Another Random Character Generator!

Random fodder for your amusement

I swear I'm not looking for these things, but here's another, even cooler random character generator created by the good folks over at Purple Sorcerer Games. It creates 0-level characters for DCC RPG in bulk, but with actual character sheets instead of just a row
of stats on a spreadsheet like some other computerized character generator we all know and loathe.

Random F**king Character Generation

Getting back to the random character business, I just found this sweet site created by Ryan (just Ryan) that fills in your randomly generated character's gaping lack of a backstory in one snappy, profane sentence. And I do mean profane; the site is called "Who the fuck is my fucking D&D character?" after all.

Nice work Ryan.

Random Character's Guild

I was wandering around over at the ol' Judge's Guild the other day when I discovered that they have  their own version of a random character generator (download it here), which also includes the one thing I really wanted to add to mine but didn't have the mojo for: a random name generator. The Judge's Guild version is made "For Use with the Universal Role Playing System" (URPS?) and contains character races such as ghuls, lunari, bardik, and confeds, but still, it's pretty cool.

Now with Clerics!

The other day, Commentor Antoine pointed out that the follower thing doesn't seem to roll clerics. Indeed, there was a flaw in the programming wherein druids and thieves overlapped on the cleric parameters. Anyway, I made a new version that basically just replaces druids with clerics. If it's your thing, by all means, go for it.

Random NPC Followers Update: Now Downloadable!

On Friday I ran a piece about my Random Follower Generator but I failed to provide the link to download the thing. Here it is. Also, I made it more printer friendly
and, for those without an 80-sider handy, expanded the list to include 100 randomly created peons, henchers, and assholes. Go forth and impart these randomized roleplayers with souls!

Also, if anyone savvier with spreadsheet formulae than I makes improvements on it, I'd be interested to hear what you come up with.

Bon soir.

d80 Followers: Random NPCs at Wholesale Prices

Start heaving those 80 siders!

It seems some folks had other thoughts on what a post called "80 Followers" on a D&D blog would be all about. It's a reasonable assumption, so I got to work and came up with a spreadsheet for creating random NPCs. Sure, nobody needs it, and even less people want it, but, in the making of it, more fun was had than anyone could reasonably expect from something so inherently dull as spreadsheet software.

Each NPC falls into one of three "roles": peons, henchers, and associates; plus a bonus role called "rivals." But don't worry about them because they almost never deign to show their faces. Seriously, of the 10,000 odd NPCs I've randomly created in the last day or two I've seen precisely 2 "rivals." Everything is determined by the 6 randomly determined (3d6 style) basic abilities. One's role is a measure of how good his or her average ability score is; your level is affected by your charisma and intelligence--cuz I figure being smart and charming's gotta be worth something, right? And in a reversal of the way we roll the dice, NPC class is determined by hit points, which was a lot easier to program than trying to finagle it via the more traditional ability score approach. Besides, I prefer a world where clumsy thieves, feeble fighters and moronic mages overcome their handicaps and achieve a degree of competence at a thoroughly inappropriate skill.

As a result of this HP-class determination, the NPCs with the lowest HP-to-Level ratio end up being MUs. And since HP are influenced by Con, MUs tend to have lower constitutions than other classes, which I kinda' like. But there's enough randomness in the process that an unlucky character with a high constitution could very well find himself wearing a magically delicious pointy hat festooned with Lucky Charms.


Race is a function of various abilities in relationship to each other rather than strict max/minimums, so while elves tend to be dexterous but frail, they aren't precluded from being either clumsy or robust, although it is unlikely that they will be both simultaneously.  I haven't incorporated any race-class limitations, yet I have seen very few Dwarves or haffies dawning the MU robes. The Dwarves make some sense, as their ability ratio tends to favor a higher Con--and therefore higher HP--but there is so much room for randomness in the system that it's actually kind of shocking that I haven't seen a single halfling wizard yet.

Anyway, I'm rather pleased with the outcome; download it here if you feel the urge.

Average Joe in New Basic D&D, or W. of the C. and I have something in common after all

As you already know, the latest Basic D&D rules abide by the old AD&D standard for rolling abilities: roll 4d6 and take the best 3.  But it also has a rule that, if you can't be bothered to roll your own dice you can just take a default set of "standard" ability scores and assign them to your character.  The standard scores are:

15
14
13
12
10
8

What's really astounding to me is that several years ago--a few years before I started this here bloggery-do--I was trying to devise anti-munchkinry character generation rules for AD&D, when I came up with the exact same idea, to the extent that the numbers are even strikingly similar.  Here's the standard set of ability scores I came up with back in '07:

16
14
13
12
10
8

The only difference is that they lowered the ceiling from 16 to a 15, which is in keeping with their whole "15 is max" ethos.  I'm pretty certain that we used the same approach to determine our standard abilities, whaddaya' think?

I came up with my standard by rolling thousands of sets of characters, ranking each character's abilities from highest to lowest and then averaging the ranked numbers in order to find an "average" character.*  In fact, I called the rule the "Average Joe Rule" and some perk was offered for taking the default ability scores instead of rolling your own, though I don't remember what the benefit was.  Of course, my players were so repulsed by such a notion that they never acknowledged its existence. Oh well.  But if nothing else--and assuming that all this isn't just a colossal coincidence--the Wizard-boys seem to validate my statistics, which is nice.

*Seriously, there were over 100,000 "dice rolls" involved, though Excel did all the heavy lifting for me.

Undead PCs

A few years ago I got into a debate with someone somewhere on the interweb--I think it was Rients--about what happens if you roll a 1 for your Hit Points and your Constitution is in the penalty zone: can a character be dead at inception?  Obviously that's not very satisfying, and yet hand-waving a minimum of 1 HP or re-rolling until you achieve a more arithmetically-pleasing result both seem like cop-outs.

Your new character sketch

Then, suddenly, just moments ago, it came to me in a flash: when your Con penalty puts your brand new, freshly rolled PC's hit point total at 0 or less then he/she is undead: you get to begin your adventuring career as a zombie!  The perks:

• You get to re-roll your hit points using 2d8 and ignoring your constitution score.
• No more worrying about things like drinking water, oxygen, and sleep or charm spells.
• Stick with this long enough and you get to be a freakin' Lich.

And some cons:

• Your appetite for brains might be a bit off-putting to your adventuring colleagues. 
• The cleric in your party can use Speak with Dead to force you to reveal embarrassing events from your past.
• Until you reach 9th level -- Vampire -- you might as well forget about getting laid; it absolutely will not happen.

Character Generation: Our First Optimal Character

So the gang was rolling up new characters the other day--quite probably several months ago by the time I finally get around to posting this--when something alarming happened.  Odyssey the Assassin--the name only becomes mildly humorous when you consider that there is also a paladin named Prelude in the party--rolled off this set of ability scores using 3d6 in order:

Fit to play the part

Str 14
Int 12
Wis 12
Dex 15
Con 10
Cha 9

What's amazing here is not the scores themselves--though slightly above average they are nothing spectacular--but that, considering we choose character class before rolling abilities, Odyssey is the first ever character that actually looks like what one might expect his chosen class to look like if we were arranging our ability scores.

Not only do Odyssey's ability scores exceed the minimum requirements for assassins per the PHB (Str 12, Int 11, Dex 12)--a first for a member of a subclass in our game--but, what with his highest ability being on Dex, next on Str, next on Int, lowest on Cha--aficionados of AD&D will recall that characters with Cha of 5 or lower can only be assassins thus making low charisma a de facto trait of assassinry--he actually seems optimized for the role.

In ~2.5 years of the Choose-First method, we've had loads of big dumb MUs, clumsy thieves,  charming dwarves and the like, but this is our first truly adequate character.
 
It should be noted that we've been completely ignoring established AD&D ability score thresholds for character classes ever since we moved our game from S&W rules to AD&D (via C&C) a year ago, but it brought a feeling of triumph over our gang to see that a straight up,  3d6 in order could finally score us a qualified member of an AD&D subclass.

It need not be noted but I'll tell you anyway that assassins in our game are more of a fighter/thief hybrid: they can choose up to 5 thief abilities--the more they choose, the more they suck at each of them--and they use fighters' combat table but at the +2 / 2 levels as opposed to +1/level progression if that makes any sense. 

Those who recall the Gold swap rule mentioned in a previous post might be interested to know that Odyssey opted not to swap his Gold score, which was 12.

Gold vs. Abilities: Unintended Consequences

How much will it cost to make me smarter?

In my AD&D-ish game, characters roll 3d6 seven times in order for their abilities, the 7th being for Gold which is then multiplied by 10 to determine starting GPs.  However, before they do the multiplification, players may swap the Gold result with any one ability if they so choose; I call it the Gold Swap Rule.

The result has been most significant for fighters.  Not only have they taken a pay cut down from an average of 125 (50-200) GP to 105 (30-180), but they're going to trade a 6 Con for a 13 Gold every freakin' time.  As a consequence, PC fighters are wearing scale mail and wielding voulges and spetums for the first time in recorded history.

Gone are the mail-clad rookies bristling with armaments for every occasion, and I like it.  The penurious paladin in my recent Hommlet campaign couldn't afford a sword so he settled for a morning star as his sole armament; Nice!  And the elven archer often has to use that long bow he sprung for--really, why does anyone bring a long bow into a dungeon?--as a handheld weapon too, since his only other weapon is a dagger. The Swap does seem to make 1st level fighters a bit more vulnerable, which is maybe not something AD&D fighters really need to be.

Spellcasters have also been significantly affected because I've also enacted the Holmesian Scroll Rule--any MU can make a scroll for 100 GPs and a week in the library.  Now magicusers are doing anything in their power to get a Gold score of at least 11 so that they can have an extra sleep spell in their back pocket before they head into their first dungeon.  This is a 100% increase in a prestidigitator's spell capacity, but it can result in a lot of insolvent spellcasters.

Thieves seem to benefit the most, financially, from this system.  Not only do they get a substantial pay raise--up from 2d6x10 GPs per the PHB--but their low startup costs allow them to swap or not to swap their Gold score at their leisure.  The shakedown is that we're having some very well equipped thieves, which seems appropriate for a class whose purview is, nominally speaking, illicit commerce.

It also reinforces the notion of the thief as the expert treasure finder, because now s/he's pretty much expected to provide for any equipment necessary for the retrieval of treasure--including sacks and rope and the like, but also food, pack animals, and hirelings.  This allows the fighters and spellcasters to focus on their jobs and gives the thief a more administrative role.  Indeed, the thief is generally in charge of negotiating fees, procuring supplies, managing NPC personnel, and even finding the next gig, on top of his traditional duties such as opening the occasional lock or backstabbing the odd hobgoblin.  If the party were a band, the thief would be the bass player and the manager.

When I enacted the Gold Swap rule, I assumed it would eliminate some egregiously low ability scores from character sheets at the table, but never really considered what consequences the diminished seed money would have on party structure.  Starting fighters definitely look more like poorly armed beginners should in my mind, 1st level spellcasters have more to contribute, and thieves have shed their roguish image and become invested--literally--members of the party.  The surplus cash generally available to thieves has also introduced hirelings into the game in a way that I never anticipated--though my encumbrance rules also went a long way to encourage this; the stuff of a later post.

Of course, the reason we've had so much experience with starting characters--despite the sporadic playing time my gang manages--is that we're losing an awful lot of PCs; 2-3 per session.  Is this death toll exacerbated by our lightly armored fighters?  Probably.  But it has definitely encouraged the players to find other ways to survive encounters besides head-to-head combat.  Which is also not such a bad outcome. 

Character Generation

I really, really, really dig reading other folks' character generation ideas--though I despise the term "chargen" with such intensity that my keyboard melted when I typed it.  In the spirit of sharing, I thought I'd put my own latest rules--they seem to change all the time so don't expect me to hold to these for very long--out here for those who fetishize this crap like I do. Without further ado, here are my Character Generation Rules for the hybrid AD&D/C&C/S&W/Hackmaster game I occasionally run:

1. Choose your character's race, gender, and class and give him or her a name.  Yes, you're committed to this before you even touch the dice.
2. Roll 3d6 in order for Str, Int, Wis, Dex, Con, Cha, and Gold.
3. So your thief has a 4 Dex? Your dwarf has a 5 Con?  You are not entirely without recourse:if your character is human, you can swap your Gold result for any one of your other 6 abilities (attributes). Non-human character races may swap there Favored/Off Abilities if the favored ability is lower than the off ability.  See below for more on this.
4. Multiply Gold by 10, this is your starting money in gold pieces.
5. Roll 1d6 for hit points.  Yep, everyone starts with 1d6 hit points.   Fighters (and their various subclasses) and dwarves (regardless of class) add 1, for a max of 7 HP before Con bonus.  This is an obvious holdover from our S&W beginnings, though bringing it to our AD&D campaign was never actually discussed; we just rolled up our characters with six-siders and never thought anything of it.  Also:  everyone has a min. of 3 HP at 1st level except magic users and elves (regardless of class) who have a min of only 2 HP.  Also, also: After 1st level, hit dice revert to the AD&D model, d10 for fighters, d4 for MUs, etc. 
6. Go shopping using the AD&D PHB Equipment list, though I'll accept items from Hackmaster or C&C if they don't appear on the AD&D list. Paladins must purchase a sword and armor equal to scale mail or better.  Cavaliers must meet this requirement and  acquire a warhorse, lance, and shield.  As a result, cavaliers will always start out in debt to some patron.  As we haven't had any cavaliers yet, I haven't worked out how this would pan out.  Thieves are not required to purchase a set of "picks and tools."  I mean c'mon, 30 geepees for a set of effin' bobby pins?!  What the hell are they made out of? 

Some other pertinent modifications:

Wisdom
Wisdom = keenness of senses.  It has no bearing on one's ability to commune with a deity, nor does it measure your willpower, guile, intuition, or judgment.  It measures how oblivious you are to your surroundings and that is that. What, you ask, does keenness of senses have to do with the actual meaning of the word "wisdom"?  I don't give a crap anymore.  For my purposes, dwarves and orcs aren't particularly keen; elves are. While every class has reason to want be keen-sensed--less likely to be surprised, better at finding secret doors and the like--thieves and rangers in particular pride themselves on being keen.  Clerics do not benefit any more from a high wisdom than anyone else.*   Man, that's a load off my back.  Shoulda' done that years ago.

*Actually, there are no clerics in our current party. And we don't miss them at all.

Favored/Off Abilities
In the spirit of perpetuating stereotypes, I  am continuing the tradition of non-human ability preferences established long, long ago.   But rather than a straight up +/-1 to certain preferred/lamented ability rolls as is generally the case in D&D-type games, prime/off abilities provide restrictions as to how demi-humans can use the gold swap feature swap abilities.  Basically: prime abilities can never, ever be lowered in a swap with your gold roll, while off abilities, conversely, cannot be raised.

So Melfrond the elf rolls an 8 for Str, a 15 for Con, and a 9 for Gold.  Elves cannot raise their str or con with a gold swap, so he's stuck with the 8 str, but since his Con roll is higher than his gold, he could swap out the 15 Con, netting himself 60 extra gps to go shopping with.  Now he has enough to get a long bow and some chainmail.


Optional rule that I just thought of but which seems much more direct: If a non-human character's favored ability is lower than his or her off-ability, then the two can be swapped.  In the case of elves and orcs--who have 2 favored abilities--if both favored abilities are lower than one of the off abilities then the character dies of alopecia in 1d20 hours.  Any characters who have spoken to the afflicted before he dies must make a saving throw or likewise meet a hairless end. EDIT 11/2/11: After some playtesting, the focus group showed a strong preference for this rule.  Only humans can swap their gold with another ability if they so choose.  When we made up our last batch of characters not only did we not have any non-human characters, but we also found that folks were more likely to trade a low gold roll for a higher ability score than a low ability roll for high gold except in cases where the gold role was very high--say 15 or higher. Also, the alopecia thing was just a joke.  It's not really contagious.

Exp Bonus
We've done away with prime abilities; having a high strength is inherently advantageous to fighters, but it does not mean they are better at improving their fighter skills.  Same goes for everyone else.  Instead, Intelligence--in its aptitude aspect--affects experience bonus for all classes.  Int bonus x 5 = % exp bonus/penalty.  So a low Int character of any class is going to progress slower than his smarter brethren. 

Half- Races

This might not sound very sensitive but I'm gonna' say it: Just say no to mongrels!  In my world, elves are not particularly fertile--the elfmaid estrous cycle is decades long and it's unlikely in the extreme that a human female would ever succumb to the effete charms of an elfgroom--and human-elf pairings are exceedingly rare; as such half-elves are so rare that they can be dealt with on a case by case basis.  And half orcs are straight-up, full-on orcs. 


Also:

Apparently it's Halloween today which means... discount pumpkins!!!