Sorcerer and Swashbuckler

[Eric]

Hey --

I noticed the ad for Swashbuckler in the back of Sorcerer, so I read a review of it.  Sounds like it is a system good for dueling but lacking in other ways.  Since I like Sorcerer a lot, and I like dueling in RPGs, I wonder if anyone here has ever tried to put the two together?

-- Eric

[Ron Edwards]

Hey Eric,

One of the scenarios in "The Sorcerer's Soul" was heavily influenced by the swashbuckling RPGs (although even more by my direct reading of Dumas and other authors).

Jesse Burneko is apparently skeptical that the Sorcerer rules can do a good job with this material. It may be, however, that he and I are working with different starting points. I think that the fighting rules expansions, as well as some character creation stuff, in "Sorcerer and Sword" apply very well to 17th-century setting stories written in the 19th-century style, but NOT to the Hollywood version of them. When I say "Musketeers," I'm thinking Dumas fiction, not the screen Flynn, York, or whoever it is lately.

What sort of synthesis were you thinking of? Humanity issues? Rules? Demon types? ...?

Best,
Ron

P.S. Did you see my review of Swashbuckler here at the Forge? I provided a lot of source references for RPGs and otherwise to help beef up its sketchy foundation.

[Jared A. Sorensen]

Here's my micro-setting idea:

The Sorcerer's Second

*All* demons are Passers who act as servants in the very real sense of the word. They assist their lord or lady and advise them when the situation arises. Of course, they also carry out other kinds of unpleasant activities...

Sorcerers are wealthy noblemen and women in a decadant "Dangerous Liasons" inspired world of intrigue, duplicity, passion, bitter rivalry and heated duels.

Humanity changes to "Respectable Villainy" -- it represents your ability to do dishonorable deeds and get away with it. The demons' job is to make their masters kill one another off *or* lose their Villainy and become enlightened souls of wisdom, morality and piety.

See:
Dangerous Liasons
The Duelists
The Three Musketeers
The Count of Monte Cristo
...et al

[Paul Czege]

Demons as social conscience. Really freakin' cool.

[jburneko]

For the sake of clearity I would like to state that I have not read Sorcerer & Sword and thus have not seen Ron's expanded fighting rules.  It is entirely possible that these rules meet my expectations of what a good swashbuckling system will do.  This is of course all spawning from the side of me that still enjoys a ruleset that contains special cases that support all the 'trappings' of a given genre.

Jesse

[Eric]

On 2001-10-16 16:58, Ron Edwards wrote:
Hey Eric,

One of the scenarios in "The Sorcerer's Soul" was heavily influenced by the swashbuckling RPGs (although even more by my direct reading of Dumas and other authors).

Oddly enough (or predictably enough?), what flips my switches is actual dueling rather than swashbuckling per se.  I think I was 30 pages in to Sorcerer when I started thinking, "You could do Highlander with these rules," so it was nice to get to the sanzoku a hundred pages later and see that you agreed with me.  Honor, revenge, and sword play (particularly if you can find an excuse to have them in the modern day) are all things I like.

Jesse Burneko is apparently skeptical that the Sorcerer rules can do a good job with this material. It may be, however, that he and I are working with different starting points. I think that the fighting rules expansions, as well as some character creation stuff, in "Sorcerer and Sword" apply very well to 17th-century setting stories written in the 19th-century style, but NOT to the Hollywood version of them. When I say "Musketeers," I'm thinking Dumas fiction, not the screen Flynn, York, or whoever it is lately.

I haven't seen the "S and S" stuff, so I can't comment on that, but I think straight S would do a fine job with this sort of game.  The best duel I've ever run was in Feng Shui and combined various Fu path maneuvers with the "the description is as important as the roll" action declaration that S and FS share.

What sort of synthesis were you thinking of? Humanity issues? Rules? Demon types? ...?

What I'm always looking for in dueling rules, the Platonic ideal of dueling [I know it is because it's perfection is one of the few things everyone in my game group agrees on], is the duel at the top of the Clifts of Madness in the The Princess Bride.  There is a small amount of acrobatics in that, but no wire work.  It is overwhelmingly maneuvers and repartee.

What I'm curious about is if there is a way to add the maneuver system from Swashbuckler to Sorcerer so that you have a frame work around which the players can build their descriptions of their cuts and thrusts.

As for humanity and demon types . . . well, humanity is the score I have the least handle on from my reading of the rules.  I like the sanzoku demons, and demon weapons would be a part of the campaign I would run, but I would also put demons to work powering the other "baseline sorceries" of the world.

P.S. Did you see my review of Swashbuckler here at the Forge? I provided a lot of source references for RPGs and otherwise to help beef up its sketchy foundation.

No, I didn't see it but I've read it now.  Very good.  I've read Captain Blood and I own GURPs Swashbucklers and I own and have run 7th Sea, which you didn't mention.  7th Sea actually broke my will to GM, but that's a really dull story that I'll spare you.

[Ron Edwards]

Hey,

"What I'm curious about is if there is a way to add the maneuver system from Swashbuckler to Sorcerer so that you have a frame work around which the players can build their descriptions of their cuts and thrusts."

Such a thing would be a wonder to behold. It'd probably keep the "pathways" structure from Swashbuckler, in terms of what maneuvers led to which other ones, but lose the table in favor of a more fluid, "one-to-three dice bonus or penalty" kind of modifier.

Hell, man, invent such a thing and we've got some serious supplemental material to work with.

Best,
Ron

[Eric]

On 2001-10-18 13:00, Ron Edwards wrote:
Such a thing would be a wonder to behold. It'd probably keep the "pathways" structure from Swashbuckler, in terms of what maneuvers led to which other ones, but lose the table in favor of a more fluid, "one-to-three dice bonus or penalty" kind of modifier.

Well, I'm supposed to be getting a copy, so I'll have a look.  And I agree it would be cool.  That's why I was hoping someone had already done it.

Hell, man, invent such a thing and we've got some serious supplemental material to work with.

It might be worth posting on the website anyway.  The reviews all say that Swashbuckler lacks a way to do one on two duels.  We'd have to fix that too.

[greyorm]

You know, I altered the Swashbuckler rules to work in a die-based system, and it would likely work quite well with Sorcerer (with a little tweaking: changing the die-sizes to die bonuses).

[Eric]

On 2001-10-18 20:28, greyorm wrote:
You know, I altered the Swashbuckler rules to work in a die-based system, and it would likely work quite well with Sorcerer (with a little tweaking: changing the die-sizes to die bonuses).

Do you have it posted anywhere I could take a look at it?

[greyorm]

Do you have it posted anywhere I could take a look at it?

I do now. http://www.daegmorgan.net/rpgs/imm-swashbuckling.htm">Immortal Swashbuckling
Keep in mind that this is both incomplete and for another game system.  However, the Manuever Modifier Charts would work in Sorcerer very easily.

#d= die/dice modifier
1 = 1 point modifier to roll (this obviously wouldn't work in Sorcerer; I'd suggest making this a one-die bonus and leaving everything else alone or making this a one-die bonus increasing everything else by a factor of one (so that 1d becomes 2d, etc.))

[Eric]

Wow.  Someone who actually playes Immortal.  You have my complete respect.

The page look good.  Ron?  Do you think the plus conversion will work?

[Ron Edwards]

Hey,

I think it should be tried. Raven knows Sorcerer pretty damn well, so the next step ain't theory but play.

Best,
Ron