Old Man

Every so often, Lady Luck favors us with a smile (oftentimes a modest display, at best, yet still worth cherishing); I was fortunate enough to chance upon this piece of tabletop gaming history. A similar specimen turned up on the electronic bay, oh...a little under two years ago. Nowadays, even (original) 2e products are increasingly beyond the reach of casual collectors thanks to exorbitant premiums; if you have had your eye on something, carpe diem before you find yourself busting out your third kidney.
 
Speaking of which, has anyone here ever played in or ran campaigns wholly focused on ruins far removed from civilization? Alternatively, a campaign that wasn't entirely confined to exploring the remnants of a lost age, but which still involved a substantial chunk (say, forty percent or greater of the total duration) of discovery throughout long abandoned ancient structures also counts. The idea is to keep player characters away from a fortified base of support while simultaneously denying them easy resupplying of provisions. NPCs willing to engage in civilized discourse - or perhaps trade - are few and far between; friendly personalities are in the minority, while the majority is decidedly neutral in disposition (naturally, vipers lurk in their midst).
 
P.S. Recommendations for relevant modules are welcome!

Well, between moviemaking and his side gigs--making his own gin and owning a soccer team, I imagine he has little time for making an independent streaming series by a bunch of complete unknowns--unless, of course, we get him a really awesome script.  (I'm thinking Kurt Busiek, myself.  Does he work cheap?)

Unnecessarily redundant at that level of wealth.

This one is from "Thing Explainer", a book by Randall Munroe, creator of xkcd.  It's worth the $24.

This one is from "Thing Explainer", a book by Randall Munroe, creator of xkcd.  It's worth the $24.

Infinite improbability drives

Isn't he a little short for a stormtrooper?

This one is from "Thing Explainer", a book by Randall Munroe, creator of xkcd.  It's worth the $24.

This one is from "Thing Explainer", a book by Randall Munroe, creator of xkcd.  It's worth the $24.

Everything with alcohol is yukky.

I've approached it in the past, but that's a whole story that mere mortals (with functioning livers) don't really need…

He is bottom row second from left square

Oh, man.  They did the picture when his eyes were closed.  How embarrassing.

Where are you in that photo?

Man, I could write a thesis on what makes fictional magic systems 'feel' like magic.  It comes up all the time in fantasy fiction discussions.  There, it boils down to whether magic is repeatable, whether it is known, and whether it is knowable.  At some point, alchemy became chemistry; where your magic system is on that continuum determines how 'soft' or 'hard it is, IMO.
 
Keeping magic magical is even harder in RPGs where it needs to be systematized for playability and balance.  Fortunately, as Steve mentioned, we're already throwing dice, so that helps.  Drastically increasing the complexity of spellcasting is absolutely required--I've spent decades fighting this battle with Hero critics who whine that magic 'feels like superpowers'.  Not if your spell requires a skill roll, incantations, gestures, concentration, thirty seconds, and multiple foci, it doesn't.  I use Doctor Strange as the minimum example here.  At least in the comics Strange has to contort his fingers, sit crosslegged, recite various invocations, and carry several magical artifacts, and even then he's still a borderline superhero.  MCU Strange drops the incantations and is basically wuxia.  Conversely, in literature it takes three witches chanting while they drop all kinds of weird and creepy ingredients into a cauldron to cast a precog spell.  It takes three days of fasting and concentration while painting a single room-sized rune for Elric to summon Arioch for the first time.  Potterverse wizards can be like unto gods but must use a wand.  Magic circles.  Pointy hats.  Staves and wands.  All these accoutrements are what flavors the magic. 
 
And for unpredictability, as I see it there are three ways for a wizard to screw up: magnitude, control, and effect. 
 
Power: Usually this manifests as a failure to generate enough magical power.  Luke can't lift the X-Wing.  Ron can't leviosa.  It's also possible to overpower a spell--this might not matter if you're trying to kill a dragon, but could be bad if you're casting a love charm.  Some Hero powers already have dice rolls here, but not all. Control: Power is nothing without control.  Ron casts a slug curse with a busted wand and it backfires on him.  He later Disapparates without a license and leaves an arm behind.  Hermione successfully transforms herself... into a cat.  Ged summons Elfarran, but also summons a shadow creature that almost kills him on multiple occasions.  To-hit rolls cover some of these instances but not all. Effect: Sometimes magical mistakes have completely unrelated results.  The Potterverse almost has a monopoly on this trope.  Harry loses his temper while casting a spell and... accidentally inflates Aunt Marge into a balloon.  Neville accidentally transplanted his ears onto a cactus.  Luna Lovegood's mother cast an experimental spell and simply blew herself up.  This is the hardest thing to randomize without just having the GM make something up. This really cried out for a much more fleshed-out Side Effects system.  As it stands Side Effects is entirely situational--in fact without GM intervention it's possible for the Side Effect to be better than the original spell.  But using the above it should be possible to set up a system to randomize spell failure without leaving it to the GM to make something up.
 

Man, I could write a thesis on what makes fictional magic systems 'feel' like magic.  It comes up all the time in fantasy fiction discussions.  There, it boils down to whether magic is repeatable, whether it is known, and whether it is knowable.  At some point, alchemy became chemistry; where your magic system is on that continuum determines how 'soft' or 'hard it is, IMO.
 
Keeping magic magical is even harder in RPGs where it needs to be systematized for playability and balance.  Fortunately, as Steve mentioned, we're already throwing dice, so that helps.  Drastically increasing the complexity of spellcasting is absolutely required--I've spent decades fighting this battle with Hero critics who whine that magic 'feels like superpowers'.  Not if your spell requires a skill roll, incantations, gestures, concentration, thirty seconds, and multiple foci, it doesn't.  I use Doctor Strange as the minimum example here.  At least in the comics Strange has to contort his fingers, sit crosslegged, recite various invocations, and carry several magical artifacts, and even then he's still a borderline superhero.  MCU Strange drops the incantations and is basically wuxia.  Conversely, in literature it takes three witches chanting while they drop all kinds of weird and creepy ingredients into a cauldron to cast a precog spell.  It takes three days of fasting and concentration while painting a single room-sized rune for Elric to summon Arioch for the first time.  Potterverse wizards can be like unto gods but must use a wand.  Magic circles.  Pointy hats.  Staves and wands.  All these accoutrements are what flavors the magic. 
 
And for unpredictability, as I see it there are three ways for a wizard to screw up: magnitude, control, and effect. 
 
Power: Usually this manifests as a failure to generate enough magical power.  Luke can't lift the X-Wing.  Ron can't leviosa.  It's also possible to overpower a spell--this might not matter if you're trying to kill a dragon, but could be bad if you're casting a love charm.  Some Hero powers already have dice rolls here, but not all. Control: Power is nothing without control.  Ron casts a slug curse with a busted wand and it backfires on him.  He later Disapparates without a license and leaves an arm behind.  Hermione successfully transforms herself... into a cat.  Ged summons Elfarran, but also summons a shadow creature that almost kills him on multiple occasions.  To-hit rolls cover some of these instances but not all. Effect: Sometimes magical mistakes have completely unrelated results.  The Potterverse almost has a monopoly on this trope.  Harry loses his temper while casting a spell and... accidentally inflates Aunt Marge into a balloon.  Neville accidentally transplanted his ears onto a cactus.  Luna Lovegood's mother cast an experimental spell and simply blew herself up.  This is the hardest thing to randomize without just having the GM make something up. This really cried out for a much more fleshed-out Side Effects system.  As it stands Side Effects is entirely situational--in fact without GM intervention it's possible for the Side Effect to be better than the original spell.  But using the above it should be possible to set up a system to randomize spell failure without leaving it to the GM to make something up.
 

Man, I could write a thesis on what makes fictional magic systems 'feel' like magic.  It comes up all the time in fantasy fiction discussions.  There, it boils down to whether magic is repeatable, whether it is known, and whether it is knowable.  At some point, alchemy became chemistry; where your magic system is on that continuum determines how 'soft' or 'hard it is, IMO.
 
Keeping magic magical is even harder in RPGs where it needs to be systematized for playability and balance.  Fortunately, as Steve mentioned, we're already throwing dice, so that helps.  Drastically increasing the complexity of spellcasting is absolutely required--I've spent decades fighting this battle with Hero critics who whine that magic 'feels like superpowers'.  Not if your spell requires a skill roll, incantations, gestures, concentration, thirty seconds, and multiple foci, it doesn't.  I use Doctor Strange as the minimum example here.  At least in the comics Strange has to contort his fingers, sit crosslegged, recite various invocations, and carry several magical artifacts, and even then he's still a borderline superhero.  MCU Strange drops the incantations and is basically wuxia.  Conversely, in literature it takes three witches chanting while they drop all kinds of weird and creepy ingredients into a cauldron to cast a precog spell.  It takes three days of fasting and concentration while painting a single room-sized rune for Elric to summon Arioch for the first time.  Potterverse wizards can be like unto gods but must use a wand.  Magic circles.  Pointy hats.  Staves and wands.  All these accoutrements are what flavors the magic. 
 
And for unpredictability, as I see it there are three ways for a wizard to screw up: magnitude, control, and effect. 
 
Power: Usually this manifests as a failure to generate enough magical power.  Luke can't lift the X-Wing.  Ron can't leviosa.  It's also possible to overpower a spell--this might not matter if you're trying to kill a dragon, but could be bad if you're casting a love charm.  Some Hero powers already have dice rolls here, but not all. Control: Power is nothing without control.  Ron casts a slug curse with a busted wand and it backfires on him.  He later Disapparates without a license and leaves an arm behind.  Hermione successfully transforms herself... into a cat.  Ged summons Elfarran, but also summons a shadow creature that almost kills him on multiple occasions.  To-hit rolls cover some of these instances but not all. Effect: Sometimes magical mistakes have completely unrelated results.  The Potterverse almost has a monopoly on this trope.  Harry loses his temper while casting a spell and... accidentally inflates Aunt Marge into a balloon.  Neville accidentally transplanted his ears onto a cactus.  Luna Lovegood's mother cast an experimental spell and simply blew herself up.  This is the hardest thing to randomize without just having the GM make something up. This really cried out for a much more fleshed-out Side Effects system.  As it stands Side Effects is entirely situational--in fact without GM intervention it's possible for the Side Effect to be better than the original spell.  But using the above it should be possible to set up a system to randomize spell failure without leaving it to the GM to make something up.
 

JUST dropped in my inbox...from NYT, an earthquake hit Taiwan.  Tsunami alert for Japan.  Pic from the email:

The granularity of Hero is unfortunately too great to really allow us to get into gun minutiae in game terms.  You can add an OCV or not, or a damage class, or cut the STR Min by a couple of points, or give a Concealment bonus.  I suppose having the basic stats for each could still be useful though.