Grim-n-Gritty: Revised and Simplified

[Northcott]

Blacksad, you evil b@$t@rd! If you direct him to Nutkinland, he'll surely go MAD! Mad, I tell you!

Y'know, I pointed the guy who was running a Deadlands d20 game at this thread. The bugger's now thinking of adopting the rules for Deadlands. I see a TPK coming down the pike.

 

[FraserRonald]

Y'know, I pointed the guy who was running a Deadlands d20 game at this thread. The bugger's now thinking of adopting the rules for Deadlands. I see a TPK coming down the pike.

You're just lucky I didn't have this in hand when you guys were going through Brass. Zombie Beggars? The least of your worries!

 

[Northcott]

Oh Jeezus! You're here too? You and your damned zombie ninja beggars.

I like to think that you'd have been kind enough to at least temper the number of undead, magical traps, and spell-wielding villains with these rules in hand. (I knew you'd dig this.)

 

[KenHood]

err...Perhaps I should mention to Mr. Kenhood that I've done a PDF of the revised rules and posted them at Nutkinland (I've also modified a bit some font size, so that the OGL and the Critical Hit Effects takes only one page each), is it OK?

Sure.

Free to all!

The first rule of the revised Grim-n-Gritty rules is that you do not talk about the revised Grim-n-Gritty rules.

The second rule of the revised Grim-n-Gritty rules is that you do not talk about the revised Grim-n-Gritty rules!

By the way, what's a nutkinland?

 

[KenHood]

Y'know, I pointed the guy who was running a Deadlands d20 game at this thread. The bugger's now thinking of adopting the rules for Deadlands. I see a TPK coming down the pike.

What's a TPK?

 

[Northcott]

Total Party Kill. Bugger darn near did it to us anyway. Messy.

And a Nutkinland is www.nutkinland.com -- the forums will break your brain. Or insult you. Most people experience both. (Actually, we're a right friendly buch, save for a misanthrope or three.)

 

[KenHood]

Total Party Kill.

Well, it could happen -- but -- if you run into a fight prepared, it shouldn't. Best thing to do is gather information about your enemy, figure out its habits, and ambush it.

And spread misinformation so the bad guys don't do the same thing to you.

I've played for a pretty good while with rules like this. Once players dispense with the "sport" mentality (i.e., "Fights are fun!") and start acting like total bastards, TPK's don't happen. You've got to be ruthless, plan ahead, and make sure that no one gets the drop on your group. (In that way, they're a lot like real life.)

The word is RUTHLESS.

If your group survives a few fights, your GM should take that into account and give you a reputation. Folks tend to avoid types who can handle themselves and have proven it. Bad guys want to prey on the sheeple, not the wolves.

 

[Northcott]

Oh, we were pretty ruthless... and we were even passable in the planning department (edit; but when we screwed up? Whooooo-boy!). Where we failed miserably (especially me) was in the luck category. I think I set a new record for the number of 1's rolled in a session. I'm sure that as Fraser reads this he's chuckling to himself... I think I'd gotten up near a dozen 1's by the time he started demanding I warm up for my combat turns with "practice rolls".

Then, of course, we had one of those wizards -- you know the sort. The nutter in the robes who, like the friendly chap in your example, tosses big fire spells at the party figuring "they've got a decent save, I'll probably only get the NPC bad guys".

On second thought, you're right. My planning was amiss. In hindsight, I should have killed the bugger with one of my few good rolls.

 

[KenHood]

It does occur to me that a pretty cool image comes up: a wizard with quickened true strike and a handful of darts killing one person every round by throwing a dart directly into their brainpan.

Hey! Now, that would be cool.

True strike is first level. Quicken knocks the spell level up by +4. Grab a sorcerer, make it to 10th level, and you'll be spattering folks at least three times a day.

I like it!

All the more reason to kill the pencil necks in the back row, first.

 

[Hodag]

Vindictive SOB aren't you?

Hey now, some people like playing spellcasters...

Seroiusly though the GnG rules seem that they would work better with D20 Modern then any sort of fantasy game. It's awfully difficult to play fictional heroic when ambushes become the preferred method of attack.
I used to be all about the realism, but when it started interfering with the fun I started slacking off. Now don't get me wrong, I think the GnG rules are beautiful piece of work, but I probably won't use them because that's not the tone of game I want to run. I have had TPKs, but the fights that engendered them were awesome and took a while to play out, rather than smack dab, body on slab like GnG strives for.

I have played out three combats with AU characters
Human vs. Giant (3 lvls Giant)
Human vs. Spryte
Giant (3 lvls Giant) vs. Spryte
All were warmains (ECL:4th level) same equivalent equipment
The larger turned the smaller to goo every time. The Giant vs. Spryte took the longest because of the Spryte's flight, then the Giant threw a dagger...