A curious thing happened a few days ago a blog that's been silent for 2 years started posting again and announced it's author had developed a new spin on old D&D: SEVEN VOYAGES of ZYLARTHEN. I downbloded the free pdf version and here's part one of the review.
In the words of it’s author “SEVEN VOYAGES of ZYLARTHEN is a re-imagining of the original edition of
the world’s most popular paper and pencil fantasy adventure game, first published
by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson in 1974. The brilliance and charm of the earliest
version was its simplicity and elegance, combined with a certain asymmetrical
quirkiness. It invoked many sources—King Arthur, the Crusades, Middle-earth, the
Arabian Nights, pulp fantasy, fairy tales, even science fiction. Its breadth of
tone was a virtue, offering to the players a multiplicity of delights. Our
intention was to follow the spirit of the original as closely as possible.”. It
does seem to achieve this.
Let’s start with Volume One: Characters and Combat.
Seven Voyages of
Zylarthen has three basic classes of Fighting-Man, Magic-User, and Thief alogn
with three racial classes for elf, dawf, and Halfling. Fighting Men are have no
surprises and will play very much like they would in many a retro-clone but
will benefit from the wider range fo rules devoted to combat in this game. The
magic-user if familiar as well with a few minor tweaks but is the vancian spell
caster of classical role-playing. The thief gets a range of abilities the
reader may be familiar with but it lacks the detect/disarm traps skill along
with moving silently, the abilities the thief does have moves the class from backstabbing
burglar to sneaky thug; a thief may use Luck to have a reroll on any die rolled
once per combat, open locks is a simple flat chance, they have increased
ability to surprise foes and at high level may use scrolls. Elves, Dwarhs,and
Halflings are limited to fighter/Magic-Users, fighters and Thieves respectively
with pretty strict level limits.
Seven Voyages uses level titles and they are evocative with
only the 7th and 8th level thief titles being disappointing.
Alignment is resnet in the game with Lawful, Neutral, and
Chaotic serving for the spectrum of good and evil. The rules assume PCs will be
partisans of Law (i.e. the good guys).
Character creation is done by rolling 3d6 in order for each
ability score. Ability scores have rare and modest influence in most areas of
the game. MU’s of intelligence 10 or less will start with but one spell known
to them: “Read Magic”, brighter ones will have 1-8 additional 1st
level spells in their books. Constitution determines one’s ability to survive
adversity which is a pretty essential part of these rules. There is a fiddly
means of providing an exp bonus based on high ability scores, such a bonus is something
I don’t much care for myself but players seldom complain. Loyalty, morale, and
reactions all get explained in the charisma section.
Characters will gain experience for slaying monsters and for
spending silver pieces for experience points, the player must decide to use
their sp on goods and influence or on gaining levels as simply fetching fortunes
will not raise a level. I like the spending money for exp method as it gives a
reason to seek loot throughout the entire course of a campaign and get’s the funds
out of the players coffers.
Encumbrance system of the game is based on an item count
with a few minor twists. It appears simple and playable.
Money and expenses in Seven Voyages is based on a silver
piece economy where 5 copper = 1 silver and 10 silver = 1 gold, there are alos
2 optional coins an iron piece worth ¼ a cp and an amber diamond piece worth
100 sp. Goods and services are spelled out in sp throughout the game. The
author recommends using tokens (actual coins and washers) to represent treasure
and while this is curious it does look like it could be fun with the right
group (and cheaters would be giving the DM their own money instead of making
math “errors” I suppose). With tokens flowing as a means to gain exp I suppose
such a token based method may be workable but it also looks like one wouldn’t
see many 1000+ coin hauls.
Equipment is pretty standard fare for fantasy adventure games. Leather
armor is cheap enough but mail is a serious outlay no one could afford at
character generation and plate is a considerable expense, even so there is
little on the list fortunate characters will not be able to afford shortly into
a campaign aside from ships and large buildings. There is a goodly coverage on
men at arms and other hirelings that focuses on extra fighting power.
Combat in the Seven Voyages of Zylarthern uses a d20 and the
classic descending AC order from 9 to 2. The attack table for men vs men
compares weapon class/type vs target AC, higher level characters get a bonus to
the hit roll. Monsters compare HD to AC.
Everyone can turn undead if they have and present a proper
holy symbol, but only one try is allowed in an encounter.
A combat round is broken into 2 phases a movement phase
followed by a melee phase. Some actions use up you move phase and spells can’t be
cast in a round where one moves or makes an attack. There are a few
modifications to what happens when and it all looks playable without a lot of fiddling
about.
A range of combat options are given such as the good old charge,
critical hits (doing 2 dice of damage instead of 1 die), disarming an opponent,
disrupting spell casting, driving back foes, strike for extra damage (up to 3
dice more), shields may be splintered, haxted weapons may be chopped, and
weapons have some risk of breaking.
Hit Points work as one would expect in most ways but
recovery and treatment get expanded but simple coverage in these rules. Binding
wounds can be done right after a fight for 1-3 hp, surgery can be used to save
or restore a character and this brings the survive adversity chance into play. The
biggest change is healing spells,
potions, and devices can only restore hp once per day (at this point I’m unsure
if this once per day is all inclusive or once per category). No yo-yo almost
dead and just fine healing spell fueled combats in Seven voyages. A character
loses 1 point of CON each time they must endure surgery so getting knocked down
in hp is going to be serious business. Surgery can save a character’s life and
can take weeks to recover from in some cases; fights are serious business in
this game.
That’s all for now , just one book in and even with a lot of
familiar ground a few rules here and there are shaping up this game to be it’s
own despite all the familiar ground it covers. More to come…
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