Fighting Fantasy
Fighting Fantasy
Details
Optional rules:
Max 5 Dice: Your Cliché might be higher than 5 but you roll only 5 dice at most.
FF Clichés: Your Clichés are: Toughness (Stamina), Skill, and Silky-Smooth (Luck). They are used a bit different here than in the FF system. These are mandatory with at least 1 point on them, and you can buy anything extra to enhance your character.
Toughness: besides toughness related skills this provides an intimidating presence. If you want friendly responses instead of frightened ones work on your Silky-Smooth Cliché. Whenever any of your Cliché gets a beating you can try to Tough It Out. You can roll your Toughness against the number of damage (ie: 2 damage means 2d6). This will damage your Toughness by 1, but if you beat the score damage roll, your original Cliché will not decrease.
Skill: This is used for a range of activities: fighting, sneaking, climbing, dodging arrows, etc... How dodging arrows will decrease your opponent's shooting Cliché? Simple: he will be a bit out of arrows, he will be a bit more nervous as you change your distance, a bit less sure in himself.
Silky Smooth: Zohan had the ultimate score on this one. So this is your Trickstery Cliché. If you roll it against 10 and win you can double your damage against your opponent, if you fail you will half the damage. In any case your Silky Smooth score will decrease by 1. You can apply it the other way around when you suffer any damage. 0.5 rounds up in case you halve an odd number.
Double damage: When you loose a fight you loose 2 points from your Cliché instead of 1. Of course this will not decrease your Cliché under 0. In draws it is 1 point of damage to both sides.
Temporary Clichés. All Clichés are double pumpable in order to perform magic. Similarly to Minute-Made Magic: one can create a temporary supernatural Cliché by double pumping one of his regular Clichés. From this point of view all Clichés are double pumpable. So the regular Cliché will loose a number of points, and the temporary Cliché will gain 2 times these points+ the original points of the generating Cliché. The temporary Cliché has to be in close relation to the regular one. For example Necromancer(3) can double pump it creating Zombie Body Guard* (9) while completely exhausting itself into Necromancer(0). The temporary Clichés loose 1 point at the end of each turn, except for the turn when they are created. Temporary Clichés are psionic magical mystic extraplanar intradimensional creations, so only other temporary Clichés can hurt them. Even if they loose a contest against a regular Cliché they will not loose a die. Some examples to Cliché-Temporary Cliché pairs:
Ranger - Rain of Arrows
Fire Mage - Body of Fire
Abjurer: Protective Circle
No Funky Die. Except for Gods, who can have special Clichés, but still they have the same 10 dice setup, but each of their die is the product of 2 dice. For example Zeus has this Fling Lightning(3) Cliché. When he flings a lightning at the roof of your wizard tower he rolls 6 dice, lets say 1,2,6,2,5,6. He pairs them up the way he wants, in this case he does is thus: 6x6+5x2+2x1=48. Not bad... there goes the new roof of your wizard tower... They are not to be messed with. They also might have some nifty skills that give them +1 on each of their dice rolled (before multiplication).
Mundane Magic: This is again the Minute-Made Magic. You can buy Mundane Spells Slots as Skills to your Clichés. For noting the available slots the [] mark can be used. For example Necromancer(5) [] [] [] has 3 mundane spell slots. Mundane spells can "doing anything that can be done without magic; lighting a fire (though without matches), opening a door (without touching it), or reading a book (no long nights under candlelight))". The spells performed has to be appropriate to the Cliché. You can also use them to decrease a Cliché of your opponent by as many as the number of spell slots you used. Spell slots get used up when a spell is performed, but they regenerate when the Cliché does. When a Cliché is purchased double pumpable, you don't have to buy spell slots, it will always have as many as the max number of dice of the Cliché. So it makes sense to buy Necromancer[1] because it comes with a mundane spell slot.
No magic inside water. Creatures that need magic for life support (for example demons) can not exist inside large bodies of water, and spells can not be performed under water.
Industrial Magic: there is a strong industrial magic performed by priests and monks to increase the productivity of the society. This could bring wealth to everyone if there were no other forces in play and natural greed would go out of fashion.
Level ups: you level up when your GM says so. At this point you can add +1 to a Cliché or alternatively buy a spell slot to a Cliché. The number of spell slots never exceeds the max score of that Cliché.
Genre:Fantasy, World: Magical Mystery Medieval Settings
The world of this setting is made by disgruntled minor gods who wanted to have their way for once without the influential big players of the pantheon. The entire world is made cheap. When miners find gold for example it will be a slab of gold, because the minor gods had no power, experience, patience and aesthetic sense to do real mines, they created everything in shape of bricks, put it together, and punished it with heavy storms for a hundred year, so it would look like a real world at least on the surface. However if you dig in, it is bade of enormous slabs. The largest caverns are to this day between the slabs, because the gods didn't even have the decency to fit them properly.
Geography: 80% of the surface is rugged mountain covered by forests. The water of the rivers collect into large lakes, and the water from their bottom is recycled in a rather ruthless but efficient manner to the springs of the rivers.
The gods went into efforts to prepare nice places for residential areas, where cities will can be built. They are usually on elevated grounds on the shores of major lakes (think on the scales of Lake Huron), with agriculturally profitable plains arranged strategically around the area. It is easy to find these highlands, for they are holy ground. This is because minor gods have not enough power to defend their world from daemons. They needed a way to close them out from at least the major cities.
The Kingdoms: The gods' residence is in the elements of the world. Some of the elements are none-traditional, for example Richard Rothschild, the god of banking lives in the element "money". The Gods live everywhere, but they have favorite cities, and they usually go into no end of troubles to make their favorite the center of a glorious kingdom. Since they are not very ken on fighting each other, these kingdoms are separated by vast wilderness. This is mostly forest covered mountains with various level of hostile creatures and rogue tribes in them. All the intelligent life forms was brought in by the gods from other plains of existence. Some of them had enough of the rule of minor gods, or they were seduced by daemons and went rogue, they set up their own cities in the mountains, or live in barbaric tribes in the wilderness.
The areas controlled by the kingdoms have strong central power. This power is centered on the holy court of the king. The King's court is also the center of culture and academic knowledge. The king never leaves his palace, he governs the country by appointing warlords, he is not supposed to deal directly with anyone who is not a warlord himself or member of his court. The warlords rule their domain by appointing knights to perform various duties. The warlords are usually busy repelling invasions of various rogue nations, raids by demon summoned monsters, and rogue clans. The basic edict governing most kingdoms look a lot like Buke Shohatto, and the king has the means to enforce them:
Every knight should devote itself to pursuits appropriate to the warrior aristocracy, such as archery, swordsmanship, horsemanship, and classical literature.
Amusements and entertainments are to be kept within reasonable bounds and expenses for such activities are not to be excessive outside of the capital.
The domains are not to harbor fugitives and outlaws.
Domains must expel rebels and murderers from their service and from their lands.
The Warlords are not to engage in social interactions with the people (neither knights nor commoners) of other domains.
Castles may be repaired, but such activity must be reported to the king. Structural innovations and expansions are forbidden.
The formation of cliques for scheming or conspiracy in neighboring domains must be reported to the king without delay, as must the expansion of defenses, fortifications, or military forces.
Marriages among a warlord and related persons of power or importance must not be arranged privately.
Warlords must present themselves at the capitalfor service to the kingdom on short notice.
Conventions regarding formal uniform must be followed.
Commoners are not to ride in magically enhanced or man powered vehicles such as palanquins.
Knights throughout the realm are to practice frugality.
Warlords must select men of ability to serve as administrators and bureaucrats.
A king usually has at least 3 warlords appointed to do special tasks. One to operate the secret police, which is an internal spy organization dedicated to ferret out untrustworthy warlords, rebells,and demonic activities. One to hand out edicts asking Warlords to commit suicideand helping them in this act. This is an important task, often the only way to preserve a family's honor when the secret police uncovers illegal activities. And the last one to operate king's own assassin organization to deal secretly with anyone who is not a warlord himself.
Agriculture: this is an important part of all medieval societies. Because of the priestly blessings and magic devices, one farmer can produce enough food to support about 100 men. A farmstead produces about 10 times this much, of course this needs a rather large area. Therefore villages are scarce, the farmsteads are not on holy ground and do not have the means to defend themselves for a longer period of time. therefore the constant vigilance of the knights of the kingdoms are of utmost importance. The biggest danger to any farmer is not the failure of the crops, that hardly ever happens. Raiding parties from the wilderness are to be feared, for they not only take what they need, they often kill and put to the torch what they can not take.
The agriculturally profitable areas are priced lands for the warlords. They are constantly scheming against each other to acquire most of these areas.
Fishing villages are absolutely controlled by the capital. The magically enhanced fisheries produce enough fish to make it the staple dish of the average kingdom, this is several tons of fish every year.
For cultivation about 10-20% of the kingdom is suitable. The main agricultural product is cabbage, rice or potato, depending on the climate. Livestock raising is a minor activity. Demand for meat drives the prices relatively high. (100gold for a meal when a knight's income is about 5000 gold in a month.)Milk cows are numerous, about 25% of farmers run diaries.
The Wilderness: The wilderness is hostile to civilized visitors. There are undead, demon spawn, orcs, goblins, were tribes, demon worshiping cults, old destroyed cities, hiding criminals, refugees from law or the gods themselves. Still there are 2 important things in the wilderness that are important to civilization: caravan routes and magic resources.
The wilderness is practically impenetrable because of the dense shrubbery. There is the caravan road system through it and a web of minor roads and trails through it, however it is very difficult to get off road, into the wilderness. The dense edge of the forest around the roads defends as much thepassengerson the road as it is an obstacle. It is impenetrable both ways. You can threat all the path as dungeon corridors, except for the light filtering through the canopy during daytime. The shrubbery feeds on the magic of the roads, it can not penetrate the road, but tries to get as close as possible, so it regenerates incredibly fast, it is thorny, there is no way to see through it, and far the easiest way to get to the other side is teleportation. Of course teleporting into the forest means that you might have to face dire horrors.
The caravan routes are built and maintained by spells. These means produced the 8 yard wide solid surfaced strips connecting cities. There are inns on the side of the roads. The forests of the wilderness surrounds these roads with dense scrubs, creating a wall of thorny shrubs at the edge of the forests. These roads have far less military support than what they need, so all the caravans are well equipped with guards and scouts.
The magical resources are mostly rare plants and other spell components that do not tolerate the pollution of industrial magic created by the churches and monasteries. Therefor prospectors are in constant need to find and exploit these resources in a timely manner.
Of course both caravans and prospectors have a much more difficult job than what it looks like at first glance. Unfortunately they mostly fail without much of a noise, the rare success is well advertised with celebrations. So what you see is not what you get if you try your luck in these professions.
There are even cities in the wilderness. Of course the gods try to extend their influence on them, but mostly it is impossible to completely break the links to demonic influence. Most of these cities are connected by caravan routes. They are often the main suppliersof heavy industrial products or narcotics in the surrounding area.
Adventurers: Field operatives of knight orders, and their retainers are often called adventurers. Their task usually includes several common knightly duties. First and foremost to complete tasks for their warlord in his scheming against other warlords.
To maintain oder.
To go and fix issues on the caravan routes. This can be the assassination of a leader of a group of bandits, the rebuilding of a collapsed bridge, there-installationof the magic maintenance device of a broken part of the route, to rescue a kidnapped princess from a marauder camp in the wilderness, perform a hit on a cultist group in the wilderness or anyone else disturbing the peace on the caravan routes. This often involves the application of construction skills, mapping, scouting, installing and maybe fixing magic devices.
To go and fix issues and investigate crimes in the inns on the caravan routes.
To rescue prospectors from the wilderness. Prospectors can get lost, they can get kidnapped, killed, or detained for ransom. Knights and his trusted group of adventurers are expected to provide a solution.
Since the gods of this plain are happy to have any help, they are willing to turn a blind eye on the deeds of their trusted servants. If you check out the Sewer Rats Campaign settings for 3.d DnD, what it says about the paladins, applies here too: A knight "is expected to kill evil things without much thought. Morals are applied with the sharp end of a sword. Kill evil. Loot the bodies. Share treasure equally. That's lawful good. By definition, it is both legal and good to kill those who resist arrest, fight you, or are the target of your mission. If you are expected to bring back prisoners, your orders will say so. Otherwise, you are expected to kill your opponents and finish off the wounded."
Field operatives often dislike the law and order of the central areas of a kingdom. These knights often set up their permanent residence in an inn close to their warlord's headquarters.
Tone: Heroic Slapstick
Adventures
AdventureSnippets
Module ideas
Campaign chain
Monsters