Barbarians of Heavy Metal: Sonic Wizardry...

I'm currently working on the basic rules for using music in the game. As you may or may not have read here, the whole foundation for game setting rests on the idea that scientists at some point in the past created Harmonic Resonance Technology that could manipulate the underlying superstring structure of the universe. Harmonic Resonance Forks are built into various items, but the most important one for our discussion today is the Musical Instrument, from guitars to drums to flutes.

These Instruments can be played in two modes:

1. Safeties On: The Harmonic Fork is disengaged and the instrument functions as a normal one of its type.

2. Safeties Off: The Harmonic Fork is engaged and the instrument may be used to manipulate reality or focus sound into a killing force.

In game, characters will use their Harmonic Instruments for three specific types of encounter resolution:

1. Gigging: This is a simple attempt to gather Fame by playing to an audience, either solo or as part of a band, with the Safeties On. Audiences are generated by the Metal Master (the gamemaster) with a few rolls to take into account their mood and their musical tastes. Results can lead to permanent Fame increase, temporary Fame Points which can be used in social situations, or possibly the entire audience rushing the performance area to beat the band into the dirt for wasting their time and hearing.

2. Headcutting: Musical Duels which can be played Safeties On or (if there is really bad blood between the competitors) Safeties Off. Headcutting rolls are like Gigging rolls except that one side bids a performance level (the Difficulty of the roll) and makes their roll. The other side then tries to match that Difficulty with their own performance.

If the safeties are off, then all sorts of physical effects can be added to performance, which make it more difficult for the individual performer, but can cause serious damage to the opponent or even do things like throw them through the air or open up the ground beneath their feet so the earth can swallow them. The only defense is for the target to add their own effects to cancel out the incoming ones. Sometimes, if they think the roll will be too difficult if they attempt to stop all of the effects, they may choose to block only a few, letting the others past their guard.
The trick to Headcutting is the Fame generated is based not only on winning, but doing so without hammering the same combinations continuously. In addition, repetition is easier to block, so you can't just 'magic missle' someone over and over again, you have to use your abilities creatively.

3. Sonic Wizardry: Duels are quick effect affairs, but the ultimate use of Harmonic Instruments is to play entire songs that can alter reality in a real, long term way. By playing specific chord progressions in an extended performance, the character can create 'magic' using effects from any style they know, integrated into their main style.
Effects for Sonic Wizardry will be leveled, so a novice in the Nazarite style will be able to light up the area around him, but journeymen  musicians will be able to use that style to create light shows and illusions and masters will be able to create destructive beams of energy that will make even a Titan sit up and take notice.

BANDS
While a single character can utilize Harmonic Resonance on their own, it is with a band that they can achieve even greater effects in all three arenas of music. The basic idea is you are only as good as your Style permits and even Grandmasters of a Style can only achieve their maximum potential with the help of a backing band. Our Nazarite Grandmaster might be able to plink a Titan, but with a great backing band, they could possibly destroy one and bring down any aircraft nearby with a massive Electro-magnetic Pulse.

HARMONIC RESONANCE INSTRUMENTS
I'm still working out the details on a  lot of this section, but instruments are basically composed of three parts:

1. The Base Instrument: This can be a guitar, bass, drums, whatever. It also includes microphones to allow vocal wizardry. Harmonic Instruments are built to take enormous amounts of punishment and the Harmonic Forks inside them can survive the complete destruction of the instrument in many cases.

2. The Harmonic Resonance Fork: These are AdTek, and their construction methods are lost to the mists of time. They are a contested resource, for that reason, and the victor in Headcutting Duels usually claims the instrument of their opponent, or the Harmonic Fork if the instrument is destroyed.

Harmonic Forks come in Keys, with each Key representing a particular Style and it's attendant effect, and Chords, a single Fork with numerous Keys. Whatever the case, a Fork of a specific Key cannot be used to create an effects opposite it's Key (or the root Key of a Chord), so choosing the right instrument is important.

3. Sonic Amplifier: This is the lethal end of a Harmonic Instrument. Instead of using the Resonance to generate effects, it uses the fork to build up a burst of sonic energy that can be fired like a gun. The Amplifier is typically located in the headstock of a guitar, bass or other stringed instrument while drums tend to place them in the Bass Drum, but configurations can be customized to place it almost anywhere.

Mechanically, Instruments are defined by the following characteristics:

1. Attack: This is the Damage Rating of the instrument when the Sonic Amplifier is used.

2. Decay: This is the maximum duration of any effect after it is no longer maintained.

3. Sustain: This is the maximum number of effects that this instrument can maintain simultaneously.

4. Release: The chance that the instrument will cause Silence or Fury.

5. Key/Chord: This is the Key or Chord of the Harmonic Resonance Fork inside the Instrument.

6. Forte: Certain instruments are items of such masterwork that their body actually enhances certain aspects of the instrument's resonance. The Flying V guitar, for instance, is built in such a manner that it enhances any use of Sonic Wizardry to move through the air.

SUMMARY
Although I'm still working out the gaming specifics of a lot of this, what I've laid out here is the basic idea behind using music as a weapon and a tool in the 31st century Metalsphere. I've attempted to make it highly thematic as well as useful, but am eager to hear ideas on how it can be made even better. Comment below and let me know what you think...

Barbarians of Heavy Metal: Character Generation...

I have, this very day, put the finishing touches on Character Generation (I have an alpha presentation of the game and tablet functionality due Tuesday) and will now take you through the character generation process by making a couple of sample characters.

NAME & SCHOOL OF ROCK

The first and most important thing is to name the character and determine exactly which School of Rock they were brought up in. Schools of Rock, as I have mentioned, are more than just simple music schools, they define a way of life for a whole section of the inhabited universe.
The characters we are going to create here will be a pair of rival Titan Riders: Keneniah, a Nazarite; and Asmodeus, a Sabbathite. The names fit the schools, the Nazarites taking names from angels and Biblical heroes and the Sabbathites taking names from fallen angels and bastardized Latin names.

The Schools themselves will affect the rest of character generation (and I'll talk more on them in detail in a future post), so we'll move along and show their character by example.

ATTRIBUTES

In BoHM we use the same four attributes as BoL, but we've reskinned them to sound more Metal: for Strength we have Might; for Agility we have Celerity; for Mind we have Savvy; and finally, Appeal is now measured in Cool. We still distribute 4 points amongst the Attributes, as with BoL. One attribute can be reduced to -1 to gain an extra point for another.
For Keneniah, we are going for a more well rounded character, so we will be placing 1 point in each Attribute.

MIGHT 1, CELERITY 1, SAVVY 1, COOL 1

For Asmodeus, we are going to focus more on Might and Cool, so 2 points in each of those. In addition, the Sabbathite School provides a +1 to Might, so Asmodeus' final Attributes look like this:

MIGHT 3, CELERITY 0, SAVVY 0, COOL 2

Every School of Rock has a Bonus in either an Attribute or Combat Ability, meaning that the average character will have 5 points in one or the other. This is intentional as it further delineates the strengths and weaknesses of the various schools and fits in well with the extended range of difficulty set forth in the previous post.

COMBAT ABILITIES

Again, we have reskinned these to fit the thematic qualities of the Metalpshere: Brawl is now Rumble; Melee is now Shred; Ranged is now Fire, and Defense is still pretty close to the original as Defend, which fits in better with the other CAs, from a tense perspective. Again, our characters have 4 points to spend. Like attributes, one Combat Ability can be reduced to -1 to raise another by 1 point.

Keneniah gets the School bonus here, adding +1 to Defend, and sticking with our drive to be well-rounded, his Combat Abilities come out thusly:

RUMBLE 1, SHRED 1, FIRE 1, DEFEND 2

Asmodeus' stats are going to lean more heavily on personal combat, to take advantage of his heavy might, and he'll probably wear heavy armor to make up for his average defense:

RUMBLE 2, SHRED 2, FIRE 0, DEFEND 0

CAREERS

There are 24 Careers currently in the game, and our characters have 4 points to spread amongst 4 careers, with no career starting out with a rating greater than 3.

Keneniah is going to take advantage of a special ability of his School and take a career normally not allowed to anyone but The Church: Priest. Along with that, he's going to want to be able to fight in Titan combat, so he takes Titan Rider. He wants to play up the leadership side of his character, so he takes Manager. Finally, he wants to be able to do some basic repairs on his Titan and other equipment, but cannot take Tek (another Career only available to the Church), so he takes Roadie. He spreads his 4 points amongst those four careers thusly:

TITAN RIDER 2, MANAGER 1, PRIEST 1, ROADIE 0

Asmodeus, coming from a very different school has very different interests. He is fascinated with the Occult and so he takes Occultist. He also wants to ride the 'Heavy Metal' and takes Titan Rider. His final two skills reflect his dedication to his School's Style: Inquisitor, because only the most dedicated deserve to be a Sabbathite in his eyes; and Warlord, to indicate that he is Sabbathite nobility. He takes an even spread in those careers.

TITAN RIDER 1, WARLORD 1, INQUISITOR 1, OCCULTIST 1

STYLES

Our characters must now choose 4 Styles of Rock to play in. They receive 4 points, as above, to distribute amongst these styles, with the following restrictions:

• They must take their School as their first Style.
• They cannot take a Style that is opposed to their School of Rock.
• They cannot have more points in a Style than they do the Style of their school.

As mentioned in the previous post, Styles are more than just musical characteristics and make up one third of every resolution test. They are therefore important when determining what sorts of tasks your Headbanger will be proficient in.

Keneniah's main Style will be Nazarite, Christ Rock. He won't even touch Sabbathite music, which is opposed to Nazarite music, but he does appreciate both Dedite power shredding (and has an affinity with the application of force) and Yngwie virtuosity (along with a bent towards skills that require precision and timing), so he takes those. For his final Style, he chooses Ledite, as he finds the blues driven but contemplative style to be very cool (and his slightly intellectual nature is derived form this). He spends his 4 points in these styles in an even manner, with no style being greater than the other:

NAZARITE 1, YNGWIE 1, DEDITE 1, LEDITE 1

Asmodeus prefers the upper half of the Rocktagon with a little wild chaos thrown in, so he goes for the party-hard Glamling style (which enhances his vitality and makes him somewhat fearless), the Dedite style (for the raw destructive power it provides) and throws in some Punk for flavor (he is highly adaptable and good at sorting through chaos), but he makes sure that his main style is his first and most potent style:

SABBATHITE 2, GLAMLING 1, DEDITE 1, PUNK 0

INSTRUMENTS

Every Headbanger is proficient to some degree in 4 instrumental styles (and has 4 points to spread around those instruments). There are 5 to choose from: Axe, the ubiquitous guitar; Bass, the bass guitar which provides a pounding rhythm; Percussion, the use of drums; Vocal, including singing or spoken rap; and Other, which covers a wide range of other instruments which must be chosen separately.

Keneniah is going the frontman route and chooses:

VOCAL 2, AXE 2, BASS 0, OTHER (KEYBOARDS) 0

Asmodeus goes for the might of pounding rhythm with a bit of back up vocals and an instrument designed to unnerve his enemies:

BASS 2, DRUMS 1, VOCALS 0, OTHER (BAGPIPES) 1

HARMONICS & DISCORDS

Every Headbanger starts off with 1 Harmonic and 1 Discord from their School of Rock, which, if you will recall, are activated by hitting the Harmonic or Discord numbers on the Rocktohedron. Headbangers may take an additional Harmonic, but must either take another Discord or reduce their starting Fortune to 3.

Keneniah's Harmonic number is 1. He has the following choices:

• You Are I Am: The Nazarite is infused with the Holy Spirit and gains 1 Fortune. This may take them above their maximum.
• Reborn: The Nazarite is filled with the breath of life and regains 3 Fight.
• Seventh Angel: A guardian angel intervenes, aiding the band in small, almost imperceptible way. The Nazarite generates 3 Bonus Dice that can be added to any of their Band's rolls until the end of the scene.

Keneniah doesn't plan on doing much fighting outside of his Titan, so Reborn is not very useful for him. You Are I Am is very useful, but only once in awhile (you can only activate each Harmonic or Discord once per session) and Seventh Angel fits in more with his concept of a Band Leader, so he takes the latter.

His Discord Number is 5 and he must choose one of the following:

• Abyss: The Adversary takes a personal interest in the Nazarite and their band. The enemy gains D6 Penalty Dice that they may apply to the entire Band for the rest of the scene.
• Holy War: The Nazarite becomes wrathful and divisively sanctimonious. They take a Penalty Die on any Cool rolls for the rest of the scene.
• Lamentations: The Nazarite has a crisis of Fath that  reduces his Nazarite Style to -1 for the rest of the scene.

As a leader, Keneniah would be a poor example if he suffered Lamentations, so he gives that a quick miss. The same could be said of Holy War. Abyss sounds perfect, as it fits in with the idea of Satan trying to bring the whole Band down by messing with its leader.

Asmodeus has an entirely opposite set of Harmonic and Disocrd realities. His Harmonic number is 5 (the opposite of Keneniah, which is appropriate as they are of opposing schools), and he has the following Harmonic choices:

• Iron Man: The power of the abyss seems to fill the Sabbathite with unholy vigor and they regain D6 Fight.
• Sabbra Cadabra: The Sabbathite sometimes pulls off miraculous feats that seem for all the world like true Magick. The roll is counted as a Success, even if it is a Failure or Critical Failure.
• Hand of Doom: Those around the Sabbathite feel the hand of The Adversary himself interfering with their actions. The Sabbathite gains D6 Penalty Dice that can be added to any roll from any character until the end of the scene.

At first glance, Iron Man would seem to be ideal for a close combatant like Asmodeus, but he loves the thought of the Devil himself interfering on his behalf as well as the ability to pull a success out of certain failure. He dices to take two Harmonics, forgoing Iron Man, as he is already fairly robust, in favor of the other two.

Again, Asmodeus Discord is opposite that of his rival Keneniah, a 1, and he has the following Discords from which he must choose 2 to make up for his bonus Harmonic:

• Paranoid: The Sabbathite is distracted by what they think are demons eyeing them with diabolical intent flitting about with just outside of their direct  line of vision. They suffer a cumulative -1 modifier to all rolls for the rest of the session.
• Faeries Wear Boots: The Sabbathite is convinced that demonic gremlins in massive Doc Marten boots are interfering with their actions by hobbling gear and stomping on their feet. This roll becomes a Critical Failure automatically and cannot be rerolled or modified in any way.
• Crazy Train: The Sabbathite sees demons of madness swirling around the heads of D6 Band-Mates and allies, who suffer an automatic Discord on their next roll, even if they roll a Harmonic.

Faeries Wear Boots just happens to be a favorite song of mine, and its effect, while critical in the moment, is not as long-standing as Paranoid, so we'll take FWB. Crazy Train is definitely more punishing, but it punishes others, not Asmodeus, so [two-ginger salute] those guys! ROCK & ROLLLLLLL! (translation: we'll take Crazy Train).

 SECONDARY CHARACTERISTICS

In BoL we have Lifeblood, which is called Fight in BoHM (as in 'having the fight beaten out of you'). It is figured the same way: 10 + Might.

Next we have Fortune, which are like Hero Points and have a similar function. You start with 6 in BoHM, as they have an additional use that will see them spent a bit more freely, that of negating Discords.

Fame is a new Secondary Characteristic, and it represents a pool of influence that can be used during an adventure to add 1 point to any Cool roll to influence others. Like Fortune, it only recovers at the end of an adventure, so it is a dwindling resource. Fame is equal to Cool during character creation, but may be raised using advancement points, to represent the Headbanger's increased notoriety spreading their reputation throughout the Metalsphere. If there were a single number that represents 'winning,' in the Charlie Sheen sense of the word, this would be it and the Headbanger with the highest Fame should lord it over the other, lesser players.

There is a fourth characteristic that will be introduced in a later expansion: Freak. For those who want Sabbathites to cast real sorcery, Priests to get actual miracles from God, and Punks to disrupt their foes with Psychic screams while Ledite Yogis levitate above the fray, this is the power source of those sorts of things, which will be an option in the expansion, which will cover all sorts of alternate wrinkles for the universe of the Metalsphere, and it will be equal to 10+Savvy.

Keneniah's Secondary Characteristics come out as follows:

FIGHT 11, FORTUNE 6, FAME 1

Asmodeus comes out a bit tougher and a bit more notorious:

FIGHT 13, FORTUNE 6, FAME 2

GEAR

Ok, so I fibbed a bit, as I still haven't worked out the way Gear will be distributed. the general idea however is to restrict it in a way similar to BotA, as this is a post-apocalyptic universe, but not so severely and without the between-adventure attrition found in that game.

Career will play a large roll in what you can have and you will gain a number of free points, + career points + special items that are granted by your school to equip your Headbanger. I imagine that, as both the above Headbangers have Titan 2 a careers, they will be able to pick up a Medium Titan as part of their equipment.

 SUMMARY

So there are your two sample BoHM characters. Hope that gives you a taste of how they differ from other BoL games and a feel for the type of people you might meet living in the Metalsphere. Next time I'll try and go into depth about the Revised Rocktagon and the Schools of Rock themselves...

Barbarians of Heavy Metal: The Base Rules...

 NOTE: For those who have not read the design diaries that led up to this post, you can find them over at Strange Stones. The rest of this will make a lot more sense if you start there...

After a long pause, during which time I have written, designed and laid out an entire supplement for Doctor Who; wrote, recorded and engineered a 45 minute science fiction audio-play; created an alpha prototype for a Sword & Sorcery boardgame; experimented with publishing tabel-top RPGs as fully functional apps and have generally been kept hopping by my graduate degree *DEEP BREATH* I am back at work on Barbarians of Heavy Metal. And about time, too.

The game will be designed specifically for the Gameslate format, with a cheap text only version of the rules going up for distribution after the full app is finished. It is part of my experimental game design class, so the player's version of the app should be ready by Summer, to be quickly followed up by the full game.

Now that I've had a year to digest the idea, I've started realizing the mechanics. The core mechanic of Barbarians of Lemuria is intact, but modified in a number of ways to fit the genre:

Roll 2D6+D8, Base Difficulty 13

The D8 is called 'the Rocktohedron' and it is something special for BoHM. First, it adds a 3rd die to the roll to extend the spread between character ability and difficulty and prevent characters from becoming too powerful too quickly. But more importantly, it ties into your School of Rock, your school of musical martial arts.

By rolling your school's sacred number on the Rocktohedron, you activate a Harmonic effect. By rolling the sacred number of your opposing school, the one opposite yours on the Rocktagon, you instead generate Discord, or some sort of penalty. These will be described in further detail in the next post.

Mighty Successes, Legendary Successes and Critical Failures still exist, and are generated on the 2D6 part of the roll, as normal, but are now called Hardcore Success, Thrashing Success and Bollocks. They work pretty much the same way except now they are organized into a 'Results Ladder' that goes Bollocks-Failure-Success-Hardcore-Thrashing. The reason for this will be explained when we talk about Harmonics and Discord, but suffice to say, striking certain Harmonics or Discords can move a result up and down the ladder without need for Hero Points.

Another change comes in the area of Opposed Rolls. In BoHM all opposed rolls will involve bidding wars, similar to the system used in the old James Bond RPG chase system, with both sides gradually increasing their risk to borderline ridiculous levels to outperform their opponents.

Another possible change, one which I need to see in action to judge the effectiveness of, is to add in three factors to the characters roll, instead of the two normally allowed in BoL. So, instead of Celerity+Fire being used for ranged combat, I might allow Celerity+Fire +Appropriate Career. This allows for a wider spread of difficulties, a wider range of character ability and a whole lot more variety in the mix of Attributes, Combat Abilities, Careers, Styles and Instruments. A virtuoso guitar performance would use Celerity+Yngwie+Guitar, for instance, a crushing drum solo would use Might+Deadite+Percussion and firing a Titan's weapons would use Celerity+Fire+Titan Rider. 

Regular Career use would add an appropriate Style, assuming that certain Schools of Rock are more adept at certain tasks. So trying to fly an aerospace fighter through an asteroid field, which requires precision and virtuoso piloting, would be rolled using Celerity+Yngwie+Flyboy.
So as you can see, in BoHM, your School of Rock is more than just a musical style. It is a way of life that affects every aspect of the game and helps to further define your character and their place in the Metalsphere.

Now that you understand the basic mechanical modifications, the next post will discuss the ins and outs of BoHM characters...