These are my complete notes on Worlds without Number. I'll post the final thoughts separately so they're easier to read.
TLDR: i like this game but it's complicated.
Worlds Without Number Notes
Dying earth story. Didn't remember that. Vance vibes. Fallen Fantasy.
The underground as a location originates in the humans trying to survive while under siege.
We've got some race science. Aliens made elves because their slender hands wove better or something.
The contents of the book is actually fine. There isn't any derision of the other species so far. They are treated as equals mostly. Except some are full of "fury of ancient instincts and present bitterness." The are still being othered pretty hard.
Setting up clearly that this is a game about heroes and adventure.
Much more emphasis on characterization and who characters are.
Dangerous world, ancient kingdoms, politics, exploration, intrigue.
Calls out being in the OSR tradition.
"Even so, I understand that a good many readers will have their own preferences in game systems, and may have a different rule system in mind for running their campaigns.
This is perfectly reasonable, because ultimately, Worlds Without Number is more about supporting a style of gaming than a particular system. This game is built from the ground up to support the GM in running a sandbox style of campaign, one where the thrust of the action is entirely dependent on the ambitions and goals of the players. The tools in this book are built to support this play style no matter what game system is being used." pg 2-3.
Very interesting framing. This is what I remember of this game. It is a DM guide/toolkit. That seems to be the emphasis of this game.
Follow a similar ethos to B/X, though the form and mode is very different.
Really hits this being a Sandbox Style game hard.
Has a thoughtful description of 'Story Arc' games that manages to describe them as an oppositional position while not being negative about it.
Sandbox is defined as focusing around the goals of the characters, rather than an arc that they are wrapped up in. The GM offers situations and the players decide what to engage with.
Frames sandboxes as providing freshness for the GM.
Really selling this game as a tool to aid in sandbox play.
This is a weird way to realize this, but I think I've been running a sandbox game for my current Armour Astir game without realizing it.
Also ascribes it's own setting as the default. This is one point that is counter to my interests as a GM and Designer.
Reemphasis on Overland and Underground play. No castles yet though.
Modern advice for what kind of characters work well
Legates as an advancement goal. Prestige classes?
Character creation Procedure
Overall, much more modern process. Options for stats and stuff that won't brick your character out the gate.
More options if you opt for random skill acquisition. That's a cool way to incentivize what would have otherwise been a troublesome bit of creation.
Built in mixed class-class.
foci: further ways to specialize your character in some kind of gameplay.
allowing non human pcs. Odd to include that. Makes it feel like it may be insecure in its setting or trying to preempt some complaints from a certain set of players.
To hit and ac all seem to be normal, additive systems. No thac0.
Cohesive system for saves.
a lot of options for how they are generated and assigned. In this, however, it is a bit unclear what the intended method is.
An aside asks players to not worry too much about their stats and let their character's shortcomings encourage novel types of play. Interesting, but I'm not sure if I would feel that way as a player. This isn't an issue unique to this game.
Maybe the largest divergence in form yet. Only thieves had skills originally.
Checks subtract 1 if you don't have a relevant skill.
Variable skill/ability combos.
Skills vary from being broad to narrow
WAKE UP BABE, SAILING'S BACK
work is a funny one. Level 0 Do labor.
take the listed quick skills
pick two from the bgs list
roll and pick from two lists, but be locked into the numbers rolled.
level 0 skills mean you have them, but gain no bonuses. You are proficient and may make attempts at actions that otherwise would not be possible for an untrained person.
Taking skills multiple times increases the number.
I'm not going to go through all of the bgs. They're what you expect. Each one has a paragraph and a few skills associated with it.
two notable ones are barbarian and slave. The former being in the roman sense of the word. The latter is… interesting. I don't think there's anything wrong with this inclusion, but both of these betray some of the genre's more colonial roots. The External-Other and the Subjugated-Other.
This section doesn't have a great layout. The formatting for these seems to be a little awkward and thus leaves a few pages with a lot of blank space.
I'm coming back later to note that I realized I'm reading the Lightweight version so a lot of images are absent. That might explain some of this. Whoops
Your character is destined for greatness. Huge departure in concept from OSR roots.
Adventurers: a clever idea for a class that is just mixed from the others. Just based on the bits of info about it so far, it kind of seems like this subsystem could have just been spun out to replace the other classes. This feels like not wanting to commit to a feat or talent based system. Specifically only two other classes.
Classes come with built in Foci,, in addition to a number of extras you can choose.
10 level system. Weird to reveal this first in a chart for the first class.
I like expert as a way to replace thief. Its cool that you can make a sage, or a scholar, or a thief, etc.
Class abilities are here! They are concise and what you get is what you have. There isn't feature progression.
Mage also feels a little defensive about what may or may not exist in a setting. The game can't decide if the game is endemic to the default setting or not. Just commit to your world and let them figure it out. You're not making GURPS.
This kind of speaks to the clashing philosophies in this work. There is an urge to make a coherent world in which to play, but I know that the book is also very interested in being a design aid to GMs.
There is a lot of dragonlance in the mage section too.
Warrior seems very good at killing things.
Adventurer is very cool. Since the classes are pretty simple, it's not too bulky. I could see this becoming a problem in other games.
Another layer of additive modification. Usually 2 levels each.
Uses the language "bought" when talking about acquisition. Implicit Foci Points to spend lol
Wow, there's a lot of these suckers. This is really where the meat of character creation lives.
Henchkeeper is pretty good.
Some of these are much more evocative than others. To be expected, but there's some real standouts.
Character Creation Thoughts
It is remarkable what 30 years of further game design affords you. What a breath of fresh air.
There are parts that feel almost too modern. This is firmly in the NSR based on my definitions.
The system itself feels like it has more in common with 5e than it does b/x. Just based on this section, it feels like a fantasy heartbreaker more than anything.
Classes are still very simple, but there are some extra systems layered on top of them to add the possibility to player choice. This is something that I wish to emulate.
Over all, I really like this system. Modular, but fairly simple. Easy to imagine how to build a lot of characters out of this.
starter equipment packages
different types of money. but coin is coin. Uses silver as the base currency for pricing.
calculated in terms of items, with some items being more items. Excellent.
Readied items and stowed items.
Can carry a number of ready items equal to half their strength att. Includes worn armor, weapons, etc.
big charts of prices and items.
This game also seems to severely under value a trained and healthy animal.
Mules are sooooooooo cheap again. I guess because you can't breed them is the logic. Not that there is any implied animal husbandry with any of the animals.
same goes for boats? 30 sp for a rowboat
Much larger variety of roles baseline to the people.
If I'm paying a sage as much as a horse costs for a single answer, it better be a fucking good answer.
I've never come across the term Dragoman before. Professional interpreter. neat
Again, the economy of this world is odd. There's also politics being conveyed here, but we don't need to get into that.
Living expenses are also here right after this section but I don't think it warrants its own section.
more distinction to specific varieties.
I was going to comment that this is a line from the earlier works, but it's actually a more expanded list than my previous readings.
"war shirt" luck based armor. This may be the most evocative thing in here. Despite not being anything more than clothes, it still stops casting for some reason.
Blackjacks are interesting as a concealed weapon.
Claw Blades. Hell yeah brother
Huralant: catch all term for gun type weapons.
Variable weapon damage based on type.
weapon traits are fully here. They have hard mechanical meaning.
Multiple mentions of lethal vs less lethal
I had noticed that we haven't actually gotten a lot on the basics of rules so far. There was some in the into section. I do prefer this layout method, but I know others strongly disagree. So long as everything is restated in a complete section later, I'm fine reading sections that mention specifics I don't know yet. Character creation should be very early and bulk rules text should be after and all together.
Combat, softly calls out modern games for being to soft on characters.
Calls out that the GM will often have to translate what the players want to do into rolls based on their descriptions. Players will never learn the rules. We should kill them all
GM has the final say on what is rolled. standard trade off for player outcome.
"GM makes the rules" in the midst of many rules. I don't come down either way on the systems matters thing, but the systems are all around us.
interesting to find scenes here. Rebrands the the B/X turn to scenes. No stated duration, just vibes.
Oh wait, im wrong. Turns do still exist, they are a discreet 10 minute time chunk. I suspect that combat is going to flow more like the encounters of b/x then.
not really sure why scenes exist then. Just for spell duration? A nebulous time period that the DM is in charge of discerning. Makes sense. Is a useful lever for pressuring players.
3e style saves that are governed by Intelligence OR dex, wis OR cha, str OR con
Calculated by 16-level-higher of the two governing stats. These are static targets.
The actual Save is made by rolling a d20 and trying to get over their score.
Luck rolls. Completely random rolls.
Monsters and NPCs only have one save score. Ease for the GM. 15-half their hit die rounded down.
I don't know that saves are really substantially different from regular skill rolls. I don't think they even need to be called out a separate types of rolls
skill checks are made with 2d6+ relevant skill+attribute modifier
-1 if the character doesn't have at least 0 in a skill.
PC uses the best of their skills if there are multiple that might apply. Contradicts the earlier statement about the GM deciding what to roll.
I think they actually meant that GM calls for the check itself in response to what the player wants to do. And then normal negotiations open for what applies and what doesn't.
At the end, it doubles down on the GM having final say. This isn't a huge issue, regardless.
uses a standard ascending difficulty chart that caps out at 14+ as the max highest
" if failure at a task would make the PC seem notably in competent in their role in life, then they shouldn't need to have to roll a skill check for it." pg 41
Standard compounding help roll for +1s to the ginal roll. More than one pc can try to help, but only one +1 can ever be applied.
Opposed skill checks, standard really. NPCs don't get -1 if they don't have a relevant skill.
Initiative: Each side rolls 1d8 and adds the highest dex. NPCs usually have no modifier.
doesn't reroll at the end of the round
offers an individual inti as an alternative.
does point out that this takes longer and is more complicated, but leaves the offer there for GMs.
sneak and surprise rounds.
main action, what you'd expect. attack, use, spells, etc.
Move, 30 ft standard. No mention of grids or battlemaps.
fighting withdrawals weirdly make a comeback as the only movement specific manuver. Only an instant attack in response
On turn actions: quick, simple tasks. falling down, talking, drawing a readied item. This is one layer of litigation that I would do without. Not every moment needs to be measured and the GM should just be given the option to either allow it, call a roll, or say no.
Instant action: literally instant spells from MTG. Inturupts, responses, passive effects. I actually like calling this out specifically. There are things that just happen. It would be interesting to think of a game that uses phases like MTG.
Attacking, almost always a main action.
hit roll: d20+combat skill+class combat bonus. -2 if no level-0 skill. Weird that this is different. Have to beat the target's AC.
Shock damage: not explained yet. Dealt if the WEAPON has a shock rating and that is lower or equal to the target's AC? Odd. Morale?
Notable NPCs are Mortally wounded instead of dying.
Nonlethality: 5e style decide to not kill.
Chart of common to-hit modifiers.
Shock: damage done on a miss. simulates blades glancing off of armor or being assaulted blows.
weapons have a set amount of damage and a max AC that is affected. Damage is weirdly effected by weapon attribute?
Shock damage is the max lowest that a weapon can do. even if an attack does less, it changes to the shock value. Also weird
Dual-Weilding gets its own call out. Just do some extra damage when attacking with one hand weapons.
Shoving grappling: 5e is here. It's fine. Contests. Oddly long section of rules about this. This feels like a fix-it
Execution attacks? Requires a full minute of preparation, so not in combat?
Oh, I think this is meant to be a sneak attack. This is the kind of thing that solves the "I'm in a room alone with this person and they're not ready for a fight. Why can't I just stab them."
Saving throw in response from the NPC or they immediately become mortally wounded. Only ranged attacks require a roll.
Game uses action systems like 5e. It's fine. There are a lot of them. This game seems very interested in filling or preempting mechanical space.
These are interesting in that they are given unique mechanics, but also seem to not be all that can be done with an action. The paragraph suggests that there may be more, but the GM decides.
The places where the games osr roots are showing are odd and irregular. There are some structural or conceptual aspects here, but one that I don't want to overlook is that there are dice, and they're used in different ways throughout. The D20+ isn't king in everything.
That said, this section might be the most 5e like. The same concerns that govern the design choices of 5e combat balance are here. This game seems very interested in filling mechanical space and preempting possible action. This is in many ways a fairly modern impulse and breaks with the OSR ethos.
At this point, I think I am maybe barking up the wrong tree with this game. This feels like i've read this before, but I haven't. I think, for the sake of getting to other works, I'll start summarizing more.
Mortal Wounds and STABILIZING
language about who is important enough to live again.
Plot armor. This falls far out of line from what I expect from a game with OSR pretensions.
When revived, the creature is frail which is a kind of status effect that lasts until they rest for a week. No healing damage during that time.
interesting as a way to get people out of a dungeon, but make the escape very dangerous.
NVM. magic healing automatically removes frail and mortal wounds.
First aid system is actually a cool thing to formalize for dungeon delving. Feels a little over designed, but that's just how the system is. A lot of -1s +1s and when and how things can happen.
stress system. Their max strain = con score. Reduced by 1 per nights rest.
I suppose that this sets an interesting timer for how long adventures can go and how much your character can push themselves.
So far, the only things that add to this is healing. A kind of long term stress on the body, despite the physical healing.
I'm not sure if this kind of game really needs this? Or, it could, but the rest of the game hasn't really been built around this vibe. Its mostly been a heroic fantasy.
Blades does this because it's a noir so it serves the genre. This is a heroic fantasy where everyone is touched by a kind of magical source.
I'm sorry to nitpick this game so hard. I just don't like 5e and the more I read here, the more it feels like a fix-it.
Notable that they don't just kills you like in b/x. Saving throws, recovery.
Weekly saves to resist disease.
Falling and Other Hazards
These feel almost like they should be in the GM toolkit. Not that this is something that needs to be hidden from players, but if the game is supposed to be structured like they say it is, these are more of something that I would expect to be phrased as "if the players do this, these might be a way to give consequences."
10 hours a day. Rest and weather not withstanding. Speeds determined by
correctly calls out that horses don't make travel quicker most of the time. Unless you have a relay network and don't care about killing your horse.
Points to later rules for the GM about wandering encounters. If you can spot them first, you can usually avoid encounters if there's cover.
Caravan travel assumes food and water, but most PCs will travel in small groups and should
SEA TRAVEL BABYYYY. similar ideas. Rowing and wind. Sea encounters rolled only twice a day.
Wilderness Exploration & EXPEDITIONS
Interesting that this comes before the concept of Dungeons.
Seems to mostly cover survival aspects.
Food and Water is measured by days per person. Weight of supplies is a concern.
pack animals as seen in items and gear. Don't have to worry about food for them unless you are somewhere barren. Keeping animals chill during a fight is a concern.
First mention of hex crawl aspects.
Focused around exploring the hex itself.
proscribes a standard 6 mile scale for hex.
another use of system strain as consequences.
Did I miss the explanation of committed effort?
Survival skills are here. They're not really that in depth oddly.
once per foraging attempt.
similar 1 in d# but uses variable dice size instead of increasing the hit range.
This is the dungeon section. Blown out to include overground locations.
calls out that systems and time are there to put pressure on the players.
system for site diagrams on 243
opposed checks with some modifiers.
assumes that PCs usually aren't surprised. Might surprise the encounter depending on circumstaces.
all things that require time.
Finding something that is hidden happens automatically as long as you search the right place.
And maybe you have to know it's there already?
if they are just generally searching, there is a roll.
Locks, stuck doors, traps, etc. Everything takes a full turn at least.
Traps are also included here.
Wandering Encounter check
depending on the danger of the space, roll an encounter check after a number of turns.
sImplified Ruin Exploration
Weird that this is called ruins here specifically. Not named this anywhere else.
Even here, the rules undercut itself by giving the out of not managing resources. This is weak. Huge L, showing ass. Be confident about your design. Players will always change things to suit them regardless.
if people aren't interested in the types of play your game is, They should play something else.
The long and short of it is, drop timekeeping in favor of scenes, don't worry about light, or death, or any of the rules that I just spent and hour reading and annotating. Fuck it all I guess.
I think that what really bothers me is that this is the ultimate outcome of systems-don't-matter thinking. If this is how you view the rules you've put down, make rules you like or just play make pretend. I say that as gravely as possible. I think more people would be happier just playing make pretend and that's fine! I do that sometimes. My table doesn't work well with mechanical downtime rules alone and always just wants to free form roleplay for a while. That's just make pretend! Just do that! Play wanderhome or something if you need some framing, but don't kill your child in the crib just because you're scared that 5e players won't like your game. FUCK. I think an acknowledgment of this kind of table level game editing appearing somewhere in a game is good. Even an expanded section about it in the GM guide is awesome. Just the act of playing alters the rules text. But for the love of god, you don't have to do this every time you make a rule. Especially not when it's the core engine of your game.
I think this might be the first time experience points are mentioned at all?
Legates dangled again as higher advancement
XP doesn't reset at levels. I've always thought this makes it more of a clerical issue, but who am I to say.
I'M SORRY WHY IS THIS THE PART THAT DOESN'T HAVE ANY GUIDANCE OR STATED SYSTEM FOR WHAT GAINS YOU EXPERIENCE. IS THIS ONLY IN THE GM GUIDE OR SOMETHING? WTF.
- Skill buy system. Seems fine. Can save the between levels and increasing high skills requires more points.
can also be spent on improving attributes, with set point costs per number of times you've increased your attributes (total times, not each attribute.) Also has a level requirement for each improvment.
can also be spent on some mage class's spells or magical features from each tradition.
note, this is the first time it really became clear to me that mages have subclasses. It was alluded to that they get to make a pick about their magic type, but here it's clear that they are more than that.
PCs can also gain new foci at certain levels.
Odd cut out for potentially changing a player's leveling choices?
Modifying and customizing Equipment
I feel like I'm reading the most banal Dungeon Masters Guild homebrew shit in like 2020 or something.
I guess it's good to throw a bone to the artisan skill.
Ancient salvage resource.
A way to make special items (read tech more than magic), but they must be maintenance.
There's sort of a crafting system here. It's also a little open ended, as it only gives examples of items.
BUilding and Crafting Gear
oh wait no, crafting is just here. Why put this after the modification part?
No rolls if you have the appropriate background and tools. Makes sense and repeats the thing from earlier about just doing it if it makes sense.
heavier rolls for masterworks, which give mechanical bonuses.
The special rules for jury-rigging are also funny. It's something that I don't know if it needed its own rules, but I could see how someone gets there.
BUILDING STRUCTURES BABYYYY, BOATS AND CASTLES AND SUCH. They're expensive, but not that expensive i guess.
Oddly compelling rules for how and why a PC might work in a trade. Guilds and such.
How to play the game thoughts
That was a doozy. Part way through I was expecting to come out of it thinking that I liked having all of the rules in one spot, but that's not really what is happening here. I can feel the GM section calling to me. There's more there. Or if not, there are some glaring absences in this game.
I desperately want to skip this section. I know I can't completely, but this is a level of minutia that I'm not in the mood for.
two type so magic: High and New.
High is old magic, powerful, and rare. No petty effects.
new is unique to most practitioners.
We are fully in Vance magic terms now. 200 surviving spells.
High magic can only be used a few times a day.
New magic as quasi spells. I like this breakdown, its fun. Easier than high magic and based around schools that have developed the techniques.
High magic can be learned, even to new magic practitioners. New magic can't be shared outside of that tradition.
Have to hold on to the written version of the spell in order to prepare it later. ie, spellbooks.
Limits to prepared spells.
Oddly, slots don't have levels, so you can prepare any spells you want with the slots you have.
Prep takes an hour and a good night's rest.
Can't cast spells if you've "taken hit point damage or has severely jostled in a round," so mages should go first i guess.
Armour is like diametrically opposed to the concept of magic i guess.
Oh, actually I was wrong before. Spell uses and spells prepped are separate. There are a very limited number of spells that a mage can cast.
The mage can cast the same prepared spell a number of times.
Defined rules for targeting and sight.
Special from some schools. Weaker than High magic.
Some learn automatically, others are given choices. No exchanging
Arts are fueled by Effort
expelled and regained more quickly than spell slots.
pts=1+magic skill+highest of int or cha or no +1 for partial mages
Efforts are Committed, sunk into fueling powers, but returns automatically
each art describes how to commit effort to trigger it
This also determines duration of the art and when the effort is returned? Why not just have this built into the arts if you have to name them specifically anyways?
indefinitely until released
only ever requires a single point of effort to trigger the art. power is scaled with time committed to losing that effort.
Seems like a cool system by itself. Not sure if this game really needed two magic systems
Each tradition has a separate pool of effort?
Also, high mage has efforts too?
I'm coming back to clarify some of these since I've seen examples of them now. They are meta magic. That's it. 3.5 is here.
casters are weaker, but more varied when they have multiple traditions
This feels very pedantic or overly detailed. not really an elegant system.
God damn it, it is just Vance. They're all named like it too.
"Casting Forth the Inner Eye"
This is good actually. It's fun. They somehow managed to nail the naming for most of them better than d&d ever did.
Despite my usual disinterest in looking at spell lists, some of these are charming. Each spell is a paragraph and almost works as a piece of micro fiction.
arts, no spells. interesting
also less interesting than high magic
you can do it. There are costs and guidelines. They exits
permanant magical effects on a place. Seems cool. A little to granular and specific. This game has a different interest in the mystical than I do.
This game is very interested in player crafting. This isn't for me.
I'm going to skim this and probably not write much about it.
Opening section lays out a set of styles of play including some that thus far have not gotten much rules support. Domain play and court intrigue especially. Though they are phrased as genres, which makes me think the game thinks these are superficial narrative modes?
It's dying earth, BOTNS, a bit of steam punk, some elric. Not much Tolkien tbh.
THERE ARE SO MANY PROPER NOUNS HERE. This ain't for me. Good luck out there if this is what you need to run a game. IDK man. Couldn't be me.
I'll be real, I'm checked out of this. I'm 117 pages in and less than halfway though this thing. I'm going to do real high level for this part.
Frame work for planning your game.
Kind of basic advice about only filling in the details players might see and sketching in other things to be filled out later if need be.
Guides on world, region, kingdoms, geography, nations, society, government, history, religeon.
im going to stop listing these. There's a lot. I've gone through like 20 pages of this already.
a quick way of adding details to an location. Good idea. Usually things like "friends" or "enemies".
This section moves on to items at some point with the same degree of detail.
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
This section actually has the most OSR (by my definition of being related directly to B/X mechanically). Use monsters from those formats and port them in.
Also includes details about the other races of genetically modified people.
Races have a unique foci that gives them their traits.
good use of another game system to simplify something.
Take the monsters are smart approach
also make a point that enemies don't scale. You may have to run.
- No fights per day! That's not how the game thinks about encounters.
OH MY GOD THERES SO MUCH OF THIS. THIS IS BY FAR THE LARGEST SECTION OF THE BOOK. OH MY FUCK. IT'S EVEN MORE THAN I REMEMBERED. I MUST HAVE JUST READ THE VERY FIRST PART.
I don't want to come across as dismissive. There is a lot of really good stuff in here. It is a VERY granular guide on how to build a world. There are some things I agree with and some things that I think are maybe overwrought. I think it asks you to do more work upfront that is really needed. It also seems to imagine what I find to be a very boring fantasy setting in this. I don't need gonzo, but I want something that is more gripping. I'm sure it's fine. It's just that by making generic tables and advice, the output is probably going to be generic most of the time.
Worlds Without Number- Final Thoughts
I want to start off saying that there's a lot here that I like. I think if I had read the bulk of this a few years ago, I'd probably be a different designer. A worse one, by my current estimation, but more palatable by the general mainstream. There's a version of myself that goes from 5e to this and never leaves instead of becoming hooked on Dungeon World and eventually falling out of love. This comes from both structural ideas and specific game elements.
I was wrong to place this one so early in my divergence reading list. This is not OSR in any system sense. There may be some philosophical overlap, but not much in terms of content. I could even see making the case that this doesn't really fall under NSR. I called it out earlier, but this is firmly a modern game built with some earlier sensibilities in mind in regards mostly to the high level concept of interaction.
If you're reading my notes on the systems of the game, you'll notice that I use a kind of shorthand for writing out specifics, calling aspects of the game "standard". This betrays my history of ttrpgs more than anything, as the standard I refer to is 5e, rather than B/X which I am really trying to compare this to. When I do use this short hand, consider that I am also implicitly saying that the specific quirk of the game is more inline with modern game design than it is with the OSR standards.
In the final instance, this game seems more like a melding of 5e and latter OSR projects. Everything that is added outside of those seem to be rehashes of commonly complained absences that didn't make the jump for 3.5 to 5e, or other common complaints for what's missing in 5e. I don't hate this in concept. Make the game you want to see in the world. It is noteworthy if we are doing a comparative reading focused specifically on the OSR claim though.
The largest signifier of this origin comes from the general framing of the expected gameplay structure. It hold fairly hard to the sandbox style of gameplay that characterized the early years to tabletop games. There are some systems that lend themselves to this goal, formalizing many parts that would have been left to the digression of the GM in base B/X, but was often modified in modules (or I'm sure at almost every table). Travel , supplies, etc are all there. But in addition, there are some changes to hp and character longevity that make the game both easier in some ways, but also potentially puts strain on player groups for longer excursions.
I have mixed thoughts on this. It gives the game much more mechanical weight. It introduces many systems that it expects you to engage with. Part of me feels that this runs counter to the modular nature that is at the heart of OSR and undercuts the games stated goal of being an open sandbox.
By framing most of the system's rules as prescriptive (and especially ones that are tied into other mechanics such as player features), it is expected that all be honored if they are called upon. By having hard rules about drowning, it reframes all encounters with water as a negotiation about drowning. By stating hard system for foraging based on terrain, it locks the GM into allowing for the chance that the players may find respite in the Evil Swamp, despite it not making much sense.
This makes the mode of interacting with the game pieces fundamentally different than if they had, for instance, been left as statements that a PC in metal armor cannot swim without risk. The vagueries are what allow for that space. Obviously, players are able to make any table level changes they like, and some rules do cut out space for rules to be ignored by the GM. But these are different from the game allowing for the GM to pull modular rules from expanded sources or make calls on their own. If the GM does choose to make these calls under this framework, it begins to call into question the entire conceit of these games. I'm not looking for verisimilitude or "immersion," but there is something lost in that transaction.
Beyond that, the game seems slightly inconsistent in what it thinks needs specific rules and what can be left of to the GM. There are many subsystems that feel out of place to me, and larger systems that end up feeling bloated or immobile as a result.
The game seems very concerned with a certain type of play that would be nostalgic to certain demographics of players. Things that would have come up naturally through play in the grognard days. The game seems to have its own perspective on what OSR does as a framework and then works backwards from there to recreate that vision (and, if I can be ungenerous in my reading for a moment, tries to fix or patch some of what I suspect it thinks of as shortcomings.) This has been the trend for Dungeons and Dragons for a while, and this being so closely wed to 5e makes the whole system feel… off. Or not what it says on the tin, at least.
If I can be honest, there are large parts about this game that I do have interest in as a designer. I think the character creation and concept is just a flat upgrade from the OSR model and has aspects that I could see myself incorporating into my game design toolbelt. The GM guide is legendary already without me singing it's praises. Some of the thoughts on encounters are very interesting, especially in the way time and pressure is talked about for the party. That said, I think the game's relevance to my broader projects of studying OSR phenomenon is… complicated. There are parts there, but it doesn't really carry much over beyond the game's high level concepts of what play looks like and the general form of overland/ dungeon gameplay. Notably, no foundation for dominion level play. My warrior doesn't get a castle and my precious Goblin Wolf Riders, 50gp, are tragically absent. Or maybe they're in the vacuous campaign guide at the end somewhere and I just can't be bothered to find them.
What can we learn from this?
systems are a double edged swords. Including more zoomed in gameplay particles isn't always additive to the over all experience of play or running the game.
Character creation can be expanded considerably without it feeling aberrant to the over all size and tone of the game.
Dungeons and ect. have always been endurance tests. There can be subsystems that codify this more clearly.
Not a heavily recurring idea, but just succeeding when it makes sense base on background and circumstances is good. If your character was a blacksmith, you should just be able to make a horseshoe or something.
Things like the magic system can be used to be very evocative of the world.
Maybe the campaign guide is an art of brevity. Sometimes people have a special interest, but that doesn't make them an expert or a good judge.
As a matter of personal taste, systems that try to do to much tend to crumble under their own weight. It's hard to see the forest through the trees a bit here.
