Urlord

I'll disagree with Massey there. I've ran several low-point games during my time and, though they were indeed deadly, it was not so deadly as to make it impossible for a player to get invested in a character. The trick is balancing the world and the NPC opposition to provide a challenge to the characters. You've already stated that you want a deadly game, so that pretty much creates a lean towards lower points.

 

I will agree that you should probably lean the other way on the side of your formula (50 total with 25 in matching Comps). Reasonably capable characters can be built on that without them being too powerful or diverse. You also mostly avoid the Complication Hunt for the purpose of meeting the quota.  Just my $0.02.

I too have played/GM'd many low-point games in my day and the key is to create adventures that challenge the players and promote the flavor you are trying to get across.  If a lion has the potential of a total party kill, then i wouldn't place a lion there unless there were environmental advantages the players could potentially take advantage of.  If the players decide to stand toe-to-toe with the lion and all die, instead of use their environment, then perhaps they deserve to die.  But, my players would never do that - they are pretty smart old guys and gals in their 40's and 50's.

However, I do like the 25+50=75 build because 50 points in complications really helps promote the oppressive/messed-up nature of this world.  Character's will not be able to buy things common to everyone or are the key tenants of the campaign, such as "Hunted by Minions of the Overlord", "Slave", "Oppressed" or "Destitute/Poor".  They will have to come up with complications specific to their characters.

Starting out as a nobody slave, and then growing into a badass is something that really only happens in D&D.  It's not common in other types of fiction.  Usually the nobody actually turns out to have a lot of potential, but not in a "gaining XP" kind of way.

 

Think Luke Skywalker.  From an in game perspective, the first session he buys some droids and then fights sand people, ending with him meeting Kenobi.  In the second session, he finds out his aunt and uncle are dead, fights a guy in the bar, and then hitches a ride into space.  In the third game session, he sneaks around the Death Star, shoots some stormtroopers, gets half-drowned by a sewer tentacle, and shoots TIE fighters as they escape.  Fourth game session he blows up the Death Star.  He goes from "normal kid" to "galactic hero" in 4 sessions.  And I'm being very generous with what he does in some of those game sessions.  Long story short, Luke probably started out as a fully fleshed out character, instead of gaining XP to get there.

 

Now it sounds like you don't want something nearly as action-adventurey as Star Wars.  But I think starting people at 25+50 is going to result in some very dead characters, very fast.  Fantasy Hero can be quite lethal, even with expensive characters.  The handful of times we tried it, characters died left and right.  We were built on 75+75, in 4th edition (when characters were cheaper), so that would be the equivalent of maybe 100+100 today.  A tiger came out of the forest and killed our entire party in under a turn.  While you say you want some amount of character death, if these guys are going to be able to actually defeat the evil overlord someday, then they have to live long enough to get there.

 

I'd suggest giving the characters a higher starting point value.  While the characters are supposed to be slaves, you probably don't want real slaves.  You want heroic slaves.  You probably want Conan, forced to push the wheel until he looks like Arnold, not Kunta Kinte, who had his foot chopped off so he can't walk.  Think Aladdin the street rat (Disney version), who is athletic and fast and slips away from the guards, not the fat merchant that he's stealing food from.  They don't have to be combat monsters, but a higher starting point level would allow for a lot more potential.  It's the reason why these guys are the ones to overthrow the dark lord, and not somebody else.  But that's just my preference.

 

I'm imagining a world very much like a lot of the fantasy movies I grew up with.  Conan, Krull, Beastmaster, Ladyhawke, Sword and the Sorceror, etc.

They don't want Conan, Ladyhawk or Aladin - we've done campaigns like that many times.  They want to try a true Zero to Hero campaign. Starting off as 25+50=75 point slaves is exactly what my players want. They originally wanted 25+25=50 point characters but when I explained that you have to pay for racial templates in FH6, they agreed that 75 was better.

Here is what I am thinking of so far:

Campaign Name: Fragments of Hope

Initially, the characters will be skilled normals and have no magic or abnormal powers at all.  After the accidental death of their master, which would most likely be seen as their fault, the characters must flee for their lives or be executed. Sessions 1 and 2 will focus on running/hiding from slaver and pure survival.  In session three, the characters stumble/fall into the lost tomb of Anteele, a benevolent lesser deity who perished at the end of the last age. While hiding in and exploring the tomb, they find fragments of an artifact that still contain a tiny bit of the Anteele's essence.  These fragments, when willfully attuned to (a 12- EGO roll), are absorbed into the character's flesh becoming a Tattoo (IIF)  that imbue the characters with 10 CPs spend on powers not allowed by "Normals".

As the campaign progresses, the "Awakened" characters must research and travel to the locations of other ancient sites that may contain additional Fragments of Hope as they come to be called. Each fragment can be absorbed granting additional character points.  As they gain in power their exploits will eventually raise the attention of the Overlord who will send lackeys to dispatch the trouble makers. Hopefully, if the characters do thing smart, the Overlord will realize too late that they have amassed enough power to pose a threat.

Each session will only give 2 experience point on average, but locating fragments ever 3 sessions or so for 10 CPs will average things out to the 2-8 per session the players want.

When a character dies, the fragments that had been absorbed excise themselves from the corpse and are once again fragments that can be used by a replacement PC.  Only one Fragment of Hope may be absorbed from a single source (broken artifact, mystical pool, crystals of power, etc.).  That keeps the balance and the characters searching for additional fragments.

Thoughts?

Thanks for your comments.  I had a conversation with my players last night about Character Points and this is what they came up with.

Starting CP = 25 Base + 50 Complications = 75 (with a half dozen or so everyman skills)

Ending CP = 200-225 after 25-30 sessions.

Experience = This means each session should average 2-8 XP depending on how things go and what they accomplish.

Mark - I really like the magic costing BODY instead of END it adds a very good balance to things.  Kind of reminds me of Lay Healing in RoleMaster. And if you use an ability to draw BODY from others as a sacrifice, it has a gradual side effect that slowly turns one very evil or an undead as in Lucius' Way of the Lost idea above.

Thanks again and keep lets keep the dialogue going please.

I hope you guys can offer some assistance here!

This is the campaign I am developing.  I am a very experience GM and my players are likewise very experienced.  We have all been playing Table-Top since the 1980s and 90s.

Consequently, they all know my style, my tricks, and how I do things for the most part (I'm always the GM).  I am reaching out to get some fresh ideas - maybe I can surprise them a bit?

Campaign Concept

Imagine a world where the heroes failed to fulfill a prophesy and the evil bad guy won...

Imagine if this immortal evil bad guy ruled the world unchallenged for four centuries...

Imagine if even the concept of hope no longer existed among the enslaved peoples of the world...

Then, in a stroke of fate, a few slaves make a discovery that awakes dormant powers within them.

With enough good decisions, experience and luck, these new heroes might, just might, have a chance to overthrow the Overlord and restore hope, peace and balance to the world.

Here is the criteria I have gotten from my 7 players:

• System MUST be Fantasy Hero (they have grown tired of Pathfinder in our last 2 year campaign).
• Campaign MUST be gritty, deadly and very difficult (not just in combat) - to the point that a permanent character death every 2-3 adventures wouldn't be out of place.
• Campaign MUST last 18-24 months with us playing 1 per month (we play from noon to midnight each game session).
• Society MUST be detailed, political and oppressive so the characters will need to work within the shadows to get things accomplished.
  Even minor slip ups could result in them being captured and executed.
• Characters MUST start out as normals, or just slight better, and grow through experience into heroes.
• Not all adventures should be successes to show the difficulty of the world and plot. Kind of a 3-steps forward, 2-steps back feel.

I am just starting with world creation and could use any and all suggestions to feed off of. I have 4 months to build the campaign before our first adventure.

My biggest questions right now are:

1. Starting Power Level - What do you think starting character points be?
2. Ending Power Level - How many character points should they be near the end of the campaign?
3. Experience - With the first two questions answered, I can calculate the number of XP to give out per adventure.
4. Character Deaths - How to bring in new character (after a death for example) and not have them start completely over but at the same time have a penalty for dying?
5. Races - I like the standard FH races, but they would be different after 400 years of living in slavery. Any suggestions on how to alter them?
6. Powers - Should I use one of the Fantasy Hero magic systems or create a unique system for this game?  Suggestions?
7. Optional Rules - What optional rules should be used (from FH or other books) to portray the hard, gritty, deadly world that my players want?

That's plenty of questions for now. I'm sure others will crop up as this discussion continues...

Thanks In Advance,