Laughing Leviathan

Knave is a rules-lite tabletop rpg written by Ben Milton of Questing Beast  (and available here ). It's OSR compatible, incredibly easy to teach, and even easier to run. Between reading its seven-page rulebook, and rolling characters, you and your players will be dungeoneering and adventuring within minutes. For starters, it's a fairly standard d20+mod roll-over system (as in, roll higher than a target number). If you're experienced with Dungeons & Dragons 5e or Pathfinder , more than anything you're going to be spending more time unlearning  things than having to learn anything new. What I loved For being so lightweight, it's actually pretty hard to pick a feature that I love the most. Every mechanic and rule within the book has purpose and weight, and is balanced well within the system. Things just make sense. Each of its six traditional ability scores (Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom, Charisma) share equal importance so there...

This is part 2 of my series where I explore magic in Dungeons & Dragons 5e that manages to be everything but magical. You can read the first post here . Today's entry is going to be focused on magic food and drink, and how to make what's mundane into something fun. Whining and Dining For the purpose of this series, I'm going to ignore the Outlander background and half of the Ranger traits, even though my primary complaint about these spells could probably apply to those things too. My main issue with these spells, is that they can completely trivialize a part of the game that can be oh so fun for some groups: survival. Finding food and drink while in the wilderness, or a mile underground, or even on another Plane of Mild Existence can lead to some amazingly fun situations, or even prop up an entire adventure on its own, assuming you actually use and enforce inventory slots, scarcity, and food / water requirements in your game, that is. I'm not even sure that...

This isn't a language of the gods or celestial beings, it's The First Language , used by those primordial beings before there was sound and light. I mean, technically, anyone can understand it, but not anyone can use it. It bypasses translations and words. Like how some languages are based on intonation or pitch, The First Language is based on conviction and sheer force of will. Lacunas , or words without translation between languages are all over the place because of a lack of context in different cultures. For The First Language however, there are no questions, no expressions of doubt or fear. It's not a matter of being able to intonate or enunciate . Speaking it is a matter of knowing your truth and projecting that forward onto another. Hearing it, if you can even call it that, is knowing and accepting the Truth laid bare before you. If you know it to be true, you understand it. If not, then you don't. If a creature hears it, they make a Wisdom saving throw or ...

This is the beginning of a series of posts that addresses what I like to call, "No-Fun Magic". To me, "No-Fun Magic" are spells and abilities that don't necessarily add anything to the game, interact in any meaningful way, and whose purpose is solely to skip a part of the game or act as a specific answer to another magic spell. Although this can be applied to any game where these spells exists, this series is a direct response to my time spent playing Dungeons & Dragons 5e, so take that as you will. First up on the chopping block is the 3rd level Abjuration spell Dispel Magic. I like it because it's a classic, both in D&D and fantasy fiction in general. Wizards cast spells and sometimes those are bad spells. Other wizards then casts spells to undo those bad things. Or vice versa, good and bad are just words. Whatever. What I don't like about it (at least, in D&D 5e) is how boring it is. If there's a magical barrier or trap, then as lon...

Knave is a great chassis of an rpg for modding and hacking, and it seems that the first thing that most game designers see is a need for class customization in an otherwise classless system. I'm no different. Here's a stab in the dark at trying to add a little more character customization. Knacks As characters level, they reveal themselves to either have obtained or show a natural knack for different aspects of dungeoneering. At levels 3, 6, and 9, instead of increasing three abilities by one point, they increase a single ability by one point and roll on one of the following tables. (I guess your players can pick one if they want, but rolling is usually more fun, and that's what matters).  Fighting       +1 boon on attack rolls        +1 boon on stunts        Deal damage equal to your Strength on a successful stunt       Ignore losing 1 point of quality on armor or extra damage when an attacker r...