"....HERE ARE THE GUIDLINES FOR MY CAMPAIGN ‘REALMS OF THE FORGOTTEN” AND THE RULES I USE:...I was thoroughly amused by the above, giggling and all. But the idea stuck in my head. I'm not a wrestling "Fan" although I can enjoy it (especially small, local league matches), but the idea of a D&D Fighter having his sword eaten by a Rust Monster only to, without missing a beat, pick up said Rust Monster and pile-drive it's bug-eyed head into the stone dungeon floor!! is far too awesome to not experiment with. (yes, I know about the various "grappling" rules in various editions of D&D, they can fuck off on account of not Being Exciting/Awesome.) Plus I read this afterwards, which really motivated me to continue with this line of thought.
...SPECIAL WRESTLING MOVES. DROP YOUR SWORD? NO PROBLEM, JUST CRUSH SOME DUDES WITH A HEADBUTT OR A PILEDRIVER (STRENGTH REQUIREMENT IN AFFECT, SO THIS ONLY REALLY WORKS FOR FIGHTERS)."
- From Joesky the Dungeon Brawler (thanks to Gnome-Bientus for turning me on to this!)
You know which genre characters were inveterate bad-ass wrestlers? Conan and Captain Kirk! (I also need rules for double karate-chop shoulder attacks...)
I also need something spontaneous, something that's not going to be a "magic bullet" weapon such as 3.5s sunder or trip/AoO combo, but something exciting.
I immediately thought of Zak Smith's (the master of awesome, simple subsystem rules) "Lucky Number Kung Fu," which seems an almost perfect fit, although I would change it so that Fighters and Fighter-types are the only ones with "lucky numbers", with perhaps the head-butt and grappling options from Sham's What Price Glory rule packets and perhaps something from this. And pile-drivers.
I'm going to put some more thought into this, look over the 1st-ed Oriental Adventures martial arts rules, and try some play-testing; but for some gonzo-stupid-awesome reason I am obsessed about incorporating wrestling moves into my D&D.
