing on the combat section, and on the shopping section as just a thing you can use your money on. It's not impossible to piece things together, but i was confused initially, especially because there is a playsheet dedicated to them. Aside from that, i love this game.
Thank you so much for your comment. I'm really glad you're enjoying the game!
The way I play hirelings is that they usually start off as generic 'Footman', 'Archer', etc recorded on the notes and hirelings sheet (sometimes with names assigned). They are presumed to have their own inventory etc but I don't track it as I'm effectively treating them as mercenaries. I'll put a tick in two attribute boxes for each to mark them as primary, either randomly (d6) or whatever I think suits their role. These hirelings are generally for above-ground wagon guarding or similar.
My PC's actual companions were generally elevated from hireling status (or met through other circumstances etc), at which point I flesh them out on the companion sheet, tracking inventory, conditions, experience, etc, and these guys follow my PC down into dungeons and get a half share of loot, as well as an increased wage (though more often than not I remove the wage if they are getting a share).
Mechanically there isn't much difference between hirelings and companions, except companions can gain xp and become stronger with your PC. They should all hopefully be quite quick to run. I'll generally establish more character details for companions too, such as appearance, quirks and motivations, however I track that separately on my character list.
The total number of followers that a PC can have (CHA check bonus +2) are the number of hirelings and companions combined. However, when playing solo I think it's fine to be a bit less strict with this.
I'll definitely add a section on hirelings and companions to my to-do list, thank you!
Hello, I have reviewed the latest version and I think it is a great system, I usually play solo and I think the tables and oracle will be very useful for me, I only have one question, how are the initial values of the attributes assigned? I look forward to version 1.0
Hi there! Thank you, I'm really glad that you like it!
If you check the top of page 11, I mention rolling 3d6 for each attribute in turn (3d6 down the line - STR > DEX > CON etc.) This will generally result in lower attribute scores than in more modern versions of d&d, but also they have slightly less mechanical impact too..
I'm hoping to release 1.0 soon, I just want to make sure I've got all the wrinkles ironed out.
Hi, thank you for the feedback (I do appreciate it). I included a 'button' to take you back to the contents page on every page - I use this on my own documents as it helps streamline my solo-play experience. I deliberately put it in the footer so that it would be easier to hide/remove from later versions if people don't like it.
I made an effort to add hyperlinks to all the sections and tables, again in an effort to speed up solo-play, but yes you are right, there are no bookmarks, which some people prefer. I will add them to a future release.
This is just... beautiful. I've spent good money on significantly smaller documents. The layout is excellent, and the amount of content is ridiculous for the page count. I love the tables and procedures included. The Knave and Maze Rats influences on these areas are obvious, and that's not a complaint. The occupation system doubling as race or class replacement is great, Worlds Without Number if I'm not mistaken? Overall, I've wanted to put together my own OSR solo book for a while that fits my tastes and I think you've just done it for me. I may have to print it off in A5 size.
Thank you for the kind words! I hadn't originally intended on making a full book, but it just blossomed into one over the course of a year or so. I'm primarily a solo player, so that's why there is so much focus on the random tables. Ideally i wanted a full system and oracle/adventure/item/creature generation that synergised with itself without needing to convert on the fly.
The result is a heavily modified combination of procedures and tables from various sources (including my own) that i have used for years with great success.. all in one place!
Oh, and the fact that the page count is divisible by 4 is no accident - you can print it as a booklet in Adobe and saddle stitch/staple to give you an A5 booklet.
When i get around to it, I am intending on adding a spread of example items after the treasure pages. Plus anything else that I think of that might be helpful.
← Return to game
Comments
Log in with itch.io to leave a comment.
Something I've noticed is, somewhere in the manual I think I read something about Trapped Treasure, but in the dungeon generation pages there's no seeming relation between the unguarded treasure or the result in traps, are you supposed to ask the oracle if the treasure IS the trap?
Hi there, thanks for your comment. So, I actually rephrased the bit early in the book regarding 'room traps' and 'treasure traps' - these are now defined as 'simple traps' and 'complex traps', with complex traps requiring thieves tools to disarm. In general, I'd say anything linked to opening a door or chest would be classed as complex. A pit, a hinged trapdoor, a rope attached to an alarm bell etc are all simple traps. I leave this up to the GM to determine, based on the description of the trap and the fiction.
With trap/dungeon generation, unguarded treasure appears on the discovery table and traps appear on the danger table. On delving deeper you can get danger+discovery together, so that would be one hardcoded way to link the two.
Outside of this, you can also interpret unguarded treasure in different ways.. i recently had a room in a crumbling crypt in which my PC found a gem as unguarded treasure.. i decided this was lying amongst the rubble and i wasn't suspicious of a trap. If a treasure makes you suspicious of a trap based on the fiction, I'd definitely ask the oracle.. whilst playing solo I often do this when my character is right in front of the treasure and I say that is him actually checking for traps (1 turn passes), that reflects what would happen at the table with a real GM. Both my character and I find out if there is a trap at the same time.
I would rule that a character skilled in dungeon exploration or thievery should always automatically discover a trap, but I often use the oracle or an attribute check to determine if they can disarm it depending on the fiction (e.g. He cuts the wire connected to the wall - does this disarm it? (Likely Odds) if it doesn't, I'll give him a chance to roll out of the way of whatever trap springs). It keeps a lot of the tension present whilst playing solo.
You can certainly ask the oracle about potential traps on treasure hoards owned by monsters.. but the likelihood will again depend on the type of monster etc.
I hope that helps somewhat? Let me know if I misunderstood.
Hey! I skimmed pretty much everything except the spell lists, and have not really caught much on my end so far except maybe one typo and a potential mistake with one of the tables:
1) I see 5-6 next to the moderate potions section so I am confused on that piece.
2) I see most the of the verb and noun tables are in alphabetical order but on the third noun table, this pattern stops on entry 24. It looks like some entries after that are a repeat of earlier entries. Is this intentional?
I also have some questions for clarifications on my end. Some of these might just be a matter of applying common sense, or even just creative use of the oracle, but may or may not be worth elaborating on in the text somewhere if there is room in the text and/or time before your 1.0 release.
!) Do you track water and thirst?
3) How do you determine how far is a creature during the start of an encounter?
3) In the Alchemy section, the potion example is specific to healing potions. Is the same template used for other potions?
5) Runestones and writs can only hold one spell correct?
Hey, thanks again for your comment. You've actually picked up on a huge copy paste mistake there. All the tables are put together in excel and then copied in.. I'll definitely get that fixed straight away, especially as its such an important table!
the 5-6 next to Moderate Potions is supposed to be 2-6. As in, roll d6 to find out if you've found one of the simple potions or if you get to roll d66 on the larger table. I think i need to make that more obvious.
For the clarifications:
I generally handwave thirst and water. One group I know include it as part of a Ration, which seems to work well enough. I think anything beyond that and it starts to defeat the simplification idea behind forge.
I don't, actually. I generally insert the creature wherever I initially imagined it to be. But I think there's a good argument for adding encounter range onto the bottom of page 37.
I admit that the variable potency of crafted Potions probably works best for healing Potions and poisons, but I think it's also interesting if someone tries to brew a potion of fly, but they end up with levitate.. or if they were trying for a potion of strength and ended up with giant strength. I think this will definitely require some GM thinking. Alternatively, you can ignore variable potency for Potions where it's a bit ambiguous, and just roll d4 on complication/added bonus.
Correct, runes and writs all contain a single spell, however that spell may be cast multiple times, based on how many spells a character can cast per day.
I have a fair few other fixes that i need to make, in addition to those above, however I'm hopeful that I'll be able to upload v1.0 by the end of the week.
Thanks for your response!
Wish you the best of luck on finishing the rest of it. Sounds like it is going to be a solid release.
Quick question regarding potions that can be found as treasure. For those involving special effects (potion of water-breathing as an example), would it be around 1 hour such as what is stated in the alchemy section or would it be the same duration as the spell? Figure it would be the former but was not sure if that applied only to potions brewed by the character vs those found randomly as treasure.
My intention was that all potion effects should last 1 hour, as it makes it significantly easier to adjudicate. I've actually added the following note to the potions section under treasures, as I also thought it wasn't immediately obvious - "Potion effects, if temporary, last 1 hour (poison is potent on a blade for two hits, or up to 1 hour before drying up – save with advantage vs the 2nd hit)".
I'm getting closer to v1.0. I've revamped the Wilderness section, which now includes a half-page set of terrain-based feature tables, with splits for water, plant and land features. I've tried to keep them as concise as possible, but results like "Dust bowl", "Creek" or "Wildflowers" should be enough to send you in the right direction! Terrain feature is also now tied into the expanded wilderness discovery table too.
I've added some tables for resources - types of stone, wood and metals (e.g. for trade or construction/item crafting), as well as a section on plants (both poisonous and edible) which can also be used as a "what was found on a foraging attempt" roll. On the whole, I'm much happier with the wilderness section - it feels packed, without being bloated.
I've also added a page that goes into detail about incorporating followers into your game, as well as breaking down mechanical differences between hirelings, mercenaries and companions.
All the changes sound awesome! Looking forward for the next update.
Do you think you are going to release those additions before the 1.0 release or are you going to hold off and release everything at once in the final release?
Hi again! I've decided that it would be best if I released it with all the new additions/changes in advance of a V1.0 release (V0.9.7).. just so that if there any any obvious mistakes they will get captured. Hope you enjoy it!
Awesome! Love what I see so far and plan on reading the whole thing over the next week or two to see if I can catch any typos/mistakes on my end.
This is definitely the best set of rules that I have seen so far for an osr/nsr rpg that also integrates a framework for solo gaming. Without a doubt going to be my solo rpg of choice for quite some time since this game fundamentally contains rules from some modern osr/nsr rule sets that I love (Such as abstract distance) with all of the fundamental procedures you need to solo this type of game (especially dungeon generation).
As far as feedback, if possible, I probably would add maybe one more page for the wilderness section that would contain some expanded examples for the discovery’s you can find. That being said, this is pretty much just a nitpick since, for example, if I needed a specific landmark, I can roll for that in one of the games you mentioned as attributions (such as maze rats or the upcoming knave 2e). This would also give you that nice two page spread to make it consistent with some of the other sections in the book.
Hope more fans of solo gaming discover this game so that it gets the attention it deserves.
Hi there, thank you very much for your kind words and feedback!
I do agree that the wilderness section could be fleshed out slightly - my goal is to try and include everything needed to run a solo game, all in one book. Plus you are definitely right about the two page spread layout.
I am conscious of not making tables too prescriptive, as I find that tends to hamper imagination, however I totally get that others may feel differently. As you say, I think expanding the wilderness discovery table one level deeper (similar to the dungeon discovery table) will be a step in the right direction, without overdoing it.
After seeing the recent Dolmenwood PDF, I was also thinking that I could add a table or two expanding on foraging in the wilderness too, such as example plants and herbs (e.g. edible, inedible/poisonous). I'll have a play around and see what looks good. I do need to be careful, as I want to give people the tools to easily create their own game worlds, rather than force feed them made up plant names from my own setting :)
Thank you again for your comment - collaboration is key to creating the best product!
Im really happy with this system! Genuinely! Its become my go-to for solo.
Because youre looking for feedback, id suggest a dedicated section on hirelings, just for the sake of having those rules available on the table of contents.
As it stands now it seems they are only mentioned in passing on the combat section, and on the shopping section as just a thing you can use your money on. It's not impossible to piece things together, but i was confused initially, especially because there is a playsheet dedicated to them. Aside from that, i love this game.
Thank you so much for your comment. I'm really glad you're enjoying the game!
The way I play hirelings is that they usually start off as generic 'Footman', 'Archer', etc recorded on the notes and hirelings sheet (sometimes with names assigned). They are presumed to have their own inventory etc but I don't track it as I'm effectively treating them as mercenaries. I'll put a tick in two attribute boxes for each to mark them as primary, either randomly (d6) or whatever I think suits their role. These hirelings are generally for above-ground wagon guarding or similar.
My PC's actual companions were generally elevated from hireling status (or met through other circumstances etc), at which point I flesh them out on the companion sheet, tracking inventory, conditions, experience, etc, and these guys follow my PC down into dungeons and get a half share of loot, as well as an increased wage (though more often than not I remove the wage if they are getting a share).
Mechanically there isn't much difference between hirelings and companions, except companions can gain xp and become stronger with your PC. They should all hopefully be quite quick to run. I'll generally establish more character details for companions too, such as appearance, quirks and motivations, however I track that separately on my character list.
The total number of followers that a PC can have (CHA check bonus +2) are the number of hirelings and companions combined. However, when playing solo I think it's fine to be a bit less strict with this.
I'll definitely add a section on hirelings and companions to my to-do list, thank you!
Hello, I have reviewed the latest version and I think it is a great system, I usually play solo and I think the tables and oracle will be very useful for me, I only have one question, how are the initial values of the attributes assigned? I look forward to version 1.0
Hi there! Thank you, I'm really glad that you like it!
If you check the top of page 11, I mention rolling 3d6 for each attribute in turn (3d6 down the line - STR > DEX > CON etc.) This will generally result in lower attribute scores than in more modern versions of d&d, but also they have slightly less mechanical impact too..
I'm hoping to release 1.0 soon, I just want to make sure I've got all the wrinkles ironed out.
Thanx, english is not my first lenguaje and I was looking in the wrong page.😅
Can you rename the subfiles so that they start with FORGE - there are so many and they wont sort together.
Good point to be fair! I'll do that now.
There’s a “Contents” footer on every page.
Hi, thank you for the feedback (I do appreciate it). I included a 'button' to take you back to the contents page on every page - I use this on my own documents as it helps streamline my solo-play experience. I deliberately put it in the footer so that it would be easier to hide/remove from later versions if people don't like it.
I made an effort to add hyperlinks to all the sections and tables, again in an effort to speed up solo-play, but yes you are right, there are no bookmarks, which some people prefer. I will add them to a future release.
Oh! OK. I didn’t realise it’s a link.
Bookmarks would be nice.
This is just... beautiful. I've spent good money on significantly smaller documents. The layout is excellent, and the amount of content is ridiculous for the page count. I love the tables and procedures included. The Knave and Maze Rats influences on these areas are obvious, and that's not a complaint. The occupation system doubling as race or class replacement is great, Worlds Without Number if I'm not mistaken? Overall, I've wanted to put together my own OSR solo book for a while that fits my tastes and I think you've just done it for me. I may have to print it off in A5 size.
Thank you for the kind words! I hadn't originally intended on making a full book, but it just blossomed into one over the course of a year or so. I'm primarily a solo player, so that's why there is so much focus on the random tables. Ideally i wanted a full system and oracle/adventure/item/creature generation that synergised with itself without needing to convert on the fly.
The result is a heavily modified combination of procedures and tables from various sources (including my own) that i have used for years with great success.. all in one place!
Oh, and the fact that the page count is divisible by 4 is no accident - you can print it as a booklet in Adobe and saddle stitch/staple to give you an A5 booklet.
When i get around to it, I am intending on adding a spread of example items after the treasure pages. Plus anything else that I think of that might be helpful.
I hope you get as much use out of it as I have :)