Hi! Reading through Chain of Command I think I found a typo: the parrying section (pg. 187) reads "The ability of a defender to parry depends on how much greater their weapon class is compared to that of their attacker", but it should be "The ability of a defender to parry depends on how much lower their weapon class is compared to that of their attacker".
Also, the weapon breaking in case of a kill score is the defender one, not the attacker one.
The idea being that only similar weapon (or lighter and faster ones) can engage in parrying, with the added possibility for the defender weapon to break, denying an otherwise killing blow.
Was literally looking over that part in FMC last night and it did strike me as a bit odd, my immediate thought was to things like the parrying dagger. A weightier thing like a polearm wouldn't be able to parry a dagger too well when in close combat unless imagining the pole part being used to absorb the cut from the dagger. I guess on the opposite end, though, I find it hard to imagine daggers doing too well against a polearm. Once they get far enough apart the techniques are drastically different.
I see what might have happened, given the wording in Chainmail, but it does seem like the faster (lower classed) weapons get a chance to parry, originally, as you said. The problem here is, it seems odd that weapons with a higher class, with their pretty much sole advantage of attacking first in the initial engagement, seem to lose that advantage with this subsystem, given the language about "first blows" seeming to mean the first strike of the engagement. I feel like it makes sense if in close combat already, where both opponents could already reach each other, but the initial chance to hit should go to the character with more reach, I think. It does seem like it makes an exception for pikes, spears, and lances (but not polearms apparently): if there's a charge, then those weapons get priority in the first round, but I feel like I'd want to expand on this.
Combine this system with the generally rougher time lighter class weapons get versus most defensive types, though, maybe it evens out?
One thing to remember is that Chainmail rules were used in a wargame, and then imported to be used in a proto-ttrpg, so the rules makes sense the most applied to the former, when a single strike is straight up a kill.
Keeping that in mind, as you also point out, daggers and hand axe have a very low chance to hit an armored opponent, while higher class weapon like two handed swords are arguably the best weapon by a large margin, speaking strictly about chance to hit the opponent.
The lowest class weapon to be kind of reliable is the Mace (Class 3), that if pitted against a 2h sword (Class 10) has a difference of 7 classes, so the mace wielder gets the choice of having first blow OR parry, not both. In this case, it's a gamble: since the 2h sword has higher chance of hitting, you could forgo first strike and parry, getting a counterblow in case of success; or maybe you could go "all in" attacking first...but if you miss, the 2h sword has an higher chance to strike without a parry reducing the roll.
The flail seems to have one of the best overall to-hit, which strikes me as a bit strange, but maybe since it's in the middle it's got the problem of not being dedicated enough in speed or in reach
Highly enjoyed every part of this book. Reading the blurb at the end, I greatly appreciate your honesty in why you've created FMC. This is possibly my favorite OD&D clone, like you said it's like a mirror that gives you what you put in.
Received my copy from Lulu today. It's wonderful and fills a heretofore unaddressed niche in the OD&D OSR scene: re-presenting the original 1974 rules while retaining all of the ambiguities that really force you to think, craft, and make the game your own for your table.
Delving Deeper serves a similar purpose, but does away with as many ambiguities as it can in the name of making the game more immediately playable. That's the other retroclone I wholeheartedly recommend anyone interested in OD&D in this day and age check out.
This is a most excellent resource, and also a reminder of the beginnings of the hobby. Also thanks especially for both your postface and your invitation of critique at the end.
Do you plan on adding more to the appendix in the future, or optional rules as its called there?
I received my printed copy the other week and its been as wonderful as I expected it to be. Been excitedly following this project's progress for a while. Also, I appreciate that this retroclone has a specific "raison d'etre" that goes beyond just republishing rules for use, but as a critique of a foundational game to TTRPGs, both from a perspective of rules as they foster gameplay as well as how they foster an ideology. Excellent work!
One has to be either home-schooled by orcs or a hypocrite to call Gygax & Arneson fascist, all the while copying their work, and making money off of it.
Omega based book. Loved everything about it, and to think this is free! Marcia, you did an AMAZING job, I appreciate it a lot. As long as you keep creating TTRPG stuff, I'll be closely watching and supporting. The OSR is for everyone
Got my Lulu copy today and it's ah-mazing. Absolutely worth the wait (but don't do that to us again, mkay? ;p) Thanks so much, once again, to you and the rest of the team for a valuable resource for both silly gaming and the research thereof.
While I'm here, I've caught an erroneous page ref. (And let me know if you'd rather have these, should I spot more, sent somewhere else or not at all.)
p270, last paragraph: the 20-sided tables are on pp. 246-249 (and not 240-243).
Love this work! On the Simple Skirmish system in Appendix B, would you allow a player character or high HD character to make multiple attacks by dividing their HD i.e a A level 4 Fighter makes 2 attacks as a level 2 Fighter?
Alternatively, given a high HD creature such as a Giant would normally have multiple attacks against a low level party of PCs (if not higher level), can they roll to hit multiple PCs? If so, have you ruled / would you rule to "divide" the damage roll amongst PCs that have been hit?
I'm sure much of this is purposefully left to the Referee, but I'm interested in your opinions if you have any!
thank you so much! yes, i’ve allowed players to split or combine attacks as they wish—the default in the LBBs is that characters have 1 attack per hit die (against regular figures), so the idea is just that you can choose to combine them instead though you are not forced to.
i probably would not allow monsters who already have multiple attacks or damage dice to keep them; instead, i would consider that to be encapsulated/replaced by the simple skirmish system which just looks at their hit dice.
thank you so much! :) and while i rewrote the dungeon to be more like interesting (lol), the LBBs are full of references to mars and especially the john carter canon! what comes to mind in particular are the desert encounters being split between regular and martian ones.
A nice book overall that i think is a bit sullied by that "intentionally left blank" part at the end. I like the little playing with format ALA house of leaves but i cannot disagree with the message more. I even agree with the message after that and in this very page, but to call the likes of Gygax and Arnessen racists and fascists is preposterous, insulting and frankly misguided.
hi there! i don’t think it’s possible to read the text critically, as a product of its cultural context, and not arrive at the conclusion that the authors were influenced by a socially ingrained prejudice against indigenous people (especially considering the western genre’s influence on sword-and-sorcery pulp literature). luckily for us, gygax explains this himself in a forum post from 2005, comparing the position of lawful-good characters who are obliged to slay evil characters (where evil, above all else, is a racial categorization) to the position of american soldiers killing not only native american warriors but women and children (“nits make lice”). again, i think all this is quite clear from the text itself, but this interpretation agrees entirely with gygax’s own. take it up with him!
Gygax was definitely a racist and a generally terrible person. In addition to the post already linked, he also said some absolutely terrible stuff about women. Arneson is much less clear to me as he didn't seem to engage as much online back while he was still alive, but given the crowd he kept and where he was I wouldn't be surprised.
'Definitely' and 'terrible person'. I'm sure this person knows this from experience and knew Gygax. They couldn't possibly be basing this on their own priors, confirmation bias, or limited data from like-minded folks.
Gygax's own words, viewed in a convenient way can be shown to mean many things. People pick the exact same (essentially) few lines to nail him on stuff. He certainly was a believer in good and evil. Heck, he was a Jehovah's Witness. He had essentialist ideas. Sometimes monsters are just that ... the zombie isn't nice, the orc is part monster ... whatever... I am opposed to essentialism but am adult enough to recognize this is not just a basic fantasy trope, but a basic (flawed) human impulse throughout all of human history and is still alive in (most?) many areas of the world today. Is it nice? Of course not. It's often used in attacks from both sides of a debate. Lumping together people of color when convenient or beneficial, and calling it racist when not. The primary thing done by posting about it is to explain who you are likely to vote for in an election what organizations you probably sympathize with or rail against, what charities you probably donate to, or what audiences you don't want to deny yourself the money of (obv. not in this case as this is a free product).
Was he gross towards women? Again, I'm sure a random internet person knows based on personal time spent with him not just hearsay. Maybe he was, heck he probably was based upon current mores and perhaps those of the time. If so - it's irrelevant to pretty much anything. When the radio station plays Thriller - it doesn't make them complicit in child sexual abuse to not mention that Jackson was a likely abuser. I don't expect all albums, art, books, products, and films by anyone to begin including muck-raking about how the person had unseemly feelings, thoughts, or actions (even if unfalsifiable). Owning a Ford doesn't imply I support anti-semitism. Seriously, microscopically few people care about these modern comments on the lives/works of dead people.
Ridiculously long story short, who cares what random people say? It's a them 'problem'. Cut the offending pages out of the book if you don't like them and then ritualistically burn them while listening to Beat It sitting in your Ford motorcar and enjoying culturally appropriated food.
Congratulations on completing FMC. As I stated before I believe this work will endure for many years to come as it fills a niche no other previous work as quite mastered. It is a faithful reproduction of the original rules presented as simply as possible in a modern concise style. I love it.
Very interested in this set of rules. I've just discovered them and must commend you on some terrific work. The only comment I have at this time is about the digital character record sheet created by Milton (@QuietMastermind). It might be me, but it seems this sheet is locked and I am unable to use the sheet.
I don't know how to leave a review, but you've done an excellent job clarifying the rules of the original 1974 game. This is an amazing standalone game and an essential companion to the1974 rules.
thank you! and is there a specific question about the combat tables i can answer for you? they’re a matrix of d20 target numbers based on the attacker’s type/level and the defender’s armor class.
When looking at your version of the Man-to-Man table from Chainmail, why did you not decide to keep armor class consistent with either the descending or ascending system? Chainmail itself doesn't give them another armor system, so this decision seems to further complicate matters where it doesn't need to be?
thank you! and chainmail lists armor classes from 1 to 8 rather than from 9 to 2 (or from 10 to 17, which is extremely modern). descending armor class as it appears in D&D is a post-chainmail modification by gygax, seemingly because a system similar to target-20 may have been used in the game at some time prior to publication.
i thought it’d be more interesting to have the original values to encourage people to look at it as a distinct set of rules.
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hello. thanks for this nice book. Is the versions on lulu updated to Gamma?
Hi! Reading through Chain of Command I think I found a typo: the parrying section (pg. 187) reads "The ability of a defender to parry depends on how much greater their weapon class is compared to that of their attacker", but it should be "The ability of a defender to parry depends on how much lower their weapon class is compared to that of their attacker".
Also, the weapon breaking in case of a kill score is the defender one, not the attacker one.
The idea being that only similar weapon (or lighter and faster ones) can engage in parrying, with the added possibility for the defender weapon to break, denying an otherwise killing blow.
Was literally looking over that part in FMC last night and it did strike me as a bit odd, my immediate thought was to things like the parrying dagger. A weightier thing like a polearm wouldn't be able to parry a dagger too well when in close combat unless imagining the pole part being used to absorb the cut from the dagger. I guess on the opposite end, though, I find it hard to imagine daggers doing too well against a polearm. Once they get far enough apart the techniques are drastically different.
I see what might have happened, given the wording in Chainmail, but it does seem like the faster (lower classed) weapons get a chance to parry, originally, as you said. The problem here is, it seems odd that weapons with a higher class, with their pretty much sole advantage of attacking first in the initial engagement, seem to lose that advantage with this subsystem, given the language about "first blows" seeming to mean the first strike of the engagement. I feel like it makes sense if in close combat already, where both opponents could already reach each other, but the initial chance to hit should go to the character with more reach, I think. It does seem like it makes an exception for pikes, spears, and lances (but not polearms apparently): if there's a charge, then those weapons get priority in the first round, but I feel like I'd want to expand on this.
Combine this system with the generally rougher time lighter class weapons get versus most defensive types, though, maybe it evens out?
I'm glad you brought this up.
One thing to remember is that Chainmail rules were used in a wargame, and then imported to be used in a proto-ttrpg, so the rules makes sense the most applied to the former, when a single strike is straight up a kill.
Keeping that in mind, as you also point out, daggers and hand axe have a very low chance to hit an armored opponent, while higher class weapon like two handed swords are arguably the best weapon by a large margin, speaking strictly about chance to hit the opponent.
The lowest class weapon to be kind of reliable is the Mace (Class 3), that if pitted against a 2h sword (Class 10) has a difference of 7 classes, so the mace wielder gets the choice of having first blow OR parry, not both. In this case, it's a gamble: since the 2h sword has higher chance of hitting, you could forgo first strike and parry, getting a counterblow in case of success; or maybe you could go "all in" attacking first...but if you miss, the 2h sword has an higher chance to strike without a parry reducing the roll.
The flail seems to have one of the best overall to-hit, which strikes me as a bit strange, but maybe since it's in the middle it's got the problem of not being dedicated enough in speed or in reach
Highly enjoyed every part of this book. Reading the blurb at the end, I greatly appreciate your honesty in why you've created FMC. This is possibly my favorite OD&D clone, like you said it's like a mirror that gives you what you put in.
thank you so much :) really glad you enjoyed it
Received my copy from Lulu today. It's wonderful and fills a heretofore unaddressed niche in the OD&D OSR scene: re-presenting the original 1974 rules while retaining all of the ambiguities that really force you to think, craft, and make the game your own for your table.
Delving Deeper serves a similar purpose, but does away with as many ambiguities as it can in the name of making the game more immediately playable. That's the other retroclone I wholeheartedly recommend anyone interested in OD&D in this day and age check out.
This is an incredible resource. Thanks for all the work.
I'll be ordering a Lulu copy next time I have a basket of stuff to keep shipping costs down.
This is a most excellent resource, and also a reminder of the beginnings of the hobby. Also thanks especially for both your postface and your invitation of critique at the end.
Do you plan on adding more to the appendix in the future, or optional rules as its called there?
I received my printed copy the other week and its been as wonderful as I expected it to be. Been excitedly following this project's progress for a while. Also, I appreciate that this retroclone has a specific "raison d'etre" that goes beyond just republishing rules for use, but as a critique of a foundational game to TTRPGs, both from a perspective of rules as they foster gameplay as well as how they foster an ideology. Excellent work!
One has to be either home-schooled by orcs or a hypocrite to call Gygax & Arneson fascist, all the while copying their work, and making money off of it.
I’m literally not making money off of it. That’s the point! Goodbye.
Omega based book. Loved everything about it, and to think this is free! Marcia, you did an AMAZING job, I appreciate it a lot. As long as you keep creating TTRPG stuff, I'll be closely watching and supporting. The OSR is for everyone
Thank you so much!! That means a lot :)
Got my Lulu copy today and it's ah-mazing. Absolutely worth the wait (but don't do that to us again, mkay? ;p)
Thanks so much, once again, to you and the rest of the team for a valuable resource for both silly gaming and the research thereof.
While I'm here, I've caught an erroneous page ref. (And let me know if you'd rather have these, should I spot more, sent somewhere else or not at all.)
p270, last paragraph: the 20-sided tables are on pp. 246-249 (and not 240-243).
hi eric, thank you so much! so glad you liked it :)
also thank you for catching that! will make a correction and publish in a week, in case others catch any mistakes
Love this work! On the Simple Skirmish system in Appendix B, would you allow a player character or high HD character to make multiple attacks by dividing their HD i.e a A level 4 Fighter makes 2 attacks as a level 2 Fighter?
Alternatively, given a high HD creature such as a Giant would normally have multiple attacks against a low level party of PCs (if not higher level), can they roll to hit multiple PCs? If so, have you ruled / would you rule to "divide" the damage roll amongst PCs that have been hit?
I'm sure much of this is purposefully left to the Referee, but I'm interested in your opinions if you have any!
thank you so much! yes, i’ve allowed players to split or combine attacks as they wish—the default in the LBBs is that characters have 1 attack per hit die (against regular figures), so the idea is just that you can choose to combine them instead though you are not forced to.
i probably would not allow monsters who already have multiple attacks or damage dice to keep them; instead, i would consider that to be encapsulated/replaced by the simple skirmish system which just looks at their hit dice.
It owns that you did this, thank you
Reading it is a fascinating experience, and also the art is wonderful
Is all that Mars stuff really in the original work? Feels very Ultima II, which I guess is appropriate
thank you so much! :) and while i rewrote the dungeon to be more like interesting (lol), the LBBs are full of references to mars and especially the john carter canon! what comes to mind in particular are the desert encounters being split between regular and martian ones.
How about you completely remove the "intentionally left blank" pages and I might consider this.
oh no, surely i need to appease this random person!
"Free" or "at-cost." Take it or leave it lol!
A nice book overall that i think is a bit sullied by that "intentionally left blank" part at the end. I like the little playing with format ALA house of leaves but i cannot disagree with the message more. I even agree with the message after that and in this very page, but to call the likes of Gygax and Arnessen racists and fascists is preposterous, insulting and frankly misguided.
hi there! i don’t think it’s possible to read the text critically, as a product of its cultural context, and not arrive at the conclusion that the authors were influenced by a socially ingrained prejudice against indigenous people (especially considering the western genre’s influence on sword-and-sorcery pulp literature). luckily for us, gygax explains this himself in a forum post from 2005, comparing the position of lawful-good characters who are obliged to slay evil characters (where evil, above all else, is a racial categorization) to the position of american soldiers killing not only native american warriors but women and children (“nits make lice”). again, i think all this is quite clear from the text itself, but this interpretation agrees entirely with gygax’s own. take it up with him!
Gygax was definitely a racist and a generally terrible person. In addition to the post already linked, he also said some absolutely terrible stuff about women. Arneson is much less clear to me as he didn't seem to engage as much online back while he was still alive, but given the crowd he kept and where he was I wouldn't be surprised.
'Definitely' and 'terrible person'. I'm sure this person knows this from experience and knew Gygax. They couldn't possibly be basing this on their own priors, confirmation bias, or limited data from like-minded folks.
Gygax's own words, viewed in a convenient way can be shown to mean many things. People pick the exact same (essentially) few lines to nail him on stuff. He certainly was a believer in good and evil. Heck, he was a Jehovah's Witness. He had essentialist ideas. Sometimes monsters are just that ... the zombie isn't nice, the orc is part monster ... whatever... I am opposed to essentialism but am adult enough to recognize this is not just a basic fantasy trope, but a basic (flawed) human impulse throughout all of human history and is still alive in (most?) many areas of the world today. Is it nice? Of course not. It's often used in attacks from both sides of a debate. Lumping together people of color when convenient or beneficial, and calling it racist when not. The primary thing done by posting about it is to explain who you are likely to vote for in an election what organizations you probably sympathize with or rail against, what charities you probably donate to, or what audiences you don't want to deny yourself the money of (obv. not in this case as this is a free product).
Was he gross towards women? Again, I'm sure a random internet person knows based on personal time spent with him not just hearsay. Maybe he was, heck he probably was based upon current mores and perhaps those of the time. If so - it's irrelevant to pretty much anything. When the radio station plays Thriller - it doesn't make them complicit in child sexual abuse to not mention that Jackson was a likely abuser. I don't expect all albums, art, books, products, and films by anyone to begin including muck-raking about how the person had unseemly feelings, thoughts, or actions (even if unfalsifiable). Owning a Ford doesn't imply I support anti-semitism. Seriously, microscopically few people care about these modern comments on the lives/works of dead people.
Ridiculously long story short, who cares what random people say? It's a them 'problem'. Cut the offending pages out of the book if you don't like them and then ritualistically burn them while listening to Beat It sitting in your Ford motorcar and enjoying culturally appropriated food.
Random person out
Congratulations on completing FMC. As I stated before I believe this work will endure for many years to come as it fills a niche no other previous work as quite mastered. It is a faithful reproduction of the original rules presented as simply as possible in a modern concise style.
I love it.
thank you so much!! that means a lot :)
Amazing
thank you! :)
Very interested in this set of rules. I've just discovered them and must commend you on some terrific work. The only comment I have at this time is about the digital character record sheet created by Milton (@QuietMastermind). It might be me, but it seems this sheet is locked and I am unable to use the sheet.
Thank you!! And it turns out that was my mistake, had a slightly incorrect URL that forces you to view the spreadsheet as an HTML table. :) Fixed now!
Brilliant! Much better now. Thanks for updating the link.
this is unbelievably cool
thank you!
I don't know how to leave a review, but you've done an excellent job clarifying the rules of the original 1974 game. This is an amazing standalone game and an essential companion to the1974 rules.
thank you so much! :)
This looks great.
though i have to say i have no idea what the combat tables on page 25 mean at all. they could probably do with some clarifications
thank you! and is there a specific question about the combat tables i can answer for you? they’re a matrix of d20 target numbers based on the attacker’s type/level and the defender’s armor class.
no further questions, over the past 4 months I understood descending armor class :D
Great work, Marcia! What's the current status/ETA on a full release + POD?
in a couple hours!!!
When looking at your version of the Man-to-Man table from Chainmail, why did you not decide to keep armor class consistent with either the descending or ascending system? Chainmail itself doesn't give them another armor system, so this decision seems to further complicate matters where it doesn't need to be?
Love the work you're doing though!
thank you! and chainmail lists armor classes from 1 to 8 rather than from 9 to 2 (or from 10 to 17, which is extremely modern). descending armor class as it appears in D&D is a post-chainmail modification by gygax, seemingly because a system similar to target-20 may have been used in the game at some time prior to publication.
i thought it’d be more interesting to have the original values to encourage people to look at it as a distinct set of rules.