Path of Slaying and Looting by Jack Coney

The Path of Slaying & Looting

Alpha Pamphlet. 09.07.24

About the Game

This system is about simulating old school story campaigns where players run around and dig their own graves by upsetting noblemen and generally disturbing the status quo in search of personal fulfilment- while maintaining a facade of performing public services. Who bothers to criticize the personal habits and poor manners of a plumber when their home is flooding with septic? And in the fantasy world, that septic is often armed to the teeth. Doing public good is your character’s way of escaping social constraints. In essence, you’re a badass dandy. Of course, this might come across as overly critical of the old school game. It isn’t meant to be. Did I mention that part about pursuing personal fulfilment? It’s fun. Dungeon crawls are a must, but that’s also one of the flaws of this system. Much like DnD 4E, everything is too damned balanced. At first glance, it’ll look like everyone in the party has niche roles. Let’s not kid ourselves. If you can’t use your skills to handle just about any situation that comes up, you’re not powergaming well. Unlike 4E, though, you have to actually explain how the knowledge skill applies to fighting that bugbear instead of just adding your intelligence modifier to the damage roll. Maybe that’ll smooth it over. Dig out your sword, don your armor, unleash your cunning strategies. Conquer the world- and look damn good while you do it.

Table of Contents Skill Ranks- page 4 Aggressive/Passive Skills- page 4 Choosing Skills- page 4 Skill List- page 5 Essential Skills- page 6 Character Traits- page 6 Introverted Dive Pool- page 7 Success Rates- page 7 Gaining Drama- page 8 Drama Checks- page 8 Gaining Fortune- page 9 Drama v. Fortune- page 9 Taking Wounds- page 10 Injuries & Disadvantages- page 10 Wound Progression- page 10 Healing- page 11 Dying- page 11 Grudges- page 11 Classes- page 12 Creative Skill uses- page 13 Character Sheets- page 14

Skills and Actions Skill Ranks

Every skill has ranks between 1 and 5. Each rank represents some degree of uncertainty or insecurity- the lower the number, the more efficient the character is at the skill.

5: 3: 1:

Can I do it? Of course I can do it, jackass. Just wait until next time. Then I’ll show you! Next time! What do you mean I’m lying? Yeah, I can do it. Sometimes it’s easier, sometimes it’s harder. I do it anyway, because that’s what I do. Don’t judge me. I do it all the time. I could do it for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and inbetween snacks without getting tired. I do it and I’m good at it.

Aggressive/Passive

Every skill has two ranks, aggressive and passive. In general, the aggressive rank is used when the character is being proactive, such as attacking, or when things are going the characters way. The passive rank is used when the character is being forced into action, such as defending, or when things are going against the character. A character with “(5/1) Kill Things” will fumble with his sword during combat. But if you surprise him, or put him in a hopeless situation, your head is coming off. A character with “(1/5) Kill Things” will slice through any opponent, but a well-placed ambush or overwhelming odds will cut him down to size.

Choosing Skills

The skills are listed on the following page. Choose three of them. Alternatively, for ideas, look through the Classes listed on page 12 which describes a couple of classic builds to make creating that noble paladin, fierce warrior, and eccentric mage all the easier.

Distribute 18 ranks between the aggressive and passive ranks of the skills. An average skill has rank (3/3). Aggressive and passive ranks don’t need to relate to each other: (1/3) is as valid as (5/5).

Kill Things:

It takes a certain gall to be willing to kill another living being. And you have it. Use this skill to slay creatures whether in combat, with a trap, or even poison.

Take Stuff:

Taking those keys makes sense, but carrying 20 short swords and 200 lb worth of copper pieces through a dungeon is a new low. Use this skill to handwave your carrying capacity and otherwise explain why you’re burdening yourself.

Lob Spells:

Decide what flavor of spells you cast. Healing spells remove penalties and aggressive spells disable opponents. Unless you also have Kill Things, though, that fireball spell just knocks out the goblins and leaves them with nasty burns.

Lurk & Stalk:

Use this skill to maneuver around and do generally shifty things like sneaking around or hunting something else down. Unless you have Kill Things, though, that sentry you backstabbed might be bleeding out from twenty stab wounds, but he’s still alive (albeit it very, very unconscious).

Righteousness:

Use this skill to prove just how right you are and how wrong everyone else is. It might be that you are winning an argument or giving someone a wedgie. As long as you’re dominating, this is the skill.

Expertology:

You read it in a pamphlet somewhere, so that makes it true... even if you’re the one that wrote the pamphlet. Use this skill to make up facts and be a know-it-all.

Social Climber:

Use this skill to influence and manipulate your way through social situations, including lying, using diplomacy, and intimidation.

Badass:

Did the dice just tell you that you were injured? Well, the dice were wrong. Why? Because you’re a badass, and it takes more than a polyhedron to hurt a badass. Use this skill to soak damage and generally be an unstoppable monstrosity. Drink that flask of acid and take that punch without flinching.

Essential Skills

Essential skills are skills that every character has. If a character is trying to do something that doesn’t fit with another skill (getting into a sword fight without the Kill Things skill, for example), use one of the following skills:

Survive:

The single most universal skill. If you’re doing anything where your survival is on the line, either directly or indirectly, you can make a survival check. Hope you pass the check.

Ego:

The second most universal skill. If you’re doing anything that doesn’t affect your survival, but that might affect your reputation or sense of glory/self efficacy, make an ego check. Default skills are measured the same way as other skills. At character creation, distribute 12 ranks between agressive and passive ranks of default skills. An average default skill has rank (3/3).

Character Traits

Traits are the fiddly bits you can use to specialize in certain kinds of actions. Traits represent: natural aptitude, training, and/ or exceptional equipment. If your character is particularly healthy, or difficult to dominate, those are traits. If your character is a swordsman or expert pickpoct, those are traits. That magical sword and armor? Those are traits too. Every trait has a value of +1. In general, you can only apply one trait to an action, so diversifying traits is usually handy. We all know you’re an expert with that sword, no need to devote everything to it... maybe you’re good at baking too. During character creation, choose three traits to make your character’s awesomeness unique.

Inverted Dice Pool

Every action is based on a skill. Roll a number of dice equal to your ranks in that skill. The lowest die in the dice pool, plus any appropriate traits, is the success rate of the action. If a character has a “(3/3) Kill Things” skill, they might roll 2, 4, 3. The lowest die is 2. A character with a “(5/5) Kill Things” might roll 2, 5, 6, 6, 5, The lowest die is a 2. A character with “(1/1) Kill Things” might roll 1. The lowest die is 1.

Success Rates

Every action is measured and judged by the value of it’s success rate. Every action has a minimum SR needed for success, showing how much effort is needed to pull it off.

7: 5: 3: 2: 1:

Epic effort is needed. This is the stuff legends are made of. Guess that’s what makes you a hero, huh? Amazing effort is needed. This is on par with olympic athletes and similarly crazy people who sacrifice personal lives for the sake of notable achievements. Impressive effort is needed. If you can pull this off, you’re a contender for sure. This requires training, dedication, or luck. Slightly above average effort is needed. Not exceptional or noteworthy, but worth feeling slightly good about. Your mom might be impressed by this effort, but that’s only because she remembers when you couldn’t wipe yourself.

By contrast, getting an actual result of 7 doesn’t necesarily mean you did something epic. If you only needed a 2 in order to climb a rope, a 7 doesn’t mean you climb the shit out of the rope. It just means you got higher than a 2, so you succeeded. Exceptions to this are at the GM’s discretion. Sometimes it’s pretty cool to climb the shit out of a rope.

Gaining Drama

Every character has a Drama Score. This is the part of the system that lets your argue with the dice. After all, you deserve better than that 1, right? That polyhedron doesn’t know what it’s talking about, so you’d better put it in its place. Drama kicks in after you’ve rolled for an action. For every drama point you choose to gain, remove the lowest die from your dice pool. If you’re down to one die, treat it as having a result of 6. If you gain drama in this way, make a drama check. Drama can also be gained passively at key moments: having the door slam closed behind you when you enter the lair of the final boss is a fine example. Drama measures how close things are to hitting the fan.

Drama Checks

When making a drama check, roll 1d10. If the result is higher than your drama score, you got off scott-free. Congratulations. If the result is equal to or lower than your drama score, things go wrong and your actions have unforseen results. If the drama check was instigated by your action, the action still succeeds or fails without being impeded by the results of the drama check. What the drama check means is that maybe ninjas jump into the room, or maybe the cavern starts collapsing. Maybe the bad guy activates his magical sword. Maybe some shmuck barges into the conference to tell the king that the princess has been kidnapped (for real this time). Drama checks mean things can get weird, fast, and invites the GM to adjudicate to his or her heart’s content for the span of about one round.

Gaining Fortune

If gaining drama points is a cheap way to get around the system, Fortune points are your reward for living inside the box. Every time you make a check and accept the dice results without using Drama, you gain fortune points equal to the size of your dice pool. Fortune points are used to heal your character and buy character improvements. Think of it this way: Your character has “(5/5) Kill Things”. If killing things wasn’t important to you, and you wanted to avoid doing it, you shouldn’t have bothered putting it on your character sheet. Skills are the way your character thinks about solving problems. Your character obviously thinks about killing things as a potential solution to problems... you’re just not effecient at it. Do you, the player, always do the most efficient thing in the real world? Nah. There are things you think you’re good at even when evidence suggests otherwise, or things you think you *could* be good at with more practice. Fortune is the system’s way of rewarding you for letting your character do the same.

Drama v. Fortune

If you roll a 1 on your “(1/1) Kill Things”, that’s pretty lame. You get to choose: gain 1 drama and pop your result up to 6 to be as awesome as you know you can be, or gain 1 measly fortune for being lame at your best trait. Likewise, if you have that “(5/5) Kill Things”, you should expect to be rolling 1’s. If you want to get a 6, you’re going to need to gain a lot of weighty drama points. Being awesome at your worst traits can save you in a pinch, but begs the story to backhand you (obviously you’re doing something dramatic). If you gain fortune instead, though, the system will give you 5 fortune points.

Taking Wounds

Wounds are a measurement of what kind of punishment the character has taken so far. If a character is in a dangerous situation, such as combat or trying to unlock a door in a room with a shrinking ceiling, any checks stand the chance of causing wounds. The value of the wound is equal to the SR needed and the SR the player rolled. For example, a character tries to fight a dragon with a spoon. They need to roll a 7 and they roll a 2. That’s a 5 point wound. Take the following steps: 1) Put the value of the wound next to their score in that skill. 2) Make a Wound check. The dice pool is equal to the the sum of the skill ranks and the wound value. The minimum SR is the wound value- in this case, 5. A 5 point wound is nasty. 3a) If the Wound check succeeds, carry on as normal. The value of the wound is continued to be added to your skill checks as temporary ranks. Yes, a 5 point wound is really, really, nasty. 3b) If the Wound check fails, you’re unable to use that skill for the remainder of the conflict. If it was your Survive check, you’re out for the count. If it was your Ego check, you stay up and about, but have to resort to undignified means of justifying it. If you have the Badass skill, it’s the first skill to take wounds regardless of the circumstances- it’s your buffer zone.

Injuries & Disadvantages

If a character uses Drama on a wound check, they become injured. An injury is a temporary trait that increases the difficulty of associated actions (running with a broken leg, fighting a dragon with a broken sword, wooing a princess after insulting her mother). Most injuries increase the minimum SR by 1.

Wound Progression

If you take a wound to a skill that’s still active after a previous wound, compare the value of the new wound to the current wound score. If the new wound has a higher value, bump the wound score up to the value of the new wound. If the new wound is lower than the wound score, increase the wound score by 1.

Healing

Characters can reduce their Wound scores by spending Fortune points. For every three Fortune spent, reduce the wound score’s value by 1. Injuries can be removed by making a check with a minimum SR based on GM fiat without using Drama. Characters with Lob Spells can cast make the check for their allies and can use Drama. (Since Fortune points are new additions to this system, exchange values are untested- adjust as appropriate.)

Dying

Any GM worth their weight will tell you that it’s lame for characters to die without the death having any kind of narrative impact. So, obviously, it can only happen during dramatic moments. Fortunately, this system has rules for dramatic moments. If you fail a wound check, you lose access to that skill for the conflict. If you fail a wound check based on Survive, you’re knocked out cold or otherwise immobilized. If you use Drama on a Wound check and fail the subsequent Drama check, you have two choices: accept a permanent disadvantage (like losing a leg or going crazy) that will increase the difficulty of some tasks, or dying in a suitable blaze of glory.

Grudges

Whenever the party kills, maims, disrupts, or helps anyone or anything, the GM rolls a d6. This is the value of the Grudge held against the characters on behalf of any survivors or surviving relatives. It might be the goblins caught in that fireball have gotten skin grafts and are hot on your tail, or it might be that the son of the family the party saved has decided to become an adventurer too. Whatever it is, it’s a lasting consequence. Every time the grudge is used in play, knock it’s value down by 1. When the value of a grudge is reduced to 0, the party has paid off their karmic debt.

Acting Classy

Fighter: Kill Things, Take Stuff, Badass Barbarian: Kill Things, Lurk & Stalk, Badass Ranger: Kill Things, Take Stuff, Lurk & Stalk Monk: Kill Things, Righteous, Badass Paladin: Kill Things, Righteous, Badass Rogue: Take Stuff, Lurk & Stalk, Expertologist Cleric (Catholic): Take Stuff, Lob Spells, Righteous Druid: Lob Spells, Lurk & Stalk, Expertologist Mage: Take Stuff, Lob Spells, Expertologist Sorcerer: Lob Spells, Social Climber, Badass Knight Errant: Kill Things, Righteous, Social Climber Bard: Lob Spells, Expertologist, Social Climber Noble: Lurk & Stalk, Righteous, Social Climber Professor: Righteous, Expertologist, Social Climber Professor (tenured): Righteous, Expertologist, Badass Duelist: Kill Things, Righteous, Social Climber Dungeoneer: Kill Things, Take Stuff, Lurk & Stalk Evangelist: Righteous, Social Climber, Badass Ex-boyfriend: Lurk & Stalk, Righteous, Expertologist Ex-Girlfriend: Take Stuff, Righteous, Expertologist Game Designer: Take Stuff, Expertologist, Badass

Creative Skill Uses

Either Survive or Ego can be used in any situation. Given how severe wounds can be, though, smart players will figure out ways to apply their other skills so that Survive isn’t put in danger. For example, the character looks up and a troll is diving down onto her. He could use Survive to roll out of the way, but if he fails he might take damage. Here are some alternatives: Kill Things: Falling troll, huh? Extra momentum for my blade! Lob Spells: Feather fall on the bastard, or Cat Reflexes on me. Lurk & Stalk: He didn’t see me. I rolled into the shadows. Righteous: I hold my ground and play psychic chicken with him. I won’t budge for something as trivial as a falling troll, but he’ll budge for me. Expertology: Based on wind resistance and troll anatomy, there’s a 75% chance he’ll land this way. Therefore, I should be over here. Social Climber: It’s a good thing that henchman thinks the world of you and dived in the way. Too bad about his head though... As another example, the party is trying to convince the king to free their rogue. They could use Ego to make their arguments (or Survive, depending on the temperment of his Majesty). Here are some alternatives: Kill Things: Well, it’s not pretty, but it makes for a good threat. Take Stuff: He didn’t need that royal seal, did he? But we do. Lob Spells: Charm should do it. Righteous: He better sit his ass down and listen. We’re a higher authority, after all... we just need to prove it by force of will. Expertology: Some call it applied logic. Others call it blackmail. Social Climber: Actually convince him. With this option, he might even like us afterwards instead of signing warrants for our executions!

Notes

Player: Alias: Drama: ( ( ( ( ( (

/ / / / / /

Fortune: Character Skills ) ) ) ) ) ) Traits

Injuries

wounds