Steelie Robot PC Name Generation

Steelies, a race of military robots, have unusual names due to their manufacture and programming. Their original creators purposely gave Steelies hard, aggressive names, appended with a nine-digit  File Designator. And, due to their programming, Steelies insist on using their rank or “level title,” aside for the most informal and off-duty moments.

Generate a Steelie’s name by rolling a d6 and a d20 and consulting the below table. Generate a 9-digit number, in a format such as 537-961-023 or 646-498-834, for the File Designator. Files Designators are used to differentiate between Steelies with the same rank and name, and in most situations Steelies use only the first three digits of their File Designator, “Brigadier Plutonium 154” for example, reserving the usage of the fill nine-number File Designator for official and formal usage, such as ceremonies and paperwork. No two Steelies share the same File Designator

Examples:
1st-level - Trooper Slam 163-693-423, “Slam 163” to his squad buddies.
4th-level - Captain Machine 521-756-154
5th-level - Lieutenant Hunter 172-221-666
8th-level - Brigadier Plutonium 154-957-232

d6 -

1-3 - d20

1 Bash

2 Blade

3 Blast

4 Blaze

5 Bolt

6 Bomb

7 Boulder

8 Breaker

9 Bronze

10 Bullet

11 Buster

12 Brick

13 Chopper

14 Cracker

15 Crash

16 Crunch

17 Engine

18 Gear

19 Granite

20 Gravel

4-6 - d20

1 Grind

2 Gun

3 Hunter

4 Killer

5 Mace

6 Machine

7 Nail

8 Nuke

9 Plutonium

10 Radium

11 Rock

12 Slag

13 Slam

14 Slate

15 Spike

16 Steel

17 Stone

18 Titanium

19 Tread

20 Uranium

No Clerics!

I'm a jerk DM. I run a dangerous, freeform sandbox campaign with the potential for all sorts of injurious events, and I've explicitly disallowed Clerics as a PC option for reasons of genre emulation (despite the Bene Gesserit, Severian, etc.).

I created the Sage and Mind Wizard classes as a genre-appropriate replacement, but althoughs they have access to the cleric's suite of poison and disease cures and the like, they do not have access to cure light wounds and the other hit point refilling spells. Undead aren't that common in my game, so the loss of Turn Undead hasn't really affected things.

I'm not a total jerk, so I instituted the common First Aid houserule (apply first aid immediately after a battle/injury to restore 1d4 hp), as well as a generous hit point recovery rate of 1d3 points per day (I'm quite fond of random healing rates...it certainly emulates the uncertain nature of recovering from injuries in adventure fiction, "After several days Wilson hadn't regained consciousness so we had the bearers build a litter so that they could carry him as we continued our journey," "..despite his grievous injuries Rok-Mhor was his usual lusty self after a few days rest...")

The end result is that while on an expedition the party often has to shack up in a defensible campsite for several days so injured party members can get back on their feet, in both the literal and figurative meaning, often having of fend of random encounters in the process.

A band of treasure hunters, holed up in a swarming jungle, fending off hostile natives and voracious wildlife, hoping desperately that the injured members of their party recover before they run out of supplies or are overwhelmed so that they can escape this green hell...

The no clerics rule has been working out pretty well as far as I'm concerned!

ALSO: I've been having problems with both my computer and my mobile device, and consequently have been neglecting keeping up with my emails and the comments, please bear with me as I get caught up :)

Player Characters - I find Survivors More Engaging Than Badasses

Superman is boring. He's too powerful, he may be a great symbol and I think it's a great concept but I just don't find superman engaging. Aside from convoluted corner cases he can accomplish almost anything sans risk.

I don't find Jedi engaging either. I'm not into superheros. My Conan is the vulnerable, human, literary one. I prefer the Ash of the first Evil Dead movie. I think Aliens kinda sucks compared to the Lovecraftian terror of Alien. I don't like it when a video or computer game is too easy, I prefer desperately conserving my ammunition while crawling behind cover a half mile away from the vastly superior enemy.

The Road Warrior. Indiana Jones. Snake Pliskin. James T. Kirk. Fors the "Star Mans Son." Hiero. Dirty Harry. Ripley. "Blondie" and "Tuco the Rat." These are the heroes I find engaging. They may have been high level characters, some even bad-asses, but they were human characters that often failed, often got hurt, and pretty much got to high level by using good tactics and consistently making the important saving throws. They were no Batman, Wolverine, Lobo, Lone Wolf or Rambo. They weren't perfect.

Perfection is boring in large doses.

I grew up on a steady diet of science fiction with plenty of adventure fiction. Most of this stuff was from the public and school libraries and generally it was old. They had a distinct smell. In many cases the artwork was almost alien in it's difference from the modern art I was used to. In most cases the protagonists of said fiction were "ordinary" people. Sure they may have been genius scientists or tough soldiers, but they were human, and they were frail in the way real people are. They could twist an ankle or break an arm. They plans could fail, catastrophically even. They often got lost deep in hostile wilderness without full kit. They got sick. They didn't want to get into a gunfight or even a two-on-one. They got beat up or overpowered and if they got shot they usually woke up in a hospital or tied to a chair in a basement.

That's what adventure meant to me as I grew up. That what I want when I play D&D.

A Question About Your Preferences and Gaming Goodness Courtesy of B. Portly

At some point in the new year I'm planning on publishing Planet Algol material in booklet form. It will include the setting information; the player information (classes, races, houserules, etc.); and the referee information such as hexmaps, encounters & locations, monsters, treasures, and so forth. They will be digest sized and will have information from this blog and the referees resources blog, but edited, revised and expanded, as well as entirely new content.

If you are interested in such a publication or similar products, would you prefer that it be contained in one single volume or split into two booklets, one with the players' information and one with the referees' information?

As well, Planet Algol campaign participant & artiste Lester/B. Portly provides us with am optimized version of the purple Unofficial Planet Algol Character Sheet available here. Still no smoking brazier I'm afraid...

Lester also made the below table. Originally a result of 8 was "girl-child," I changed it to child on account of all Earth boys romping about in Narnia. Maybe I should have a random encounter with a small group of dejected early 20th-century british children on my tables...

Earth Man Explorer Table (d8)
1 - Astronaut - Could be from any time and flung through space and time.
2 - Sailor or Pilot - Whether shipwrecked or plane crashed, they find themselves on Planet Algol.
3 - Pioneer - Traveler in the new world. Includes Vikings, Mountain Men, Conquistadors, Voyageurs, etc.
4 - Soldier - Could be cavalry officer transported from earth or a trench fighter that wanders into mustard gas.
5 - Professor - Time travelers or those those that study altered states of consciousness.
6 - Occultist - Those that dabble in ancient esoteric ritual or eldritch rites.
7 - Dreamer - Men who's imagination is so prodigious, the may enter different realms.
8 - Child - Characters like Alice or Dorothy transported, from pastoral settings to a bizarre world.

Emergent Character Backstory...

Although I caution my players from investing too much effort into the back story of a 1st level character who could easily get incinerated by the radioactive eye-beams of a mutant cyborg random encounter, I do enjoy it when a back story emerges. Which coincidentally enough, usually happens sometime after the character achieves 2nd level.

One of the players in my Planet Algol campaign has a character, Nigel Nightbreaker, a British Fighting-man who, due to my ability score requirements for weapons house rules, uses a halberd in melee. He is also upset that he can't find ale or beer anywhere.

However, while talking after a session, we decided that on account of him being a polearm wielding Englishman that he was most likely a Beefeater who had been guarding British archaeological treasures in the Tower of London. One eve while investigating a strange glow emanating from a bizarre artifact he was transported to Planet Algol 210? A.D.

Musings on Character Definition and Editions

Now that I'm DMing AD&D instead of the two most recent incarnations of the brand, I'm reveling in the simpler ruleset (yes, I know...). With the simpler character generation the players are able to churn out new characters in minutes. Memorable characters. Without feats, skills or build options. I've been handwaving languages ever since I erased the whiteboard. I don't even use weapon specialization...

And the characters have been distinctive and memorable, even the ones in the heap of dead 1st-levelers. Somehow the stench of their rotting corpses hasn't dissuaded my pool of players.

I'm not a proponent of capital-R Roleplaying, the game comes first. But the characters have personality and an engaging story sometime emerges. This may very well be due to the fact that the players in my game are well versed in the source literature, enthusiastic about the genres and themes I'm exploring in the game, tolerant of my radical traditionalist exploration of Dungeons & Dragons, creative and enthusiastic people, and quite coincidentally great roleplayers. And I don't prioritize roleplaying at all, aside from NPCs speaking in funny voices and acting like characters in Curb Your Enthusiasm or an Oscar Wilde play. I am truly lucky to have such a great band of bohemians at the table, and they may be the greatest group I could ever imagine (aside from Clark Ashton Smith, Robert E Howard (HPL doesn't get invited on account of being a sadsack; plus he'd make a fuss about the bong rips and atonal music), Oscar Wilde, Gary Gygax, Dave Arneson, Bod Bledsaw, MAR Barker, Isaac Asimov, Robert Heinlein and Lin Carter).

Aside from the touchy-feely roleplay/story aspect, these memorable characters are also defined by their diverse equipment and tactics. A combination of using the weapon vs. armor type modifiers and weapon proficiency rules (no character class weapon restrictions however!) combined with strength and dexterity requirements for various weapons has helped with this as well as generally random treasure generation with no wish-lists or class/level appropriate "parcels." Buzz Brazelhatch is a great swordsmen simply because the Shunned One he killed was carrying a +3 two-handed sword and he rolled really well for hit points. Rodan the Scrounger is an excellent skirmisher by virtue of his completely random high dexterity score and that he sought out and acquired a random laser pistol. Gan-Ron the Silver Man NPC signed his death warrant due to having a low-intelligence and a magic sword. Sorcerers are cowardly lurkers due to their low hit points and vancian casting, and we're all fine with that (although the acquisition of technological weaponry could very well radically change that despite their -5? non-proficiency penalty with said arms until they finally get a proficiency at level 6? or 11?)).

The genre conventions are emerging as an artifact of the rules. Perhaps an indication of the modern/plastic influences upon that later editions? As much as I tried to run a gritty, pulp romp in 3.5 the system fought me tooth and nail (while chaining me to endless rule lookups). Although anime and videogame/Peter Jackson LOTR superheros are not my bag when the dice hit the table, if they are your thing than definitely the later editions are suitable for such play. Me, I'll be sticking with my musty yellow-spined DAW paperbacks.