For this series of posts I will be using the free PDF of the
Labyrinth Lord rules that can be found Here at Goblinoid Games
Now for the start of Section 2: Characters, which as the name may suggest is about the creation of a Character for the Labyrinth Lord rule set.
Page 6
The page starts off with an overview of basic character generation. I like that it gives the 3d6 in order as the default way of doing attributes though it only makes since as it is a retro clone. It does give another two ways of doing it but they are only optional and thus I plan to opt-out of them.
Underneath that they have a small picture of the character sheet. Its nice and gives a slight idea of what they mean but in the pdf its not really legible. Now there is nothing wrong with that necessarily and maybe in the printed book you can read what it says but unless you have a full size sheet with you already, defeating the purpose of the small one, its not really doing anything for it. Also it has all the information filled in including stuff not even covered on that page. I think that it would provide a clearer example if instead it only had the attribute stats filled in and a box inside the image had a close up view of the stats.
After the picture it goes on to talk about how to choose a class including things like how some classes have requirements. It then tells you all kinds of things you need for the basic character.
It now has all the basic covered so it starts going into more detail starting with the attributes. This continues onto the next page so...
Underneath that they have a small picture of the character sheet. Its nice and gives a slight idea of what they mean but in the pdf its not really legible. Now there is nothing wrong with that necessarily and maybe in the printed book you can read what it says but unless you have a full size sheet with you already, defeating the purpose of the small one, its not really doing anything for it. Also it has all the information filled in including stuff not even covered on that page. I think that it would provide a clearer example if instead it only had the attribute stats filled in and a box inside the image had a close up view of the stats.
After the picture it goes on to talk about how to choose a class including things like how some classes have requirements. It then tells you all kinds of things you need for the basic character.
It now has all the basic covered so it starts going into more detail starting with the attributes. This continues onto the next page so...
Page 7
It continues with the more indepth review of what each attribute means. This includes not only what it represents but also what it actually does. The tables for this are all lined up correctly and look nice so once again I can compliment the aesthetics and layout of it.
If follows all that talk about the attributes with a bit on how a prime requisite affects you. One thing to note here is that unlike with the attributes themselves where an 18 or a 3 had its own special category the experience lumps the extremes in with the closest group.
Now it talks about how to choose your class. It includes what the prime requisites actually means so I would have put the table after this part but not really much of a problem and probably has a reason.
It then talks about how you can sacrifice two points from one attribute to raise another by one. It also mentions some restrictions on that such as not allowing a stat to be lowered below nine, not being able to lower you prime requisite, that dexterity can only be raised, and constitution and charisma can not be changed. Wait a second...
That means only strength, intelligence, and wisdom can be freely changed and only if your a thief because all the rest of the classes have one of the three as a prime requisite and elves are really stuck out in the cold. They can only lower wisdom. I understand they wanted a way for people to play what they wanted to play with stats that are sorta good but there are better ways to do it. Just putting a limit on how many times you could use it would be enough though the charisma restriction makes sense as it is one of the most popular dump stats especially in older editions like what this is based off of. Maybe there is a good reason for this convoluted rule, I don't know.
Finally the page finishes up with hit points and how reaching zero kills you. It gives the basic method to generate your starting health and an optional one. The optional one is just re-rolling if you happen to get a result of one or two. Now for fighters and such this means something but a magic user it basically means they get flip a coin, on tails they have three hp and on head they have four. At that point I would just say let them have max at first level. Not that I would use the rule, I totally expect to eventually fill a few landfills with the sheet's of dead characters.
If follows all that talk about the attributes with a bit on how a prime requisite affects you. One thing to note here is that unlike with the attributes themselves where an 18 or a 3 had its own special category the experience lumps the extremes in with the closest group.
Now it talks about how to choose your class. It includes what the prime requisites actually means so I would have put the table after this part but not really much of a problem and probably has a reason.
It then talks about how you can sacrifice two points from one attribute to raise another by one. It also mentions some restrictions on that such as not allowing a stat to be lowered below nine, not being able to lower you prime requisite, that dexterity can only be raised, and constitution and charisma can not be changed. Wait a second...
That means only strength, intelligence, and wisdom can be freely changed and only if your a thief because all the rest of the classes have one of the three as a prime requisite and elves are really stuck out in the cold. They can only lower wisdom. I understand they wanted a way for people to play what they wanted to play with stats that are sorta good but there are better ways to do it. Just putting a limit on how many times you could use it would be enough though the charisma restriction makes sense as it is one of the most popular dump stats especially in older editions like what this is based off of. Maybe there is a good reason for this convoluted rule, I don't know.
Finally the page finishes up with hit points and how reaching zero kills you. It gives the basic method to generate your starting health and an optional one. The optional one is just re-rolling if you happen to get a result of one or two. Now for fighters and such this means something but a magic user it basically means they get flip a coin, on tails they have three hp and on head they have four. At that point I would just say let them have max at first level. Not that I would use the rule, I totally expect to eventually fill a few landfills with the sheet's of dead characters.
Once again you can find the rules Here at Goblinoid Games
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