A Song of Ice and Fire Roleplaying by ThisIsNoZaku

1 Worldbuilding
2 Laws and Customs
3 Game Rules
4 Character Creation and Example Characters
5 Abilities and Specialties and Destiny and Qualities
6 House Creation
7 Equipment
8 Intrigue
9 Combat

Worldbuilding

posted by ThisIsNoZaku Original SA post



A Song of Ice and Fire Roleplaying is, as the name suggests, an RPG set in the world of George R.R. Martin's books. (Copyright puts my copy of the RPG approximately a year before the show came on.)

The introduction is a bunch of stuff no one ever cares about.

Chapter 1 is a primer on Westeros. To summarize the summary: Westeros is a single state made up of seven kingdoms united a long time ago. Seasons last years and there's lots of old shit everywhere; it mentions lineages that can be traced back thousands of years. Magic is rare, some argue completely gone. SIFRP, as the game acronymizes itself, is a game about court politics and family alliances and war, and on a personal level honor, love, leadership, betrayal, etc.

The next section is an Almanac, done in character.

Three hundred years ago, the Targaryens first landed on Westeros, and with their dragons united the continent, facing the kings already there with a simple choice: submit or burn. They ruled over civil war, rebellion and expansion, until the Mad King Aerys II who was overthrown in a rebellion and slain by Jaime Lannister, who earned the sobriquet “Kingslayer.”

A long, long time ago, during the Dawn Age, the only people who lived in Westeros were the children of the forest, who lived with nature and worshiped nature deities. 12,000 years ago, the first Men came to Westeros over a land bridge and through the region that would become Dorne. The first men brough bronze weapons, horses and their own gods, and made war against the children of the forest. Centuries of struggle ended with a Pact sworn between the two. Both prospered during 4,000 years of peace, the Age of Heroes, and the Seven Kingdoms had their beginnings in this time, with some noble houses tracing their bloodlines back to the fabled figures of this time. The Night Watch was also founded in this period, to defend against all of the weird shit that wanders out of the Very Most North (not the real name) and the Wall was also raised then. Out of this time came the Seven Kings: the King in the North, the King of Mountain and Vale

Happy times ended with the arrival by ship of the Andals in the Vale of Arryn. This fresh batch of invaders brought even more gods, and steel weapons and just as the first Men had done, they went on a conquering and killing spree, destroying the children of the forest's sacred weirwoods and either slaughtering them completely or driving them so far north as to make no difference. Regardless, the children of the forest vanished from history. The only kingdom not to fall to the Andals was the North.

1,000 years ago, the queen Nymeria arrived with a huge fleet that landed in Dorne. She eased the friction between her people and the natives by marrying Mors Martell and their combined might consolidated Dorne and established the Martells as the masters of the land.

During this time a lot of fighting between the various kings was going on.

400 years ago, the Doom (yes it's capitalized in the book) came to Valyria and lots of refugees fled to Dragonstone, an island off the east coast of Westeros and the western most outpost of Valyria. This is how the Targaryens came to prominence; as the masters of Dragonstone they became the leaders of the Valyrian remnants. 100 years after that, they landed on Westeros proper and under Aegon the Conqueror began their campaign on conquest, uniting all of the kingdoms except Dorne. Dorne was taken by a future Targaryen king, lost through insurrection and finally integrated through marriage.

King's Landing
The spot where Aegon first set foot on Westeros, King's Landing went from a tiny fishing village to an enormous modern city and the capitol of the kingdoms.

The king rules from the seven-towered Red Keep, on the highest of King's Landings three hills, with his advisers. The most important is the King's Hand, the only man other than the king himself allowed to sit on the throne and who is invested with all his authority. The city is surrounded by walls with seven gates for passage and the peace is kept by the City Watch, called “gold cloaks.”

In the last moments of his reign and life, King Aery's sent his pregnant queen and son to Dragonstone. He kept the crown prince's wife, a Dornish princess, and their children in King's Landing, as leverage to keep Dorne on his side. When Lannister sacked the city, however, she and her children were killed. When the Targaryen's were defeated on the mainland, the rebels sailed to Dragonstone to capture the rest of the now-deposed king's family. However, the queen had died giving birth and Prince Viserys and Princess Daenerys escaped.

The North
The North is ruled by the Starks of Winterfell. They are served by many lesser families: the Karstarks of Karhold; the Mormonts of Bear Island; the Umbers of Last Hearth; the Boltons (it doesn't say where they're from); plus a bunch of mountain clans who swear loyalty to the Starks but don't get out much.

Also in the North is the Night's Watch, who defend the wall against whatever wanders down from farther north. The 19 castles of the Wall can hold 5,000 warriors, but these days there are only around a tenth that many brothers and 3 castles remain manned.

The Iron Islands
A cluster of barren rocks jutting out of the stormy and cold Ironman's Bay, the Iron Islands are the realm of the Greyjoy's. The people of the islands are the ironborn, or ironmen to the rest of Westeros and are famous sailors, pillagers and raiders. They posses a brutal culture of violence and worship the Drowned God.

When the ironmen want something, they take it, including thralls to work their farms and mines and “salt wives” for their beds.

Leadership of the ironmen was given to the Greyjoys after Aegon destroyed the line of the previous ruling family. He allowed them to choose their new lord and they swore to follow Vickon Greyjoy.

Seven years ago Lord Balon Greyjoy named himself King of the Iron Islands, of Salt and Rock, Son of the Sea Wind and Lord Reaper of Pyke. His lords flocked to him, eager to return to a life of raiding and piracy.

Much less excited was everyone else in Westeros, especially King Robert Baratheon, who marshaled his own forces to put down the rebellion. The ironmen destroyed the ships of Lannisport, but Stannis Baratheon caught the ironman fleet and destroyed most of it. (Damn, I don't remember Stannis being so badass in the books.)

Balon lost his two eldest sons and his youngest was taken by the victors to be warded by the Starks to ensure his future good behavior.

The Riverlands
Once under the rule of ironmen, after Aegon the Conquerer took these lands from them he granted them to the Tully's who rule today. They get their lands from the Trident, a series of three rivers that come together before emptying into the sea.

The Tullys had joined up readily with Robert in his rebellion and their bannermen had followed. There's lots of Andal blood in the Riverlands, and most follow the Seven Gods, though some worshipers of the old gods can be found.

Mountains of the Moon
This was the first place that the Andals landed when they came to Westeros and is ruled by the House of Arryn. Among the mountains is the Vale of Arryn, home to the most imposing mountains in Westeros and the demarcation between the northern and southern kingdoms. Among the mountains is the Eyrie, the most impregnable fortress in Westeros. Two gates guard the approach to the castle, a very long and winding road up the side of the mountain.

Lord Arryn fostered Eddard Stark and Robert Baratheon and remains steadfastly loyal to them both, serving as the Robert's Hand.

Other families within the Vale include the Baelishes, the Redforts, the Templetons and the Royces.

The Westerlands
Lion Territory. The Lannisters are the richest house, controlling many productive gold mines. They have some of the best trained and disciplined soldiers in Westeros and skilled horsemen, and a respectable fleet rebuilt since it's destruction at the hands of the ironmen.

The Lannister Patriarch is Lord Tywin. He brought his family back from the disgraceful state his father had left it in and was named Hand by king Aerys at the age of 20. He served for twenty years before being dismissed, and when he marched on King's Landing during the rebellion, the king had the gates opened expecting his former Hand had returned to aid him. Not so much, as it turns out, and the Lannisters sacked the city while Tywin's own son in the Kingsguard killed Aerys.

The Lannister sworn houses include the Cleganes, the Crakehalls where Jaime Lanniser squired, their cousins the Leffords, the Marbrands, the Paynes, the Swyfts and the Westerlings.

The Reach
The second largest region behind the North, the Reach is well known for it's flowers; the main road in the region is even called the roseroad and it connects the home of the Maester's in Oldtown, King's Landing and High Garden, the seat of the Tyrells who rule the Reach.

The Tyrells are second only to the Lannisters in wealth and with the larger army, while they combined fleets of their bannermen could challenge the royal navy. In Robert's Rebellion, the Tyrells had remained loyal to Aerys, but sworn loyalty to him after the defeat of their previous king and were accepted by the new one.

Beyond the Tyrell's, the Reach has lots of big, powerful and influential families: the wealthy Florents; the Hightowers, one of the oldest families in Westeros; the Redwynes who control a powerful fleet; the Tarlys famous for battling with the Dornishmen; the Rowans; the Fossoways, of Cider Hall and New Barrel and the Oakhearts.

The Stormlands
This region gets its name from the ferocious storms that sweep over it, comparable to those of the Iron Islands.

The stories say that the castle of Storm's End was raised by the first Storm King, who married the daughter of sea and wind. As punishment, the gods threw an enormous storm at him, killing everyone but him. In return he declared war and raised six castles, which the gods destroyed, but the seventh, Storm's End, stands today.

The Stormlands passed from the hands of the last Storm King and into the hands of the Baratheons by Aegon who killed the former and put the latter in charge.

Also found in the Stormlands are the families of the Carons; the Conningtons; the Dondarrions; the Estermonts, whose patriarch is the kings grandfather; the Selmys and the Tarths.

Dorne
The southernmost kingdom, Dorne is also the most different from the rest of Westeros. Dorne was conquered by the Targaryens, but they couldn't hold it. It was a marriage between a Targaryen king and a Dornish princess that finally brought them into the fold and the Martells and Targaryens were close ever since. In fact, the Targaryen crown prince was married to the sister of Lord Doran Nymeros Martell and he was extremely upset by her death. It took all the diplomatic efforts of Jon Arryn to keep the peace between the Dornish and the new regime.

The Dornish use “prince”, instead of king, and inheritance favors the eldest child, regardless of gender. There are three types of Dornishmen, the “Salty” who live on the coast, the “Sandy” who live in the deserts and along the rivers and the “Stony,” who live somewhere the book doesn't specify.

Beyond Westeros
There's all kinds of stuff across the sea. The two most noteworthy are the Free Cities and the lands that the Dothraki call home.

This is mostly geography that isn't interesting.



Now that that's all out of the way, after this we start getting into the parts more directly relevant to playing the game.

Edit: Added an image of the cover.

Laws and Customs

posted by ThisIsNoZaku Original SA post

Now we start getting into the parts that directly impact play, talking about the customs and laws, technology and social organization in Westeros.

Customs and Laws


Technology
The technology of Westeros is similar to that of 13th to 15th century Europe, without any gunpowder. The most interesting difference from the real world is that crows are used

Faith and Religion
There are two main faiths in Westeros, the Seven and the Old Gods.

The Seven is the faith of the Andals, called the "New Gods" despite existing in Westeros for 6,000 years. Technically, the Seven is monotheistic, worshiping seven aspects of a single creator god.

The Father is called on for wisdom in judgement and judging the dead. The Mother guards children, mothers and innocents, blesses pregnant women and unborn children. The Warrior is the patron of knights and soldiers. The Smith is the god of creation, healing and cripples. The Crone is the face of fate and wisdom, said to have let the first crows into the world when she looked behind death's door. The Maiden protects girls and young women and lovers. The Stranger collects the dead and takes them to the afterlife.

Followers of the Seven give up their family names to become septons or septas, for men and women, respectively. The Great Septon leads the religion from the Great Sept of Balor in King's Landing. Down one rung are the Most Devouted, fantasy!Cardinals to the Great Septon's fantasy!Pope. Godsworn are often learned and literate and teach the children of nobles. The faithful pray in Septs or Septries and the symbol of the faith is a seven-pointed star or seven-faced crystal.

The Faith used to be much more powerful before Aegon the Conqueror, when there were seven kings and one Great Septon. The Targaryens cut them down to size, but the faith still carries a lot of influence and moral authority.

The Old Gods were worshiped by the children of the forest and adopted by the First Men. They are gods of nature- rivers, trees, etc- and are represented by weirwoods, special trees with while bark and dark red leaves. The children of the forest carved faces into some of them and these special trees are called heart trees. Lots of weirwoods were destroyed, first by the First Men before their peace with the children of the forst and then by the Andals.

Now, worship of the Old Gods is limited primarily to the North and pockets where the First Men blood runs thick.

Other Religions
The ironborn worship the Drowned God, the god of the sea and raiders, along with the Storm God, ancient enemy of the Drowned God.

Sometimes found among the Dorne are those who still follow the ways of the Rhoynar from before they came to Dorne as the Orphans of the Greenblood.

A prominent faith in the east is R'hllor, the Lord of Light. He's a god of light and fire, invoked by his followers to protect against darkness and evil.

Knighthood
As a medieval fantasy setting, Westeros is filled with stories of shining knights and heroic deeds. Of course, reality does not always match the stories, sadly.

Young noble boys start on the road to knighthood at 8 or 9, serving as squires to full fledged knights. They can become knights of their own as early as 15, but old squires are not unknown. As warriors, knighthood must be earned; if you cannot fight, you cannot be knighted.

There is also a religious side to knighthood, closely tied to faith in the Seven. In the ceremony for knighthood, the aspirant keeps an overnight vigil and in the morning, walks barefoot in a simple shift to a septon and a knight. The septon anoints him with holy oils and the knight touches him on each shoulder with a sword. An abbreviated version can be performed by just a knight. The would-be knight is anointed by the established knight and swears his vows.

Knights are formally called Ser. Knights can have personal coats of arms, distinct from their family arms, but only legitimate heirs can inherit those of their father. Fake knights who were never knighted but claim to have been do exist.

Knights can become landed by being granted lands and keeps for service. Knights commonly swear themselves to the service of nobles and those without a liege are "hedge knights," often poor wanderers.

Maesters of the Citadel
An unusual social group existing a bit outside of the traditional feudal hierarchy. The Citadel is the center of learning in Westeros and the Maesters are a mashup of philosophers, scholars, scientists and ambassadors.

The Maesters accept anyone who comes to them to learn, regardless of status- though no girls allowed- even if they don't wish to become Maesters.

The Archmaesters rule the Citadel and are the closest thing to a ruling body the Maesters have. They make decisions about the administration of the Citadel, choose the Grand Maester who advises the king and announce the changing of the seasons.

Those training to be Maesters study a wide variety of topics: accounting, anatomy, architecture, astronomy, dragonlore, forensics, healing, herblore, "higher mysteries", history, mathematics, nagivation, raven lore and training, watercraft, yadda yadda. When a student thinks they've mastered a topic they can ask to be tested by that fields archmaester and if they pass, the student earns a chain link. Each different subject is represented by a different metal. Once a student earns enough links to create a chain they can wear around their neck, they swear their vows to become a full maester.

Maesters are assigned to lords to advise them and since they have to give up their family names, titles and lands when they swear their vows, they are seen as a wise, neutral party.

There is some rivalry between the Maesters and religious faithfuls. The Maesters see themselves as men of reason and intellect, poo-pooing "superstition" like many elements of religion and mysticism.

Game Rules

posted by ThisIsNoZaku Original SA post

Chapter 2: Game Rules
Let's skip directly to the parts us will care about.

ASOIF uses d6s in a roll-and-add dicepool system- Roll a number of dice and add them together to get a result.

There are four types of tests: Basic, Extended Basic, Competition and Conflict Tests.

In a Basic test, you roll and compare the result to the Difficulty. Extended Basic tests are used in situations where multiple tests are needed to succeed on something.

Competition tests are when multiple parties are trying to achieve the same goal, and the test is to determine who succeeds first or best.

Conflict tests happen when characters are acting directly against each other; essentially, whenever one character is “attacking” and the other is “defending.” The game then says that the “active” character in the conflict should do the rolling. The game gives the examples of a guard and an infiltrator. If the infiltrator is trying to sneak past the guard, he rolls. If the guard is actively looking for someone trying to hide, the guard rolls.

For conflicts, each character has a passive “Defense” rating that serves as the Difficulty for the rolls an acting character makes against them, equal to 4 x the Ability.

Modifying Tests
A Modifier is a flat amount added to a roll.

Assistance provided by an ally gives half their rating in whatever Ability is being used, rounded down but minimum 1, as a modifier to the test.

Taking More Time gives an extra die for the roll for each additional unit of time spent before making it, up to double your normal dice pool.

Specialties are narrow specializations that a character can have. Specialties have numeric ratings and whenever a Specialty applies, the character gains the rating in Bonus Dice . For each bonus die a character has, they roll an extra die and then subtract one die before calculating the roll result.

Penalty Dice remove dice from your roll like Bonus Dice, except that they don't give the extra die.

Rolls have degrees of success or failure, based on the result. Getting exactly the number needed gives one degree of success and you get one more for every 5 points you beat the Difficulty of the roll by.

The next section covers several character archetypes you can use:
Anointed Knight
Godsworn
Hedge Knight
Heir
Maester
Noble
Retainer
Scout
Squire

Each of these characters comes ready to use directly out of the book, with skills, traits and equipment.

The next chapter goes into the full character creation system.

Character Creation and Example Characters

posted by ThisIsNoZaku Original SA post

A Song of Ice and Fire Chapter 3: Character Creation and Example Characters
Now we start in with the character creation

Step 1: The Noble House
First off, the game suggest generating a noble house that all of the characters belong to or serve directly. This gives everyone an inbuilt reason to work together, a support network for the group and plot hooks, plus ASOIF has mechanics for playing at the “house” level, a la Companies from Reign.
I'm going to generate a custom house for the characters, but in the interest of keeping things organized in this thread I'm going to put all the specifics of that part in it's own post.

Step 2: Character Concept
First we decide the kind of character we want to make and the first part of that is your age. Life expectancy in Westeros isn't too long and there are a lot of young people carrying a whole lot of responsibility on their shoulders.

Now let's introduce our example characters:

Tasoth posted:

If you don't make at least one Northman, especially one bearing an axe and a grudge for Southern knights, you will upset my need for petty vengeance against characters from the book.
Victarion Snow, bastard Hedge Knight (from a different family) and house master-at-arms. Despite his skill at arms, he resents all of the disrespect shown to him by knights from southern kingdoms, sitting fat and happy in their warm homes and peaceful lands.

dereku posted:

If you're taking ideas how about a mischievous/manipulative noble
Rodrik Sunderly, House Heir. An intelligent and sociable young man from a family of rough-and-ready warriors, he dislikes how his father has become so old and lacking in energy while awkwardly crushing on his new, hot young step-mother. Plots and intrigues as a hobby.

Count Chocula posted:

I'd like to see a eunuch.
Eustace, Family Maester. The first son of a Westerlands noble, he was castrated as a young boy by an uncle in a plot to steal his inheritance. Intelligent and happy to learn, he joined the Maesters.

You need to pick your characters age, which is measured in categories.

”Victarion Snow” posted:

Victarion is Middle Aged.

”Rodrik Sunderly” posted:

Rodrik is a Young Adult.

”Eustace” posted:

Eustace is Middle Aged.

Next is Status . Your character's Status is your rank in the social hierarchy of Westeros. The maximum Status that you can have is determined by your house; the more important and influential it is, the higher the Status characters can have. There are lots of advantages to high Status, but it has to be bought like an Ability.

After that is character Role. Role is the characters archetype. This doesn't have any mechanical effect, it's just a guide to help you make a particular kind of character and gives a few examples from the novels.

The roles given in the books are:

The Expert , someone who specializes in a narrow range of skills. (Syrio Forel, Gendry, Maester Luwin, Jojen Reed, The Tickler)

The Fighter is any kind of warrior. (Robert Baratheon, Gregor Clegane, Victarion Greyjoy, Jaime Lannister, Barristan Selmy, Brienne of Tarth)

A Leader is anyone who command others. (Stannis Baratheon, Tywin Lannister, Jeor Mormont, Jon Snow, Eddard Stark, Daenerys Targaryen)

Rogues are sneaky characters who get along on the outer edges of society. (Tyrion Lannister, Meera Reed, Davos Seaworth, Arya Stark)

Schemers are plotters and conspirators. (Petyr Baelish, Cersei Lannister, Grand Maester Pycelle, Sansa Stark, Varys the Spider)

”Victarion Snow” posted:

Victarion is a Fighter.

”Rodrik Sunderly” posted:

Rodrik is a Schemer.

”Eustace” posted:

Eustace is an Expert.

After Roles is fleshing out the character with their before play history and the building blocks of their personality.

The book suggests thinking up one important event for every age category above Youth the character is.

Personality wise, the book talks about four elements: the character's Goal, Motivation, Virtue and Vice.

The Goal is something the character wants to achieve.

While the Goal is the what , the character's Motivation is the why .

A Virtue is something good about the character, while their Vice is the most noteworthy negative trait.

The game provides tables for randomly rolling all five of these.

”Victarion Snow” posted:

Victarion is Middle Aged.
In his Youth, Victarion was involved in a battle. (4) In both his Adolescence and Young Adulthood, he was kidnapped and somehow got away. (5, 5) As an Adult, he had a torrid love affair. (3)

His Goal is Revenge.
His Motivation is Lust.
His Virtue is that he is Humble.
His Vice is Licentious.

”Rodrik Sunderly” posted:

Rodrik is a Young Adult.
In his Youth, he was involved in a battle. (4)

His Goal is Mastery in a field of expertise.
His Motivation is Love.
His Virtue is that he is humble.
His Vice is that he is Cruel.

”Eustace” posted:

Eustace is Middle Aged.
In his Youth he kept the company of a famous individual. (8) As a Young Adult he had a torrid love affair was involved in a villainous scandal . While an Adult and his Middle Age, he was involved in a battle or fight. (5, 5)

His Goal is Wealth.
His Motivation is Greed.
His Virtue is that he is Devoted.
His Vice is that he is Licentious Prejudiced (10)

All right, there is a bit of a problem with the tables they give for randomly determining stuff: for simplicity, they're all just a number of dice to get a table entry. However, having multiple dice means the results get weighted to the middle of the table, so if you roll a lot of times, you're going to get similar looking results.

Step three is Abilities . ASOIF doesn't have any attributes, all of that is rolled into Abilities, the way FATE does the same with Skills. This is the first part where your age plays a factor in the mechanics: the older you are, the more experience you get and age also determines the maximum level you can have in an Ability. Characters hit their peak at Adult, when their maximum rank is 7.

Every ability starts at a rating of 2. You can, with permission from the “Narrator” drop a single Ability down to a rank of 1 and gain 50 more experience.

Increasing an ability costs 10 experience to increase by 1, plus 30 for every rank after that.

The Abilities in the game are:

Each ability has a bunch of sections describing how and when it's used, Difficulties, etc. in chapter four.

After you buy all your Abilities, you can buy Specialties, again with an amount of Experience determined by your age. Each rank of a specialty costs 10 Experience and gives a Bonus die, and you're not allowed to have a Specialty with a rank higher than that of it's parent Ability.

”Victarion Snow” posted:

As a Fightan Man, Victarion should get high ranks in Agility, Animal Handling, Athletics, Endurance, Fighting, Marksmanship and Warfare, according to the book. Middle Age gives Vic 270 Ability and 100 Specialty experience.

Agility 3 (10)
Animal Handling 3 (10)
Athletics 4 (40)
Endurance 3 (70) Specialty: Resilience 3B (30)
Fighting 5 (70) Specialty: Axes 5B (50)
Warfare 4 (40) Specialty: Command 2B (20)

”Rodrik Sunderly” posted:

Schemers should get Awareness, Cunning, Deception, Knowledge, Language, Persuasion, Status and Will. As a Young Adult, Rodrik gets 180 Ability and 60 Specialty experience.
Awareness 3 (10) Specialty: Empathy 2B (20)
Cunning 4 (40)
Deception 4 (40) Specialty: Bluff 1B (10)
Fighting 3 (10)
Knowledge 3 (10) Specialty: Education 2B (20)
Language: Westeros Common Tongue 3 (10)
Persuasion 3 (10)
Status 3 (10)
Will 4 (40) Specialty: Dedication 1B (10)

”Eustace” posted:

Eustace is an Expert, so uses whatever skills are important to his field of expertise. He gets 270 Ability and 100 Specialty Experience for his age, the same as Victarion.
Cunning 5 (70) Specialty: Logic 2B (20)
Healing 4 (40)
Knowledge 5 (70) Specialty: Education 4B (40)
Language: Westeros Common Tongue 4 (40)
Persuasion 4 (40)
Status 3 (10)


Step five is Destiny Points and Benefits . You get Destiny points based on your age, except you get more the younger you are. A Youth gets 7, and a character gets one lest for every age category

You can do two things with your starting Destiny Points: Invest them in benefits or save them to be spent later. Chapter 5 has bunches of things you can buy with your Destiny Points.

You're also limited to a maximum of 3 Benefits, if you have more than 3 Destiny Points.

”Victarion Snow” posted:

For his totally pimpin' Axe skills, Victario gets Axe Fighting I . Whenever he makes an attack with an Axe, he can sacrifice any of his Bonus dice and inflict that much extra damage. (For a benchmark, a suit of full plate prevents 10 damage)
He is also a Leader of Men , and may automatically reorganize or rally a unit once per round of battle.
The Blood of the First Men flows in his veins, adding 2 to any Endurance tests he makes and giving him 2 extra Health.
Victario starts play with no Destiny Points.

”Rodrik Sunderly” posted:

First, Rodrik must take Heir for his position as the heir to the house. He gains +1 to all Status tests and becomes the Head of House if anything happens to his father.
Treacherous lets him add his Cunning rank of 4 to his Deception test results.
Courteous adds half his Persuasion ranks to his Deception test results, and whenever anyone tries to use the Read Target action on him, he adds his Cunning ranks to his defense against it.
This leaves him with two Destiny Points.

”Eustace” posted:

Eustace is a Maester , which ties his fortunes with those of the house he serves. He adds his Cunning ranks to all Knowledge and Will test results. He also must Knowledge Focus two or more times to qualify as a Maester, so he also gets ]b\Knowledge Focus: Alchemy[/b] and History and Legends .
He also must have a Flaw, and takes on in Endurance.
He has no Destiny Points remaining.

In Step 6 , we get to Drawbacks . Once a character hit Adult, they have to start taking Drawbacks. These are just like Disadvantages or whatever from any other game you've seen. There are also Flaws, which just lower an Ability by one rank and are caused by the ravages of age.

You can take extra Drawbacks, gaining a Destiny Point for each, though you cannot have more Drawbacks than Benefits.

”Victarion Snow” posted:

Because of his age, Victarion gets a Flaw in Agility.
He is also Lascivious , inflicting a -2 penalty to Intrigue Defense if the first action he takes in an Intrigue isn't Seduce, and suffers a -2D penalty to Persuasion tests to Charm.
Being Bastard Born earns him a -1D penalty to Persuasion tests with anyone with higher Status than him.
Victation gets two bonus Destiny Points.

”Rodrik Sunderly” posted:

Rodrik is Haughty , suffering a -1D penalty to Awareness tests for Empathy, and whenever he deals with someone beneath his station or acting improperly, his starting disposition must be Dislike or worse.
Rodrik gets a bonus destiny point, leaving him with a total of 3.

”Eustace” posted:

Eustace us a Eunuch , taking a -1D penalty to persuasion tests, but is immune to Seduction and cannot have kids.
He also has a Flaw in Athletics.
He gets a single bonus point,

Step 7 is Starting Possessions.

Each character makes a Status test. The result is the amount of Gold they have to purchase starting possessions. A character must use at least half of their starting money. Going through equipment lists for stuff to buy is one of the worst things in RPGs, so I'm going to skip this part.

”Victarion Snow” posted:

Victarion has 2d6 = (2 + 2) = 4 Gold Dragons.

”Rodrik Sunderly” posted:

Rodrik has 3d6+1 = (6 + 5 + 2 + 1) = 14 gold.

”Eustace” posted:

Eustace has 3d6 = (3 + 4 + 3) = 10 gold.

Step Eight is calculating all the Derived Statistics.

In Intrigues you have Intrigue Defense and Composure, equal to Awareness + Cunning + Status and Will x 3, respectively.

In Combat you have Combat Defense, equal to Agility + Athletics + Awareness + Defensive bonus from shields/parrying weapons – Armor penalty; health equal to 3 x Endurance; Armor Rating determined by the armor you wear; and damage, based on your weapon.

”Victarion Snow” posted:

Intrigue Defense: 6
Composure: 6
Combat Defense: 6
Health: 11
Armor Rating: 4
Damage: 4 (Battleaxe)

”Rodrik Sunderly” posted:

Intrigue Defense: 10
Composure: 12
Combat Defense: 7
Health: 6
Armor Rating: 0
Damage: 0 (Unarmed)

”Eustace” posted:

Intrigue Defense: 10
Composure: 6
Combat Defense: 6
Health: 4
Armor Rating: 0
Damage: 0 (Unarmed)

Step Nine requires a bit of audience participation:

"Play the Game!"



This chapter ends with character advancement.

You can improve your character in three ways: money, Glory and Experience.

Money lets you buy stuff, or invest it in your House.

Glory is only invested in your house, as your awesome deeds reflect well on it.

Experience can be spent to improve your Abilities, gain or improve specialties or buy Destiny Points.

Specialties cost 10 experience per rank increase, with the maximum limit of the Ability it's under.

Improving an Ability by one rank costs 30 experience. It also takes 1 week of training by someone with a rank at least one higher than yours, or 1 + 1d6/2 weeks of self training.

An additional Destiny Point costs 50 experience. When you buy it, you can bank it, invest it in a Benefit or remove a Drawback.

The next chapters are the Abilities and Specialties and Destiny and Qualities chapters. I'll combine those and go over them briefly, because there isn't a whole lot interesting about lists of skills and such. Then is the chapter on creating a house, where I'll go through the house I generated for these guys.

Abilities and Specialties and Destiny and Qualities

posted by ThisIsNoZaku Original SA post

A Song of Ice and Fire Roleplaying
Chapter 4 & 5: Abilities and Specialties, and Destiny and Qualities

Abilities are a combination of Attributes and Skills from other games. There's really nothing particularly interesting here.

The Qualities a character can get are divided into several groups.

Ability Qualities improve one of the character's Abilities.
Examples: Hardy (Ignore penalties to Endurance when healing); Head for Numbers (Add your Cunning to Status tests for household events and your family gains extra wealth); Furtive (Add your Agility to your Sneak tests and reroll any 1s on Sneak tests)

Fate Qualities represent a character's destiny and fate. Seems like the miscellaneous grab-bag category.
Examples: Lots related to social position (Brother of the Night's Watch, Maester, Head of House, Ward, Man of the Kingsguard); allies, subordinates and animal cohorts; supernatural powers like Greensight (Prophetic dreams), Skingchanger (Possess your animal cohort when you sleep); also Wealthy, Lucky and Night Eyes. Like I said, grab bag.

Heritage Qualities are related to your family and heritage.
Examples: Blood of the Andals (Super lucky), Blood of the First Men (Tough), Blood of Heroes(Exceed limit on one Ability), Blood of the Ironmen (Bonuses while at sea and while fighting), Blood of the Rhoyne (Agile and sneaky), Blood of Valyria (Commanding and fire resistant), Blood of the Wildlings (Resistant to cold and disrespectful of the social order). Also, Massive (really big).

Martial Qualities are advantages and special abilities in combat. (This is the biggest group, of course)
Examples: Fighting Style chains (Axe Fighter, Bludgeon Fighter, Braavosi Fighter, Brawler, Long Blade Fighter, Pole-Arm Fighter, Short Blade Fighter, Spear Fighter, Water Dancer), Tourney Knight (Bonuses in jousting), mass combat bonuses.

Social Qualities provide benefits and bonuses during Intrigues, in the same way Martial ones give bonuses in combat.
Examples: Adept Negotiator (No penalty from your disposition towards others, as long as you hide it from the subject), Favored of Nobles/Smallfolk (Bonuses with people with high/low status), Worldy (Bonuses to persuasion with people outside of Westeros)

Drawbacks are bad things the character has.
Examples: Debt (All prices are doubled), Furious (Your temper means you have to try and Intimidate in Intrigues and take a penalty for trying to seduce), Nemesis, Haughty (Your disposition against anyone of lower status or acting social unacceptably must be negative)

House Creation

posted by ThisIsNoZaku Original SA post

I forgot I've been sitting on this for, like, two weeks.

A Song of Ice and Fire Roleplaying
Chapter 6: House Creation

An important part of ASoIF and the historical time and place it's based on is family and noble houses. To give this connection some heft in the game, there are rules for generating a noble house that all of the characters belong to.

This chapter gives all the steps you need to create the house.

Step One: The Realm
First, you select which of the Seven Kingdoms your house is located in. This will determine which


The group can either select their house or roll on a table to determine randomly.

For our example house, we're going to pick The North .

Step 2: Starting Resources
A house has seven Resources, it's mechanical representation used in the house-level mechanics.
Each Resource has a starting rating of 7d6, which is then modified by our Realm. These a handful of tables giving benchmarks that gives concrete ideas to the numbers.

Using a die roller, I got the following numbers:
Defense 25, + 5 from Realm, for a total of 30.
Influence 22, + 10 for a total of 32.
Lands 34, + 20 for a total of 54.
Law 23, - 10 for a total of 13.
Population 19, -5 for a total of 14.
Power 27, -5 for a total of 22.
Wealth 27, -5 for a total of 22.

After determining these starting scores, each player chooses one of the Resources that they want to improve. The resource gets increased by 1d6. Let's pick Law, Power and Wealth, all of them pretty low as a result of being set in the North. For the rolls I get 4 , 4 and 6 .

Now we're sitting at:
Defense 30.
Influence 32.
Lands 54.
Law 17.
Population 14.
Power 26.
Wealth 28.

Step 3: House History
Now we determine the history of the house, including how old it is and notable events in its past.

Determine it's founding with a d6: a result of 5 gives us Recent, meaning our house was founded around the time of the Blackfyre Rebellion, about a century and a half ago. This also determines the number of historical events we get to roll; a history of Recent means we get 1d6-1. A roll of 1 gives us a 0 But! The book says be get at least one event.

To determine the event, we roll another 3d6 and it's a 7 , which is Invasion/Revolt - Either a smallfolk rebellion or attack by wildlings or clansmen. Let's say that this means our house was founded after an exceptionally large and devastating attack by wildlings left huge swathes of land devastated and disorderly and our house was founded to rebuild it.

This event gives Resource modifiers : -2d6 (6) to Law, -1d6 (2) to Population, -1d6 (2) to Power and -1d6 (5) to Wealth.

Final Resources and our Benchmarks:
Defense 30. A single castle or fortified town.
Influence 32. A minor house like Clegane, Payne and Karstark.
Lands 54. A seriously enormous amount of land, equivalent to the holdings of the Starks themselves.
Law 11. Bandits and lawlessness are common along the borders of the houses territory.
Population 12. A small population, with nothing larger than a small town found anywhere.
Power 22. A modest force and some of the soldiers are trained.
Wealth 23. Enough to get by, but not exceptional wealthy.

Step 4: Holdings
Now we allocate our Resources to decide particular property the house controls.
A Defense of 30 gets us a small castle . Soldiers defending the castle get +6 Defense in mass combat.

---

Influence can be spent to gain heirs to the house. It can also be saved and burned during play to give bonuses to House Fortune rolls and players can expend it for bonuses during Intrigues.

We'll spend 20 right now to gain a first-born son and keep 12 for other use.

Additionally, the maximum Status any of the members of the house can get is determined by Influence. Our 32 gives us a maximum of 4 (not super great).

---

Points in Land is spent to determine the types of terrain and features the house controls. These determine modifiers in battle from the terrain.

At the heart, we'll take a mountain and a hamlet that serves our castle for 19. Nearby we've got some plains with heavy woods and some old ruins for 13. Plus we've got plains, grasslands, a hamlet and a major road for 21.

---

Law doesn't have any investments, instead giving a modifier to house fortune rolls. Our shitty Law of 11 means we have a -5 penalty.

---

Population works the same as Law; this time we have no modifier.

---

Power can be spent on subordinate banner houses sworn to your houses service as well as soldiers that fight for you directly.

We don't have a whole lot of Power to spare, so no banner houses.

We'll buy a unit of Trained Cavalry Garrison (10) for keeping the peace and another Trained Infantry Garrison (9) to guard our castle. Plus we've got 3 units of Green Peasant Levies. These don't cost any power; instead, our house Population takes a hit while they are called up.

---

Wealth is the house soluble resources and money making investments.

We'll buy a Maester (helps us manage our holdings), an Artisan (a castle architect that improves our castle) and a Mine (copper and makes us lots of money).

Step Five: Motto & Arms
Every family has a motto representing the house philosophy and a coat of arms that acts as their symbol.

For a motto, let's take the situation of the house founding: created to return civilization, peace and order to the devastated lands of the North. I decided on “Law and Loyalty”

The next section is a whole lot of about the proper way to design a coat of arms: acceptable colors and combinations, patterns and symbology. Let's not worry about that right now.

Step Six: Household
The final step is to define the important individuals in the household. The lord and lady that lead the house are extremely important, but there's lots of other people associated with an entire noble house worth defining.

This house creation stuff is supposed to happen before character creation, so we have a few characters already named and positioned. Normally you would sketch out the characters here and then people decide who they want to be.

The house Lord is Hother Sunderly. An archetypical old warhorse, he marched with the Starks during Robert's Rebellion. In his 60s now, he had a single son from his late wife, the house heir Rodrick. Far from the lustiest man even in his youth, his recent political marriage to the young widow of an heirless minor lord to combine their lands remains unconsummated over a month later.

The Lady is Marya Sunderly. Young and intelligent, but denied education due to her gender and desperately bored of the North, she loves hearing stories of the rest of Westeros and beyond. A great deal of her time is spent with Maester Eustace, who has taught her to read and write and tells her stories. She is absolutely infatuated with him and his mind, and his status as a eunuch is probably the only thing keeping the relationship from turning into a full blown affair.

House Heir is Rodrick Sunderly. Rodrick is the exact opposite of his military-minded, gruff and not especially quick-thinking father; he's smart, smooth talking and pursues the fine art of politicking, horse-trading and blackmail as a hobby. Although not to the point of wishing his father dead, he still thinks he would make a much better lord, believing his father doesn't have the know-how or inclination to manage the realm properly, especially with his age. Is quite upset that his father was chosen to score a hot young bride instead of him, on account of everyone important within 250 miles are a bunch of grizzles warriors who don't like his smooth talking ways.

The house Maester is Maester Eustace. As a young boy, he was embroiled in a plot by his uncle to seize his birthright as heir of a noble family in the south after his father died unexpectedly. Kidnapped, castrated and prepared to be shipped across the ocean and sold into slavery, he was rescued by a loyal vassal of his father. His maiming cost him his inheritance, however, as his family line would die with him. His lands given to another, he traveled to the Citadel and became a Maester. Not a fan of the North, but is polite enough to not make a fuss about it.

The house Man-at-Arms is Victarion Snow. Born a bastard, he grew up hearing stories of heroic knights and of his nobleman father. When Northerners marched south during Robert's Rebellion, he marched with them, acquiting himself well in battle. However, in the south he saw the knights he had admired as a child acting like a bunch of shits, and they looked down on him as an incompetent, uncouth Northern bumpkin. Only, he's not an incompetent and in the war proved himself an ice-cold killing machine.

Equipment

posted by ThisIsNoZaku Original SA post

In this post I finally get around to continuing
A Song of Ice and Fire Roleplaying
Chapter 7: Equipment
The chapter in which we get our gear on.

In Westeros, barter is commonly used by the smallfolk in their day to day lives, with money being the purview of nobles and merchants, though it also depends on where you live: nobles in the hinterlands might not have lots of coin on hand for trade while in large cities like King's Landing enough currency circulates that everyone uses it.

Coinage
The games gives a list of the coins used it Westeros and it's a mess.

Coins are divided into copper, silver and gold. But not so fast!

There are copper Halfpennies, Pennies (worth 2 halfpennies), Half Groats (worth 2 pennies), Groats (4 pennies) and Starts (8 pennies).

Silver Stags are worth 7 Stars (or 56 Pennies) and Silver Moons (7 Stags = 392 Pennies).

There is thankfully only a single gold coin, a Dragon worth 210 Stags (30 Moons or 11,760 Pennies)

Then there's a list of some trade goods to provide some benchmarks for judging the value of things: A loaf of bread and a dozen eggs are each 1 penny, a chicken is 4 pennies as is a pound of tea leaves, a puppy and a pound of salt are both 3 silver stags, a cow is 9 silver stags and a pound of saffron is an entire gold dragon per pound.

Then there's a list of items you can buy, followed by the list of weapons. (The weapon list takes up more space than the list of every non-weapon and non-armor item).

In the weapons, you've got your Axes, your Bludgeons, "brawling" weapons, fencing weapons, long blades, pole-arms, shields, short blades, spears, bows, crossbows and thrown weapons. Weapons generally range from 20 to 100 silver stags, except for the long swords and fencing weapons, and bows (a Myrish crossbow that fires three bolts at once is 2000 stags).

Armor ranges from 200 stags for padded to 3000 stags for full plate.

There are a bunch of different mounts, including a variety of horses for different jobs and barding for your mount.

There is a whole section of poisons a person can encounter.

Firemilk and Myrish Fire are used as disinfectants. Pouring them into wounds helps prevent infection but the pain it causes can be disabling. Alternately, Milk of the Poppy is used to induce sleep and dull pain, while Wasting Potion is used to help "purge" poisons from the body. Sweetsleep is a less potent substance than Milk of the Poppy for calming nerves and aiding sleep.

The dangerous poisons include:
Basilisk blood and Basilisk Venom are gathered from a jungle lizard. The blood is made into a paste and applied to meat. When eaten, it drives the person bugfuck crazy, eventually causing brain hemorrhaging and death. The venom, when ingested, causes muscle spasms and paralysis of the face and throat, leading to suffocation.

Greycap is a powder made from a poisonous mushroom. Has three effects: first, you just start puking and shitting all the time. Then, the hallucinations. Finally, organ failure and death. Nghtshade is also a hallucinogen, as well as causing increases heart rate, dizziness and nausea.

The deadliest poison is the Tears of Lys , a colorless and odorless liquid that attacks the bowels and stomach. It's super potent, and sits around in the body a long while.

Second place might go to Strangler however, which is the crystallized extract of a foreign plant. Dissolved into a liquid, the poison causes the victims throat to constrict, choking them to death.



Next is Chapter 8: Intrigues

Intrigue

posted by ThisIsNoZaku Original SA post

Really need to get this done.


A Song of Ice and Fire
Chapter 8: Intrigue

Intrigues are a sort of social conflict system: the same way you use the combat rules to hurt someone, you use Intrigues to convince or deceive them.

Two important parts of Intrigues are Exchanges and Influence.

Exchanges are like rounds in combat (no, we haven't gotten to the combat rules yet but you've played other RPGs so you know exactly what I'm talking about) where the participants get to do some stuff.

Influence represents how much sway you've gained with a character. Getting enough Influence is how you get the other person to go along with whatever it is you're doing.

Important Abilities in Intrigues are Awareness (for reading people), Cunning (for quick thinking), Deception (for lying to them), Persuasion (for convincing people), Status (Social position) and Will (will). Your Intrigue Defense, how easy you are to get one over on, is equal to Awareness + Cunning + Status + miscellaneous bonuses. Composure acts like Health and is equal to Will x 3; when Composure is depleted, a character goes along with whomever influenced them.



In the first step of an Intrigue, you decide which of the three type the Intrigue will be:

Simple intrigues are for situations where one side is a minor NPC and the situation is a relatively unimportant one, or one of the sides would be fairly easy to sway.

Standard Intrigues are more involved affairs, often for when players and important NPCs are trying to get one over on each other. The “rule of thumb” is to use a Standard Intrigue whenever going along might be dangerous or uncharacteristic for one of the sides.

The most involved type of intrigue are Complex Intrigues . These are for overarching schemes that require multiple smaller steps to pull off- A Complex Intrigue is to a war as a Standard Intrigue is to a battle.

The example the book gives is of trying to organize an invasion of a neighboring lord's lands- you have to try and find allies and dissuade your rivals', deal with merchants to secure supplies and gear, etc.

For a Complex Intrigue, the GM decides how many victory points are needed for it to succeed. This is the number of standard intrigues you need to succeed at to achieve your overall goal, with a standard amount being 3 but especially complex ones going up to 6. Whenever you succeed at an Intrigue related to the complex one, you gain a VP; if you make no progress, you gain none; and if you manage to bungle it and fail, you lose one instead.



Step Two is setting the scene.

This is where the GM describes the location and circumstances of the Intrigue, and who will be participating.

Step Three is the Objective, where the instigator of the Intrigue states the goal they're trying to achieve.

Step Four is Disposition.

In this step, each participant describes their general feelings towards the others.

Disposition has a lot of important effects, including determining your DR(how easily the other person can influence you), and giving you modifiers to your Deception and Persuasion.

The more you like someone, the easier it is for them to influence you (represented by a low DR) and the harder it is for you to deceive them (a Deception penalty) but your sincerity lends a lot of weight to your words (Persuasion bonus). At the opposite end, if you just absolutely despise someone it's extremely difficult for them to convince you of anything (high DR) and you get a sizable Deception bonus but an enormous Persuasion penalty.

The book gives a few simple ways to calculate character dispositions besides simply selecting them.



Step Five is Initiative, determined by Status rolls by the participants.



Step Six is deciding on your Technique, the methods you employ to try and influence your target. Technique decides what specialties are applicable to your roll, and what happens to someone you defeat with this Technique.

Bargain involves trying to strike a deal or trade between the two of you. The better your opponents disposition towards you, the better your end of the bargain.

Charm means trying to get them to like you. Success improves the targets disposition towards you.

Convince is an honest (or honest seeming) attempt to convince someone of something. Succeed and they buy whatever you're selling.

Incite is when you try to get the target upset about something. When you succeed, you get them mad about whatever it is you want them to be mad about.

Intimidate is an attempt to frighten or cow someone. A successful Intimidate either causes your opponent to flee you, or improves their disposition towards you for as long as they're under your power if they can't

Seduce involves trying to create desire for you in another. When you succeed, and the target is into you, their disposition towards you temporarily improves a bunch.

Taunt is where you try to goad a person into doing something you want. If the target likes you, they do what you want but their disposition worsens. Someone in the middle will still like you less, but may or may not do what you ask, and if they just hate you, they'll try to get away or attack.



Step Seven is roleplaying. This part is totally superflous, so completely unnecessary I'd rather talk about how I noticed I had misspelled superfluous and then decided not to fix it so I could add this aside here.



Step Eight is, finally, the actual actions and rolling. People say what they're doing and make their rolls.

You can Assist and help another character with what they're doing.

You can Consider which I guess is like an “aim” equivalent, where you give up your turn to get a bonus on your next action.

You can Fast Talk , where you just blather on to try and confuse someone.

Manipulate is where you try to mess with someone's emotions so they act in a way you want, allowing you to pick their technique next round.

When you Mollify you restore some lost Composure to another participant.

If you Quit , you abandon the Intrigue, possibly suffering some sort of repercussions.

You can Read Target to try and suss out another character's Disposition or Technique, plus a bonus die for the rest of the Intrigue, I assume against them but the book doesn't specify.

Shield of Reputation involves trying to use your social status to try and instill some respect for you in another.

Switch to Combat when you're sick of talking and just want a fucker to die.

Withdraw lets you sideline your self for a bit to defend yourself from others better, increasing your intrigue defense.

When a character succeeds on an Influence action against another character, they generate Influence. The target subtracts their DR from that amount and the rest is applied to their Composure. Being dropped to 0 or less Composure means defeat.

A way to avoid Influence is through Frustration . Whenever a character would lose Composure due to another character's influence, they can take a point of frustration to reduce the influence by their Will in a manner similar to Consequences in Fate. Each point of frustration inflicts a -1 die penalty and a character automatically loses an Intrigue if their Frustration exceeds their Will.

If someone won, figure out what the effects are based on the Technique used by the winner.

On their turn a character can yield, offering a compromise to the other participants.
When you're defeated you can burn a Destiny Point to change the outcome, but not in a way that invalidates the victory. You just get to choose how you lose.

If no one has won yet, start over from Step Two.

Next is Chapter 9: Combat

Combat

posted by ThisIsNoZaku Original SA post

Some more junk about A Song of Ice and Fire
Chapter 9: Combat
The combat system for A Song of Ice and Fire RPG is pretty generic D&D derived stuff. It's divided into rounds, each person gets a turn during a round and they can take a “Greater action” or two “Lesser actions.”

A bunch of abilities are important in combat: Agility for defense, initiative and dodging, as well as weapon damage; Athletics for defense, movement speed and damage with weapons; Awareness for defense and noticing things; Endurance for Health and the number of “injuries” and “wounds” you can take, healing and resisting poison; Fighting for attacking with hand-to-hand weapons; Marksmanship for attack with ranged weapons; and finally Warfare “to gain the tactical advantage” in the game's own words.

Your Combat Defense is the number enemies need to roll on their attacks to hit you and is made up of your Agility + Athletics + Awareness + “Modifiers” (like for shields) – Armor penalty .

Health is Endurance x 3, and as long as you have any left, you suffer no ill effects.

Your movement is 4 yards, +1 yard per 2 bonus dice in Run or -1 if you have an Athletics of only 1. You also lose 1 yard per 2 points of Bulk the items you're carrying have.

Armor
Armor has three stats: Armor Rating; Armor Penalty; and Bulk.

Armor Rating is how much damage the armor subtracts from hits you take.
Armor Penalty is the amount the armor slows you down, applying a penalty to Agility tests and defense.
Bulk is how unwieldy and clumsy the armor is, as opposed to its weight. In this section, the game adds that when you Sprint, your speed is equal to (your modified movement x 4) – total Bulk.

Weapons
Each weapon described the Specialty their wielder uses when attacking with them as well as a minimum number of bonus dice needed to use properly. For each die short of the necessary training a character has, they suffer a -1D penalty.

The game has two pages of weapons, grouped into axes, bludgeons, brawling, fencing, long blades, pole-arms, shields, short blades, spears, bows, crossbows and thrown.

Damage is based on either the Athletics or Agility of the wielder, plus or minus a modifier. This is the number of damage dice rolled on a hit.

Qualities are a bunch of descriptors and special abilities weapons have:
Adaptable is usable in one or two hands, gaining +1 damage two-handed;
Bulk adds its rating to your Bulk while wielded;
Close Range gives the weapon a 10 yard range;
Defensive gives a defense bonus when you don't attack with it;
Entangling can trap your opponent;
Fast let's you strike quickly, giving a bonus when you make Divided Attacks;
Fragile causes a weapon to break when you hit too hard;
Grab lets you seize an opponent on a hit and keep hold of them;
Impale pierces into your opponent, possibly sticking inside their body and allows you to pin against a wall or the ground with your weapon.
Long Range gives a range of 100 yards;
Mounted inflicts a -2d penalty if not used from horse back;
Off-Hand adds it's rating to the damage of your primary weapon when you make a special two-weapon attack;
Piercing reduces the protection from armor;
Powerful gives an extra die of damage for any bonus dice in Strength the wielder has;
Reach weapons lets you hit enemies 3 yards away, but inflicts a penalty against closer targets;
Reload makes a Marksmanship weapon require an action to reload before it can be used again;
Set For Charge Only means a weapon can only be used in the Set for Charge action;
Shattering weapons destroy weapons, shields and armor when they hit hard enough;
Slow weapons can't be used to make Divided Attacks;
Staggering weapons prevent the opponent from performing Greater Actions with powerful enough blows;
Two-Handed inflicts a -2D penalty if not used with both hands;
Unwieldy inflicts just a flat -2D penalty to rolls with the weapon;
Vicious weapons always kill anyone they reduce to 0 or less Health.


Combat takes place in the following steps:
In Step One, the narrator describes the environment including participants, the terrain and visibility.

In Step Two, the narrator determines the awareness of the character's of each other. When a hidden character attacks someone they've surprised, they gain a +1D bonus.

In Step Three, initiative is determined. Everyone rolls Agility, using their Quickness bonus dice. Arranged from the highest to lowest total, this is the order of initiative for the battle.

In Step Four, everyone takes their actions. They can perform the following actions:
The actions are all very generic, except in a few places:
Divided Attacks, allows you to divided your attack dice among any number of targets.
Two-Weapon Attack inflicts extra damage if you have an off-hand in it.
Combining Attack, combines both a Divided and Two-weapon attack.

When fighting while mounted. you use your Mounts movement in place of your own, gain a bonus die against on melee attack rolls against unmounted targets and gain a +2 bonus to damage if your mount is a trained combat mount and didn't move that round.

Repeat until the combat ends.

Defeat and Consequences
When someone is reduced to 0 health, they're defeated and the person who drops them decides what happens to them.

Death is the obvious one.
Maiming permanently reduces one of the victim's skill ranks by 1.
Ransom means you're hauled off into captivity and held prisoner until your friends or family can scrape up the cash or a valuable prisoner of their own to trade for you.
Take the Black forces the victim to abandon their position and join the Night's Watch.
Unconscious causes them to be knocked out and left for dead.
Yielding allows the victim to voluntarily lose in exchange for being allowed to decide the consequences, ala concessions in Fate.

A character can also burn a Destiny Point to change the consequence they suffer.

Damage and Recovery
Any damage a character takes in excess of their Armor Rating is subtracted from their Health.

Characters can reduce the damage they take via Injuries and Wounds.

Injuries reduce the damage by your Endurance, but inflict a -1 penalty to all your tests, and you can't have more Injuries than your Endurance.

Wounds are more severe, eliminating all the damage from an attack, but each causes a -1D penalty. A character dies if they have Wounds equal to their Endurance.

A character recovers all their health after a fight, and makes Endurance tests every day to heal Injuries, and every week for Wounds, with the difficulties determined by how active the character is while healing. A basic success heals one of either type, and every degree of success to heal Injuries heals an extra one, while it take two degrees for each extra Wound.

If someone heals a hurt character, the result of their Healing test replaces the subject's Endurance roll.


Tournaments
Tournaments are the big football events of Westeros. Everyone loves watching them, and hosting them is a common way for noble houses to earn prestige.

Three common combat-related events at a tournament are archery contests, grand melees and jousts.

An Archery Contest is a series of increasingly difficult Marksmanship rolls.

The Grand Melee is just a giant brawl.

In a Joust, both competitors armor up, get on their horses and slam lances into each other to try to dismount each other. Each player makes a Fighting (Spears) test against the other's passive Animal Handling(Ride) value. On a success, the hit character must make an Animal Handling (Ride) test to avoid being knocked from the saddle, with a better rolls forcing a higher difficulty.

You can also cheat to try and injure your opponent or kill his mount.


Advanced Combat
The game provides some optional advanced rules.

Critical Hits
If your attack roll double or more than your targets Combat Defense, you get a Critical and inflict some additional effect based on how many sixes are rolled. The results range from bonus damage, causing automatic wounds or injuries, or outright killing the target.

Fumbles
The opposite of criticals, Fumbles occur whenever all the dice on a roll come up 1. The effects of a fumble can be striking yourself or an ally with your weapon, breaking your weapon or losing your grip on it, blinding yourself or losing your balance.

Interrupting Actions
In the normal rules characters can delay when they act, but can't interrupt other characters. With this rule they can.

Battlefield Tactics
You can forfeit your initiative roll to coordinate your allies to make a Warfare (Tactics) test. On a success, you give a bonus die to all your allies' initiative rolls; you, however, go last.


There are rules for fighting unarmed, damaging objects, bonuses for attack from high ground and penalties for attacking sprinting targets, and more.

Advanced actions include reckless and cautious attacks, trampling, knockdown and knockout and disarming.

Reach weapons get some more involved rules. A weapon's reach quality determines the optimal distance they can attack at, in yards. You can hit someone on yard closer, or farther, at a penalty. If you fight with two weapons with different Reaches, that's another penalty.

There's some "attack of opportunity" rules.

Fatigue lets you push yourself during the fight to receive a one-time bonus, but as a longer-term penalty. This lets you ignore your Armor penalty for one round, ignore a single Wound or all Injuries or get an extra Lesser Action, while you take a -1 test penalty for each point.