TOR for another fantasy setting

[Candacis]

Zedturtle suggested in the new house rule forum thread that I make a new thread for my TOR conversion and explain why I even want to use the TOR rules for some other setting.
I don't know, how particular interesting or even useful this will be for other people, but maybe someone likes the theory behind it.

I want to add house rules and alter some TOR rules to fit the ruleset for a german fantasy setting named Splittermond. A lot of people might ask first, why.

------- Start of a long background story ------

The TOR rules are one of my favorite rulesets for pen&paper roleplaying games. I played a lot of Das schwarze Auge (a german pen&paper similiar like D&D) and Cthulhu and a lot of other stuff. Back in the days we had lots of time for a looong session, could well go over into the next day. And we met often. So, my group didn't mind complex rules and hour long fights, we enjoyed it, even enjoyed playing around with all those stats and loads of rules. But as you get older and you have less time to meet up, our interests in what we wanted out of a roleplaying game shifted. Getting a story flowing is more important, not getting caught up in a web of complex rules that stretch out moments in the session unneccessarily. We tried some systems that concentrated more on the storytelling aspect and had very little rules. But we noticed that too few rules quickly felt too arbitrary and even made us feel disconnected with the game.
And then we tried TOR and it has that amazing sweet spot of just enough rules (for us). An elegant, but efficient ruleset. Of course, the fact that rules and setting is connected very well helps, too. Our group is currently waiting for the campaign book to be released in german.

So, why would I ever want to change that? Don't get me wrong, I love Middle-earth, I played tons of MERP in my youth and I certainly will continue playing TOR. But.. the setting can be a bit narrow and sometimes you just want to get a change of scenery. In comes Splittermond. This is a typical fantasy setting (at least in terms of german roleplaying games), beautiful described, huuuge world (basically a whole planet), lots to discover. You can have your intrigues in a palace court in an orient flavored empire, or be a pirate on the vast oceans, or wander through exotic jungles, be a mage diplomat or a soldier protecting your land from rat creatures. And so on. My point is, lots of variety.
But, I'm not a fan of the rules for Splittermond. Too complex, too many little subrules for everything, fights are too long etc. I hear, a lot of people enjoy those rules, but it isn't my cup of tea anymore.
Nevertheless, I want to play in the setting. Without having to part with the TOR rules. Thus, the crazy idea to mix those two.

------ End of the long background story -----

Could it work in the end? I don't know, it could very well crash and burn. But, I'm having fun trying to find out if it could work. Splittermond and The One Ring even have some little similiarities. For starters, Splittermond has journey rules that are a lot like those in TOR. So much in fact, I'm thinking, they even could be called TOR-inspired (the publisher of Splittermond is the same as the german translation of TOR). They have journey tests, scouting and hunting, different terrains that can alter the difficulty of the tests, and journey events.
Splittermond also has some skills that are the same as TOR skills.
But yeah, other than that, a lot of it is different.

Here is a cover sheet and character sheets I made for my conversion:

Cover Sheet
Character Sheet Page 1
Character Sheet Page 2

Sorry, that it is german. Hopefully you can still see how it differs from the normal TOR sheet. My goal is to have any change and added rule in the same spirit of the original, meaning it remains elegant and doesn't get too complex.
Still, I added a fourth attribute (called Geschick - meaning something like dexterity). For two reasons. First, I needed more common skills. Splittermond has a lot more social interaction, more big cities and academics. I wanted skills to reflect that, giving, for instance, thiefs and academics (like mages) more options. Thus I added Locks/Traps, a slight of hand, arcane knowledge, acrobatics, perfomance (don't know, if this is the right word, like juggling, dancing, music and theatre) and changed some other skills. Second, I wanted to use dexterity for ranged weapons. Every ranged weapon would use dexterity for attribute/damage bonus instead of body. Dexterity would also determine, who acts first in case of characters being in the same stance in a battle.
Of course, a fourth new attribute means a new character creation regarding the attributes. Every player simply has 18 attribute points he or she can distribute between the four attributes. No attribute can be less than 2 and higher than 7.

I added new weapon skills since Splittermond has a variety of weapons. I didn't add all from the Splittermond list, I concentrated only on the main ones. The cutting weapon group (apologies if it is the wrong word) consisting of club, mace and war-hammer. Chain weapons consisting of a flail and a chain sickle (which is a special weapon in the setting). Staves consisting of battlestaff and a bladestaff. Crossbows consisting of a crossbow and a heavy crossbow. And, at last, throwing weapons consisting of small throwing weapons and throwing hatchets.
If someone is interested I can list the stats of the new weapons. I tried to keep them fairly similiar to the other weapons.

Next on the character sheet are the mage schools on the left side under the weapon skills. Right next to that is a space to note down your armour and overall encumbrance. The magic system is seperated in different schools in Splittermond. For instance, you have fire, water etc., or healing magic, illusion, death magic etc. Every school has different spells. I cut down the sum of the magic schools and simplified it since a lot of the spells in Splittermond are only useful within their set of rules. They wouldn't do much within the TOR rules.
My adaption works like this. You have your magic school, for instance, healing. The ranks can be bought simliar like the weapon ranks (meaning with experience points, although slightly cheaper). With every rank in a magic school you get a spell. Every magic school has 6 unique spells, sorted into ranks. Meaning the first rank spell is weaker (but costs also less focus points) than the 6th rank spell. For instance, the 1st rank spell in the transformation school is a spell that lets you change your haircolor. The 6th rank spell lets you change your whole appearance into that of another person. Every spell does something different, but always within the theme of the specific school.
A spell costs focus points. Focus points are calculated using: heart+wit+every rank in magic schools.
For instance, a character with 5 heart and 7 wits and 2 ranks in fire and 1 rank in light magic has 15 focus points. This means every time, a player gains a rank in a magic school, he gets 1 additional focus point. I thought, this was a good way to show the growing strength of a character that uses magic a lot.
Right now, I'm thinking every ranked spell of the same number has the same amount of difficulty (TN). So, the difficulty level of your highest ranked spell you have available is always somewhat challenging. I'm playing around with two different sets right now:

Rank 1 - 10
Rank 2 - 12
Rank 3 - 14
Rank 4 - 16
Rank 5 - 18
Rank 6 - 20

And a version that is more challenging:

Rank 1 - 10
Rank 2 - 12
Rank 3 - 15
Rank 4 - 18
Rank 5 - 21
Rank 6 - 24

I don't know which one would be better suited or if the TN should be entirely uncertain for players and always be depending on the gamemaster. Maybe you have some ideas regarding the magic system.

--------------------------------------------

Okay, that was a looong explanation about the magic system mainly, but it shows you hopefully what I'm going for. I also changed a lot regarding the character creation and virtues/rewards, but I think, I save this for another post.

And some will maybe have a big question on their mind. Is this still TOR? Yes and no. I know, that the TOR rules are very intertwined with the setting of middle-earth, but I'm hoping with some changes I will still have the same game flow only with another setting. I want it to remain simple, but being broader in its use.

And then I'm wondering, if it would be okay to share the final outcome of my attempts. Certainly, someone without knowledge of the TOR rules will NOT be able to use my conversion and I will try my best to limit the explanations in my "house rules" ONLY to changes I made. With this in mind and a proper mention/credits in a statement on the first page, would it be okay to share it, when it is finished?

[Corvo]

Hi Candacis!

The idea of using TOR engine for different games isn't without merits.
A friend of mine is using it for Warhammer. At least two users of this forum converted it to post-apoc settings. I thought about using it for (pseudo)historical high-middle ages settings.

Back to your idea, I think it's pretty sound. My main doubt arise from the addition of the fourth stat, Geschick or Dexterity.
To use a traditional gaming jargon, you are splitting the Body in two stats, one governing Strenght and Costitution, one governing Dexterity and Initiative.
I understand that this is pretty traditional in RPG, so to have different niches for "Warriors and Bruisers" and "Rogue and Archers".
The problem is that in TOR many players already feel that Body is the dump-stat, so to say (=the weakest stat, the one where NOT invest many points). Splitting Body in two weakens it even more, making them stats where it's unwise to have more than 4 points.

To give you a different perspective, keep in mind that in TOR stats aren't so crucial as in other games: most of the time Stats come in play when you spend Hope.
PCs aren't defined by their stats: there are Hobbits that have higher Body than Men. What defines the characters in TOR are their skills, Valour, Wisdom and related Virtues and Rewards. Here comes the "Role" of a character in the group.
To this effect, you can give a look to Rich H houserules: he included the Might as a third element beside Valour and Wisdom, creating a more complex and varied dynamic between Virtues and Rewards (and more "niches" for the characters to fill).

Sorry if I was long-winded, hope it's clear enough

[Rich H]

To this effect, you can give a look to Rich H houserules: he included the Might as a third element beside Valour and Wisdom, creating a more complex and varied dynamic between Virtues and Rewards (and more "niches" for the characters to fill).

Just to be clear, it was Rocmistro that had the original idea that I just streamlined/simplified for my own game but it works a treat.

I'm still working on my Star Wars hack using TOR but it's currently in "development hell".

[Corvo]

My apologies to Rocmistro /bow

[Candacis]

Thank you for your input, I really appreciate it. I haven't taken a look at house rules others have done, I didn't want to get influenced too much and first try out my own approach, but now I'm certainly going to take a look.

---------

My character creation is a bit different and with it also the virtues and rewards section.
You choose your race [Human, Dwarf, Gnome, Alb (Elf, I guess) and Varg (which is a cool humanoid wolf-creature)] and then distribute 18 points on the four attrributes. Favoured attributes are distrubted 1 - 2 - 2 - 3. The race also determines your hope and endurance. Next, you choose a culture, which gives you your weapon skills, 2 specializations and most of the common skills. In this way a Splittermond culture functions like the TOR cultures, but the culture isn't as important as in TOR. Because of this there are no culture blessings.
After that you pick a family origin, kind of like how and in which surroundings your character grew up. It is a bit like the background of a culture in TOR. You can have a merchant origin, noble, hermit, farmer, servants and so on. It determines your standard of living, one favoured skill and two distinctive features.
Next you choose one profession. This is what a character does for a living or has learned. It gives you a favoured skill group (much like a calling), more common skills and sometimes magic and/or weapon skills (nothing over 2). A profession is much more important than the culture.

The last big change is the moonmark. It is something special in Splittermond. Every playable character has it. I kind of treat it like a culture blessing, except to use the ability of a moonmark you have to spend hope out of your own hopepool (because the moonmark abilities are a bit more powerful than culture blessings). The moonmark also determines the shadow weakness of the character. There are 10 moonmarks and every moonmark has a unique ability and a unique shadow weakness. The player chooses one moonmark at character creation.

Now, since the professions shape a character more than a culture, I connected the virtues and rewards to the professions. You have 5 virtues per profession (I used TOR virtues, but created a lot of new ones, too). Rewards are different. There are 2 unique rewards per profession, but weapons and armour rewards (2 per weapon/armour) are freely available for everyone. Since weapon use is not restricted for cultures or professions, I wanted to give everyone the same options for the weapons/armour.

---------

I think, the Might house rule is very interesting. Certainly something to think about.
You also made good points about my fourth attribute. I wasn't aware that body is perceived as that weak. I mostly wanted a nice way to have more common skills and push ranged weapons a bit.
Here is what I had:

Body:

• Awe
• Athletics
• Awareness
• Explore
• Animal Guidance
  (Probably the wrong word, it is a skill to train animals, ride them, tame them etc., it replaces Song)
• Craft

Heart:

• Inspire
• Travel
• Insight
• Healing (covers now also Alchemy, too)
• Diplomacy (a bit like Courtesy)
• Battle

Wits:

• Persuade
• Stealth
• Search
• (Nature) Knowledge (I wasn't so sure about that one, but it covers academic knowledge)
• Lore (It covers stories and myths, folkore lore)
• Arcane (Knowledge about magic and magic-related phenomenons.

Dexterity:

• Performance (Song, Dancing, Theatrics, Juggling etc. in one)
• Acrobatics
• Locks/Traps
• Hunting
• Slight of Hands (useful for delicate works using your hands, pickpocketing)
• High Crafts (Crafting involving jewlery, art, architecture, everything more delicate)

However, I could drop the fourth attribute and instead add a new skill group, which would mean I have to drop three common skills. I would drop nature knowledge, acrobatics and high crafts. You think, that would be better?

[Glorelendil]

For a while I worked on a port of TOR to the Conan setting. Some of my transformations:
Hope -> Luck
Shadow -> Doom
Wisdom -> Guile (Virtue -> Trick)
Valour -> Might (Reward -> Feat)

skills
Lore -> Languages
Song -> Carouse
Courtesy -> Etiquette
Riddle -> Intrigue

initial cultures
Cimmerian
Bossonian
Zingaran
Poitainian
Barachan
Gunderman

callings
I renamed Slayer to Reaver, and dropped Warden for Captain

In the original Robert E. Howard stories, Conan is using a new weapon and wearing new armor (if any) in every story, and frequently he was losing/changing weapons during the stories. So not only did I want to introduce mechanics to encourage or cause that, but I also couldn't have plot-proof items. Thus there are no "Rewards" in the form of gear; regardless of whether you increase Might or Guile you then get special abilities, not items (including choices exclusive to the callings).

I also had a system for weapon quality, damage, and repair. The idea being that sometimes your weapon breaks and you need to pick up a new one, and sometimes you get a particularly fine weapon that you'd rather not have to replace. In a nutshell:
- Quality ranges from 0 to 6
- Condition ranges from 0 to your weapon's quality
- You can't roll more Success dice than your weapon's (or your armour's) current condition

So...yes...even if you have Sword: 6, if your weapon sucks or it's damaged, you don't get to roll all those dice.

The mechanic I really wanted to figure out but didn't come up with anything satisfactory for: I want there to be a rating, maybe 1 to 10, that represents how wild vs. savage a character is. So Conan is on one extreme, a Zingaran aristocrat is on the other. This theme is central to the Conan stories. The thing is, although in the stories Conan's lack of civilization is almost always an advantage, in the game neither would be "better": depending on circumstances you either want the Feat Die to be above or below your current rating.

But I couldn't even think up good terminology for the scale, let alone figure out the details of implementation.

[zedturtle]

I think a good model for that would be Pendragon's opposing stats, where you have paired stats that are opposite of each other (in this case, Civilized vs. Savage). Whatever you have in one stat you have the opposite score in another... for example Conan might be Civilized 2 and Savage 9. When trying to do something in one of the spheres, you must pass the relevant side of the twin-stat. So Conan trying to pass himself off as a noble in a court must pass both a test of Etiquette and roll equal to or under his Civilized score. What makes it even more interesting is when players manipulate the situation so that they can utilize their strong side (I'm thinking of the real-life example of the King and Queen of Hawaii visiting the English Court).

But we probably don't want to derail Candacis's thread too much.

[Rocmistro]

My apologies to Rocmistro /bow

No problem Corvo.

As always, Rich, thanks for sharing the credit with me.

[Otaku-sempai]

With the low-key approach to magic in TOR I can't think of many other fantasy settings where I would use the same mechanics. Perhaps for Lloyd Alexander's Chronicles of Prydain.

[Glorelendil]

With the low-key approach to magic in TOR I can't think of many other fantasy settings where I would use the same mechanics. Perhaps for Lloyd Alexander's Chronicles of Prydain.

That's why I liked it for Conan. TOR actually has lots of magic, just not so much for the players. Which is similar to Conan's world, where he is often battling sorcerers and magicians and supernatural baddies but almost never using it himself. (Some exceptions, and he always finds it distasteful and risky.)