ACKS v23 Copy Editing

I guess we might as well kick this off with a tiny nitpick…
I noticed a minor typo in the “Recommended Reading for Judges” section:
“Deeds of Paksenarrion” should be The Deed of Paksenarrion (with a period - for some reason this is the only entry on the list without one).

Did the sap/blackjack not get added to the game? I don’t see it in the weapon list.

Bottom of Pg 52 seems to have 1 row of an empty chart?

The Hijinks is much improved. I like that section a LOT! Great work guys! Overall I see a number of new charts and sections. Still need to read it in more detail but keep it up!

Page 136. Determine market characteristics.
Any village smaller than 1,000 inhabitants is Class V.
– should be Class VI ?
Page 242. Mapping The Setting
‘The first step in constructing a campaign setting for ACKS is to create one or more maps of the regions that the player characters will adventure, conquer, and rule’

  • maybe ‘where’ reads better than ‘that’, because of adventure not having ‘in’ after it?

Character Abilities, Strength: “Strength is a prime requisite for assassins, explorers, dwarven vaultguards, elven nightblades, and fighters.” Elven nightblades should be elven spellswords, yes?

Tunic and pants for a serf costs less than a yard of cheap wool (6 sp vs. 8 sp), which is the cheapest cloth listed. Are their clothes assumed to be second hand or some such?

Duskreign’s Minion here.
Elven Nightblades have access to the lockpcking proficiency - giving a +2 to open locks. Only Thieves can open locks (as far as I can see). So…does the lockpicking prof allow the PC to open locks, or does Nightblade have the ability to open locks? Or does every character have the ability to open locks (18+?) and the prof. simply improves this skill?
Hijinks
Assassinating
The Bounty listed in the chart states 900gp/level of the victim while the description states 1500gp/level of victim.
The level of the victim is 1d4-1 (0-3rd level) As the bounty is X gp/level of victim, how much is the bounty for a 0th level victim? 0 lvl. x 1500gp = 0gp
Carousing
The benefit of Carousing is 3d6x10gp/level of perpetrator, however Carousing is available to 0th level perpetrators. As above, 3d6x10gp X 0th level = 0gp
Treasure Hunting
The chart states the success fee is 15% value of hoard while the description states 4%
“The boss receives the treasure map, which leads to a treasure worth 2d4 x 1,000gp/level of the perpetrator (see Section Nine, Treasure, for more details on treasure maps.)” So, is the treasure map simply 2d4 x 1000gp or is it rolled on the chart? (Thus giving the possibility for magic items) Finally, does the map lead to a flat piece of ground 50 paces off the road, marked with an “X”, and a camp of porters nearby with nothing better to do than cart your treasure home? Or, does it lead to an adventure with just enough danger to make the hoard make sense?

Everyone - Thanks for your keen attention to all my errors! I must say that designing in real-time with a community reviewing the work has demonstrated just how damn hard it is to release an error-free product.
joshlyle - Thanks for catching the error. Nothing so systematic as an assumption of second-hand clothes. I just screwed up in a few places.
Duskreign’s minion - I’m afraid I’ve introduced new errors while trying to fix my last round of errors. I’ll post later with updates and get them into v24.

To correct some earlier mistakes:
Assassinating: The bounty is 1,500gp per level of the victim. 0th level victims are counted as 1st level.
Carousing: 0th level perpetrators are treated as if 1st level, with rumors worth 3d6x10gp.
Treasure Hunting: The success fee is 4% of the value of the hoard. The treasure map’s hoard is 2d4 x 1,000gp/level, not rolled on the treasure table chart. The location of the treasure map’s hoard is determined by the Judge, but is always at least 1 6-mile hex distant from his hideout per 1,000gp value. (For instance, a 5,000gp hoard would be at least 30 miles distant.)

UPDATE: Magical Engineering is now a class-only proficiency. Elven Spellswords lose Trapping as a class proficiency but gain Magical Engineering. Elven Nightblades lose Lockpicking but gain Magical Engineering. Magical Engineering now provides a small bonus to magical research.
Magical Engineering: The character has specialized knowledge of magical items. He gains a +1 to magical research throws. He can recognize most common magical items after careful investigation with a proficiency throw of 11+, but is unable to recognize uncommon or unique magical items, to divine command words, to distinguish trapped or cursed items from safe ones, or to assess the specific bonus or number of charges remaining in an item. This proficiency can be selected multiple times, each time adding an additional +1 bonus to magical research throws and reducing the proficiency throw required to recognize common items by 4.

UPDATE: The following rule had been inadvertently left out when converting my handwritten notes into ACKS.
Magic Item Creation
If a charged item has multiple spell effects powered by the same charges, use the base cost and time for the highest level spell effect, plus half the base cost and time for each other spell effect. The minimum time to create a charged item is never less than 1 week per spell level of the highest level effect.

Another cloth related note - sacks (small and large) are cheaper than a yard of cheap wool, and need be pretty stout if they’re going to haul 2 stone. For that matter, a price on canvas by the yard would be handy (checked against the tent price).
A price on dried/salted/smoked fish would be nice, or just a note on fish under “meat”.

So… I’m anal retentive and I know it (Alex, Tavis, Ryan - you’re welcome to point and mock). I’ve been through sections 1-6 and made some notes (where some is now up to 10 pages in Word). I’d done section seven on v20 of the rules and sent that through to Tavis via email (any feedback on that guys?). Here are my notes for sections 1-6 (Long posts ahead…):
Page 5.
‘Descriptions of each proficiency’ sounds a little strange. Would ‘A description of each proficiency’ be more appropriate, given each proficiency does only have one description.
‘Viktor emerge from the treeline’ – I think this should be’ tree line’.
Page 9.
‘Add any relevant modifiers to the number generated by the idea’ – should ‘idea’ be ‘die’? (and do you need to specify? Does ‘Add any relevant modifiers’ get the message across as clearly?)
Page 11.
‘some classes will require minimum scores for some abilities.’ – It’s interesting to note this only applies to the 4 demi-human classes. Why, for example, does a Mage not require Int 9 given his apprentices (once he’s L9+) will have a minimum of Int 9 because lower rolls are discarded? There’s a strange disparity in this.
Page 12.
‘Roll 3d6 for each ability. The Judge may allow you to roll abilities in any order, or in order as listed here’ – There’s an ambiguity here. A suggested rewrite is: ‘Roll 3d6 for each ability, in order. Alternatively, the Judge may allow you to roll 6 scores and assign them to your abilities in any order.’
‘Some class may have other minimum ability requirements which must be met in addition’ – suggested rewrite: ‘Some classes may have minimum ability scores which must be met in order to play that class.’ It fixes the singular ‘class’ typo and also makes the sentence less confusing.
Under strength, the list of classes that use it as a Prime Requisite incorrectly lists nightblades. This should be spellswords.
Also ‘Note that a penalty here will not reduce damage from a successful attack below one point’. A rules lawyer might try to argue that if you have a strength penalty then you always do 1 pt of damage, even if the creature requires magic weapons or something special to damage it – which is lame. A suggested rewrite is ‘Note that a penalty here can not reduce damage from a successful attack below one point, unless the target would normally take no damage anyway’.
Under Intelligence – ‘Mages and elven spellswords increase the number of spells … they can learn’. It’s interesting that Elven Nightblades don’t get the same benefit. Is this deliberate?
Also ‘various beastman dialects’ – That the beastman tongues are dialects is interesting. If I speak Zaharan, can I communicate with all the beastmen types? Personally, I’d make them separate languages, but related – Like the Romance languages (French, Spanish, Italian, Portugese, etc…). They may have started from Zaharan (Latin) but each will have evolved over the centuries into distinct tongues.
Page 13.
‘If a class has two prime requisites…’ etc. – Are the classes that fall into this category balanced in terms of progression or special abilities to take this obstacle (to getting bonus xp) into account? Does it matter?
Hit Points – I absolutely love you description of what HP represent. Just love it.
Page 15.
Mage spell progression table – Given the two tables (Spell and Level) are side by side, do you need to repeat the ‘Level’ column for the Spell Progression?
Page 16.
Cleric spell progression table – as with the Mage table, above.
‘Humans who become clerics have pledged their lives to serve a deity’ – Are there no pantheonic clerics?
‘As holy warriors, clerics are trained to wear any armour’ – One oft cited criticisms of Clerics in general, is that they overshadow Fighters due to the combination of strong combat ability and spells (particularly self-buffs and healing). One way of balancing this, if it’s at all appropriate to ACKs, is to restrict the armour that Clerics can wear to one or two tiers below Fighters – so, Chainmail or Banded Mail. That way, Fighters retain the front rank supremacy they deserve and Clerics function as second line warriors / supporters. Given what you’ve done to try to balance Fighters in ACKs, this may not be appropriate – is it something you’ve considered and rejected?
Page 17.
‘he will attract 5d6x10 0th level soldiers’ – What is the impact of this on a Domain – particularly a Small Wilderness domain that has very limited capacity to support large numbers of people? Also, although they can garrison for free, what is the gp value of these followers for the purpose of offsetting their value against the garrison expenses?
Page 18.
Cleric Turning Table – The lines for Zombie and Ghoul at levels 2-5 are not in line with the rest of the table.
Page 19.
Opening Locks – suggested rewrite: ‘He may only try to pick a lock once, and if he fails he may not’ instead of ‘one time, and if he fails, he may not’.
Finding and Removing Traps – suggested rewrite: ‘A thief may only try to find or remove a trap in any given area once.
Picking Pockets – I suggest that the Reaction Roll made to determine a victims reaction is made at a penalty to avoid the situation where the victim is super friendly to the person who they just caught trying to pick their pocket. A -3 would make it only possible for a Charisma 18 character…
Climbing Walls – Suggested rewrite: ‘If the roll fails, they fall a distance equal to half the attempted distance, plus the distance covered by any previous throws, taking 1d6 damage per 10 feet fallen.’ – If you make the first 2 rolls, but fail the 3rd on a 300 foot climb you’re going to fall 250 feet (and probably die…)
Page 21.
‘At first level, bards hit an unarmored foe (AC 0) with an attack throw of 10+’ – Is there any class for which this is not true? If not, does it need to be in each class description or could it be a general rule that a 1st level character of any class will hit an unarmored foe with an attack throw of 10+’.
‘Bards are smooth tongued and familiar with protocol and courtly manners’ – Just a tongue in cheek comment really – how is that going to help them avoid the orcs stew pot? The implication is that Bards are courtly, but the reality is that they may well be talking down hostile intelligent monsters with presumably unknown or at least relatively alien cultures that the Bard may not understand.
Page 26
Dwarven Vaultguard Attack and Saving Throws – Given that Vaultguards can only go to L13, the last row of the table is unnecessary.
Page 27.
‘When examining works of his craft, the craftpriest can identify masterwork items, rare materials, and famous artisans’ – Is this limited in scope to things of dwarven origin, or to all races? It seems to give the craft priest a very generic ability, where a narrower focus may be more appropriate.
Page 28.
Dwarven Craftpriest Attack and Saving Throws – the last 2 rows on the table are not needed as the max level is 10.
Page 29.
Elven Spellsword Attack and Saving Throws – the last 3 rows on the table are not needed as the max level is 10.
Page 30.
Elven Nightblade Attack and Saving Throws - The last row on the table is not needed as the max level is 11. Also, the second to last row would need amending to 11 rather than 11-12.
Page 31
Money and Coins - As as been mentioned on the forum, this and the Weapons and Equipment section are out of sync with the character creation process outlined earlier. I know Alex has said he’s loathe to put equipment into a separate section, but it’s jarring to the usability of the rules to have to ignore several pages now and come back to them later. Would they logically fit into Section 5? Something like ‘Before embarking on an adventure, all Adventurers need the tools of their trade’. The rules for encumbrance are already in Section 5 and it’s really only equipment (to begin with) that is relevant to those rules, so it’s a logical fit.
‘For the purposes of encumbrance, 1,000 coins is considered 1 stone’ - 1,000 coins are considered 1 stone – as the coins are plural, though I see what the intent is. Maybe ‘For purposes of encumbrance, a volume of 1,000 coins is considered 1 stone’ is more grammatically correct, but probably doesn’t read as well.
Page 34.
Belladonna – This is made of awesome.
Page 36.
Holy Water – How is holy water made exactly? I haven’t seen any rules for it within the Cleric class description, Create Water only creates rainwater and Bless doesn’t mention it either.
Page 38.
Rope, 50’ – ‘can hold the weight of approximately three human-sized beings’ – what’s that in stones, given that’s the general unit of weight being used in the game?
Sack, Large – there’s an extra space in the first sentence.
Shield – Would the game still be balanced between the 3 current modes of fighting (Sword and Board, 2 hander, 2 weapon) if a shield user were able to sacrifice their shield in order to avoid damage. E.g A goblin hits a soldier using a wooden shield (3hp). The blow causes 4 points of damage. The soldier sacrifices his shield, absorbing 3 hp of the damage and destroying the shield but he also takes 1hp in the process.
Page 39
Sword, Two-Handed – This is the first time I think I’ve seen the longsword described as a two-handed sword. Also: There’s some debate about how accurate it is to call a Claymore a 2-hander. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claymore. I know what you’re trying to achieve, and I guess to the majority of your audience it probably doesn’t matter.
Torch – ‘If a torch is used in combat, it deals 1d4 damage’ – That’s the same as a club, which sort of makes sense. However if the torch is lit, does it do more damage? I suggest that it could do an additional 1 or 1d2 points of damage due to the burning – a weaker version of oil splash damage.
Equipment Availability - I can sort of see what you’re doing by having this section here. However, given it introduces market classes which are properly defined in Section 7, and given it’s sort of for the Judge to adjudicate, and given the ‘buying in bulk’ stuff could be regarded as ‘trade’, could this section be moved to section 7 as well? I accept it’s not a great fit, so the answer is probably no.
‘Adventures may sometimes wish to purchase equipment in greater volume…’ – Adventures should be Adventurers.
‘The vast majority of empires, with urban populations…’ – The figures given in the sentences that follow this line don’t match the figures in Section 7 for what classifies as a ‘small village’ etc…
Page 43
Ancestral Magic – ‘He also enjoys the elf’s immunity to paralysis’. What if the ancestral blood is dwarven or another long lived race? You’re forcing players into the ‘Half-Elf’ niche here which is a shame because there’s so much more scope with this proficiency.
Page 44.
Art – There’s a missing full stop after ‘(e.g., painting, sculpture, mosaic)’
In the Art Proficiency table gp is capitalised as Gp Earned/Month. I don’t know if this is deliberate.
Page 46.
Fighting Style – the +1 to initiative for Pole Weapons. Does this simply mean that the -1 penalty for using a 2-Handed weapon is removed, or does it provide an overall +1 to Initiative?
Gambling - For added sh*ts and giggles, might I suggest tweaking this so it has the potential to explode? Dramatically, stories, films, etc… that involve gambling often build up to stupidly high stakes (that are often lost) and much story can be generated as a result. Perhaps if they buy it twice and they roll double 6 (good), or snake eyes (bad) then interesting things happen…
Healing – The proficiency throw is 8+. For consistency with the other ‘ranked’ proficiencies why not make it 11+ at L1?
Page 47
Leadership – How does it affect play balance if the +1 domain morale is ‘by 1 or by the characters Charisma modifier, whichever is greater’?
Lip Reading – Should provide a bonus on the Carousing roll, and possibly Spying.
Page 48.
Magical Engineering – A character with this is unable to recognise uncommon magical items. What determines ‘commonality’?
Naturalism – ‘the terrain of his homeland’ – This doesn’t fit well for the former slave, kidnapped as a child from his homeland and raised in a far off place. ‘Terrain that is deeply familiar’ may be more appropriate.
Page 50.
Swashbuckling – It’s a shame that neither the Elven Nightblade, nor the Elven Spellsword can take advantage of the Level 13 bonus to this proficiency.
Theology – Why do craftpriests get this for free and Clerics don’t?

Page 52.
The final word of the first paragraph should be ‘spells’ not ‘spell’.
Page 54.
First paragraph - In practical terms, what happens to the ‘Shield’ spell? The rules have so far described how the spellbook is more like a journal – replete with notes on the alignment of the stars etc… etc… If Quintus is simply no longer monitoring Shield in favour of Magic Missile, the implication is that the written knowledge is still there. However, he’s lost access to it. So what happens to the Shield spell information? Personally, I like the idea that the pages might be removed from the book and stored in the mages library until such a time as he may want to start paying attention to Shield again. Thus, mages build up a body of knowledge that they can’t use unless they start to pay close attention to it, but the rewards of previous adventures aren’t simply lost.
Page 57
Animate Dead – Calls for Unholy Water to make undead ‘permanent’. How and where can unholy water be acquired?
Augury – This is a particularly difficult spell to manage because the nature of players and random chance caused by dice rolls may make even the best of auguries impossible to come true.
Page 82
Suggested rewrite - ‘If a large map is being used, the players might use dice, tokens, or paper, plastic or even painted metal miniatures to represent their characters and where they are in the marching order’.
Page 83.
Suggested rewrite – ‘If using a large map and tokens or miniatures,’
Rest – ‘Further, resting is useful for spellcasters to recover spells. This is discussed in Section 4, Spells’. – In the context of explorative movement, there’s no mention of resting to recover spells in Section 4. What is there is overnight resting, which isn’t the subject of this paragraph.
Encumbrance – ‘Items weighing more than 14lb can weigh more than 1 stone’. If a stone in ACKs weighs between 8 and 14lb, then does an object weighing more than 14lb not weigh 2 stone?
Character movement and encumbrance table – You’ve changed the references to ‘stones’ in the text to ‘stone’. Do you need to do it for the table as well?
Page 84
Animal/Vehicle movement and encumbrance table – Dogs were mentioned elsewhere as requiring stats. They’d be useful here as well.
Doors – ‘The standard door in a dungeon is made of heavy wood, reinforced with iron banding’ - This seems to be very specific and quite a ‘cliché’ thing do say. It’s certainly within ‘classic dungeon’ trope, but does it need to be so heavily reinforced here? Could you not say something about there being many different types of door, or which the most common is the heavy wooden reinforced door?
Page 86/87
Getting Lost – I’m not entirely sure I’m happy with the rules here. I find it hard to believe that a party with a Navigator would not notice that the sun/moon/stars is on the wrong side.
Page 89.
Getting Lost - I confess I’m not quite sure how you get lost on a river, and given land can be seen from 24 miles away, lake sailing should be relatively straight forward as well – less than 20% chance of getting lost…
Page 90
Hiring Availability by Market Class Table – Mounted Crossbowmen - I don’t get this. Dwarven settlements must be built underground and in Wilderness areas. Having cavalry doesn’t make sense with what’s been written about dwarves so far
Page 91
Retainer Loyalty Table – under the adjusted dice roll column, change ‘2-‘ to ‘2 or less’.
‘A retainers morale score is permanently decreased by 1 each time he suffers a calamity’ - This seems quite harsh in some ways. If the retainer is genuinely inconvenienced / harmed by the calamity for a period of time I can understand it, but if he is ‘cured’ quickly and effectively I don’t see why there should be a penalty to morale – his boss is taking great care of him.
Page 92
Experience – ‘Unlike other hirelings, retainers gain experience just as other adventurers do’ – remove the ‘do’ from between retainers and gain.
Mercenaries – ‘The cost of armorers to make and repair troop armour and weapons, stablehands to groom horses, and other miscellaneous expenses are not included’ – Perhaps a worked example that includes these costs would make using these rules more accessible?
Mercenary Troop Type GP Wage per month table – What about Slave-Soldiers for less enlightened rulers? Mamluks for example. Would they be paid wages or could the cost also cover simply feeding them?
Page 94
Spell availability by Market Table – Would it not be more appropriate to work out if there is an NPC of the right class and level first, and then work out if they know the spell? I’m not convinced by the figures here.
Page 95
Monster Experience Points Table - All of the monsters in the Monster section have listed XP values. Rules for creating new monsters should ideally sit in the GM secrets section, or as an epilogue to the Monsters section. Putting this table here serves to confuse players and lure them into trying to calculate XP based on HD and Special abilities. This isn’t really necessary given the availability of information elsewhere. I’d recommend removing the table (or moving it) and making reference to the XP values for monsters under their stat blocks.
Page 97.
‘However, in wilderness play the Judge will first roll at the start of each day of travel to determine if the group becomes lost’ – This is a travel rule that has already been described in the previous section. I don’t understand why it’s repeated here as it doesn’t have any direct relevance to Encounters.
Page 101.
Movement – the first sentence is very broken up with commas. Is there a cleaner way of rephrasing it?
Charging – ‘Certain weapons, including spears, lances and pole arms, are especially suitable for use while charging’ – is this the full list of weapons that can be used in a charge? If so, perhaps rephrase to say ‘Spears, lances and pole arms are especially suitable for use while charging’. If not, it would be useful to provide either a specific list, or to say ‘If a weapon can be used to charge it is stated in the weapons description in Section 2’.
Set Weapon against Charge – see my comment about Charging, above.
Page 103
‘If more detail is desired, there are many figurines on the market that can be used to represent character positions and movement…’ – You’ve already mentioned used miniatures during the description of mapping. Rather than restate ‘If you want to do this’ again, you could instead say something like ‘Miniatures or tokens provide an ideal method of representing character positions and movement during can provide’. Or just cut the two sentences entirely.
Missile Attacks – ‘Combatants may not make a missile attack at opponents engaged in melee’ – Why not? It doesn’t make logical sense to fiat say “This is not possible”. Players will try it. Pathfinder models this by giving archers a -4 to hit if they don’t have the ‘Precise Shot’ feat. Given the disparate power levels this is sometimes not a massive problem. However a -4 to hit in ACKs would be a significant penalty and Precise Shot would be very valuable. It also ties in with an opponent being in cover.
Missile Attacks and Cleave – That ranged attacks get to use the Cleave rules is interesting, and very cool.
Does a +1 Bow cause the arrows it shoots to affect a creature with an Invulnerability or must the archer use a +1 Arrow as well? How much does a +1 Arrow cost, and are you putting Archers at a significant disadvantage if the cost is disproportionate to the cost of a +1 Sword? I.e. If cost of Bow +1 and Arrows +1 is well in excess of the cost of a Sword +1 the game will tend towards Melee warriors because it’s more efficient once characters get to the level where they’re fighting ‘invulnerable’ creatures.
Page 103
‘Holy water cannot retain its holy power if it is stored in any other container than the special vials it is placed in when blessed’ – I recommend this is added to the item description in Section 2.
Casting Spells – It would be nice to provide some context as to why casters cannot move when casting, and why they lose spells if damaged or saves are failed. Something about needing intense concentration to handle the magical energies.
‘See the discussion on Spells in Section 4’ – does Section 4 need to be in bold, and say Section Four instead?
Page 105
Invulnerable Monsters – ‘monsters with 5 HD or more are able to affect these monsters through natural ferocity’ – To clarify, this only applies to monsters, not to Humans/Demi-Humans with 5 HD or more? Also, I’m not sure it follows that an incorporeal creature such as a Spectre could be harmed by a monster such as a Giant Scorpion (7HD)
Effects of Damage – without the table being in the book it’s impossible to put some of this in context. I assume this is a formatting / layout issue to be resolved prior to printing? The final location of the table needs to be added here to direct people to it. In general though, the idea of permanent wounds is awesomeness.
‘Tampering with Mortality’ – a reference to the table needs to point players to it, wherever it ends up.
Nonlethal Damage – ‘Marcus starts attacking with the flat of his blade (takeing a -4 penalty on his attack throw)’ – I think this is the first time this rule is mentioned, could it have a reference to where it is found, or even a ‘See below’, if that’s appropriate.
Cleaving – These look like nice, simple, rules for multiple attacks.
Page 106
Saving Throw Categories – ‘When there is a doubt as to which categories to use’ – should that be ‘category to use’?
Page 107
Knock Down – What about creatures with more than 2 legs (e.g. a Centaur) or no legs (e.g. a Giant Snake)? Can a prone opponent attack from the ground?
Overrun – This looks significantly powerful compared to the others because it doesn’t count as your attack for the round.

James - thanks for the detailed feedback! Much of what you’ve noted look to be simply errors on my part in grammar or math, but in a few places you asked some questions that I want to respond to.
‘some classes will require minimum scores for some abilities.’ – It’s interesting to note this only applies to the 4 demi-human classes. Why, for example, does a Mage not require Int 9 given his apprentices (once he’s L9+) will have a minimum of Int 9 because lower rolls are discarded? There’s a strange disparity in this.
APM: Great catch! This is due to a confusion on my part between two different models I used at two different points in the game design. In one draft the prime requisite had a minimum of 9. I need to clean this up.
Under Intelligence – ‘Mages and elven spellswords increase the number of spells … they can learn’. It’s interesting that Elven Nightblades don’t get the same benefit. Is this deliberate?
APM: Not deliberate at all, simply an error.
‘If a class has two prime requisites…’ etc. – Are the classes that fall into this category balanced in terms of progression or special abilities to take this obstacle (to getting bonus xp) into account? Does it matter?
APM: The intent is that those classes are genuinely harder to succeed within. This explains, in part, why there are fewer of them in the setting.
One oft cited criticisms of Clerics in general, is that they overshadow Fighters due to the combination of strong combat ability and spells (particularly self-buffs and healing). One way of balancing this, if it’s at all appropriate to ACKs, is to restrict the armour that Clerics can wear to one or two tiers below Fighters – so, Chainmail or Banded Mail. That way, Fighters retain the front rank supremacy they deserve and Clerics function as second line warriors / supporters. Given what you’ve done to try to balance Fighters in ACKs, this may not be appropriate – is it something you’ve considered and rejected?
APM: Fighters and Clerics seem to be, in practice, well-balanced. Around the time that Clerics come into their own as spellcasters, they begin to fade in comparison as melee combatants due to the Fighter’s damage bonus, cleaves, and proficiencies.
‘he will attract 5d6x10 0th level soldiers’ – What is the impact of this on a Domain – particularly a Small Wilderness domain that has very limited capacity to support large numbers of people? Also, although they can garrison for free, what is the gp value of these followers for the purpose of offsetting their value against the garrison expenses?
APM: It can bankrupt a domain if the cleric isn’t careful! Even though they just need to be feed, that’s hundreds of gp per month. For purposes of garrison, the gp value of the followers will depend on how they are equipped. .
‘At first level, bards hit an unarmored foe (AC 0) with an attack throw of 10+’ – Is there any class for which this is not true? If not, does it need to be in each class description or could it be a general rule that a 1st level character of any class will hit an unarmored foe with an attack throw of 10+’.
APM: My desire was that a player could read just his class description and have the info he needed to begin play.
Would they logically fit into Section 5? Something like ‘Before embarking on an adventure, all Adventurers need the tools of their trade’. The rules for encumbrance are already in Section 5 and it’s really only equipment (to begin with) that is relevant to those rules, so it’s a logical fit.
APM: Everybody just hates having Equipment under Characters, huh? That’s where Moldvay/Cook put it! :expressionless: Your suggestion is not bad. Another thought might be to move encumbrance and hirelings together with Equipment into a new Section, and then move the remaining (much reduced) Adventure section into Encounters and Combat and just rename that section Adventures. I’ll have to tinker with the structure.
Holy Water – How is holy water made exactly? I haven’t seen any rules for it within the Cleric class description, Create Water only creates rainwater and Bless doesn’t mention it either.
APM: It’s…uh…water that’s been holynized. Please excuse me as I go write these rules.
Shield – Would the game still be balanced between the 3 current modes of fighting (Sword and Board, 2 hander, 2 weapon) if a shield user were able to sacrifice their shield in order to avoid damage. E.g A goblin hits a soldier using a wooden shield (3hp). The blow causes 4 points of damage. The soldier sacrifices his shield, absorbing 3 hp of the damage and destroying the shield but he also takes 1hp in the process.
APM: Noooo! This is a terrible idea. I know that “Shields Must Be Splintered” is a darling rule of the Old School Renaissance. It’s fun at 1st level, but in long-term campaign play it is dreadful. As soon as the PCs really think about what it means, it breaks the game. The first thing you get is legions of “shieldbearers” accompanying the low-level characters, whose only purpose is to carry get-out-of-jail shields for the fighters. Then, the moment a Bag of Holding is discovered, you have a fighter carrying 100 Shields in the dungeon, essentially unkillable. Put it this way: If you saw a magic item that gave you +1 AC and let you sacrifice the item to ignore any one melee or missile blow, how much would it be worth? More than 10gp…
Torch – ‘If a torch is used in combat, it deals 1d4 damage’ – That’s the same as a club, which sort of makes sense. However if the torch is lit, does it do more damage? I suggest that it could do an additional 1 or 1d2 points of damage due to the burning – a weaker version of oil splash damage.
APM: My thinking was that a club is likely to be heavy and hard, whereas a torch is going to be as light as possible. But perhaps a lit torch should do 1d6 damage.
Ancestral Magic – ‘He also enjoys the elf’s immunity to paralysis’. What if the ancestral blood is dwarven or another long lived race? You’re forcing players into the ‘Half-Elf’ niche here which is a shame because there’s so much more scope with this proficiency.
APM: The original name of the proficiency was “Elven Bloodline”! That was sort of the intent. A Half-Dwarf should have Ancestral Grouchiness…
Fighting Style – the +1 to initiative for Pole Weapons. Does this simply mean that the -1 penalty for using a 2-Handed weapon is removed, or does it provide an overall +1 to Initiative?
APM: It’s +1 -1 = 0.
Gambling - For added sh*ts and giggles, might I suggest tweaking this so it has the potential to explode? Dramatically, stories, films, etc… that involve gambling often build up to stupidly high stakes (that are often lost) and much story can be generated as a result. Perhaps if they buy it twice and they roll double 6 (good), or snake eyes (bad) then interesting things happen…
APM: Hilarious! I’ll see what can be done.
Healing – The proficiency throw is 8+. For consistency with the other ‘ranked’ proficiencies why not make it 11+ at L1?
APM: Originally, healing’s proficiency throws didn’t decrease by the standard 4 points per rank. It’s been standardized that all throws improve by 4 per rank, though, so I should adjust this.
Leadership – How does it affect play balance if the +1 domain morale is ‘by 1 or by the characters Charisma modifier, whichever is greater’?
APM: Domain morale is already modified by the character’s Charisma modifier. Leadership is on top of that, allowing a high CHA character to really govern with aplomb, or a low CHA leader to learn to overcome his lousy personality.
Lip Reading – Should provide a bonus on the Carousing roll, and possibly Spying.
APM: Great point!
Magical Engineering – A character with this is unable to recognise uncommon magical items. What determines ‘commonality’?
APM: It’s left to the Judge’s discretion as to what’s common in his campaign. I personally treat most items in the main rulebook as common.
Swashbuckling – It’s a shame that neither the Elven Nightblade, nor the Elven Spellsword can take advantage of the Level 13 bonus to this proficiency.
APM: That’s a feature, not a bug!
Theology – Why do craftpriests get this for free and Clerics don’t?
APM: From a mechanical point of view, its game balance. The dwarven “racial power” is bonus proficiencies. From a world point of view, your average 1st level craftpriest is considerably older and more studious than your average 1st level cleric. Moreover, not every cleric necessarily will come from a faith that has a rigid theocratic school - one can imagine a dervish-type who communes with the gods directly, etc.

First paragraph - In practical terms, what happens to the ‘Shield’ spell? The rules have so far described how the spellbook is more like a journal – replete with notes on the alignment of the stars etc… etc… If Quintus is simply no longer monitoring Shield in favour of Magic Missile, the implication is that the written knowledge is still there. However, he’s lost access to it. So what happens to the Shield spell information? Personally, I like the idea that the pages might be removed from the book and stored in the mages library until such a time as he may want to start paying attention to Shield again. Thus, mages build up a body of knowledge that they can’t use unless they start to pay close attention to it, but the rewards of previous adventures aren’t simply lost.
APM: I’m not sure what game mechanical implication you are suggesting…?
Getting Lost – I’m not entirely sure I’m happy with the rules here. I find it hard to believe that a party with a Navigator would not notice that the sun/moon/stars is on the wrong side.
APM: In actual pre-GPS exploration throughout history, getting lost is exceptionally frequent. ACKS/D&D is somewhat perverse in that getting lost means “knowing what direction north is”, while historically navigation was much based on landmarks, routes, waypoints, and so on. In an era when most maps were hardly accurate, absolute directions weren’t that valuable. Since (for sake of simplicity) it’s far easier to use absolute directions, we abstract this into not knowing exactly what direction you are moving. In-world, it’s likely that a seasoned explorer does know what direction north lies, but he’s not exactly sure whether to get to the Lost City of Zahar he needs to go south-south-west, or south-west-west. The net result is the same.
Hiring Availability by Market Class Table – Mounted Crossbowmen - I don’t get this. Dwarven settlements must be built underground and in Wilderness areas. Having cavalry doesn’t make sense with what’s been written about dwarves so far
APM: Legacy rule. :-\ Moldavy/Cook gave dwarves mounted crossbowmen on mules.
‘A retainers morale score is permanently decreased by 1 each time he suffers a calamity’ - This seems quite harsh in some ways. If the retainer is genuinely inconvenienced / harmed by the calamity for a period of time I can understand it, but if he is ‘cured’ quickly and effectively I don’t see why there should be a penalty to morale – his boss is taking great care of him.
APM: It is harsh, by intent. It forces players to think twice before using their favorite henchmen as “trap testers” and “medusa scouts”. Even a brave and loyal follower will have second thoughts about ‘what might have been’.
Mercenary Troop Type GP Wage per month table – What about Slave-Soldiers for less enlightened rulers? Mamluks for example. Would they be paid wages or could the cost also cover simply feeding them?
APM: Slave-soldiers would need only to be fed, but there’d be a high upfront cost to buy them. Using the standard ratio, it’d be 33x their monthly wage. This would include equipment. So, for example, a Slave Knight would be (33x60=) 1,980gp, including horse, armor, and weapons. Slave armies are very expensive, which is they end up becoming hereditary institutions, which in turn end up dominating their cultures.
More to come later!

Spell availability by Market Table – Would it not be more appropriate to work out if there is an NPC of the right class and level first, and then work out if they know the spell? I’m not convinced by the figures here.
APM: I did work out the NPCs and their class/level first, and the numbers presented are correct (unless I’ve made an error, which does happen). I just believe that the exact class/level of any given NPC is secondary to the information that Judge/PCs need. The chart is designed to answer common questions that arise in game about how much and how fast healing magic is available, etc.
Monster Experience Points Table - All of the monsters in the Monster section have listed XP values. Rules for creating new monsters should ideally sit in the GM secrets section, or as an epilogue to the Monsters section. Putting this table here serves to confuse players and lure them into trying to calculate XP based on HD and Special abilities. This isn’t really necessary given the availability of information elsewhere. I’d recommend removing the table (or moving it) and making reference to the XP values for monsters under their stat blocks.
APM: Traditionally (B/X) this information was presented with the adventures section, and I think presenting them to the PCs is the right thing to do – otherwise you’re scoring them on a system they don’t understand. Experience points are meant to be objective, like touchdowns, rather than subjective, like art reviews.
Charging – ‘Certain weapons, including spears, lances and pole arms, are especially suitable for use while charging’ – is this the full list of weapons that can be used in a charge? If so, perhaps rephrase to say ‘Spears, lances and pole arms are especially suitable for use while charging’. If not, it would be useful to provide either a specific list, or to say ‘If a weapon can be used to charge it is stated in the weapons description in Section 2’.
APM: There may be other weapons that the Judge introduces which are also suitable for charging. Weapons suitable for charging are noted as such in their description in the Equipment sec…region.
Missile Attacks – ‘Combatants may not make a missile attack at opponents engaged in melee’ – Why not? It doesn’t make logical sense to fiat say “This is not possible”. Players will try it. Pathfinder models this by giving archers a -4 to hit if they don’t have the ‘Precise Shot’ feat. Given the disparate power levels this is sometimes not a massive problem. However a -4 to hit in ACKs would be a significant penalty and Precise Shot would be very valuable. It also ties in with an opponent being in cover.
APM: I know players will try it. What the rule is saying is “you have no chance of hitting your target.” I know what Pathfinder/3.5 does, but I think those were bad rule choices. They made missile weapons considerably too powerful. Prior to the age of gunpowder, melee weapons dominated close combat under virtually all circumstances, and dominated pitched battle under most circumstances. Firing into a moving melee is essentially a legendary or magic power, not something that happens in the real world. A default rule that allows fire into melee means that fire into melee becomes standard and common. Therefore, ACKS gives you a -4 to hit if you have Precise Shot and no shot if you don’t. If particular cases arise where the Judge thinks a shot into melee is justified, or the player insists on doing so, he can house-rule as needed.
Does a +1 Bow cause the arrows it shoots to affect a creature with an Invulnerability or must the archer use a +1 Arrow as well? How much does a +1 Arrow cost, and are you putting Archers at a significant disadvantage if the cost is disproportionate to the cost of a +1 Sword? I.e. If cost of Bow +1 and Arrows +1 is well in excess of the cost of a Sword +1 the game will tend towards Melee warriors because it’s more efficient once characters get to the level where they’re fighting ‘invulnerable’ creatures.
APM: A +1 bow would cause the creature to be affected, yes. You have, however, made an exceptionally good point regarding missile weapons and arrows. They ought to be less expensive or they ought to stack; otherwise it favors melee.
Invulnerable Monsters – ‘monsters with 5 HD or more are able to affect these monsters through natural ferocity’ – To clarify, this only applies to monsters, not to Humans/Demi-Humans with 5 HD or more? Also, I’m not sure it follows that an incorporeal creature such as a Spectre could be harmed by a monster such as a Giant Scorpion (7HD)
APM: Yes, it applies only to monsters. When we mean characters and monsters, we will say “combatants” or “creatures”. When we say monsters, we just mean monsters. As far as the Giant Scorpion, the idea is that it’s a freaky magic-infused monstrosity that could hurt a Spectre. That said, rather than have this be on the basis of HD, it might be a better idea to do it on the basis of TYPE of monster, i.e. undead or summoned creature or whatnot. I’ll take a second look.
Effects of Damage – without the table being in the book it’s impossible to put some of this in context. I assume this is a formatting / layout issue to be resolved prior to printing? The final location of the table needs to be added here to direct people to it. In general though, the idea of permanent wounds is awesomeness.
APM: The table is landscape formatted and everytime I put it into the rules it broke the formatting and was galling to scroll through, so I just made it a separate document for the time being.
Knock Down – What about creatures with more than 2 legs (e.g. a Centaur) or no legs (e.g. a Giant Snake)? Can a prone opponent attack from the ground?
APM: I probably need to write some rules about this.
Overrun – This looks significantly powerful compared to the others because it doesn’t count as your attack for the round.
APM: Overrun doesn’t harm the target, merely bypass them. It is really nothing more than 3.5’s Tumbling, in that sense. It hasn’t proven overly powerful so in play.

(Two Pre-reqs)APM: The intent is that those classes are genuinely harder to succeed within. This explains, in part, why there are fewer of them in the setting.
James – That’s a nice rationale. Thanks. There may be some interesting emergent properties that could arise from this that mean ‘specialists’ have a slight edge.
(Cleric Followers)APM: It can bankrupt a domain if the cleric isn’t careful! Even though they just need to be feed, that’s hundreds of gp per month. For purposes of garrison, the gp value of the followers will depend on how they are equipped.
James – Ok. Follow on question then – How are they equipped, by default?
(Equipment Rules) APM: Everybody just hates having Equipment under Characters, huh? That’s where Moldvay/Cook put it! :expressionless:
James - I don’t care where Moldvay put it :wink: What I think is super important is to make the rules as useable as humanly possible, and if you’re guiding someone through the character generation process then the rules should facilitate that. Follow the steps to make a character; you should never have to flip back to an earlier chapter or set of information. I do appreciate that it may mean some restructuring of the Sections but I think it will pay off in terms of a players ability to pick up the rules and be taken on the path to complete their character easily and quickly.
(Holynized Water)APM: It’s…uh…water that’s been holynized. Please excuse me as I go write these rules.
James - I’ll only excuse you if you put holynization into the rule book :wink:
(Shields)APM: Noooo! This is a terrible idea…
James – You win this round Richards. But Doom shall prevail! (yeah, fair point, well made)
(Torches)APM: My thinking was that a club is likely to be heavy and hard, whereas a torch is going to be as light as possible. But perhaps a lit torch should do 1d6 damage.
James – on that basis, why not make an unlit torch do less damage and a lit one do d4?
(Ancestral Grouch)APM: The original name of the proficiency was “Elven Bloodline”! That was sort of the intent. A Half-Dwarf should have Ancestral Grouchiness…
James – haha. Would you consider broadening the proficiency? I think it has a lot of potential beyond half-elves. Your friend (the one who wanted the Halfling riding the Gryphon) could play a Half-Halfling then :wink: (am I pushing my luck?)
(Spell mechanics)APM: I’m not sure what game mechanical implication you are suggesting…?
James – Hmm… perhaps my explanation was rubbish. Ok, I’ll try again. In the example on page 53, Quintus can know up to 3 1st level spells. Lets assume that in addition to read languages and sleep he also learns magic missile – taking up 3 pages in his spellbook (so 97 are free). Later, he picks up a scroll of Light, and decides that is more useful than magic missile. In the rules he can replace magic missile with light by spending a week and 1,000gp. What is the manifestation of the replacement in terms of how it affects Quintus’ spellbook? Does ‘Magic Missile’ magically disappear from the page of the spell book it was once written on? Is the page torn out? Is it simply ignored? The fact that the text says ‘That is, Quintus decides to stop actively monitoring the various stars, spirits, or taboos’ suggests to me that the page – the formula, and all the scribblings that accompany the spell – still exists, that it hasn’t been mystically disapparated, but Quintus cannot access those magics. I don’t quite grok what happens to that spell in the spell book. Does that help explain it any better? crosses fingers
(Dorfs on Mules)APM: Legacy rule. :-\ Moldavy/Cook gave dwarves mounted crossbowmen on mules.
James - What do Dwarfs do in the Auran Empire? You’ve got Vaultguards and Craftpriests as the examplars of what a dwarf ‘is’ - if they weren’t, they’d not be the two PC classes. So it may make sense to have the ‘special’ dwarven troops as heavy crossbowmen, or superheavy infantry or something. I dunno, I think I have some Warhammer Fantasy Battle stuff buzzing around in my head… not sure that’s a positive.
(Retainers as bait)APM: It is harsh, by intent. It forces players to think twice before using their favorite henchmen as “trap testers” and “medusa scouts”. Even a brave and loyal follower will have second thoughts about ‘what might have been’.
James - Yep, ok, I buy that for the most part.
APM: Slave-soldiers would need only to be fed, but there’d be a high upfront cost to buy them. Using the standard ratio, it’d be 33x their monthly wage. This would include equipment. So, for example, a Slave Knight would be (33x60=) 1,980gp, including horse, armor, and weapons. Slave armies are very expensive, which is they end up becoming hereditary institutions, which in turn end up dominating their cultures.
James - As happened when the Mumlaks became dominant. Hmm… Ok, so I decided to look for a reference to ‘slaves’ in the text of the rulebook and I couldn’t find one. Am I missing something? I think there should be something about slaves – particularly for Chaotic domains, and especially since many of the monster races are described as having slaves. Perhaps not relevant for these rules, perhaps for a supplement.
(Spell Availability) - APM: I did work out the NPCs and their class/level first, and the numbers presented are correct (unless I’ve made an error, which does happen). I just believe that the exact class/level of any given NPC is secondary to the information that Judge/PCs need. The chart is designed to answer common questions that arise in game about how much and how fast healing magic is available, etc.
James - Ok cool. You’re approaching it from the other end to me. My thinking was to try to make sure that the tables for randomly creating ‘stuff’ - in this case spells - were aligned with all the other tables that relate to economic and demographic distribution - so the tables about a) how many ‘levelled’ characters there were in a given settlement and b) how many of them were of a viable class. There’s a chance that every tiny hamlet in a given domain (Class VI market) has a Level 3 Cleric in it - or perhaps my thinking is faulty, because the marketplace in a class VI domain should be at the Stronghold… hmm…
Thanks for the detailed responses Alex. They’re as useful to me as I hope my questions are to you :slight_smile:
Did Tavis pass on my Section Seven by the way, or should I put the questions that weren’t solved by v23 up here as well?

APM: My thinking was that a club is likely to be heavy and hard, whereas a torch is going to be as light as possible. But perhaps a lit torch should do 1d6 damage.
I like lit torches doing 1d4 at most. It would be weird having the light source be as good a weapon as a short sword or long bow. (Introducing the Juggler class…)
Thus, mages build up a body of knowledge that they can’t use unless they start to pay close attention to it, but the rewards of previous adventures aren’t simply lost.
APM: I’m not sure what game mechanical implication you are suggesting…?
This is what I was talking about a while ago - http://autarch.co/forum/topic/spell-discussions#post-407 . We know that mages are going to be collecting formulae, old spell notes, scrolls they’re not using, etc., because it’s easier than researching a new spell from scratch. There’s no explicit acknowledgement of this. When players who are used to MUs/wizards realize that the old “spellbook with every spell I know” is now “spell library with every formula I know” and that the old “swap out all of my spells in the morning” is now “swap out a spell over a few weeks” I think some of the “What do you mean I forget my spells?!?” panic will go away.