Mechanics I Want to Use - Jousting as a Weapon Specific Deed

The Dungeon Crawl Classics rules provide seven Mighty Deeds of Arms, seven maneuvers that any warrior can perform in combat. The rules also suggest ways to create Signature Deeds to help define individual fighting styles, and Weapon-Specific Deeds for masters of particular weapons.

Signature Deeds could easily serve as the basis for different schools of martial arts, or as a prize to inspire warriors to "Quest for It." Weapon-Specific Deeds could provide an extra benefit to a warrior's Lucky Weapon, or a way for an alternative class to access a very small number of Mighty Deeds.

On page 92, the core rules suggest what one Weapon-Specific Deed for a lance might look like. I've mostly built on that suggestion to create a Jousting Deed. My one innovation here is to modify the +1 to-hit that normally accompanies being on a mount (or any kind of higher ground.) Instead, you get a bonus to either your attack roll or deed roll (your choice) based on the size difference between your mount and your opponent's.

Mowing down a revolting peasant on your princely warhorse? Enjoy your +3 bonus, autarch. Squaring off on your Chocobo or flying ostrich against a comparable opponent on the field of glory? You're both on equal footing at +0. Dwarf-knight on a miniature war-pony trying to joust with one Hannibal's siege elephants? It's going to be more difficult.

Fig 1 - Joust!

Weapon-Specific Deed - Joust (Lance)

When executing this deed, the lancer charges toward her opponent, knocking aside their defenses and sending them flying.

A lancer who attempts this deed must be mounted. She receives a modifier equal to the Hit Dice difference between her mount and her opponent's mount. She may apply this modifier to her attack roll or her deed roll. (Against an unmounted opponent, this modifier is +1 for each of her mount's HD. Against an opponent with an equivalent mount, this modifier is +0. Against an opponent on a superior mount, this modifier becomes a penalty. Because the lancer is riding a charging mount, her damage dice are doubled on any successful attack, even if her jousting maneuver fails.)

3          The opponent's shield is shattered, and they must succeed a DC 13 Strength check or be knocked prone. If the opponent was mounted, they take an additional 1d4 damage from the fall.

4          The opponent's shield is shattered, and they must succeed a DC 14 Strength check or be knocked prone. If the opponent was mounted, they take an additional 1d4 damage from the fall.

5          The opponent's shield is shattered, and they must succeed a DC 15 Strength check or be knocked prone. If the opponent was mounted, they take an additional 1d4 damage from the fall.

6          The opponent's shield is shattered, and they must succeed a DC 16 Strength check or be knocked prone. If the opponent was mounted, they take an additional 1d4 damage from the fall.

7+        The opponent's shield is shattered, and they must succeed a Strength check of DC 17 (or more) or be knocked prone. (The DC of the Strength check is equal to 10 + the Mighty Deed result.) If the opponent was mounted, they take an additional 1d4 damage from the fall.

DCC House Rule - Critical Spell Failure

I could write until I'm blue in the face about my critiques of Lev Grossman's The Magicians, but there are a couple of things I like about it.

First, the descriptions of what it's like to learn magic and cast spells feel right, and are possibly the best descriptions of really outré magic since Jack Vance. Like, to an extent where I think maybe some RPG publisher should consider paying him the royalties necessary to quote those sections at length in their rulebook.

Second, in The Magicians, casting more difficult spells isn't just harder to do, it's also more dangerous. (Actually, I believe Grossman goes so far as to imply that the general difficulty of casting a spell is only loosely correlated with the danger of casting it incorrectly. If I recall correctly, there are some fairly simple spells that are surprisingly easy to mess up with some truly horrifying consequences for failure.)

DCC already models this somewhat. The effect of a critical failure definitely gets worse as the spell level increases. Corruption becomes more corrupting, misfires miss more spectacularly. But while higher level spells are more likely to have a simple failure, they're not any more likely to have critical failure. The Magicians makes a pretty persuasive case though, that they should be.

So, here's my house rule. When casting an arcane spell, the risk of a critical failure is equal to the spell level. 1st level spells still fumble only on a natural 1. 2nd level spells fumble on a roll of 1-2, 3rd level spells fumble on 1-3, and so on. As usual, only burning Luck, not spellburn, can avoid the corrupting and tainting effects of a critical failure, and misfires cannot be avoided. However, only a single point of Luck needs to be spent to avoid corruption, regardless of the critical range. Furthermore, for casters with an arcane affinity for a spell, regardless of the spell's level, the critical failure range is always only natural 1.