When it comes to rules, I am an inveterate tinkerer. Rarely do I find a set of rules, whether miniatures or RPG, that I want to run as is. Swords & Six-Siders, however, is one of that rare breed.
I've been researching rules light system and came across a reference to Swords & Six-Siders (hereafter S&SS) in a thread in Reddit. I was skeptical at first; the system only uses a single D6. How could that possibly work?! But I picked it up from DriveThruRPG (the basic edition is free). And when I read it over, I was impressed. It seemed very similar to what I am trying to achieve with a D12 system.
What do I like about it?
- Character creation is straightforward and very old school. Roll abilities (e.g. Strength, Dexterity, etc.), Choose a class (and spells if applicable), pick your equipment, and roll hit points. That's it.
- While the game tracks treasure, it does not nickel and dime you to death. You don't have to purchase starting equipment; just pick what's reasonable. You also don't have to buy mundane items during play. So when you are at the tavern, you don't have to keep track of your drinks. Treasure is used to train for the next level or to buy magic items, such as healing.
- Body armor does not affect the chance to hit. Instead, armor reduces damage. Shields, however, help prevent getting hit in the first place. I've been experimenting with the same concept for my homebrew rules.
- Monster stats are very simple. The game just lists level. From this, it gives simple guidelines for determining attack bonus, AC (score to hit), damage resistance, and hit points. No huge stat blocks.
Any reservations? A few, but less than I thought:
- At first, I did not think that a single D6 would give enough granularity in combat. However, the system seems like it can handle this. You just have to accept that it
- Class levels max out at 6. This seems a bit low for a long-term campaign. Nevertheless, I think it could work - think of it as advancing from novice to trained, experienced, veteran, master, and legend (or something like that).
I'm not going to go into more detail on the rules right now. The Expanded Edition has a solo adventure, which I plan to play soon. Then I'll write about my experience and how the rules handle the adventure
I have been looking for a single d6 SFRPG for ages. I picked up Lasers and Six Siders (the SF version of Swords and Six Sider) only about a week ago. Alas my background is Traveller rather than D&D and so is not what I was looking for. But it does look like a great single d6 streamlined implementation of the D&D system. I continue to write my own instead :-)
ReplyDeleteI also picked up LSS. It looks good, albeit not Traveler.
ReplyDeleteEven though I really like S&SS I'm still working on my own rules. Just because :)