Goblinville - Rules of Play

Issue One of the Goblinville Gazette · By Narrative Dynamics

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My house rules

A topic by Trajectory_Press created Jul 23, 2021 Views: 365 Replies: 4

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Trajectory_Press3 years ago

I've been running a Goblinville game for 20 sessions now and thought I'd share my house rules and thoughts behind them.

• New Titles and Traits are assigned when returning to town, not at the end of each session. - We found we were taking 4 -5 sessions to go out and then get back to Goblinville and wanted to slow down XP progression.

• Fragile is a trait on an item. Fragile items break first when a twist causes an inventory item to break. - I'd mentioned this for a few loot items they found and it just became a thing.

• Magical Attributes are added to character sheets and can be used as either a Title or a Trait but can only be used once and then are erased. (ex. Chosen of Din after completing a magical ritual)

• Traits and Titles bestowed by items may be used while injured or sick conditions are active. - This is just a way to make items with traits feel more special.

• Session goals, when completed, allow the goblin to remove either Exhausted or Panicked from their active conditions. - Suggested by the players to give additional weight to session goals. We're still testing it out.

• Needing to roll a new marching order while in combat doesn't mean a camp action is immediately required. However, needing to camp immediately after said combat is a possibility. - Sometimes we would go through a couple turns while fighting a boss and I felt everyone gaining a condition while in the combat was too dangerous.

• If you try to attack an enemy who is at range and you do not have a ranged weapon you are at poor position. - This could represent charging at them with a melee weapon, or even harsh language.

Narrative DynamicsDeveloper3 years ago

These are solid. Thanks for sharing! We love hearing about long-running games. The tweaks to magic items and long combats are especially good.

Trajectory_Press3 years ago (1 edit)

Cheers! Last week was our 22nd game, playing weekly. Only one PC death so far and it was surprisingly poignant even with the goblin funeral-looting.

g4mrnub3 years ago (3 edits)

I really like your house rules, they seem battletested rather than haphazardly thrown in from theory-craft. To add my 2 cents:

"• New Titles and Traits are assigned when returning to town, not at the end of each session. - We found we were taking 4 -5 sessions to go out and then get back to Goblinville and wanted to slow down XP progression."

My group has also taken about that same time to return to town. Playing the rules as written my group has come back levelled but without much to show for their new titles and rankings which seems a bit lackluster. Because I like the fast levelling though instead of house-ruling I'm trying to just give out pretty much double the loot, really try to utilize the "Let it Ride" from Burning Wheel and increased my session length from 2-3 hrs. to 3-4hrs.

"• Session goals, when completed, allow the goblin to remove either Exhausted or Panicked from their active conditions. - Suggested by the players to give additional weight to session goals. We're still testing it out."

Goal/Belief Houserule

I have similar problems with Goals and Beliefs not being mechanically relevant enough, especially during session wrap-ups. The condition system seems too delicate for me to mess with so next session I'll be trying out a rule: Beliefs should try to reflect an outlook on Goblinville, the Goblin Squad, or the Adventure Location. The Goal must be an enactment somehow of your belief and you don't gain a title if the session goal is not accomplished.

"• Needing to roll a new marching order while in combat doesn't mean a camp action is immediately required. However, needing to camp immediately after said combat is a possibility. - Sometimes we would go through a couple turns while fighting a boss and I felt everyone gaining a condition while in the combat was too dangerous"

I totally understand the sentiment, different strokes for different folks. However, I feel the threat of a camp requirement incentivizes fast and decisive combat without it dragging on. Like npc morale/relevant moves left, it's represents the PCs fatigue and continued willingness to fight. I still do run into the problem of combat dragging a bit when a PC tries to better their position when the inciting monster move would decrease position. Fictionally things change but not mechanically. Fun, but long combat sometimes. I'm going to try to "Let it Ride" more often and possibly increase the scale of each action instead of the default loose version of DnD 5 second minutia.

All the rest of your house rules I love.

Vault House Rule:

My PCs have started to leave items and scratch in town. I realized they don't even own homes though and nowhere in the rules as written do they have a place to store things...

>As an additional ability from the mines you can pay 10 scratch to dig out a bank vault for your goblins to store things in town.

>A possible town catastrophe is getting your stuff stolen from the vault. (With evidence of the crime if you're not an evil-DM)

This one I'm still considering. On one hand not being able to store items forces you to put your valuable items in danger every outing which is a good thing, on the other hand being able to store things increases player choice for what type of "loadout" they want to take with them as they accrue more magic items and gear. It's easier to store wealth for long-term goals as well. Thoughts?

Trajectory_Press3 years ago(+1)

@g4mrnub: How did your goal/belief houserule do in your next session? Making gaining a title based on fulfilling a goal makes the goals really important so I'm curious if your players change their goal-setting based on the change.

Goal Houserules:

I can see where you'd be cautious about doing anything to change the condition system. One positive thing that's come from my group's Goal houserule is that players will do riskier things if they're close to accomplishing a goal. For example, in the last session one player set their goal as "getting everyone on a warg" so the party could escape from a force of human hoplites they had no hope of defeating. They player had their goblin take a larger risk to get the last goblin on a warg, betting that they would accomplish their goal and remove a condition afterward. It's getting them to make choices rather than being a passive reward, and that fits well with this group's playstyle.

I like Let it Ride from Burning Wheel, and definitely try to use that instead of DnD minutia. If it's a large goal, I've started asking for a total number of successes rather than relying on one roll and that seems to be working well. I'll post that later, when I can get my thoughts together.

Vault House Rule:

I like how you've codified a stash, and I think it's something that characters want right away. My players started storing bits and bobs in their huts right away, but never anything useful, just knickknacks from adventures. Once they made a bunch of scratch and started keeping more gear, then it became a possibility for theft. I didn't add it to the list of crisis because I wanted the adventure facing outward more, but I love that idea. Make it just like some of the other locations in that it can have a keystone for extra protection. Building the vault gives them a place to store stuff that's fairly secure, but if you roll Theft on the crisis table then the vault is found and raided. If you have a vault keystone then it's immune to that roll.

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Goblinville - Rules of Play

My house rules

Goal/Belief Houserule

Vault House Rule:

Goal Houserules:

Vault House Rule: