Friday 29 June 2018

HackMaster Character Records

High crunch, high production values old-school gaming.
HackMaster is one of my all-time favorite role playing games. I already loved what HM4e was doing, but HM5e is where my heart is, because it managed to advance AD&D to the next level: it offers far more realistic game mechanics, while also manages to keep the old school spirit I love. It is a crunchy system full of optional advanced rules that make it seem more threatening than it is, but in practice it flows really well once someone wraps his head around it.

The problem is I haven't run it for years, mostly due to the lack of time. The game also felt abandoned in the last few years by the publisher Kenzer & Company. These are all about to change soon though: with the end of my D&D5e Wilderlands campaign I'm finally able to fulfill my old dream of starting a HackMaster sandbox centered around Frandor's Keep, and after last year's successful Aces & Eights Reloaded Kickstarter campaign the guys at Kenzer & Co. seem to be picking up pace again. What a time to be alive!

My biggest issue with official HackMaster resources is the lack of good character sheets - the official ones are barely enough for HackMaster Basic. Fans were fortunately quick to fix this issue. I too have created a landscape sheet earlier that got a lot of positive feedback (despite being overcrowded), and earlier this year I took my time to put together a portrait sheet that is more breezy and (hopefully) has place for everything. I hope they will get as much use as my ZWEIHÄNDER character sheets. Happy hacking!

Old A4 landscape character record for HackMaster

New A4 portrait character record for HackMaster
New A4 portrait cleric spell record for HackMaster
New A4 portrait mage spell record for HackMaster
New A4 portrait humanoid follower record for HackMaster
New A4 portrait monstrous follower record for HackMaster


6 comments:

  1. Very nice work - lots of room.

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  2. I would be really interested in reading about your sessions once you get started, if you ever wanted to that is!

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    1. I would love to, but my last two Zweihänder session reports are still missing, so I can't promise anything.

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  3. Thank you for sharing this! I`ve been playing HackMaster for more than a year already with regular weekly sessions and it is always a chore to organice spells.

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    1. Yeah, HackMaster can be a bit heavy on bookkeeping, though I muts admit, it's kind of part of its charm too.

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