Old School Hack: A Free Tabletop D&D-Style RPG

TheWhaleShark

Old School Hack is a free beta tabletop RPG where you take on the role of old-school D&D adventurers going on old-school D&D adventures. Monsters and treasure and maidens and crap.

These rules are beta, so the game is a little on the rough side. However, as is the case with Danger Patrol, the core mechanics of the game are solid. Other than stats and crap like that, this game's main gimmick is called: the Awesome Point.

At that start of the game, the DM puts some chips into The Bowl, which is at the center of the table. Whenever a player does something awesome, anyone and everyone can reach into The Bowl and give that player an Awesome Point - but you can only give one each (I think - the rules are a touch unclear here). You can spend Awesome Points to do awesome stuff like hitting harder, improving a roll, healing a wound, using certain talents, creating an NPC on the fly, or other such awesome things.

And, yes, if you use an Awesome Point to do something awesome, you can get more Awesome Points.

What happens if The Bowl is empty? Oops, no more Awesome Points to spread around. However, the DM has access to The Stack. The Stack is basically a giant pile of infinite Awesome Points which only he may spend. The DM can pull some bullshit and spend Awesome Points from The Stack; he then puts those spent points into The Bowl.

So the flow is: The DM pulls some bullshit and spends Awesome Points from The Stack, which fills The Bowl, from which players may draw Awesome Points when they do awesome things. Then they spend those Awesome Points to do awesome things, and give those points back to The Stack, from which the DM pulls more bullshit.

Once every single player in the party has spent 12 Awesome Points each, the entire party levels up!

Check it out. Seems like a pretty awesome game to me.

EDIT: According to the game designer, multiple rewards are allowed but probably a bad idea. The rule of thumb is that you should start with (2.5 x the number of players) Awesome Points in The Bowl. Obviously, if everyone decides to give someone 5 Awesome Points at once, that's way fewer Awesome Points to give to everyone else.

La Petit Mort

That's a mechanic that my DM has been using for years in his D&D campagin, except for the fact that we get falcon punches.

TheWhaleShark

That's a mechanic that my DM has been using for years in his D&D; campagin, except for the fact that we getfalcon punches.

Is it a similar player-decided system? Or is it the DM's decision? I'm a big fan of mechanics which are largely player-driven. Makes my job as a DM that much easier.

Apreche

That mechanic is in almost every RPG. In Prime Time Adventures it is known as fan mail. In Freemarket it is known as an Attaboy. I personally don't see what the difference is between playing this Old School Hack game and actually playing D&D or HackMaster in an old school hack scenario.

TheWhaleShark

I personally don't see what the difference is between playing this Old School Hack game and actually playing D&D; or HackMaster in an old school hack scenario.

Did you read the rules? They're quite streamlined. I just pointed out the Awesome Point thing as the primary mode of player-directed narrative. The game is substantially different and far more abstracted than D&D; or Hackmaster.

Also, pointing out two RPG's is not "almost every RPG." The Awesome Points are literally the only way to advance, and there's a strict economy about them that drives the entire narrative of the game. That colors the pace of the game and the story it tells, which is yet another reason to play this over, say, D&D.;

Burning Wheel has nothing like this. InSpectres has nothing like this. 1001 Nights doesn't do anything like this. Play it because it's a different game than every other RPG.

Apsup

Play it because it's a different game than every other RPG.

Err. Did you miss the link for Red Box Hack on the site for that game. It's game with pretty similar idea, old-school D&D; feel with more modern streamlined rules. Haven't read the rules for Old School Hack yet, so I can't say anything more about that, yet.

Rym

Freemarket has a similar economy of success, but it's more abstracted and there is less control.

TheWhaleShark

Did you miss the link for Red Box Hack on the site for that game.

OK, OK. It's very similar to Red Box Hack, which is no longer developed. The developer of this game describes his game thusly:

For those in the system designy know I guess you could call it a Prime-Time Adventuresish Basic/Expert dressing over the Red Box Engine with a pepper-grinding of Fourth Edition. There's still a pretty strong DM/player line and the game's definitely more tactical compared to RBH but I think the spirit is Old School Make-it-up-as-you-go D&D; emergent story from exploration.

Red Box Hack is definitely a different game, and the flavors are very different. Similar, but still specifically different.

TheWhaleShark

Freemarket has a similar economy of success, but it's more abstracted and there is less control.

I still have to play Freemarket, but this is definitely a very tightly controlled flow of success. It has a bit of a competitive/cooperative feel to it; everybody has to spend 12 AP each in order to level up, and you can only level up when everyone has spent those 12 AP. So, you're all in it together. However, AP drives individual success (well, technically, it just enhances your success, and allows you to buy narrative power), and because quantity is limited, you'll be encouraged to try to earn yours.

I'm interested to see how this plays out. It feels like it might escalate in the same way that Danger Patrol does, except that it looks like you can actually fail in this game.

Apreche

Now that AP, I like.

Also, we can play Freemarket any time, but I'm getting kinda tired of running it. I want to play it. Having been the Superuser so many times now, I see all kinds of awesome possibilities as the user.

Rym

Hmm.. It's close to a zero-sum advancement cycle. Zero sum adds a level of urgency that Burning Wheel doesn't have. Think "I'm only handing out three persona points this session: first-come, first-served! GoGoGo!"

TheWhaleShark

Think "I'm only handing out three persona points this session: first-come, first-served! GoGoGo!"

Bingo.

But, if the DM wants to be just as awesome as the players, he has to give them the opportunity to earn more AP.

The rules provide "guidelines" to the DM for how much AP to Feed to The Bowl (and I did provide the creator with a lot of feedback about getting concrete with things), but a good example is: it costs a player 2 AP to introduce an NPC, and it costs the DM 2 AP from The Stack to The Bowl in order to bring in reinforcements. Want your bad guy to live? Throw 2 AP in The Bowl to heal a point of damage. A player can also spend 2 AP to heal a point of damage.

It's definitely a game that gives the DM a lot of pacing control, and gives most of the narrative power to the players.

WindUpBird

Ooooh. I want to start a group for this. It would be easy to Skype- or Mumble-play this, too.

TheWhaleShark

There's a thread talking about this game on the Story Games forums. This is where I first heard about this game.

As I said, the game is pretty beta, so there are no real rules or guidelines for overall session structure. This was my suggestion:

I would like to see rules for non-dungeon stuff. I sort of envision three "states" of the story of an adventuring party. You're either:

1. Around Town - this is where you rest, investigate, interact with NPC's, buy stuff, and find out about adventures
2. On the Road - this is where you're traveling, roleplaying and interacting with the other PC's, and possibly encountering wilderness hazards
3. In the Dungeon - this is where you've arrived at your adventuring destination and now have to delve and explore and such

These are really sort of broad ideas that inform the sorts of arenas that would exist at that particularly part of the story. It also helps to categorize the sorts of actions that are appropriate. I think it would really strengthen the game to have a page or two talking about how to run parts of the game that aren't just fighting at adventuring locales. Break the phases out and structure them more.

Basically, you can structure your game by combining those three "states" in various ways, and bridging from one to another. Each area should subsequently inform the locales for adventuring, and the Arenas in those locales.

Apsup

I skimmed trough the rules and I'm re-reading the red box hack. If I would have to choose I would go with red-box-hack. Most of the interesting and cool things in Old-School-Hack is straight out of RBH and I like RBHs take on combat, which seems faster and more flowing. On the other hand Old-School-hack doesn't have Disney Bears. I'm not sure if that's a good point or not though.

TheWhaleShark

I skimmed trough the rules and I'm re-reading the red box hack. If I would have to choose I would go with red-box-hack. Most of the interesting and cool things in Old-School-Hack is straight out of RBH and I like RBHs take on combat, which seems faster and more flowing. On the other hand Old-School-hack doesn't have Disney Bears. I'm not sure if that's a good point or not though.

I disagree. The core of the game - the AP economy - is totally different between the two games. That makes them fundamentally, and hugely, different.

Since OSH requires everyone to be awesome before they advance, you'll get into situations where you want to help other players be awesome so they can get AP and have everyone advance. RBH has its Awesome Tokens remain a very individual thing. Additionally, the infinite supply in RBH strips any sort of pacing control from the DM. In OSH, the DM can carefully control the flow of AP into The Bowl to adjust the pace of the game and keep people interested.

I vastly prefer the economy of success in OSH to the infinite supply in RBH.

WindUpBird

Awesome Points remind me of Fate Points, but I like the AP economy and multi-purpose nature of the points more.

Is the engine open-source?

TheWhaleShark

Awesome Points remind me of Fate Points, but I like the AP economy and multi-purpose nature of the points more.

Is the engine open-source?

It's derived from the Red Box Hack, which seems to be open according to the developer:

"If you still have the inclination to do anything with RBH, such as translations, hacking, or small press publishing, then please consider the thing to be yours. Do what you'd like with the thing. It's my gift to you for all the feedback and support you've given." Eric Provost, on his blog.

EDIT: Many combat and class mechanics are lifted from RBH, but the economy of Awesome Points is unique to OSH.

WindUpBird

I want to design a really, REALLY gritty RPG where you play a party of outlaws or regulators in the old west. Sort of like Poison'd, but on land; the second expansion would allow you to play in Australia as bushrangers. The other idea right now is an similarly realistic RPG with deep roots in the Napoleonic Wars, Hornblower, and Aubrey-Maturin; the party is a group of officers aboard a man o' war, with all the risks and thrills accompanying that. I'm probably going to use FATE, though.

Apsup

I disagree. The core of the game - the AP economy - is totally different between the two games. That makes them fundamentally, and hugely, different.

I didn't say they aren't different, but there are pieces of rules taken straight out of RBH, not a bad thing, but I just wanted to mention that. And I agree OSH has better Awesome Points and leveling systems, but I like the core rules of RBH better.

TheWhaleShark

I didn't say they aren't different, but there are pieces of rules taken straight out of RBH, not a bad thing, but I just wanted to mention that. And I agree OSH has better Awesome Points and leveling systems, but I like the core rules of RBH better.

You could just streamline the combat in OSH and keep the AP economy. However, I think the economy works better in a more detailed system, as it allows for more chances to be awesome.

Apsup

1. You could just streamline the combat in OSH and keep the AP economy. However, I think the economy works better in a more detailed system, as it allows for more chances to be awesome.

Yea, I rather wouldn't go around making changes like that. Just taking a piece from here and other there and mixing them together, rarely makes game that is better is even as good as the sum of it's parts. OSHs awesome point system isn't something I must have in my game, it's just nice, but not necessary.