Microlite20 : the smallest thing in gaming

[Ry]

Sweet maps. I like that gallery.

 

[greywulf]

Wow. I'm amazed the momentum for this is still going. You guys floor me. No, really!

Darrell, I was beginning to miss you What you're working on sounds just what we need. If you need a hand with the maps, Kensanata is yer man. His maps are beautiful. This one I want as a poster.

Bretbo, I await the M20M stats for a living dumpster with bated breath. Microlite20 Modern + a Microlite20 Modern Manual would be just great for litescale modern gaming.

Litescale... I like that. Trips off the tonuge.

My brain is shifting into gears regarding a Macropedia PDF where we'll need to make it very clear what's Core Rules and what's optional candy store fare. More on that another time though.

Rycanada, take all the liberties you want (but don't get caught ). I'd love to know how this plays out - I suspect an M20 session in Cauldron would focus more on out-of-combat investigation than regular D&D as you're free from the expectations of the rules.

For a fireball I'd be inclined to scale the hits radially with the "area of effect" being how much takes full damage from the blast. So, if you put three points into damage and area of effect 1, that's 3 points of damage where it hits, 2 points 5' away, 1 point 10' away.

Make it area of effect 2 and you get 3 points of damage where it hits and 5' away, 2 at 10' and 1 at 15'.

Oh, and make sure you don't get caught in the blast, so you'll need a decent amount in range too. Fireballs can be difficult to cast safely, just as it should be.

Kensanata, I think the Microlite20 site would benefit from an InspirationalMaps with links to maps by you and others. What do you think

 

[kensanata]

Kensanata, I think the Microlite20 site would benefit from an InspirationalMaps with links to maps by you and others. What do you think

Done!

 

[greywulf]

Done!

Fantastic Ain't wikis grand? Especially where they're super-powered by Oddmue (shameless plug)

InspirationalMaps are now available from the Microlite20 site, courtesy of Kensanata. If anyone else has more to add, click Edit this page and copy Alex's formating.

Thanks

 

[Darrell]

@Darrell: My offer to draw maps of anything that you have a little textual description of still stands!

Thanks for the offer, kensanata, but I already have a map, and it's been colored for me by a kind soul over on the ENW Art Gallery forums (thanks, hafrogman, if you're reading). See below for said map, sans labeling. Yours are really, exceptional, though. I love your gallery.

The problems I'm running into are actually reconciling the text with the new map. I used to use one I'd cribbed from an online source and re-labeled; but I didn't feel comfortable using that one, since I didn't have permission to use it in a publication, and didn't know where I'd originally got it, so I couldn't even try to get permission.

I decided instead to use a map I'd drawn several years ago, but it's a bit different, geographically, than the other...so I'm having to reconcile the new map with the older text, and I'm currently figuring some of my stuff has to be pared down. May trouble lies in deciding what to pare down. I'll figure it out soon, and you guys will see the result as soon as I can figure it out.

Thanks again for the offer, kensanata; I appreciate it.

Regards,
Darrell

 

[Pilsnerquest]

For a fireball I'd be inclined to scale the hits radially with the "area of effect" being how much takes full damage from the blast. So, if you put three points into damage and area of effect 1, that's 3 points of damage where it hits, 2 points 5' away, 1 point 10' away.

Make it area of effect 2 and you get 3 points of damage where it hits and 5' away, 2 at 10' and 1 at 15'.

I really like where this is going for ultramicrolite and rycanada's system for magic. Using the magic roll/magic attack, whatever you want to call it, and having the caster designate how the roll is divided amongst effect, duration, area of effect and range is simpy brilliant. It literally can accomodate any type of spell. I myself have allowed casters a "no charge" on range to allow anything in sight (within reason) to be targeted by the spell attack leaving points to be divided between effect, duration and area of effect. The only glitch seems to be when a caster tries to cast a spell with more than one "component" such as a fireball (with area of effect and damage) and the caster does not have enough points to distribute to both. Maybe the spell just affects a 5' area or just fizzles?

Any ideas?

Pilsnerquest

 

[greywulf]

Pilsnerquest, here's what I wrote earlier as a suggestion to solve this:

Also, I'd suggest clarifying what happens to any unstated variable. So if a magic user casts ball of fire and only gets a 6, it'll do damage 1, range touch, area of effect none, duration instant. It he rolls over 10, he could add an extra point of damage, increase the range to 1, make it area effect 1 or duration 1 round.

All spells could potentially have damage, range, area of effect and duration. If they're unstated, then the defaults are used:

0 damage
touch range
0 area of effect
instant duration

In Microlite20 terms, each point allocated to damage would translate to 1d6 Hit Points lost. Or "damage" could be positive energy to make it a healing spell instead recovering 1d6 damage per point.

For example, an Awaken spell could be just 0 damage, range 1 (5'), 0 area of effect and instant duration.

How's that sound?

 

[Ry]

See below.

 

[Ry]

Very close to what greywulf suggested, here's the base spell in Rank20:

You roll a magic check like any other skill check. If your opponent resists, and your check is less than the opponent's check to resist, the spell fails. Also, if your total check is ever less than 10, the spell fails. When a spell fails you still lose whatever you would normally spend to cast it (Reserve, spells per day, hitpoints, etc.)

Every spell has 3 parts: Range, # of Targets, and Result.

1. Range:

Touch/Melee                  0
Close (30 feet)  	    -1
Short (30 yards)            -2
Medium (60 yards)           -4
Long (100 yards)            -6
Extreme (200 yards)         -8

2. # of Targets.

# 	Penalty
1	+0
2	-2
5	-4
10	-6
25	-8
50	-10
100	-12

Area of Effect gets rolled into Number of Targets pretty easily, since they're similar concepts, but a caster can choose to shape it like a Cone (starting at caster), a Line (starting at caster), or a Radius (starting at a range).

To handle situations where the "targets" aren't actual opponents, think of targets in terms of what people could do in the same amount of time. For example, for "how much stuff can I levitate?" think of what a "target" could represent - my answer would be: "Let's use 100 pounds / target as our benchmark, since that's about as much as 1 fairly strong man could lift at the same time." To move dirt, "how much can a man shovel per round?"

3. Result

This is the effect and duration (if applicable). I rolled these 2 together since appropriate durations seem to change so much depending on the effect. This table can be expanded, but I've kept it short because that's the kind of exercise we're doing right now. I'd love suggestions for very concise ways to expand this table though.

[B]Result                Modifier[/B]
Harmless effect             +0
1 Hit (1d6 damage)          -2
2 hits                      -5
4 hits                     -10
Per Healing (1d6 healing)   -5
+1/-1 Stat for 10 rounds    -5

Other Effect is…	
… less severe than a hit    -2
… like a hit	            -4
… worse than a hit          -8
… crippling	           -12
... instant death          -16

4. Other conditions

For d20 spell lovers, there's a flat +2 bonus to any spell that emulates a spell from a d20 rulebook. For 4x5 magic lovers, take a +2 bonus if you use some element of the environment in your spell. I intend to use both modifiers.

 

[greywulf]

I'm liking it more and more. Nice write-up.

Mind if I snarf (again) ?

I wanna playtest it next week for my one- (or maybe two-) shot Microlite20 Wednesday game. Tonight's d20 Modern wrapped up nicely with the world about to end. Don't ask.

So next week I'm thinking about running a post-apocalyptic game using Microlite20.

It's going to feature Giant Burrowing Beetles (Bullettes), Warp Cats (Displacer Beasts), Unmen (Orcs), Skinnies (Elves) and anything else I can rename on the fly. And some of the new Critters too. Heck, I might even throw in a gow or two - though I suspect they will be eaten pretty quickly

And there's going to be magic, but not like D&D spell list, formalized stuff. This is going to be raw, untamed, wild.......perfect for your magic system, in other words.

I'll write-up the magic as it's going to be run in the Macropedia so everyone can tear it apart review it impartially, ok?

And the classes are going to be Fighter, Rogue, Cleric and Mage renamed into post-apocalyptic terms. Something like Heavy, Finder, Lost Soul and Blessed, maybe. I'll think more on that later