madmous

[madmous]

You can now delve the pages of the revised rules yourself! Get ODD revised rules vol. 1 here:

Delving the ODD

I'm in the process of creating revised rules for my game One Depth Deeper, a game inspired by Original 1974 D&D.

ODD revised adds a lot of variant rules inspired by my other game CRAWLR. Focusing on simple and fast adventuring and easy to generate and run dungeons.

In addition to new rules, new balances, and a new layout, it will also be fully illustrated by yours truly.

[madmous]

Delving the ODD

I'm in the process of creating revised rules for my game One Depth Deeper, a game inspired by Original 1974 D&D.

ODD revised adds a lot of variant rules inspired by my other game CRAWLR. Focusing on simple and fast adventuring and easy to generate and run dungeons.

In addition to new rules, new balances, and a new layout, it will also be fully illustrated by yours truly.

[madmous]

The Cauldron stirs…

“Life emerges from the primordial black sludge of the Cauldron. The descendants of dead men, born to walk the earth until their end, berthed into the flame of life until the darkness once more steals it away.”

I have made a character generator for ODD: One Depth Deeper on perchance. I was unable to figure out how to connect the hp die with the class because of its multi layers, and I have never coded anything in any language, but it’s something. It’s fun and easy to spawn a few characters. It currently only makes human characters (which are the predominant walks of life in ODD anyways) but just be aware of that.

[madmous]

Designing Doors

I’ve been working on a Heroquest inspired dungeon crawler for some time. It has deviated greatly from the original plan, and barely resembles Heroquest, but has become a very fun and robust solo/co op dungeon crawler. Lately I’ve been working on designing how I wanted doors to work.

In Heroquest, all doors are the same. Standard doors that when opened reveal a room. Door “traps” usually consisted of an unavoidable spike or pit trap placed on the tile directly after the door (in the room so you couldn’t “search” for the trap, as you had to enter the room to search it for traps. Truely cruel design!) I of course have never been a fan of this, as I think doors are a major aspect to the dungeon, and should present much more interesting gameplay mechanics. Thusly there are three types of doors.

Standard: these are your basic open and close dungeon door.

Locked: requiring a “key” or skilled thief to open. Any door may be broken down, but that makes noise, increasing the odds of a random encounter.

Trapped: a trapped door will spawn a trap on a door, immediately triggering upon opening. These traps only affect the person who opened the door (except in rare cases, one would have to see the trap section of the instruction booklet)

A door may be “searched” however that takes time, but ultimately allows the player to look at the base of the door to see if it is trapped or not. (Otherwise they simply look at the door base when activating it). Treasure chests follow all the same rules, with an extra type; “Empty”, thus no treasure roll is made. Roughly 50% of doors are standard, 25% are trapped, and 25% are locked.

Finally there are secret passages that can be found when 1. Looting a room, or 2. When a dead end is encountered in a dungeon, and there is no possible way to proceed. Secret passages allow directions of travel that are not normally allowed, and are the only 1 square wide passages in the game (meaning they can be door camped)

[madmous]

ODD: One Depth Deeper

I've released a hack of the first volume of the original 1974 Dungeons and Dragons onto my itch.io page (for free!) If your interested you can find the rules here: https://blk-feather-press.itch.io/odd

[madmous]

The maze halls of Lorrelwyn

Somewhere beneath the well of Lor lies a lost city. It's vast caverns and halls carved into the very foundation of the underdark. It once thrived, the denizens of Lorrelwyn harvesting fruits from the underground jungle that once grew by the vast sea of shadows.

I wonder what happened to that land and its citizens. Do you think they dream of the sun, or are content with living their lives under their bioluminescent stars?

[madmous]

"Riding the Cold Wind to Valhalla" -- Thomas O Miller's cover art for the Ral Partha 1993 Catalog of miniatures, reversed from the box art for dragon miniature 10-462 with the same name, and also available that year on a T-shirt

[madmous]

The Crematorii Lostad

Under the weeping moon, Only the lost wander the ashen sands of the Crematorii. The dead lands ring with a rhythmic drone of the keystones, yet no wind blows. It is said that those who stay here long enough soon lose their attachment to the world, their soul drifts away and their body fades to dust and ash.

Soooo, I forgot my login information so that’s why I hadn’t posted in so long. I’m hoping to return though, hopefully with more updates for CRAWLR and the wider world of Lystara in the future. Also, if you would like to find some of my projects, they are available here: https://blk-feather-press.itch.io

[madmous]

Thystl and the God in the Lantern

Thystl was born on the moss. At a young age she caught the withering sickness and had to be treated with the Ritual of Wyrms or she would have perished. Normally that would give one the ability to cast magic but while she can cast magic, she cannot control it. Now she works as a thief and mercenary in the grand city of Lystara.

The god Aefyr was once a grand god of light back when man first stumbled upon fire. Many things and beings were sacrificed to the greater god by being thrown into his all consuming flame. Even the dead sought passage into the next life through the embrace of flame for he was not only the god of fire light, but the guardian of the dead.

However he has been long forgotten, a burning ember buried deep within the crypts of the undercity of Lystara, that was until Thystl seeking treasure had stumble onto his humble abode in the darkness.

[madmous]

The Serpents Glare

Magic in CRAWLR is fairly basic, split into currently 6 levels with the levels being the number of spellslots (or “mana”) a spell consumes. Casting at higher “levels” doesn’t just increase the effects but also the cost. Where it gets interesting is the spells have a random attached magical requirement and spells of any level can be cast from wizards of any level.

Sorcery also requires personal sacrifice, meaning players must give up years from their characters life to obtain the ability to cast. This means it’s actually rare for younger persons to have the ability to cast magic.

[madmous]

Saint Caelwyn Slays the Great Wyrm

The opening art to my TTRPG thusly called CRAWLR is a depiction of one of the six saints who slew the Wyrms that were believed to be causing all sorts of terrible harm and calamity to the world. Though this may be later believed to be untrue as after the final Wyrm was killed (there are six in total, one for each Saint) the world was plunged into darkness. Humans moved underground, never to see the surface again. The Saints disappeared shortly after the catastrophic event.

Caelwyn is the patron saint of AlderBurrow. One of the Six great Cathedrals of the Hallow.

[madmous]

Printing PDFs for personal use

Many TTRPGs offer supplements and additional content as pdfs that are not accessible in any other format. An easy way to get them physical is to get them printed. The One Ring 2e offers a solo gaming experience known as strider mode, but as mentioned earlier it only some sim PDF, so I decided to print it. The print was done through Staples printing service, 32lb paper feels nice and hefty. For general gameplay I would recommend something more akin to spiral bound do to the nature of the pdf being able to lay flat but I collect a lot of these so wanted to see the quality of the style of binding (some with a clear cover front and black back) and overall I can say I’m VERY pleased.

Now don’t get me wrong, if the one ring printed their own version I probably would buy it in a heartbeat, but at the moment they don’t. I can’t digest material off a screen particularly well so this is my workaround. Additionally this is NOT cheaper than buying their books, in fact it cost me almost as much to print as it did to buy their normal supplement books so just be aware.

[madmous]

Born again from the primordial sludge that oozes from the world beyond.

[madmous]

The meat and bones

A combat system is generally fairly important to most dungeon crawling TTRPGs, and while CRAWLR certainly isn’t trying to break new ground, it is trying to keep it fun but simple. Roll 2d6 and deal some damage! Weapons in CRAWLR all have the same cap out point, they deal 1-6 damage, with light weapons (such as daggers and short swords or throwing axes) being able to be held in the off hand but dealing the lowest amount of damage on average. Arming swords, rapiers, hand axes, maces and the sort do 1d6 damage, and heavy weapons (anything two handed) deals the highest on average.

Not included on this page are updated rebalancing for Equipment (just gunna have to see the final product for that.

I also have not done an editing read through yet, I plan on doing that when everything is done.

[madmous]

Violence is the best way to deal with the undead

The undead lurks silently in their haunts. The only noise they make is the creaking of their bones and the clinking of their armor, assuming they are awake and moving. Most of the time the undead rest until disturbed, after which they will assemble themselves and ambush unexpecting adventurers.

Most undead are held together by magic, in which case a dispel magic spell can dissipate them, at least for a while. Holy water can permanently kill them, and so can destroying their bones into fragments, otherwise they will continue to reassemble and fight on until you join their ranks.

[madmous]

Sketch of Caelwyn slaying the Wyrm

One of the opening spreads for CRAWLR: Dead in the Dungeon edition will be of Caelwyn, one of the six saints. Here is an artistic rendering of her victory over a wyrm that had been terrorizing the city of Alsthorpe for some time.

More than anything this is a look into my process. I’m doing all of the writing, design, typesetting and art for CRAWLR. One of my weakness is drawing larger pieces so I wanted to challange myself. To help with the idea, and because I loved the original, this is based off of an engraving of similar imagery. Sainthood is something I plan on going into more detail, particularly with reference to the old gods (the old gods are long dead).

[madmous]

The first page of my TTRPG “CRAWLR: dead in the dungeon edition”.

I was heavily inspired by the more hectic and chaotic layout of Mork Borg. I wanted to improve on my design sensibilities by trying to free my mind from the rigid cage of straight lines. More so, I wanted to do something a bit different for a system that’s a bit different. CRAWLR is a 2d6 conversion of dungeons and dragons. It’s meant to be used with older school editions of D&D. I decided to make it that way because I had been playing game books while moving around a lot and didn’t have access to any dice but 2d6 I found in a box.

There is a free CRAWLR Basic that will be uploaded later after a final pass.