Is it OSR?

This is of course a long standing discussion among all sub groups of all things. What can be part of it, what can't? Are you with us or against us? You're either in or out, and there are not grey areas. OSR as a sub culture of RPGs is no different, and going through the forums one can find all sorts of (sometimes heated) debates on the subject. But here is my view of it, serving as a motivation of sorts as to why Solum has OSR in the title, and also perhaps giving the reader an insight into what sort of a game it is.

On the wiki page for OSR (old school revival/renaissance/rules/retro-clones) role playing games it states that the movement "takes its inspiration from the very earliest editions of D&D". It mentions a few prominent games: Castles & Crusades, OSRIC and refers to a page about  Dungeons & Dragons retro-clones. This is all good stuff, and fun.





But (at least in Sweden) the term OSR has a broader meaning, including not only D&D clones but also clones of other very early games, such as the Swedish Drakar och Demoner. An more importantly, games that doesn't necessarily emulate the rules from the earliest games, but the feel, ambiance and mood in them.



The very basics of the early games - exploration (of a dungeon, with map drawing), resource management (light, food, water, energy), fast and not very detailed combat (sometimes with minute long rounds) and rules light (potentially leaving room for a lot of improvisation) - can be emulated with many different rule sets, not just the Basic set, or Ad&d 1st edition. And in fact, because a lot of things has happened since the game was first published, it is likely that it's possible to recreate them better today than it was when the innovations were made.

And that is the simple vision of Solum OSR, to emulate the feel ambiance and mood of the earliest games, but with modern, slick mechanics, and in that way it certainly is OSR. Or put in another way: To create something that feels at the same time very modern and very old.

Let's boil it down to a few paragraphs that hopefully will shed some light on what Solum actually is:

The essence of old style rules

If you look at older rule sets you find that they are extremely varied and diverse, but a few things stand out:

• Hit points
• Levels
• The classes - Warrior, Rogue, Wizard and Cleric

While these three things may not be present in all systems (especially levels), they are undoubtedly iconic. And they have to stay.

Another thing about old style rules is what they're lacking. There are very little detail, and lots of things are left to the players to solve without rules. This is good in most cases, because it encourages people to role play or be social, be inventive and use their imagination. So that stays too, no rules about things where they are not needed for the core game play.

In cases where a resolution rule is wanted, the game needs to provide a general rule of resolution. This is important, and is a part of the aim to make a modern game.

Complexity, depth and engagement

Players and GMs should be challenged, not by the rules, but by circumstances in the game. The rules should offer interesting ways to meet these challenges. There needs to be a sand box feeling, where players and GMs have choice of which tool to use, and the rules needs to allow for this. So player (and GM) choice is important. 

Another aspect of this is long term versus short term goals. The game needs to allow for long term, strategic decisions as well as short term tactical ones.

Each player, Gm included, needs to feel active and engaged in the game for as much of the game as possible, so part of the rules needs to concern player activities rather than character activities.

Role players are getting older, have busier lives, kids and jobs. So the game needs to allow for this. Gone are the days when you had to spend hours creating your character, or an adventure. The game needs to be fast, with little or no start-up time. It takes around five minutes to make a character in Solum, and maybe a quarter of an hour to make a basic adventure.

But at the same time a lot is to be said for complex settings. So in Solum you can choose to have the setting evolve as you play. You basically build the world as you explore it, adding depth and complexity with real ease.

When role playing games were new combat was fast, deadly and fun. Solum has the same goals. You don't want to spend hours in one encounter, you want to explore, discover, make decisions, and have social encounters as well as fight. And once the fighting does start it is lethal, but presents the players with interesting choices that really affect the outcome. Best of all, combat is handled with the exact same mechanics as everything else in the game, so you can focus on real decision making instead of remembering rules.