It’s Monday again and we’re talking gunpowder and primitive firearms in D&D, love them or hate them there’s a few things you need to consider when bringing them into your game:
The subject of this post is to provide a fun little mini-game for running barroom brawls quickly in RPGs, this topic was suggested by Jason Connerley of the Nerds RPG Variety Cast and makes use of the excellent hex-flower creations of Goblin’s Henchman.
If you want to know more about hex flowers click here.
Essentially the mini-game works like this, the player party has a number of check boxes representing how long they can stay in the fight, the NPCs involved also have a number of check boxes.
The Player party has one checkbox for every player involved.
The number of checkboxes for the NPCs varies depending on the size of the establishment – 1D4 for small establishments, 1D4+2 for medium establishments and 1D4+4 for larger places.
Please note: The boxes do not represent the strict number of people nor HP, they are an abstract measurement of how you are doing in the fight.
If the NPC boxes are all checked before the PCs then the player party has triumphed, if the PC checkboxes are filled first then the PCs are all knocked out or subdued.
Please note: This game does not provide guidelines for what happens when the PCs lose or win the fight, that is down to the individual GM and the needs of their campaign, the purpose of this mini-game is to simulate a chaotic, quick, interesting pub brawl.
How to Play the Game
Once you’ve worked out the number of check boxes for PCs and NPCs, place a counter in the middle of the hex below. Each player then takes a turn to roll 2D6 moving the counter as indicated, each time the counter lands in a new space read the description and follow the action given then move on to the next player. Simple.
Hex Flower Key
But what happens if I go off the edge?
Should you dice roll result indicate that you have gone off the edge of the hex then you re-enter on the opposite side, a couple of examples are shown below:
Please feel free to leave comments and constructive criticism either on these blog or via voicemail on our podcast, the episode where we discuss the creation of this mini-game can be found here.
The icons used in the hexflower and for the header image of this post were taken from Game-Icons.net
Many thanks to Goblin’s Henchmen (the creator of the Hexflower idea) for pointing out I’d forgotten to mention what happens when you go off the edge of the hex.
