100DOS/Mythic 5.1 Update 3: Layout, Fantasy, Bestiary

Major new additions are coming to Mythic and 100DOS 5.1. The first I'll be covering of the is the complete overhaul of Mythic's handbook layout. The layout is being changed based on other TTRPG handbooks with an emphasis on bloat removal. Rules have been toned down, duplicate entries have been removed, and the structure is now made to ease players through character creation quicker.

In doing this, names have also changed for some character creation mechanics. You'll notice new terms such as Experience Tier and Creation Points, changing how players see the content and in what order, and various rules changing how things are interacted with. The first example I have is Luck. Players no longer get to choose how much Luck they have. Instead, all Player Characters begin with 6 Luck and then decide on the Outliers they'd like to purchase.

Overall, the layout change may take time for veterans to get used to, but I hope Warhound's work on the new layout will help people in the long run.

Now, for the Fantasy. 100DOS' upcoming magic system has been feature-creeped into a full-on fantasy system. At launch, it will offer dozens of races to play as that can be plugged into any 100DOS game, including Mythic. This scales from Elves, Dwarves, and Halflings, and goes to Orcs, Hobgoblins, and Kobolds, all the way to Slime, Dryads, and Fairies. The game will also have a heavy emphasis on a magic system and a small series of lore entries explaining the background of a usable stand-alone universe. The players even have a technical endgame if they so choose, which boils down to "kill god."

100DOS Fantasy is fully compatible with all 100DOS games, including Mythic. The starting of this system will also be similar to Mythic, as well. It will be character vs. character, battles, wars. There are no monsters or big bads to fight and defeat, at the moment. I will certainly create some, but due to the vast amount from other games and folklore, it would be impossible for me to deliver this to you. So here is the deal.

There is a Bestiary Tool nearing the end of its development. All it needs are more options for people to use to piece together what they want. Let me explain what this Bestiary is and how it has evolved from previous tools I've given for 5.0's release.

This Bestiary has a new system called Traits. Traits are now built into Mythic and all other 100DOS games, as well. You'll get access to all of these when 5.1 releases. Traits are originally what Mythic called "Soldier Type Special Rules." Traits are various rules, special rules, abilities, and other options players can plug into their bestiary to make both playable races and automated fully-finished bestiaries.

In this first section, you'll see the UNSC Army Soldier Type from Mythic. Next to the name you'll see "PC", "Alloc", and BR 1 through 5. "PC" is the Player Character section. This is where you'll first enter the base Characteristics of the Soldier Type you're creating. You're also able to give pre-purchased Characteristic Advancements. The Experience Cost/NPC Payout column on this row will let you know how much this Soldier Type costs to play as. 

Right underneath is Alloc, which is Allocation. Allocation is where you spend your Creation Points, which are your 85 points you spend. It's best to spend these in a balanced and even way as these are used to automatically generate the Bestiary entries. It will let you know how much you've spent to the right of this.

The BR1 through BR5 are your Bestiary Rank entries. Each of these are automatically generated. They'll fully generate all the difficulty levels for you. The Characteristics, Mythic Characteristic advancements if the Soldier Type has them (think Elite and Brute from Mythic), wounds, luck, Experience Payout. 

From there, you have Skills and Educations. These are pretty self-explanatory. You enter the amount of Skills they begin with based on the Skill tier, and the educations they have. You can list the Educations if specified are given.

From here, we have the new Trait system. You'll see that every Soldier Type has up to 32 slots that can be used to fill in pre-made Traits. These have abilities that can be viewed in the "Values" sheet. There will be an easier way to view these traits later on.

Traits will also slowly improve and more will be made as we go. Thanks to the nature of this using a spreadsheet system everyone can add to, you'll be able to load up and share Soldier Types that will be better and better balanced over time by me.

Basically, Traits are ways to plug-in-play entire monster manuals over time. Ways to easily create Soldier Types, races, and so on. It's also a way to update aspects of these Traits universally and not need to go back and make that change on a per-entry level.

People will also be allowed to copy their own personal versions of these tools so they can have private entries. Though people who do this will not have the benefits of automatic rebalances.

And for the end of the sections that modify experience and various aspects of the Soldier Type, you have drawbacks. These are per-Character drawbacks to help creators separate their hand-chosen Talents/Traits/Special Rules and their drawbacks. This would be for things like an Elite having a penalty to climbing due to their digitigrade legs. But this is also handled in Traits. If you somehow run out of Trait slots, these are sections you can fill by hand.

Second to last on this list is the XP calculation summary. This shows creators the experience cost of all the various aspects that went into the Soldier Type. If you feel like you might be getting an Experience Cost or Experience Payout that's really far off of what it should be, you can come here to see where the costs are coming from.

Lastly, you have Character Description. This lets creators put explanations into their Soldier Type. This section has text wrapping, so you can put as much information as you need. If you scroll over far enough, it's sized to fit the screen of a 1080 monitor. 

Let me know in the #100DOS-fantasy channel of the discord, or in the comments under this post, if you'd be interested in filling out a bestiary. These can be from Dungeons and Dragons or your favorite fantasy game. For now, spells are not finished so if you're creating a magic user, you'll have to wait.

CURRENTLY IN DEVELOPMENT:

Work on Mythic 5.1 is still ongoing and Medieval Ages will release alongside Mythic 5.1. 

There is a Cybernetics splatbook nearly ready to release. This Cybernetics splatbook is built with 5.1 in mind, but will still work with 5.0. 

Fantasy will eventually get a better name, but for now Fantasy will be what I use when I talk about it. Its development better improves the overall 100DOS asset creation system, as well as helping me broaden and clean up underutilized rules in Mythic. Overall, it's been a fun time for me. I've been enjoying developing this and I haven't truly enjoyed creating content like this since 4.5. 

Thank you for all of your support, we've got more content than ever in the works. But because it's only me and Warhound supporting, things will take a bit. So please use this time to come into the Discord and check out the Bestiary tools. You'll be able to use them for more than just Fantasy. This can be used to also create content for Mythic and other 100DOS games, including homebrew.