The Death Cookie

1. Monster of the Week: The Hellhound
(Columns/Monster of the Week)

... PC’s Body. If the PC’s roll is successful but the hellhound wins, the character suffers a -2 penalty to all actions due to nausea. If the PC fails his roll and the hellhound succeeds, the PC becomes ...

2. Monster of the Week: The Ghoul
(Columns/Monster of the Week)

... roll. Anyone who knew the victim in life and has reason to suspect that something is amiss can roll Brain with a DN equal to the ghoul’s Gimmick roll, with success indicating that the character notices ...

3. Monster of the Week: The Wampus Cat
(Columns/Monster of the Week)

... panic for a number of rounds equal to the Cat’s Success Degree; 11+ Victim is paralyzed with fear and can take no action for a number of rounds equal to 1/2 Success Degree. A character who knows about ...

4. Monster of the Week: The Mongolian Death Worm
(Columns/Monster of the Week)

... The round after being hit, the character takes half damage. The damage continues to drop by half each round until the total drops below 1. If a character is wearing armor or other protection, the effects ...

5. Archetype of the Week: The Holy Man
(Columns/Archetype of the Week)

The holy man is a character who serves God. Most fictional holy men serve the Christian God, but there are occasional examples of holy men serving other deities, especially in fantasy stories. It should ...

6. Number Crunching
(Columns/QAGS Corner)

... hours on character creation. We never really intended for it to be a "real" system used for "serious" games (the "real" game system was Anyworlds, the overly complex system I'd written in college). ...

7. Archetype of the Week: The Noble Savage
(Columns/Archetype of the Week)

The noble savage is a character from a primitive culture who is uncorrupted by the prejudices and quirks of "civilized" society. As a result, the noble savage is seen as embodying a high level of spiritual ...

8. Archetype of the Week: The Boy Scout
(Columns/Archetype of the Week)

... Because he's so active in the community, that's a lot of people. Sample Character Michael Holt aka Mr. Terrific Body: 15 Brain: 17 Nerve: 14 Job: Super-Hero (13); Scientist (14) Gimmick: Polymath (14); ...

9. Archetype of the Week: The Warrior
(Columns/Archetype of the Week)

The warrior is a character who specializes in battle. Unlike swashbucklers, most warriors prefer to dispatch their enemies with ruthless efficiency and sound tactics rather than with flashy displays ...

10. A Six Pack of Stagger Lee
(Features/Gaming Articles)

... has great potential as a character in a role-playing game, but because of the huge number of variations, it's hard to pin down a single Stagger Lee. Therefore, in the interest of presenting the most ...

11. Archetype of the Week: The Rookie
(Columns/Archetype of the Week)

... sufficiently tragic to spur the heroes on so they can avenge him. Likely Stories While the rookie is most common in action movies, similar characters appear in all kinds of stories: in Westerns, ...

12. The Rules: Robin Hood
(Features/Gaming Articles)

... book, Robin Hood, which attempts to find the historical Robin by tracing the character's literary history, I bought a copy. I've also been watching the second season of the recent BBC Robin Hood series ...

13. Archetype of the Week: The Trickster
(Columns/Archetype of the Week)

The trickster (often called the shapeshifter) archetype is closely related to the fool, but tends to be a more subversive character than the fool. The fool is (whether he knows it or not) is the object ...

14. The Price Isn't Right
(Columns/QAGS Corner)

... has something to do with how well their character succeeds. A few (mostly those familiar with 2nd Edition AD&D's non-weapon proficiency system) try to use the difference between their roll and Number as ...

15. Archetype of the Week: The Fool
(Columns/Archetype of the Week)

The fool is a comic relief character who makes the audience laugh by consistently making bad decisions, ignoring social boundaries, and generally acting absurdly. While some fools actively try to be ...

16. The Rules: Sword & Sorcery
(Features/Gaming Articles)

... which made it hard to do the Hero's Journey thing. Therefore, the protagonists started out as Big Damn Action Heroes with more in common with Rambo than Luke Skywalker. GMing Suggestion: Characters ...

17. Archetype of the Week: The Spook
(Columns/Archetype of the Week)

... of humor, rarely breaking character or admitting surprise at even the most ludicrous turn of events. Likely Stories Spooks can be found wherever there is a conspiracy (or potential conspiracy) ...

18. Archetype of the Week: The Mentor
(Columns/Archetype of the Week)

The mentor is a character, usually older or more experienced than other members of the group, who uses his experience to prepare the younger heroes for their ultimate mission or destiny. In addition ...

19. Fratboy of the Week: The Dupe
(Columns/Archetype of the Week)

... Dax Sheppard, Ethan Suplee, Alan Tudyk, Anton Yelchin Frat Nickname: Burwell Prized Possession: His pledge pin. Transportation: "My brother let me borrow his car..." Sample Character Kent "Flounder" ...

20. WB101 Part 6: Son of The Big Picture
(Columns/World Building 101)

... types are strange, alien, and are absolutely unavailable as player character races. I will make two concessions to the people who just can’t bring themselves to play a regular old human. The first ...