Low-Point Dungeon Fantasy Option 3: (Less Than) Five Easy Pieces

Still looking at good ways to run a Dungeon Fantasy RPG campaign at less than the default of 250 points + 50 disadvantage points + 5 quirk points.  The last two posts have talked about the low-cost templates from Eric Smith's Dungeon Fantasy on the Cheap, and the 125-point templates from Dungeon Fantasy 15 Henchmen.  Now I want to take a serious look at Five Easy Pieces, but with only three 50-point modules instead of five.

Five Easy Pieces is an article from Pyramid #3/113 by Sean Punch.  I already reviewed it in a previous post , so I won't go into detail again.  What I want to focus on now is how well it holds up if you only use fewer than five modules.  Because three 50-point modules plus 25 points of disadvantages (minus any that were already used if you picked the Monk or Cleric modules) plus 5 quirks sounds like a flexible and pretty easy way to make a character.

As an experiment, let's try to make a low-points Scout.  The 250-point DFRPG Scout template combines the ideas of being great at shooting things with a bow, being generally skilled in the wilderness, moving quickly, and being perceptive.  So we'll first try to find the modules that include those things, and then try to find the best combination of three of them.  (Or one at level two and another at level one.)

The bow stuff is clearly the Master Archer module.  It's got Heroic Archer and Bow and Fast-Draw skills, and then a choice between DX or Weapon Master (Bow).  (There's more archery-related stuff but the core things consume all the points, so the others will have to wait for disadvantage or quirk points.)  We're definitely taking at least one level of it, and might take it twice if we can afford to, or really want to focus on the ranged combat part of the role rather than the outdoor or scouting-ahead parts.

The outdoor skills are the Outdoorsy module.  Outdoorsy also includes the ability to increase Per and Basic Move.  If we want to make a scout with great outdoor skills, Outdoorsy is a no-brainer.  But for a dungeon crawling Scout, spending 20 points on Outdoorsman 2 and then 20 more on mostly-outdoor skills, with only 10 points left for Per and Move, might not be a bargain.

Per is also in the Cerebral and Rogue modules, so if we don't go Outdoorsy, maybe pick one of those instead.  The Cerebral module feels a bit too bookish to afford for a low-point Scout, since it mandates putting 20 points in IQ, and nothing else in there besides Per is a core Scout skill, so let's reject that one.  Rogue actually looks pretty good: the first 30 points can go in obviously great things like DX and Per and Move and Combat Reflexes and Luck; no problem spending those.  And the last 20 go in skills.  Some of those skills are ones a Scout really wants, like Climbing and Observation and Search and Scrounging and Stealth and Traps.  And some of the others are really good if you don't have a Thief who knows them better, like Lockpicking and Merchant.  I think that for a mostly-underground game, I like Rogue better than Outdoorsy.  Having that option is really nice, and the reason why you might use Five Easy Pieces in a 250-point game.

Basic Move is also in the Physical module, which is 40 points in ST and DX and HT and then 10 more points in more physical attributes or advantages.  Physical is obviously good; the only question is whether we can afford it.  I think it's a tossup between a second level of Master Archer or a level of Physical.  While shooting things with a bow even better would be awesome, I think I'd rather go for attributes up front and skills later, because a level of DX is 20 points, and it's hard to avoid spending points earned in play for long enough to save that many.  And if you die with unspent character points, d'oh!  So, let's say one level each of Master Archer and Rogue and Physical.

Master Archer: Heroic Archer [20], DX +1 [20], Bow [8], Fast-Draw (Arrow) [1], Armoury (Missile Weapons) [1]

Physical: ST +1 [10], DX +1 [20], HT +1 [10], Basic Move +1 [5], Fit [5]

Rogue: DX+1 [20], Per +2 [10], Acrobatics [1], Carousing [1], Climbing [1], Forced Entry [1], Jumping [1], Lockpicking [1], Merchant [1], Observation [1], Scrounging [1], Search [1], Shadowing [1], Stealth[4], Traps[4], Urban Survival[1].

Now we need to pick disadvantages and quirks, and then spend the extra points they get us.  This campaign is probably going to have a 25-point disadvantage limit, plus the campaign disadvantage Sense of Duty: Friends and Companions [-5], which doesn't count against the limit.  And then 5 quirks.  So that's 35 more points.

Let's go with Honesty (9 or less)[-15], Vow (Own no more than can be carried) [-10], and that Sense of Duty [-5]. And five quirks that I won't bother detailing right now [-5].

With 35 more points to spend, let's pick up Luck [15] and Combat Reflexes [15] from Rogue, and put the last few points in small things from Master Archer: Signature Gear (Bow) [1], Weapon Bond (Bow) [1], Strongbow [1], and Acute Vision 1 [2].

Is this a playable low-level Scout?  ST 11, DX 13, IQ 10, HT 11, Basic Speed 6, Move 7, Per 12, Vision 13, Luck, Combat Reflexes, Fit, Heroic Archer, Bow 15 (effectively 16 with Weapon Bond), Fast Draw-14 (with the +1 from Combat Reflexes), and Strongbow lets our Scout fire a ST 13 bow.  (ST 13 gives 1d thr, so that's 1d+2 with a $200 Longbow or 1d+3 with a $900 Composite Bow.  I want that extra point of damage, so I probably blow $900 on the best starting bow, then take a point out of one of those Rogue skills that another party member has covered to get more starting cash, so I can afford armor and a backup weapon.)  Decent Stealth and Per-based Traps, and one point each in a bunch of (mostly DX- and Per-based) utility skills.

This character obviously has a lot of weaknesses.  With Will 10, he's in trouble if there are any fright checks or mind control spells.  With only 11 HP, he's pretty squishy.  (It would be nice to add some light armor and pick up DR 2 or so to get slightly less squishy.)  And he has no unarmed or melee skills, just Bow and more Bow.  But he can run pretty fast and shoot pretty well while running, and if they can't catch you they can't engage you in melee.  Just in case they do anyway, he has pretty good Dodge.  (Which is key because that's the only defense he has.)  He has decent Per rolls, especially Vision, and some points in Traps and Search and Observation, so he can find hidden traps and secret doors and treasure.  And with decent DX and Per, he can improve quickly as he earns character points.

This is only one character, but it gives me some confidence that you can make a playable character with Less Than Five Easy Pieces, and it's pretty fun doing so.  So I'm leaning toward allowing this option.  Next time I'll take about one more option for low-point DFRPG characters: freeform characters with no templates needed.  And then maybe try to make a decision on which option(s) to use.