OSR OSR RPGs with no class system

[HellfireVanWinkle]

I've recently red Knave V2 and came out really impressed with what I had in my hands, which is why I was wondering if anybody knew a place to find interesting houserules and hacks for Knave? Also I would really like to hear about from other OSR adjacent games that don't use a class system, for now I only know : Into the odd, Cairn, Knave and Machiato Monsters.

 

[Greyknife Ike]

Vaults of Vaarn is a Knave Based werid science-fantasy (think 1970s acid trip ) system they crowd funded their second edition a few months ago . I backed it and am looking at the playtest drafts pdfs and while there's some elements of Knave it's got a life of its own that's unique enough that if you liked Knave but want something more Barsoom or a Galaxy far far away that may be up your alley.

 

[zottel]

Mausritter comes to mind. As far as I know, it's based on Into the Odd.
It is very easy to pick up, even for people completely new to RPGs, and imho very evocative.
You play as mice going on adventures, to explore, gather resources and the like, and have to contest with rats, cats of course, but can stumble upon more fantastic creatures like snake skeletons as well. You run through our world, more or less, just really tiny. Every barn can be a mega dungeon, a tree a colony. Inventory management plays a big role, and is handled beautifully. You have limited space, and items need one or two, possibly more spaces. Same with weapons, armor and shields. This is expressed by the items and arms being small physical cards you lay on your inventory. Super simple to understand. The rules generally are easy to pick up as well.
I am totally in love with it currently, hoping to get it to the table this year!
Also, the community is very active with a lot of cool supplements.

 

[amethal]

Advanced Fighting Fantasy 2nd edition doesn't have a class system, if it counts as OSR.

It's surprisingly customisable, although not much variation within concepts - so an Elf based around archery is different to a Human based around sorcery, but two Elven archers are likely to be very similar.

 

[THEMNGMNT]

I too recently came across Knave. Its take on gear/wounds is brilliant. I'm in the process of hacking together Knave and Shadowdark because I do want SOME kind of character progression outside of gear.

 

[HellfireVanWinkle]

I too recently came across Knave. Its take on gear/wounds is brilliant. I'm in the process of hacking together Knave and Shadowdark because I do want SOME kind of character progression outside of gear.

That's very interesting to hear, because I happen to be interested in Shadowdark as well. I'd be happy to see your current notes if you were to kindly show them to us.

 

[Fenris-77]

Trophy Gold doesn't use classes, nor does Vagabonds of Dyfed. Both are great (and very different). Vagabonds has some PbtA DNA going on, which may or may be a deal breaker (I like it waaaay more than Dungeon World, and it does the OSR play style better than DW too).

 

[Fenris-77]

That's very interesting to hear, because I happen to be interested in Shadowdark as well. I'd be happy to see your current notes if you were to kindly show them to us.

I design and sell stuff for SD, so if you have questions ask away and I'll try to help answer them.

 

[JohnSnow]

I'd also say that you could freely pilfer things from most other OSR subsystems to work with Knave. For instance, I think Shadowdark's roll to cast magic system, and Luck/Deathbringer Dice and a subsystem like "Mighty Deeds of Arms" from Dungeon Crawl Classics would be natural add-ons to Knave. You'd probably want to take the Knave attribute bonuses and pull a chunk out to figure out a progression for the "deed die."

Could also be an option as opposed to mandatory: "If you want to pull a special stunt as part of your attack, swap part of your bonus, up to dX at X level, for a Deed Die. If the attack succeeds, and the Deed Die is at least a 3, the stunt succeeds." Personally, I'd start it at d3 and follow the DCC fighter table.

You could do other things, including building a skill system or adding a feat/edge/talent system. I'd look at Vagabond, Savage Worlds, or 3e's feat list as a good place to start. But the trick is that these feats (or w/e you want to call them) should add capabilities, not numerical bonuses. At most, a feat might eliminate disadvantage when attempting a particular kind of check, for example.