Thursday 30 April 2015

Character creation

The character creation process in Solum has not really been touched for a long time, and as we've started playtesting more now it feel like it's time to revisit it.

The basic idea is for it to be fast, with very few options to begin with, but to expand this gradually as you gain levels. Basically the game gets more complicated as you level up.

This is a good strategy because presumably the players also get more proficient as they play more, and it's makes it fun to level up when you get more and more options.

Rolling dice in Solum

Dice are used in most roleplaying games to resolve situations where the outcome is not self evident. I the case of Solum the system is based around Die type, and difficulties

Die types range from D4 (four sided dice) to D12 (twelve sided dice) but is normally D6, the more sides your die type have the bigger chance of success you have. 

Difficulties range from 2 (Trivial) to 12 (Divine), but is normally 4. Read on to find out more!

Wednesday 29 April 2015

Playtest 5: Right in the face!

After last week's bravado, the characters found themselves in the former jail, discussing how to proceed while adapting the goblin armour to fit the barbarian. Little did they know the evening would end with distant shouts of alarm, drums in the dark...

Monday 27 April 2015

Nectar - a sandbox in progress for Solum

Image from Wikipedia (Copyright Boberber)
 I've been fiddling with a sandbox for Solum, a sort of campaign setting with a solid introduction, a plethora of interesting locations (that's the sandbox part), and a semi fixed ending.

It's still early days, but suffice it to say that it revolves around bees. Yes, bees. And accompanying them are creatures such as Myconids, the giant Ants, the Flower people, Troglodytes, the Ember druids and the Iron dwarves.

The whole thing takes place in and around the village of Honeytop, a place where the humans try to capitalise on the abundance of bees (and thus honey) in the area. But deep in the mountains hides Apoidea, the bee archetype trapped here in times lost, and she has plans of her own that, you might say, will sting the adventurers and in fact the whole region...

Here's a draft for the very introduction to this thing:


The swarm
The characters are closing in on the remote mountain village of Honeytop. It’s the height of summer and the light woods are verdantly blossoming. The mountains and cliffs are thoroughly warmed up. The high air is cool and the breeze is strong, but the sun is warm.

In the distance they can see the mountain Two tops, the first of many mountains in the Gray mountains, and on a smaller cliff halfway there they see the goal of their trip  - the village with it’s golden brown pointy roofs.

Suddenly the sun seems to darken for a moment, and it appears as if a dark cloud passes over it.

A while later they all sit down by the side of the road to have lunch. Around them is a meadow full of forest flowers and berries. In the distance they can hear a stream.

A faint and almost not noticable noise makes itself heard. It’s a constant sound that slowly increases in strength. Before they have time to react it grows into a deafening buzz, and a huge swarm of bees appears over the tree tops!

The bees descend on the meadow like a rug, but doesn’t seem unusually aggressive. They are large (but not gigantic) and the characters might get stung once or twice.

A few minutes later the swarm lifts as if by command and flies off. One can see that it flies off towards the mountains...




Wednesday 22 April 2015

Playtest 4: The thing in the pool

We've had several weeks worth of breaks due to real life issues but we finally managed to continue! Our characters kept exploring the dwarven mines, the rogue leading and the barbarian and cleric following suit.

Its clear that having good explorer skills is a great advantage, especially in a place where random encounters are quite rare.