2020 - The Year of Blackmoor - 50th Anniversary - Day Twenty-Three

Celebrating 2020 - The Year of Blackmoor - 50th Anniversary!

Continuing with Part Six of our look at Running Castle Blackmoor over at The Alexandrian Blog. Today we will look at Part 8 and 9 of that series "Special Interest Experience" and "Special Interests."

Running Castle Blackmoor – Part 8: Special Interest Experience 

Running Castle Blackmoor – Part 9: Special Interests 

The Introduction:

In the First Fantasy Campaign, Dave Arneson includes a system of “Special Interests” of which he writes, “Instead of awarding points for money and Jewels acquired in the depths of the Dungeon or hoarding items against the indefinite future, the players will receive NO points until they acquire the items listed below…”

He then asks a lot of excellent research oriented questions about when and how Arneson used this. He talks about different interpretations of the above and ppoints out that Arneson did not seem to spend time writing anything up that he was not going to use.

He refers you here for some additional light on the subject: Perhaps Daniel Boggs’ exploration of the Richard Snider Variant can shed some light on this.

He then proceeds to say:

For the purposes of running Castle Blackmoor, as you’ll see below, I’ve decided to go with the most extreme interpretation: The only way to gain XP is to pursue your special interests. (This is, again, not a declaration that I believe this to have been what was happening at Arneson’s table circa-1971. It’s just the most interesting choice to make as we explore alternative play dynamics.)

He says that what is in The First Fantasy Campaign is not directly usable as is, different methods produce different results and it suggests*:

(suggesting that their explanation has either been mangled or that the material is actually an inchoate mash-up of several different revisions of the ruleset), multiple “examples” that all contradict each other and any version of the rules, and copious references to other sub-systems that have simply not been included.

*File this away, I am going to make a future blog post to explore the implications of this quoted idea and why it is a beautiful thing.

He proceeds to talk about the system he devised as being inspired by what he considers the best ideas of Arneson, mixed with his own and ideas from the game Blades in the Dark.

So he has a Table to determine a random Special Interest for which you will have a 100% rating, to which you add a Racial Special Interest. Some races have a specific Special Interest and others such as human roll on a random table for a secondary interest. All other Special Interest you roll 2d6 times 10% to determine the rating.

I have thought about using this system, although I would allow some latitude with players determining a primary interest.

The next Section is Gaining Experience Points. 

You only gain XP for GP which are taken out of the dungeon and spent on a Special Interest.

XP is gained on a 1-for-1 basis modified by the character’s rating in the Special Interest.

So the higher the rating the more experience you gain and the lower the rating the less experience you gain per GP.

Followed by Complications:

Spending GP on a Special Interest may lead to complications.

This is detailed in the second post of the two we are looking at and it is very amusing to the referee part of me. 

Next up is Community Limits: Where he says the size of the community limits what you can do and spend so it behooves you to go somewhere that you can spend the amount you need or want to spend. There is also a frequency at which you can spend that much gold.

The next section is on Caravans and this should prove usual to most of us and our games. He has some great stuff here IMO.

How to setup a caravan and what that entails, the hazards to a caravan such as:

Caravans – Jeopardy: Caravans are subject to brigandry, natural disasters, and eldritch fates of an even stranger character. In some cases, characters might also simply be scammed by unethical caravan masters who simply abscond with their funds.

Rules for Basic Travel, a full Hexcrawl or on a trail/road that is part of a trade route. Also for the hiring of Mercenaries.

Then we have Community Investment and in addition to what he has here I would suggest looking at OD&D which has some useful information in this regard. Remember that Arneson in Blackmoor had "Domain Play," "Wilderness Play," "Dungeon Crawls," and "Town/City Play" all going on at the same time.

He then talks about Carousing, Carnavale, Philanthropy, Religion, Song/Fame, Training, Hoarding, and Hobbies. In a fair amount of detail, more than enough to generate a lot of gaming. 

The Racial Special Interests: Humans are Generalist, Dwarves are Hoarders, Elves and their Trees, Hobbits and Gifting. This could be extended to any number of Home-brewed or other races used in your campaign.

Arcane Projects are discussed and earning XP for these projects, including Spell Forumula, Bespoke Spell Egs, Workshops, Workshop/Laboratory Spell Eggs, Other Magic Items plans. 

In regard to Strongholds he says:

Specific rules for establishing and managing strongholds are beyond this present document, but 100% of GP spent on strongholds grant XP. If strongholds are located within the community, 50% of these expenses are also considered community investment.

He closes this part with a list of things you could add to this system, all of which are IMO great ideas.

Tomorrow we will wrap this series of posts up when we cover his last post the "Blackmoor Village Map."