John Harper's Games - Free, Open and Beautiful

[Sanglorian]

John Harper (of fame) has written three short pdfs that are self-contained role-playing games. You can check out Mustang, Lady Blackbird and Ghost/Echo .

What I like about these games is that they seem to represent the same attitude towards design that we see on 1km1kt:
* They're short. Two are two pages long (with artwork) and John has set himself a limit that Lady Blackbird will not go over 12 pages.
* They build on design that has come before. Lady Blackbird has scavenged elements from lots of different indie games.
* They have indie design sensibilities. In Mustang, the course of play is entirely mapped out. The role-playing fills the gaps between the rules. Ghost/Echo is a game you have to figure out for yourself.
* They're open. Others can build on them and make their own free games.
* They are beautiful. Even though John is giving something away for free, they're polished, pretty and really set the mood of the game. I'm often pleasantly surprised by how nice people make a free product - even one done in 24 hours.

What would you say are the 1km1kt attitudes to design? What free gems have you stumbled across?

[Rob Lang]

Yes they all. Free, Open and Beautiful and when I get through reviewing all the 24 hour games I really want to review then they're on my list.

[kumakami]

Hey Rob you think we need to start a Links page for other free game that have there own site? I think its still in keeping with the 1kM1kT spirit. We host the game with no home...but HERE are the one's with one!

[Rob Lang]

Good idea Kuma. I have the Free RPG Directory, we might integrate that into the next 1km1kt version. It's not really 'my' directory because I'm cribbing from John Kim's and 1km1kt.

[kumakami]

good to hear.....more support the better I say

[SheikhJahbooty]

Forget Mustang, Lady Blackbird and Ghost/Echo. Ghost/echo looks like a stripped-down universal version of Vince Baker's Otherkind with a setting and scenario concept and some slick artwork tacked on. Otherkind has a great dice mechanic, and I've tinkered with it myself. I'm not sure if you can still download it from September Question (if that's what Vince's site is still called).

The game you really should be paying attention to is the Alpha Playtest of Danger Patrol. I would love to play in a 1950s style sci-fi action adventure game, especially if we veered off into parody occasionally, and veered off into bone chilling horror occasionally. From my first rough read through of the rules it has enough fiddly bits to be really fun.

[Sanglorian]

[SheikhJahbooty]

The main set of fiddly bits that excites me is the threats.

The character sheets are cool too. (Basically, if you are playing in a one off or you need to start playing right-the-hell-now, then you can make a character by putting a style card next to a roll card and putting some dice on it. Even though these cards are half sized sheets of paper, I consider them fiddly bits because if you only print up one of each, then you are guaranteed niche protection. The robot will be the only robot in the party. The mystic will be the only mystic in the party. As long as you are playing with 6 or less players you never have to worry about niche protection at all.) Incidentally, for longer campaigns, he does also include a full character sheet, so you don't have to worry about the two parts of your character sheet getting separated.

I know John wasn't the first one to use this idea. Capes uses it too. But it's just so much more useful in this game. Capes is such a simple game that I almost wondered why they had fit together character sheets.

But I really dig the threats. Here's how it shakes down.

The GM has a stack of index cards, a scissors, and a pen or marker in front of him. He brain storms for a moment and gives the players an "interlude" or a "recap". These are scenes that the players can narrate pretty much with a blank check, except they can't drag on so as to be boring and whatever they mention might end up on one of the GMs index cards. Vehicles and locations get whole index cards. Threats get half index cards, PCs and important friendlies, bystanders, etc. get quarter index cards. Index cards can also include whatever the GM brainstormed on his own as the players were doing their scenes.

Then the GM changes the interludes into action scenes, or he simply frames an action scene and lays out the threats for the PCs to face.

The fun things about this is that you can time the threats, I.e. if the villain starts a procedure to awaken his monster, simply throw the monster on the table with one or more time counters on it, like a magic card with a time counter on it. If the PCs all get a turn, and some active threats remain, remove one time counter from each timed threat.

Or you can stage the threats which is also fun. Make the PCs fight the minions before they get to fight the big boss.

You can stage threats but only for one PC. The PCs are fighting the spider king, but Sindi Jones, two fisted daredevil archeologist is afraid of spiders. Throw down a threat that is named "Sindi's fear of spiders", and she has to face this threat before she can help her friends face the spider king.

You can frame an action scene with only two characters, but drag other characters into the scene, or expand the scene to include other characters with their own threats. The captain is alone in his bedroom with a conwoman who is pretending to be his wife. The preacher's player rolls to help the captain, saying, "Remember what I told you about a special hell." The captain rolls and gets 3 danger dice (dice that come up 3 or less), so the GM can introduce a new threat. By the way, on her way over to the captain's cabin, she sabotaged the life support in the preacher's bedroom, so his quarters fill up with smoke. Write that on a half index card and throw it down. New threat.

The GM doesn't actually roll any dice. His main job is filling out those index cards. He doesn't even have to make up the story or mystery or whatever. The players make that up with their recaps and interludes. The GM just fills out index cards and throws down. Oh, he also has to decide how to spend the dice that come up 3 or less, which PC to hurt, what a new threat might be, which threats to escalate, etc. Escalated threats get extra d6s on them, so when you finally face them they could really hurt you, but they also would tend to go away instantly.

Threats don't have hit points. The GM has a vague idea of how much successes it takes to make a threat go away, (about 3, roughly 12, whatever) but if a threat turns out to be boring, then it only takes one more success, and you never have to look at it or talk about it again.

Aside from the style cards and role cards which I would have to print out, I have everything needed to play this game sitting on my desk right now (actually my printer is also on my desk), a couple of bowls that I use when playing go, a little jar containing 2 or every polyhedral and roughly 40 (mostly copper-colored) 12mm d6s, a small penny jar, a pen and a stack of index cards. The only difficulty I would have is in the d8s that one needs for cool power stunts or when helping, and that would probably be more appropriate to roll before one rolls one's own dice anyway. So if you used three of your successes to give Sindi Jones three extra d8s, I'd hand you a d8 and ask you to roll it 3 times first to see if you really helped or hindered. They all come up 3 or less, so I can introduce a new threat, so I say, "Your words of encouragement only serve to startle the terrified archeologist, so she knocks over a torch that falls on a spider silk drapery," and I throw down the threat, Flaming Tapestries. Or if you are using a d8 stat, getting two bonus dice from your awesome custom vehicle (a d10 & d8), and you made up a cool power stunt (another d8), I might make you roll for the power stunt first, because I only have 2 d8s in my little jar and it might be cool if we know whether your attempted robot-vehicular interface made the stunt more successful or more dangerous.

The helping rule is way in the back, in the Other Stuff section, but I could see it becoming an important element of the game. It isn't really useful if all the threats can be faced by all the PCs, but it still might be narratively appropriate. The only slight chance I could see it being abused would be if a fight is almost over, all the PCs could help one PC get a whole mass of dice so he could crank his danger counter up to max and defeat the last villain in the same roll, thus safely earning a new power (earning a new power would usually be very dangerous). This shouldn't see too much abuse because you would kind of have to beg all the other players at the table for an advancement and get their buy in to advance safely, and it still might not work since most d8 rolls do not come up 3 or less.

Oh, one thing that isn't mentioned in the game, but that I would use is Un-face-able threats. Like if the PCs are on Earth, facing mutant beastmen, the offspring of unfortunate survivors stranded on Earth after the Atomic War, I might throw down a threat called Ambient Radiation, and mark it un-face-able. The PCs can not face this threat. Every round it simply puts an extra danger die on a beastman or it fills up a PC's lowest box of injury from burns and sickness.

[Sanglorian]

[SheikhJahbooty]

It's a little more post modern than that.

Danger Patrol doesn't simulate Gernsback pulp sci-fi adventure. It simulates modern things that harken back to that era in fiction. The telling thing is that you can play a heroic robot. Of the top of my head, I can think of no examples in old sci-fi of heroic robots. But the modern comic, Atomic Robo sure has a 1930-1950s style atomic robot that is a hero. You'll notice there is no excuse for racism or sexism, but plenty of excuse for lifting plots strait out of cyberpunk books or films.