Need help with Dark Sun Bash!

[Jason_Sunday]

I am about to run a Dark Sun campaign using Bash! Fantasy. I need advice on how to model the world's a lack of metal and the use of wood, obsidian and bone for weapons. Also, how to model Defiling Magic for mages.

[BASHMAN]

Here's what I'd do:

For the weapons, there doesn't need to be a penalty. Instead, because metal is so rare, give the metal items a bonus.

Personally, I'd give metal weapons a +2 dice bonus to damage.

Armor: Instead of Chain, have some sort of bone-mail armor, that gives 20 Soak. There IS NO equivalent of plate male.

Magic Defiling: One way to do this is to make it so instead of drawing Energy from the caster, the magic draws life energy from the land around it, destroying plants, drinking water, etc, within a certain distance. When you cast a spell this way, there is 0 Energy Cost.

The real cost should be in role-playing. If a person from Dark Sun sees ANYBODY do that, they're dead. This is like pouring out a canteen of water into the desert in front of a bunch of thirsty Fremen in Dune. A mob surrounds you and tears you to pieces with their bare hands.
A Hero who Defiles pretty much automatically becomes an NPC villain at that point. Tell the player to make a new character.

The other Heroes in the party are free to slaughter them on the spot with not a trace of guilt for it. In fact, tell them flat out they get bonus XP for role-playing if they do it.

PCs that decide to "let it go"and continue adventuring with the Defiler become accessories, and thus, also turn into villainous NPCs.

The exception would be the sorcerer-kings and their elite guards, who can pretty much do whatever they want without consequence because people are so AFRAID of them they don't dare do anything. This should be the SOLE exception.

Make it clear to the players that Defiling magic is an "NPC Only" option. The upside for you as the Narrator is that you don't have to worry about "book-keeping" the energy cost of evil NPC wizards' spells.

That said, the PCs should be pretty motivated to kill defilers. People on a world dying of thirst, where human life is cheap, and food and water are precious, wouldn't think twice about killing someone who is destroying food and water.

There may be times that a PC will defile, but it ought to be times when they don't think they'll be caught doing it.

[Jason_Sunday]

Here's what I'd do:

For the weapons, there doesn't need to be a penalty. Instead, because metal is so rare, give the metal items a bonus.

Personally, I'd give metal weapons a +2 dice bonus to damage.

Armor: Instead of Chain, have some sort of bone-mail armor, that gives 20 Soak. There IS NO equivalent of plate male.

Magic Defiling: One way to do this is to make it so instead of drawing Energy from the caster, the magic draws life energy from the land around it, destroying plants, drinking water, etc, within a certain distance. When you cast a spell this way, there is 0 Energy Cost.

The real cost should be in role-playing. If a person from Dark Sun sees ANYBODY do that, they're dead. This is like pouring out a canteen of water into the desert in front of a bunch of thirsty Fremen in Dune. A mob surrounds you and tears you to pieces with their bare hands.
A Hero who Defiles pretty much automatically becomes an NPC villain at that point. Tell the player to make a new character.

The other Heroes in the party are free to slaughter them on the spot with not a trace of guilt for it. In fact, tell them flat out they get bonus XP for role-playing if they do it.

PCs that decide to "let it go"and continue adventuring with the Defiler become accessories, and thus, also turn into villainous NPCs.

The exception would be the sorcerer-kings and their elite guards, who can pretty much do whatever they want without consequence because people are so AFRAID of them they don't dare do anything. This should be the SOLE exception.

Make it clear to the players that Defiling magic is an "NPC Only" option. The upside for you as the Narrator is that you don't have to worry about "book-keeping" the energy cost of evil NPC wizards' spells.

That said, the PCs should be pretty motivated to kill defilers. People on a world dying of thirst, where human life is cheap, and food and water are precious, wouldn't think twice about killing someone who is destroying food and water.

There may be times that a PC will defile, but it ought to be times when they don't think they'll be caught doing it.

Wow! This is some great advice. How would you handle Psionics? I was thinking of looking at Bash! Sci-fi as a model.

[BASHMAN]

BASH! SF does have an entire psionics system.

You could also, if you wanted, just take any power and change it from magic spells to psionics. Instead of a "Casting" limitation, I might put a concentration limitation on it.

[Jason_Sunday]

Chances for weapons breaking seems like a big thing in Dark Sun. Do you have any rules for it?

[BASHMAN]

Well, of course the rules cover intentional breaking of an opponent's weapon. Weapon types have their own soak/hits (see Break Weapon).

Maybe do it so that if you roll doubles on Defense and beat the attack roll, the attacker's weapon has a chance to break?

Whenever this happens, have the weapon take x3 damage. The damage a weapon takes should accumulate, so if it lost 15/20 Hits, it will only take 5 Hits more to break it.

[kroh]

very cool thread so far. Will stuff like this be incorporated into the UE version?

[BASHMAN]

Weapon breakage is something that happens deliberately using RAW. Having it happen by accident is the sort of thing to House Rule.