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Friday, April 3, 2015

The Lost World

After my stint of reading a bunch of Sherlock, I've turned my attention towards "The Lost World" by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.  Yes I haven't actually read it yet (I'm 35 or so).  I can't quite believe it either!  It must have just slipped down the list over time.  The nice thing about ebooks and a kobo is that you can grab these old books off the gutenberg project check em out, and if they are not right for you delete!  This book however I can't put down.  (its only 180 pages).  I digress... reading this makes me want to play some "Monkey Isle" for Basic Fantasy, written by JD Neal. 





A "lost world" setting on a remote island, where dinosaurs and stranger things lurk...


You can grab a copy of the "Lost World" from gutenberg here



A few little thoughts I had on this adventure while reading it this morning. 

I'd like to run basic fantasy with it probably as my players are quite happy with the system.  I was thinking however rather than the usual fantasy treatment, I might stick closer to the book's theme.  Have human PC's that become shipwrecked on the island.  Give them daggers, and maybe blunderbuss's.  So mid 1700's? I'm trying to figure out the mechanics of a  blunderbuss, I'm guessing you could only fire it every other round, and maybe a d12 for damage? 

Any thoughts on that would be appreciated!  

Another idea I had rolling around my head, although it would take quite a lot of conversion would be to use Mutant Future rules, atleast for the PC's.   Of course the monsters could use a bit of mutations and spiking up stats.  Maybe years ago this island was found and was never cleared out properly.  The man made Apocalypse happened.  The PC's are out in the middle of the Atlantic looking for a new place to create a civilization and viola Mutated Dinosaur Island! And for a twist, how about a highly intelligent Ape community?  (Planet of the apes anyone?). 

4 comments:

  1. To answer your blunderbuss-related questions:

    Melan / Gabor Lux of some OSR fame has published Helvéczia, a Hungarian-language boxed game (free pdf-s also available) set in a fantastic version of Switzerland in the late 17h century; that might give you a basis of comparison. Since the relevant stuff is available in Hungarian for free, I'm sure he he doesn't mind me copying out some of the firearms data:

    Weapon - damage - reload/prime
    Cannon* - 3d10+ - 3 rnds
    Grenade* - 2d6+ - 1.5 rnds
    Bomb* - 4d6+ - 5 rnds
    Blunderbuss - 2d6+ - 1.5 rnds
    Pistol - 1d10+ - 1 rnd
    Musket - 1d10+ - 1.5rnds

    * - Can hit multiple nearby targets, but a natural 1 on the attack roll means the weapon misfires or explodes.
    + - Open damage: if your roll maximum, roll damage again and add it to the previous result.
    Half rounds of reload: you can either hurry and shoot in your remaining "half round" with a -2 penalty, or you can just wait for the next round and shoot normally.

    Hope that helps!

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  2. Thank you very much! I'll go ahead and print this and add it to my notes. I think this will be perfect. I am going to have to do a bit of editing on the whole thing, as there are some fantastic creatures within the adventure (dragons and such).

    I just posted a long comment, but blogger decided to delete it. ugh

    MDS is reload prime, would that be in rounds? I guess. The exploding dice is friggin cool!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Actually, that's r_n_d_s for "rounds", only it's a bit hard to tell with this typeface. :)

    ReplyDelete