Let the Christmas Vacation Begin!!! The Metal Gods of Dwimmermount!

Reading....

while listening to...

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and don't forget the...

Special Thanks to Kevin for the copy of Dwimmermount!
Special Thanks to Tormentor for the Helion Prime and Sabaton CD's!
Special Thanks to the Great State of Tennessee for the Jack Daniel's!  

ACKS : Let the Work Begin!

The kids aren't home, my paper has been submitted, my honey-do list is complete (for now), that means it is time for CAMPAIGN DEVELOPMENT!

After months of going back and forth as to which Fantasy RPG System I wanted to run, I find myself back in the OSR, and sitting down comfortably to work on and hopefully run a Campaign using the Adventurer Conqueror King System (ACKS).  There are a ton of awesome Fantasy RPG's out there, my bookshelves are full of them, which was part of my issue, I kept chasing after that perfect system. Oftentimes to the detriment of my creativity and my players. The key thing I like about ACKS is that at it's core it is B/X D&D. The edition I grew up with and have arguably played the most over the years, yet ACKS has some fun new features and rules tweaks that allows players to customize their characters without me finding myself overwhelmed trying to keep up with all the different fiddly bits (like I experienced with Pathfinder). Given my hectic schedule this system really looks like it will meet my current gaming needs. While I haven't decided 100% on the campaign setting, I am leaning towards going with the official ACKS Campaign, set in and around the Auran Empire. The late Roman Empire feel to the setting seems like a refreshing break from the straight Tolkien Fantasy gaming that I grew up with, while keeping some of those elements familiar to D&D gamers (i.e. Dwarves and Elves).  Of course with all the cool stuff on my gaming shelves, I will be working in other material from my gaming library to use in my ACKS Campaign. Pictured above are a few of the books I'm planning on using. I've always liked Labyrinth Lord's Realms of Crawling Chaos, while I don't intend to go full-blown Cthulhu, this book is a great resource for Chaos elements to pull into my games. I'd also like to have some psionics in my game, not in a heavy handed way but having some out there, to make the game a bit more unusual and unique from things I have done in the past. And what campaign would be complete without monsters, but with ACKS even the traditional humanoid races have an interesting twist about them, so I'll be using my copy of the Monster Alphabet to put unusual spins on the monsters in the campaign. Well, that's all for now, I need to quit typing about the campaign and start working on it!  Have a great week and Good Gaming!

By This ACKS I Rule!

Here's a little something I worked up to kick-off my upcoming ACKS Campaign!


Original cover by Mike Ploog, from the Marvel Comics adaptation of R.E. Howard's Kull. No copyright infringement is intended. 

Weekend Reading: Conan, Kull and ACKS!

What an awesome day to go to the mailbox!

I know what I'll be doing this weekend! 

Moloids for ACKS

Thanks to Eric Fabiaschi's recents posts about the Adventurer Conqueror King System (ACKS), I started reading my ACKS books again. I have to say this is a great system. B/X at the core of the game, but with some great versatility and character options that don't overwhelm this busy DM. So for fun I converted an old Marvel Comic's race for adventurers to encounter while exploring the deep subterranean depths. 

 Moloids

% in lair:  50%

Dungeon Enc: Work Crew (4d4) / Work Gang(1 union)

Wilderness Enc: Union (1d6 work crews)/Lair (1d10 work gangs)

Alignment: Neutral

Movement: 60' (20')

Armor Class: 0

Hit Dice: 1d4 hit points

Attacks: 1 (weapon)

Damage: 1d3 or weapon -1

Save: 0 level human

Morale: -2 (in numbers fewer than 10, their morale is -3)

Treasure Type: Special (Moloids, do not value gems, coins or jewelry, however, if encountered in their lairs, they could be working to maintain powerful machines of the ancients).

XP: 2

Description

     Moloids are short (4' tall average, advanced moloids can be up to 5' tall) yellow-skinned, emaciated humanoids. Males and females are almost indistinguishable from one another to non-moloids, in fact other than the rare advanced moloids, to outsiders every moloid looks exactly the same; short, thin, yellow skinned humanoids, with large pointed ears, no visible nose and large, heavy lidded eyes, with very small pupils.

     Moloids make terrible warriors, they are workers not warriors, and will flee danger at the first opportunity, as well as, the second and third opportunities. They don't have the drive or interest in making weapons, and if forced to fight will use clubs or staves or whatever other tools they have at hand.

     Moloids live exclusively underground, and will only venture onto the surface at the command of a powerful master,  if commanded to the surface during daylight and without some form of protective eye wear they will be at -3 to morale.  They suffer a -2 penalty to all attack throws when in full sunlight. However, they have superior infravision 90' and keen hearing. 

Moloids are believed to be descended from a slave race created by some ancient peoples (Atlanteans?) thousands of years ago.  They have lived in the deep earth for untold millennia, and whatever they once looked like, or whatever their full potential once was, countless generations of inbreeding has reduced the race to its current sad state.

     Moloids are not innovative or creative (other than the rare advanced moloids), they usually wear simple rags as clothing, and beyond their occasional use of protect eye goggles wear little clothing or gear. However, they are exceptionally skilled at maintaining existing equipment and machinery. Originally designed to service the great machines of the ancients, they are innately skilled at keeping such forgotten devices in working order, however, they cannot explain to others how they work or expand on what the machines already do.

Subterranean Giant Monster Training: The moloids have lived in their deep caverns underground for generations, and share their lairs with a variety of subterranean large monsters (perhaps also creations of the ancients). Somehow the non-creative moloids have found a way to train these various giant monsters, in a way equivalent to the Animal Training Proficiency. It takes many moloids working together to train just one beast, but they have the time and the numbers, so any given moloid work gang, and especially a moloid lair will have 1d6 such beasts. 

      Moloids are innately docile and subservient, a strong, and/or charismatic leader can seize control of a large group of these creatures and bend them to his will. They are still cowards and do better as workers and laborers rather than warriors. 

                                                 Advanced Moloid

      One in every  500 Moloids shows traits of the race's prior potential, and while still weakly and sensitive to sunlight, these rare advanced moloids can be highly intelligent (16-18), morale 0,  (for an added twist give them a chance to be a wild psionic, as per Richard LeBlanc's PX-1  Basic  Psionics Handbook , a great resource for B/X based games, I highly recommend it!). 

 

Adapted from the Moloids race found in Marvel Comics. First Appearance : Fantastic Four #22 (January, 1964) No copyright infringement is intended.

Special thanks to Mark Craddock for giving me the idea!  Cross Planes