The Size of the Dog in the Fight

Hello everyone. Yes, I'm still here and posting from time to time. And this time, I'm actually going to talk about Adventures in Oz: Fantasy Roleplaying Beyond the Yellow Brick Road.

I recently had a conversation over Facebook with a fan of the game who wanted a little clarification on some things. It led to an interesting discussion and I'm going to share some of these clarifications with you all.

The big question that led to the most discussion was "Exactly what is the impact of Size on combat?"

It seems simple, right? Bigger things are easier to hit, so relative Size should add a bonus to hit the bigger thing, or a penalty to hit the smaller thing. I say something exactly like that in the book itself (the example on page 25 of the print version).

But then this fan pointed out that, due to the way the system handles damage, attack and damage are functionally tied together. So when you roll to make a Painful Strike, the roll not only determines whether or not you hit, but if your hit was hard enough to inflict the point of Wits damage. And while it may be easier to hit something that's bigger than you, the Size difference also means that you're going to have a harder time making that impact meaningful.

So Painful Strikes and Knockdowns do not receive modifiers based on the Size difference, but Grapples and Injuring Strikes do receive Size modifiers.

But why?

Because both maneuvers separate the linkage between attack and damage. When you attack with an Injuring Strike, you then make another roll on the Injury Table on page 30, much like making a damage roll in other RPGs. Since the damage roll is separate from the attack roll, and the damage roll receives Size modifiers, it makes sense that Injuring Strike attack rolls receive Size modifiers the other way around. Big things are easier to hit, but harder to damage, while smaller things are harder to hit and easier to damage.

The way grapples work, I think it's also fair to allow Size modifiers to apply to them. The roll to grapple is primarily a "to hit" roll. The primary effect of a grapple is Size-based. The grapple follow-up actions (Pin and Throw) are the "damage" effects.

To make things a little clearer, let's throw in some examples. Let's say that Toto (a very cute Size 1 dog) has discovered a Nome scout (Size 3) sizing up Oz for invasion. The Size difference between the two combatants is 2 (3-1).

Toto attempts a Painful Strike, chomping at the Nome's heel. The Nome is bigger than Toto, but Toto's small jaws mean that he'll have a hard time biting hard enough to make the Nome yelp. The two factors cancel out and there is no Size modifier to Toto's attack roll.

The Nome sees that he's been spotted and whips out his diamond-edged sword to chop poor Toto in half with an Injuring Strike! The Nome's attack roll is at -2 because of the relative Size difference, but if he were to hit, he would get +4 on his roll on the Injury Table.

Toto then tries a Knockdown maneuver, running around and between the Nome's legs to try and trip him. Reaching the Nome's legs is not a problem, but upsetting his balance is fairly tricky. No Size modifier.

Worrying that all of this scuffling is going to draw unwanted attention, the Nome then attempts to pick up Toto and run away with him. This is resolved as a grapple. The Nome suffers a -2 penalty to the attack roll due to Size difference. Once successful, the Nome inflicts a -3 penalty (equal to his Size) to all of Toto's Athletics rolls.

Do you have any questions about the setting or the system used in Adventures in Oz: Fantasy Roleplaying Beyond the Yellow Brick Road?

Time, Time, Time

For those of you who have read the transcript of the IRC Q&A I did a few weeks ago, I got a couple of questions that I wanted to give a bit more depth and attention to.

[19:54] <~Dan> On a related note... what is the tech level of Oz? I recall the Scarecrow (I think) packing a revolver in the movie.

Well, for those movie trivia buffs, the Scarecrow did indeed carry a revolver for a brief time in the film.

On the broader question of technology in Oz: There's a temptation to look at Oz as a historical relic. A product of the early 1900's. Especially after Disney's Return to Oz painstakingly recreated turn of the century Kansas for its opening scenes.

But if you actually look at the Oz stories and Baum's work in general, you'll see that he was very enthusiastic about the advances that were being made in science and technology all around him. One of his pre-Oz works, The Master Key, was a fairy story intended to illustrate the principles of electricity as they were understood at the time.

In The Patchwork Girl of Oz, Baum describes how he re-established contact with Oz via wireless telegraph (radio, basically) after he had lost contact at the end of the previous story. (In reality, Baum wanted to write things other than Oz and he knew that the only way the children would accept it was if he said that there was no way for more stories to be written. So he had Oz formally separated from the rest of the world at the conclusion of The Emerald City of Oz). Also in Patchwork, Baum introduces a character called Vic who is a living phonograph with a rag-time record on his turntable.

Those references might seem dated, but that's actually the point. Baum presented Oz in a very modern way back in 1913. It also helped make the land of Oz more comprehensible to his readers. Allowing them to believe that Oz was just as modern as the real world meant that he didn't have to explain the minutia of how Oz people lived and worked and let him focus on providing adventures.

Another interesting thing to note about the series is the clothing that the characters wear. Although Baum does not describe what characters are wearing usually, it was up to John R. Neill to draw them. And when he depicted the American characters, he tended to draw them wearing relatively modern clothes. And considering that his tenure with Oz stretched from 1904-1942, that makes for a lot of variation as fashions evolved. (Not that the characters were amazingly fashionable, but Dorothy generally looked like a little girl who could live on your street.)

So when you set up your game, don't necessarily try to force it to be a "period piece." But do be aware of the effects that technology can have on the structure of a typical Oz story. The big problem technologies are transportation and weaponry. The typical Oz story is a journey from one place to another, with lots of opportunity for small adventures and encounters in between. If cars or other types of rapid travel are commonplace, it will be possible to head directly to a destination very quickly without a lot of interruption. (Not that you can't have a lot of fun cruising down the Yellow Brick Freeway, if you were so inclined.)

I point out weapons technologies for a couple of reasons. First of all, war and destruction have never been major parts of Oz history or culture. It's unlikely that Ozma would encourage the development (or importation) of the sort of things that the militaries of the world like to parade around in. Secondly, because my combat rules lean to the unrealistic side. Players who want to fire an RPG (that's Rocket Propelled Grenade) at the Wheelers are likely to be disappointed with how the system handles the results.

Well, that wraps up my in-depth answer to that question. In the interest of keeping your head from exploding, I'll save the next topic I wanted to touch on for another post. See you soon!

Asked Questions

Now, I am nowhere near as cool as Jared, but people do ask me questions about Adventures in Oz.

When it is released, what form will Adventures in Oz take?

It will be released both as a softcover book and a PDF on Lulu.com. The book will contain rules for creating and playing your own Oz characters, being the Narrator of a roleplaying game, and an extensive guide to L. Frank Baum's Oz, complete with suggestions for making your own stories and locales within the land of Oz. The PDF will contain all of this information in a highly portable electronic format.

My goal is also to make the game available wherever quality gaming PDFs are sold.

How much will it cost?

The book will sell for $14.99 and the PDF will be $7.99

What age group are you targeting with your game?

I have designed the game so that it should be playable by virtually any age. It will be marketed as a kids RPG, but my playtest group was composed of people all in their 20's and we had a lot of fun.

Do you have anything else in the works?

Indeed I do. I hope to publish my own edition of "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz" as illustrated by my talented team of artists by the end of the year. Also in the works is a cooperative effort between myself and James Wallace, bringing the characters and locations of his book "The Magician of Oz" to your gaming table.

Farther out, I'd like to do a supplement detailing the lands beyond Oz, such as Sky Island and the Land of Mo, and a book of adventures for those Narrators with limited time to prepare their own.

I haven't read the books, but I love the MGM movie. Will I enjoy your game?

I certainly hope so. I include a lot of information from the stories, so you shouldn't feel too left out. You might even be inspired to track down and read some of the stories.

I haven't played an RPG before. What am I missing out on?

But nearly everyone has played a role as part of some kind of game. When we were younger, we all played some kind of pretending games. The rules of the Adventures in Oz game are there to provide a more structured experience and to resolve questions that can arise during play, such as putting an end to the old "Cops and Robbers" arguments of "I shot you!" "No you didn't!"

You will need at least two six-sided dice (the kind found in most board games) and each player should have a piece of paper recording their character's abilities and other details.