Scarlet Heroes by Angrymog

Intro

posted by Angrymog Original SA post

Scarlet Heroes

Published by Sine Nomine Publishing, Scarlet Heroes is an OSR game intend for lone player characters rather than the usual party. Whilst the standard assumption is for the usual GM and Player setup, the book also contains oracles and systems for three types of solo adventure – the Dungeon Crawl, an Urban Investigation and finally a Wilderness Trek.

The setting of Scarlet Heroes is Asian-themed post-apocalyptic fantasy. Most of the world has been consumed by something called the Red Tide, an alien horror that takes the form of a crimson mist, able to corrupt and consume both physically and through dreams.

The remaining population of the world fled to the Sunset Isles, where, after driving the native Shou (who replace Orcs, Goblins, Bugbears and Hobgoblins) into the wilderness they settled and formed new kingdoms.
Kingdoms of the Sunset Isles

There are four majour kingdoms in the setting – the failing Mandarinate of Xian, once the ruler of the entire island, the Hellsworn Shogunate of the North, the decadent Magocracy of Tien Lung, and finally the hard-working and faithful monotheistic Hohnberg Pact, the lone European-flavoured country in the setting.

People of the Sunset isles

Humans come in six ethnicities and generalised cultures which are found across the nations, though some are more homogenous than others – e.g. the majority of the citizens of the Hohnberg pact are Eirengarders, whilst the Kueh make up the main population of the Shogunate. Mechanically all humans are the same, getting two free trait points to spend during character creation.

The non-humans have a couple of twists from their standard D&D cousins – Dwarves collect gold as an act of piety so that they can take its spirit into the afterlife; elves are literally immortal as a result of a botched immortality ritual – when one dies, they reincarnate into an elven infant. Halflings are the usual peaceful, quiet, homebodies. They’re also utterly fearless – not stupidly – they’re capable of recognising risks and danger, they’re just not afraid, nor can they be intimidated or panicked. Their other notable feature is that they have a ‘strange solidity about them’ – they’re capable of wielding large weapons – e.g. 2 handed swords, with no issues at all.

The last race are the Shou and the Shou-blooded, which fill the role of the humanoid monsters in the setting, though unlike their traditional variations, many Shou could pass for humans if they wanted to and didn’t go whole hog with tribal scarification and tattoos. The main feature of the Shou is that they’re naturally resistant to the corruption of the Red Tide.

Character creation

The beats of character creation should be familiar to anyone who’s played a D&D based game. Roll you attributes, pick your race, class, buy stuff, pick spells and play.

Attributes are rolled on 4d6, drop the lowest, arrange to suit, and if you haven’t rolled at least one 16 or greater, set an attribute to 16 – every hero is good at something.

The classes are Clerics, Fighters, Magic Users and Thieves. Your class informs your hitpoints (a set amount per level rather than rolled), attack bonus, fray die (automatic damage you do each turn to enemies of equal or lesser strength), what armour you can use, what the maximum damage you can do with a weapon is – clerics 1d6, fighters unlimited, magic users 1d4, and thieves 1d8. Finally Magic users, clerics and thieves all have special abilities above and beyond straight numbers.

Clerics can cast spells and turn undead.

Magic users can cast spells, additionally their fray die is capable of affecting all enemies, not just those weaker than themselves.

Thieves can backstab, and gain a free 3-point trait in their Archetype – i.e. what sort of thief they are, which increases by one every time they level – the normal maximum for a trait is 3.

Classes are race limited – only Humans and Shou blooded can be Clerics, and Dwarves and Halflings can’t be Magic Users either.

Finally you pick some traits for your character – Mostly a combination of Background and Skill system, Traits are also where you’ll find most racial special abilities.

Equipment and spells

There aren’t really any surprises here, though the spells have flowery names rather than the standard utilitarian D&D ones. Weapons are divided by a generalised type - two-handed weapons, one-handed weapons, light weapons, etc. with all weapons in a class using the same damage dice and Attribute modifier for attacks - rather than there being a long and detailed list of almost identical weapons.

System
There are 5 core mechanics to Scarlet Heroes, of which two are specifically designed to allow a lone hero to face a party’s worth of adventure.

Checks
When a character is trying some task of personal prowess or skill that might reasonably tax a hero, roll a check. The difficulty ranges from 9 to 17, and is rolled on 2d8 adding the relevant attribute modifier and their highest relevant trait.

Saving throws
Rolled to avoid traps, magical attacks and other attempts to harm the character, saves have a difficulty of 9 + the HD or Threat of the attacker, and are rolled exactly as Checks are, but adding the character’s level to the result too, meaning you roll 2d8 + level + attribute + highest relevant trait.

Attack rolls
A rolled on 1d20 plus the character’s attack bonus, relevant attribute and the enemy’s armour class. A result of 20 or greater is a hit.

Damage rolls
This is the core of what makes Scarlet Heroes work for a single player whilst otherwise leaving the maths and numbers of enemies unchanged.
Instead of reading damage dice straight, damage is read as follows.

Each die is read individually, and damage modifiers apply to a single die. Damage is done to enemy Hit Dice but to player Hit Points. For example, a Skeleton, having 1 HD would go down in one solid hit, and would do between 0-2 points of damage with each successful attack on a PC.

With the exception of a Thief’s ambush damage, overflow damage is applied to the next enemy; a character fighting a group of skeletons rolls 4 damage – four of the skeletons go down.

The Fray die that heroes get is read just like a standard damage dice, and can be applied to any qualifying enemy that the character could reach. The fray die is rolled even if the character isn’t declaring an attack that round.

The end result of all this is to allow a single character to face down threats that would normally require a full party, and to enable the use of pre-written modules without having to re-jig all the encounters.

Defying Death
If a hero is about to die or encounters an obstacle they just can’t get around, they may attempt to defy death. This is done by rolling 1d4 for each of their levels and applying the result as damage. If they’re still standing they survive the threat or get around the obstacle. If they drop to zero, they’re reduced to 1hp and have failed.

Each time the character tries to defy death during an adventure the dice step up by one size, to a maximum size of d12.

Bestiary
The bestiary has a combination of old favourites – Bears, Giant Spiders, Skeletons, and new and exotic horrors such as Centipede Women, Horse-headed demons, Leaping Vampires, and Ash Basilisks.

Character creation

posted by Angrymog Original SA post

Character creation

I’m going to be following the quick character creation rules, which start by rolling for your Race and Class (1d20, 1d8).
Next three rolls on the Trait tables – one Background, one Inate quality, and one relationship. (1d100 x3)
The most likely home for our character is the Mandarinate of Xian, though the Shogunate is also a possibility, and leads to potentially interesting questions like “What if their lawyer friend is someone who tries to prevent people being unjustly executed in the Shogunate?”
Our character will be a Kueh woman. Consulting the random name tables I get Kasumi Tanaka.

Next attributes are rolled - 4d6, drop the lowest, assign as you see fit.
Not great, but saved by not having gotten a 16. So I’m going to be a bit meta-gamey and assign the 6 to Wisdom, then make that our 16.
I’ve put a low score in Strength because I feel that the Bursts of Strength trait would best represent someone who isn’t naturally strong, but who can, when the situation calls for it, really put their back into it.

Clerics get 6 hit points, modified to 7 by our Con, start with an Attack Bonus of +1, and can cast one Level 1 spell a day.

We get a total of 5 trait points – 3 as standard and another two for being Human – I’m putting 2 into Warrior Monk, 1 into Helped a Skilled Lawyer and 2 into Bursts of Strength.

Shopping is the usual 3d6 x 10 gold to spend, and we end up with 70 gold and an equipment list as follows.

Short spear (Light weapon - +1/1d6+1), Leather Armour (AC 7), Shield (+1 AC bonus), Sling (+1/1d4+1), Backpack, Camping Gear, Healer’s Bag, Scribe’s tools, Local Map, 2 sets of common clothes
With all that done, we’re ready to start adventuring

Completed character
Kasumi Tanaka
1st level Cleric
Attack bonus: +1
HP: 7
AC: 6 (5 with shield)
Fray die: 1d6

Traits
Warrior Monk: 2
Bursts of Strength: 2
Helped a Skilled Lawyer: 1

Spells
Hand of Merciful Succour (heal 2 + 2d6 damage)

Weapons
Short spear (+2/1d6+1), Sling (+2/1d4+1)

Armour
Leather (AC7)

Other equipment
Backpack, Camping Gear, Healer’s Bag, Scribe’s tools, Local Map, 2 sets of common clothes

Money
5 gold

Character creation is quick - the most time consuming part would probably be coming up with your traits, but fortunately there's a handy table to provide inspiration if you're stuck.