The Jolrhos Player's Guide

[Ninja-Bear]

4 hours ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

I am still a bit torn between reprinting the FH rules with my variants and house rules built in, or to have the house rules only and expect people to get Fantasy Hero Complete.

Anyway to present it both ways? Version one is just the FHC compatible book. And version two has the complete rules with it?  However I see the downside of people getting confused and buying the wrong product. 

[SCUBA Hero]

What would the price difference be?

[Christopher R Taylor]

I'm not sure, but a full book of all rules would be significantly larger, and I'm not convinced Jason would give permission to do it.

[tombrown803]

Might want to find out first. If Jason won't you would be saving yourself time and problems.

[Ninja-Bear]

Perhaps maybe a bundle deal? I don’t know how much FHC is being sold but I wonder if you sold the guide separately for those who have FHC and perhaps a bundle of FHC and the guide. Just an idea that popped into my head.

[Christopher R Taylor]

OK I've decided what I want to do, I'll just show changes and campaign rules, because that is easier to see the differences.  If the house rules are buried in the general text they're going to be missed.

 

I am going to wrap up the Codex first, because it is more broadly useful to players, then the Player's Guide soon after, I hope.  The Codex should go pretty fast.

[Christopher R Taylor]

Done with the bulk of the main Jolrhos Codex, the spell book.  Now its mostly building the indices to make it easier to find and get spells.  I don't know if anyone else likes that stuff but I use t quite a bit when building scenarios: I need an attack spell of this active cost range, I need to give this guy some ice spells, etc.

 

There are three major sections: Magic, Bardic, and Priest, with sets of spells or abilities for each.  I'm going to shove the "tips on building spells" section from the old Fantasy Codex in the appendices.

[Christopher R Taylor]

OK here's a preview of the kind of content and layout I'm going to use for the Jolrhos Codex.  I would appreciate whatever feedback and input people can offer for what they think of the visuals, the design, and the presentation.  This is not the finished product; there is editing that needs to be done and some elements may change.

[Mr. R]

23 hours ago, Christopher R Taylor said:

OK here's a preview of the kind of content and layout I'm going to use for the Jolrhos Codex.  I would appreciate whatever feedback and input people can offer for what they think of the visuals, the design, and the presentation.  This is not the finished product; there is editing that needs to be done and some elements may change.

 

 

WOW!  That looks GOOD!

[Christopher R Taylor]

OK here is the full cover image for the upcoming Jolrhos Codex.  I have the print version mostly done, and have to work a bit to get the pdf version finished, plus I have to get Jason's approval to make the "officially licensed" part to be true.  I don't expect any problems but one must go through the proper steps.

 

[Christopher R Taylor]

The print versions will have to wait a bit while I get a proof copy and look it over for the hard and soft covers, so that will be a couple weeks but I hope the pdf version will be available soon

[dbm]

Any update on POD or other print options? These look really good, however I would ideally like to buy physical copies so I can better enthuse my group 😃

[Christopher R Taylor]

I can't give a time line but I think soon for Codex in print.    I'm working with Jason so that some will be available to buy through Hero's store.

 

The Player's Guide is under construction still.  I'm in the combat section, working up the small differences (or maybe big, depending on your perspective) that we use in the campaign.  For example, you can make a CON Roll to try to break out of being stunned, if you were aware of the attack.  And Killing Damage has been reworked so it is rolled like normal damage so there's not two different structures for damage. 

 

The biggest advantage of this system is that it gives you more dice to roll with your KA's.  In a Fantasy Hero game, you're usually in the single digit Damage Class realm, usually 1 or 2 dice at most, so that does not give you a lot of range or feel like you're doing much.  Rolling 4d6 instead of d6+1 is a much better feel and gives you a much better bell curve. Plus it eliminates the stun multiple.

[Christopher R Taylor]

I am going to start sharing bits from the Player Guide like I did the Field Guide to show something of what is in store.  Mostly the book is just house rules, campaign rules, and helps to build characters in the setting, but there is quite a bit of interesting different stuff to pass along.  This isn't just a campaign book, I hope it is full of useful ideas for anyone's game as well as for my Fantasy Hero Campaign.

 

Although I would be the last to compare myself to Aaron Allston much less his masterpiece for Hero the Strike Force book, that is kind of what I am aiming at; new ideas and helpful things that give people a fresh look at Fantasy Hero and neat stuff they can use in their campaign, even if they don't use mine.

[Christopher R Taylor]

One of the things I am trying to add into the Guide is a section on cultural differences from the modern world and how that impacts a role player's approach to the game.  People can play however they wish, but I want to give people tools and and understanding of the differences so that they can come into the game playing something different than modern day with dragons and wizards.

 

I will be honest with people, one of the reasons I rewrote Western Hero for 6th edition was to get a strong feel on what it took to write a setting and a player book with a well-written background and existing structure.  Part of the Player section in WH was about how to role play in the old west, and that was a first stab at trying to do a section like this.

 

Fantasy isn't "now with magic" its a sort of alien setting, where the world feels different because of its culture, setting, limitations, and presuppositions.  Its a lot like Medieval-like cultures across the world; the supernatural is real.  People die a lot.  The tech is limited, so you have to work hard to accomplish just a daily survival.  I want to help players to be better able to shift gears in their mind to play the game as fantasy as they can.

[Christopher R Taylor]

And now, a section of some of the (many) new talents available in the upcoming Jolrhos Player Guide.  First, a note on talents.  I intend to use the talents to help players build interesting characters in the way that other games offer special abilities with each new level.  Both combat and magical characters need to buy talents to have special abilities; for example your character learns magic by buying talents which allow them to learn spells in given areas of magic at different power levels.  Then, like a warrior, you buy your weapons (spells) with money, make them yourself with skills, find them, etc.

 

 

 

INTUITION (General): The character is unusually perceptive, and can sense whether they are being observed.  This ability functions automatically, but can only sense being observed if they could ordinarily spot the person doing so with their normal senses.  It takes a full phase of being observed before Intuition will warn the character.

Cost: 5 points

 

 

[Christopher R Taylor]

Today's Talent:

 

HEAVY FIGHTER (General): This talent helps offset some of the penalties that  wearing heavier armor can incur.  Each level of this talent negates 1 DCV penalty caused by armor and 2m movement caused by heavy armor.  These bonuses do not negate penalties for other forms of encumbrance.  This can be purchased multiple times to offset even more encumbrance penalties.

Cost: 3 points for each +1 DCV and 1m running (only to offset encumbrance penalties)

 

[Christopher R Taylor]

Today's Talent:

 

TAUNT (General): Allows the character to try to force a creature to attack them instead of someone else, unless they make an INT roll at -3.  Using Taunt requires a successful presence roll each attempt, and each 1 point the PRE roll is made by, the target suffers an additional -1 to their roll (up to -6 total).  Taunting has diminishing returns (each successive phase used, the INT roll is +1 easier for the target).

Cost: 6 points

[Christopher R Taylor]

Today's Talent:

 

BASH (combat): You are able to strike your target so hard it interrupts the action they are taking.  This requires a successful attack roll and then the opponent must make a CON roll at to keep doing what they are doing.  This CON roll is at a penalty equal to how well the attack hit (so if an attack hit by 2 OCV then the CON Roll is at –2) up to a -4 total penalty maximum.  This requires a weapon of at least medium size or a shield to execute.  Some creatures are so large they can attempt a Bash without a weapon.

Cost: 5 points

 

[Christopher R Taylor]

I hope to have this out by Spring 2023, God willing, and then I'll turn my eyes toward a rebuild of Escape from Stronghold.  The big holdup with that is figuring how much of Stronghold to put in the module and how much to just refer people to the Hero 5th Stronghold sourcebook.  After that, I will start work on the Master Guide, to finish up the trilogy of main campaign books.  I hope to get Escape from Stronghold out next year, but the Master Guide probably won't be out until 2024, because its a pretty major undertaking and will be a lot of writing.  Its not going to be gigantic, its just a lot of the stuff I've put out has been previously roughed out in various forms over the years.

 

Once that's done, I want to do a Fantasy Hero 101 adventure, like Champions Begins, a treasure book, and a re-release of the Bestiary and Field Guide with some changes to formatting to match the Codex and to update them slightly (errata, etc).  Then a second Bestiary Book and a couple modules and my main Campaign Setting will be complete, probably 3-4 years from now.

[Christopher R Taylor]

Today's Talent:

 

CHARGE: With this talent, a character can move up rapidly to engage the enemy, closing the distance and still attack.  This skill increases running by 12m, only for making a half move used to close with a target (thus, it increases a character's half move by 6m running).

Cost: 6 points

 

 

[Christopher R Taylor]

Today's Talent:

 

COMBAT MEMORY: This talent allows the character to  gain a bonus to accuracy and damage against a foe that they have defeated in the last turn.  As long as it has been no more than 12 segments since the creature was defeated, Combat Memory gives the character +1 damage class and +1 OCV against the same kind of creature (another human, another goblin, another rabbit with sharp pointy teeth, etc).  This bonus fades in one turn after gaining the bonus.

Cost: 6 points

 

[Christopher R Taylor]

My work is on hold right now due to a death in the family, I will get back to it as soon as I can.

[Christopher R Taylor]

OK time to get back on the job.  Today's Talent:

 

PARRY: Your character is skilled at deflecting and parrying attacks.  This grants bonus DCV, only vs melee attacks, and only on segments the character does not act on. This bonus DCV only takes effect against one attack per segment.  
Cost: 2 points for+1 DCV 
    4 points for +2 DCV 
    6 points for +3 DCV 

[Christopher R Taylor]

Today's Talent:

 

RIPOSTE: The character is able to instantly attack after successfully blocking an attack.  This may only be done with melee weapons and can only be done once a segment.

Cost: 5 points

 

(bought as trigger to weapon attack)