Design Shelf: Lowercase Dragons

Game ideas are easy - I have half a dozen every day. I write down the interesting ones, either to come back to, or to inspire the imaginations of others.

I refer to my scattered ideas and half-finished projects as my “shelf”, where I can put things for the time being, until I feel ready to tackle them with full force.

These ideas are scattered across many notes and code repositories, so I’m going to gather the most promising concepts and present them here for your entertainment.

In this post: Lowercase Dragons.

Yes, that is a silly reference to Dungeons & Dragons, but I need at least a placeholder name.

This is my personal take on D&D, with a greatly cut down rule set and more distinct class design. I’ve always found the available classes to share more in terms of play style and mechanics than I’d like.

I’ve only ever played 5th Edition from the D&D lineage, but I have tried a handful of others (GURPS, et al.) and I’ve read quite a few games from the OSR scene. I’ve found that minimal core rules with expandable aspects to be the most interesting.

So, let me lay out a minimal rule set that I scratched out during a car ride.

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In Lowercase Dragons, you and several other players take on the role of adventurers in a pseudo-medieval setting. One player, the “Game Master” sets the scene and acts as a narrator and referee. To overcome obstacles, you roll a 20-sided die (d20 for short) and add one of your attributes (see below) to it to determine if you succeeded or not.

These attributes are:

• Mind - Your mental faculties, your propensity for learning and your logical deduction skills.
• Body - Your raw strength, graceful movements or dexterous accuracy.
• Soul - Who you are at your very core, your ability to empathize with others and form lasting bonds.

When you first create your character, roll two six-sided dice (d6 for short) and take note of this number - then, roll another 2d6 and subtract the second number from the first.

This result will lie somewhere between -10 and +10 - record this as your Mind attribute, then repeat the process for your Body and Soul attributes. If you’re unhappy with your attributes, your GM may let you rearrange which value goes with which attribute.

The second part of character creation is to choose what class you want to play as. There are four classes to choose from:

• Fighter - Straight forward and combat oriented, the fighter can use a multitude of weapons and armour.
• Priest - A man of the church, both learned and kind, but far from a pushover. Has access to holy magic, which leans towards order and justice.
• Mage - Access to arcane magic grants a variety of abilities, while also limiting equipment options.
• Envoy - A messenger, a representative, and one who seeks to build bridges across the chasms of differences. While only capable of using basic equipment, they have a trick or two up their sleeve.

As you progress through a campaign, your character will grow in strength as they gain levels. Each class grants new abilities from levels one to four. When you reach level five, your chosen class grants you access to a selection of High Classes, from which you can continue your journey.

The Fighter can become a Soldier or a Bruiser; the Priest can become a Paladin or Inquisitor; the Mage can become a White Mage or Black Mage; and the Envoy can become a Diplomat or an Agent.

Each High Class will take your character to level ten - the exact details of each won’t be listed here, but they each offer a unique way to specialize.

Finally, before you begin your campaign, you should choose what items and equipment to begin with. These have yet to be fleshed out, but there are different categories that only certain classes have access to, as well as the occasional level restriction.

One final note about the magic systems - each kind of magic is distinct, defined by their origins. Holy magic draws from a divine source, arcane magic uses magical particles (magicules) in the environment, and white and black magic transforms those magicules into a different ‘state’ to accomplish various effects. While holy magic is theoretically infinite in scope (only limited by divine favour), magicules are a limited resource, and a depleted area may take time to recover.

P.S. I know I haven’t outlined a combat system here, but the HP and AC would be used there - details are TBD.

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I haven’t read much of Larry Niven’s work, but the ideas alone are quite interesting - adding magicules as an expendable resource does invoke “The Magic Goes Away” - I’ll have to sit and read it one day.

This outline only details the framework for the class system, but it could be expanded and developed by those with more drive than me. I’d prefer it if the base classes were kept to a minimum though - too many classes, and they start stepping on each other’s toes.

The tripartite attributes are nothing new - I’m sure other games have done the same thing, but I’m pretty sure the 2d6 - 2d6 system is unique. The goal was to center the “baseline” for a normal person around zero, and to bring the relative power level down a notch. 2d6 might be too high - d6-d6 gives -5 to +5 - but that’s what playtesting is for.

If anyone wants to expand on this, I’d love to know, and I’ll even give you a shout-out. Good luck!

Addendum: After leaving this for a day before publishing, I’ve realized that this counts as a “Fantasy Heartbreaker”. Not the most positive of labels, but it is what it is.