19 February 2010
Today’s Tabbloid
PERSONAL NEWS FOR riorio2@rogue-games.net
ROGUE FEED
REVIEW: Hackmaster Basic
FEB 18, 2010 02:29P.M.
When you hire legendary gaming artist Erol Otus to do the cover for a
new RPG rulebook with the word “basic” in its title, it seems pretty clear
to me that a big part of your sales pitch is nostalgia. For gamers of a
certain age, the 1981 Basic Rulebook for Dungeons & Dragons will always
be the definitive version of the game, the one that not only initiated them
into the hobby but also shaped their notions of what an introductory
roleplaying game should be. Given that, I expected Kenzer & Company’s
HackMaster Basic to draw heavily on D&D Basic for inspiration. Other
than its title and its cover illustration, that’s not the case. Whether one
views this as a good thing or a bad thing depends, I imagine, on one’s
feelings about what constitutes a “basic” RPG, a topic to which I’ll return
throughout this review.
Let’s talk briefly about the physical appearance of the book itself. At 198
pages, HackMaster Basic is a large book, its two-column text being dense
and chart-heavy. The text reads well, lacking the grating “gamer macho”
tone of HackMaster 4th Edition, but still possessing a unique — and
occasionally still grating — voice of its own. That said, Basic isn’t generic;
it’s very clearly its own game, with its own style, and, while that style
isn’t my cup of tea, I nevertheless appreciate a game that knows what it’s
about and makes no bones about it. The book is well illustrated
throughout, with art ranging from the cartoony to the realistic. A number
of pieces explicitly recall classic images from early editions of D&D, once
again playing the nostalgia card. All in all, Basic is a well put together
book that’s easy to read and, thanks to an index, easy to navigate.
The book begins with 6 pages of “quick start rules,” which, despite the
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name, focus more on quickly generating a character rather than teaching
you how to play the game. Because of their brevity, characters generated
according to the quick start rules lack many elements of the full
character generation system, such as racial ability adjustments and the
like. The full character generation chapter takes up 13 pages and that’s
not including specific treatments of important character-related topics,
such as honor, quirks & flaws, skills, talents, and proficiencies, not to
mention the descriptions of the game’s four character classes, which
alone require more page count than the character generation chapter
itself.
I mention this not to damn HackMaster Basic, which, as you’ll see, I
think is a very well designed RPG, but to point out that it’s “basic” only in
the sense that it’s less complex than the forthcoming Advanced
HackMaster. It’s certainly not basic compared to any edition of D&D,
including AD&D First Edition, whose Players Handbook included three
times as many class descriptions in fewer pages than HackMaster Basic
manages. To put it inelegantly, this nearly 200-page book provides the
rules for “Basic Advanced HackMaster” — a cut-down version of what is
sure to be lengthy and complex set of fantasy RPG rules.
HackMaster Basic characters have seven ability scores: the six traditional
D&D ones plus Looks. Race options are the classic four: human, elf,
dwarf, and halfling. Class options are likewise the classic four: fighter,
thief, mage, and cleric. Alignment is the ninefold style of AD&D and its
descendants. Basic makes regular — some might say too much — use of
random rolls in character generation. In this respect, its old school
heritage is clear. However, randomness can be mitigated through the use
of “Building Points” (or BPs), usually used to purchase skills and other
secondary abilities. For example, spending BPs allows a player to
rearrange or swap randomly-determined ability scores, while keeping
them as rolled earns one additional BPs. Likewise, while each race can
take any class, choosing a class “against type” — a halfling mage, say —
costs more BPs than choosing a class more in keeping with the race’s
archetype. This is an interesting design choice that I think goes part of
the way toward addressing the usual whines about old school
randomness without reducing HackMaster Basic to yet another bland
point-buy system. At the same time, keeping track of Building Points can
be somewhat tedious and I can’t help but wonder if the character
customization they offer is more than offset by the bookkeeping they
necessitate.
And bookkeeping seems an integral part of HackMaster. There are many
stats, derived scores, and calculations involved in not only creating a
character but also leveling him up. A quick look at the downloadable
character sheet makes the point better than I ever could. Ability scores
not only include multiple columns of modifiers associated with them, but
each ability also has a fractional score as well, such as Strength 15/45 or
Today’s Tabbloid PERSONAL NEWS FOR riorio2@rogue-games.net
Wisdom 13/98, which shows how close they are to increasing that ability
to the next whole number, much like Cavaliers in Unearthed Arcana.
Characters also have an Honor score that goes up or down based on a
player’s adherence to his character’s class, alignment, and so on. Some
will no doubt find the concept of Honor a heavy-handed way to enforce
“proper” roleplaying and so it is. For myself, its looseness reminds me
uncomfortably of 2e’s XP awards system.
As I noted earlier, HackMaster Basic includes not only quirks and flaws
(minor advantages and disadvantages), but also skills, talents, and
proficiencies, each of which is subtly different in concept and mechanics.
Skills are much as you’d expect, while talents are similar to what D&D III
called “feats.” Proficiencies mostly pertain to weapons and armor use.
Taken together, it’s all a bit much for my tastes, but, like the random
detailed character backgrounds (height, weight, handedness, family ties,
etc.), these things do add a kind of goofy depth that I associate with the
Silver Age of D&D. Indeed, HackMaster Basic feels very much like a
product of that era and I suspect one’s opinion of it will depend greatly
on how much one liked late 1e.
Character classes are fairly straightforward, each with its own feel and
mechanics. I appreciate the lack of homogenization here, with the fighter
being the simple hit-stuff-until-it-dies class suitable for newbies, while
mages require more cleverness and skill to play effectively. Arcane magic
is somewhat different than in D&D, with spells costing Spell Points (SPs)
to cast. Spells can still be memorized and doing so halves their cost in
SPs. Clerics, on the other hand, differ much less from their D&D
inspirations, although Basic presents several generic religions — The
True, The Caregiver, The Overlord, etc. — that dictate what spells,
weapons, and special abilities a cleric can wield.
All classes are much beefier than their D&D counterparts, starting with
hit points equal to their Constitution + Hit Dice. New Hit Dice are gained
every other level, with “dead” levels granting a re-roll of current hit
points in order to improve the score. Again, I’m of multiple minds about
this, but, ultimately, I find it mildly baffling that game like HackMaster,
which claims to be “hard hitting old-school gaming” should care much
about the supposed fragility of low-level characters. (In fairness, I should
add that dice “penetrate” in HackMaster, which means you get to re-roll
and add if your first roll is a maximum result. This process is open-
ended, so it is possible to kill even the toughest character with a single
stab from a dagger, even though it’s extraordinarily unlikely)
HackMaster Basic‘s claims to basic-ness is sorely tested in its combat
rules, which is lengthy and complex, with lots of sub-rules, special cases,
and exceptions. Granted, many of these could, as in D&D be safely
ignored, but I have to wonder why an introductory game includes them
at all. Wouldn’t things like knockbacks and trauma, to cite but two
examples, have been better saved for Advanced HackMaster? I ask,
because the underlying combat system, consisting of opposed rolls
between an attacker and a defender, is simple and reasonably intuitive
(though the same cannot be said for its initiative system, which
reminded me unhappily of Champions, though that’s probably unfair).
The game does include a helpful 9-page, text-heavy Knights of the
Dinner Table comic strip to show how combat works. Again, pictures
2
19 February 2010
speak louder than words.
Rounding out the book are chapters on dice and the “proper” use of them
in the game (11 pages in length), monsters, treasure, and a cursory (2
pages) presentation of the “canons” of conduct for a Game Master, such
as “The GM is Always Right” and “Let the Dice Fall Where They May.”
It’s difficult to tell whether these canons are meant seriously or as a joke,
but, like most things associated with HackMaster, it’s probably not an
either/or proposition. The monster section is solid and includes a good
stable of creatures to use, while the treasure section is a bit spottier,
which I suppose is to be expected given HackMaster Basic‘s focus on
levels 1-5. The rules heavily imply a “proper” amount of treasure and
magic items based on a chart that reminds me of D&D III‘s encounter
levels — indeed, the term “encounter levels” is explicitly used — so that’s
worrisome but easily dispensed with if one is so inclined. Unless I missed
something, XP is gained solely through defeating opponents.
And that, in a nutshell, is HackMaster Basic. It’s difficult to do full justice
to this game in my review, however lengthy and detailed I made it and I
have certainly overlooked and maybe even misrepresented some aspects
of its contents. That, to me, is its great glory and its great
disappointment. Its glory is that this a game you can really sink your
teeth into; it’s not an airy, calorie-free indie game but a super-sized
bacon cheeseburger of the old school variety. Its disappointment is that
it’s neither a good introductory RPG in its own right nor even a
particularly good introduction to HackMaster for those not already well
versed in its idiosyncratic ways. The game is needlessly complex and
arcane for anything calling itself “basic” and I think that’s a pity, because
I can see how one could really enjoy a game like this. As I said, it’s meaty
and flavorful and probably one of the more cleverly done D&D pastiches
in a hobby filled with them.
I doubt I’d ever play, let alone run, a HackMaster Basic campaign; it’s, as
I said early, “too much” for me. Still, in the midst of an old school
renaissance that’s made “rules light” (or whatever other phrase we’re
using these days to describe do-it-yourself gaming) a singular virtue,
HackMaster defiantly hoists the flag for the days when calculating the
bone density of giants and arguing over terminal velocity in order to get
your falling damage article published in Dragon was the cool thing to do.
That it does this without pretension or self-seriousness and without
descending into parody is a pretty remarkable thing. Again, it’s not for
me, but then I’ve already got plenty of games that are. For old schoolers
who prefer their fantasy a bit more “buff,” though, HackMaster Basic
may be just what they’re looking for.
Presentation: 7 out of 10
Creativity: 8 out of 10
Utility: 6 out of 10
Get This If: You’re looking for an alternative to the “light” old school
RPGs out there these days.
Don’t Get This If: You don’t like random chargen, derived statistics,
complex combat systems, and fantasy that doesn’t take itself too
seriously.
Today’s Tabbloid PERSONAL NEWS FOR riorio2@rogue-games.net 19 February 2010

They found evidence of molds, fungi, and lichens running riot

ROGUE FEED
Dwimmermount, Session 31
FEB 18, 2010 09:29A.M.
Last weekend’s session of the Dwimmermount campaign was a good,
solid one, even if it felt a little underwhelming compared to the previous
week’s revelations. Brother Candor decided to forgo the question of how
to deal with Xaranes’ request to him, waiting until he’d had more time to
think about the matter. Furthermore, he felt that the party should
explore more of Dwimmermount itself before making a decision. So, they
returned to Muntburg, connected with Iriadessa and the hirelings and
henchmen, and re-supplied themselves before heading back into the
dungeon.
One of the terrific things about the detailed maps Dordagdonar keeps of
Dwimmermount is that the characters know very well what avenues of
exploration they have no yet taken up. Though the sub-levels associated
with the Temple of the Iron God had been fully explored, there were
many other areas the PCs had not yet entered. One such area was
reachable by a set of stairs the characters had avoided earlier in the belief
that it led to a level of the dungeon too difficult for them to handle at that
time. Now, months — and experience levels — later, they felt better
equipped to handle what dangers might lie ahead and descended into the
depths.
According to Dordagdonar’s maps, this new level was beneath the azoth
processing machine they’d encountered some time earlier. Sure enough,
the first room they entered included an elaborate mechanism that
seemed to be an azoth “pump” of some sort. The pump was connected to
a series of metallic tubes that ran along the ceilings of all the chambers
and corridors of this level. These tubes had crystalline tops, allowing the
characters to see inside of them and, from the looks of it, they once —
and recently — contained azoth, as there was obvious residue of the
magical liquid in the tubes (and in the pump itself). Every so often,
typically in corridor junctions and large rooms, the tubes were fitted with
devices that looked as if they were intended to “mist” azoth into these
areas, like water sprinklers but with much finer nozzles.
throughout the place — all in unnatural colors and shapes but seemingly
harmless. They also came across dead or dying “mutant” plants,
including mushroom people, who attacked them with great ferocity
under the leadership of a strange tree-like being, who escaped the PCs’
onslaught. These creatures gave some evidence to support the notion
that someone, whether in the past or the present, had been using azoth
in order to warp the development of plants in unwholesome ways.
Needless to say, this concerned the PCs, who had long been wondering to
what end the azoth still being processed in Dwimmermount was being
put.
The session concluded as the party entered what seemed to be the room
of some sort of magical supervisor of the azoth experiments, judging by
its contents. They were attacked by an animated statue of Turms
Termax, which acted as the room’s guardian and which they dispatched
comparatively easily. Grabbing the contents of the room, they PCs
decided to return to Muntburg and then possibly to Adamas in order to
decide what to do next.
ROGUE FEED
Vargold: The Wolf-Time
FEB 18, 2010 09:13A.M.
An old Internet acquaintance of mine, Rob Barrett, has started up “a blog
for barbaric gaming” dedicated to his just-started Barbarians of Lemuria
campaign and related thoughts. Barbarians of Lemuria is an RPG I’ve
had my eye on for a while, but I’ve never gotten round to looking at it
closely. Perhaps Rob’s new venture will give me reason to do so.

Seeing that the pump and these devices were no longer functional,
Brother Candor surmised that the Thulian vampire Cyrus may have been
involved. He’d learned earlier that Cyrus had returned to
Dwimmermount in order to effect some sort of revenge against the cult
of Turms Termax responsible for his state of undeath. He also learned
that Dusty and the other cats inhabiting the dungeon had seen the
vampire heading down into lower levels, although for what purpose they
did not know. Originally, the PCs thought he might have been heading
into the azoth-filled caverns they never explored, but now there was
evidence that he might have headed into this level instead (or in addition
to).

The small section of the level the party explored was very odd, feeling
slightly warmer and more humid than they expected given its depth.