ADVENTURING GEAR

Weapons

In Gauntlet Tales, you are in complete control of your character’s aesthetics. That rule also extends to your character’s weapons. It’s entirely up to you to define what weapons your character uses, and how he uses those weapons in combat. Because of this, Gauntlet Tales allows you to choose your weapons’ mechanics and their aesthetics separately.

A weapon’s aesthetics is what it looks like (your weapon is a simple longsword, a serrated axe, a glowing mace, etc). Weapon aesthetics are limitless and completely within your control.

Weapon mechanics work a bit differently. To understand weapon mechanics in Gauntlet Tales, consider the following question: What does a staff do in a fantasy world?

Clearly, weapons mean different things to different people. For that reason, it’s up to you to decide the mechanics of your weapons. When you pick up or use a weapon for the first time, you must decide on the weapon keywords for those weapons. You get 2 weapon keywords from the list below. This applies regardless of how many items you are holding. A person wielding a sword and shield, a person wielding a pair of daggers, a person wielding a single rapier, and a person wielding a two-handed great axe each get 2 weapon keywords.

This flexibility allows players to create truly unique fighting styles. For example, a player might decide that holding a shield and no weapon grants ranged and piercing. In this case, it’s a good idea for the player to describe why holding a shield grants that fighting style. Perhaps he emits beams of holy light from his shield, or perhaps he throws his shield before having it bounce back to his hand.

It’s a good idea to record your decision on the character sheet. For example, suppose you decide that holding a sword grants you melee and disarming. You sheathe your sword, and a few days later you draw it again. At that point, the sword should still grant you melee and disarming. Recording weapon keywords on your character sheets ensures that you are consistent from combat to combat.

The most common traits are melee and ranged, but players are not obligated to select those options. A player might instead opt for leadership-based keywords (defensive and cleansing, perhaps). Also, if a trait grants a player the melee keyword with all of his weapons, then the player might opt for a more offensive combination (disarming and reach, perhaps).

Weapon Keywords

Melee: When you make a melee attack with a weapon that doesn’t have the melee keyword, decrease the attack’s damage.

Ranged: When you make a ranged attack with a weapon that doesn’t have the ranged keyword, decrease the attack’s damage.

Accurate: The base damage of your ranged attacks is d8 instead of d6 (does not affect melee attacks).

Binding: Increase your rolls to maintain grapples.

Cleansing: When you spend advantage and bolster, remove 1 debuff from yourself or a visible ally.

Defensive: You have +2 block.

Disarming: When you spend advantage and deal damage, disarm the target.

Reach: Your melee attacks can reach near targets. Your ranged attacks can reach targets out to a far distance.

Rending: When you spend advantage and deal damage, inflict damage over time on the target.

Piercing: When you spend advantage to attack, the attack ignores block.

Staggering: When you spend advantage and deal damage, knock the target back a near distance (assuming you can logically do so).

Here are a few examples of keyword combinations:

Retraining
You can retrain your weapon keywords in much the same way that you retrain theme traits. If you practice weapon drills for a few hours, you can change the weapon keywords that the weapons grant you.

Unarmed Attacks
By default, your body doesn’t count as a weapon and therefore can’t gain weapon keywords. Consequently, you must decrease the roll when you make an unarmed attack because you don’t have the melee or ranged weapon keywords. However, players can get around this restriction. Some traits, items, and effects read:

If you have one of these effects, then you are able to add the default 2 weapon keywords to your body (which now counts as a weapon). For example, suppose a martial artist has “Your body counts as a weapon and gains the melee keyword for free.” He might choose to gain the binding and defensive keywords in addition to his free melee keyword to represent his wrestling fighting style.

To sum up, the weapon rules are as follows:

What constitutes a weapon?
Often, it is easy to decide what constitutes a weapon. Swords and bows are obviously weapons, but what about an enchanted holy symbol? Or what about a bar stool? Or a shield? Ultimately, it’s up to your gaming group to decide what counts as a weapon.

The GM should be flexible when it comes to magical items such as wands, holy symbols, totems, and spellbooks. It’s usually a good idea to define which of these items count as weapons in your campaign. For example, you might want to clarify that a book has to have magical spells written in it before it can count as a weapon. Otherwise, a wizard who gets disarmed might pick up the nearest book–a pamphlet or a diary, perhaps–and try to use it as a weapon.

There needs to be a distinction between weapons and non-weapons. If everything counts as a weapon, then players never have to worry about being disarmed or going into battle unarmed.

Keep in mind that if you count an item as a weapon, that doesn’t necessarily mean that it has to be compatible with every weapon keyword. For example, the GM might conclude that a dagger can’t have reach because daggers are so short.

Melee Weapon – 25 gold
Holding any combination of weapons grants you 2 weapon keywords.

Ranged Weapon – 25 gold
Holding any combination of weapons grants you 2 weapon keywords.

Ammunition Bundle – 1 gold
This bundle provides 10 pieces of ammunition (arrows, bullets, magic dust, etc).

Armor

Much like weapons, the type of armor that a creature wears is largely an aesthetic choice. Armor in Gauntlet Tales falls into one of two categories:

Light Armor – 20 gold
You have +1 block while wearing this armor.

Heavy Armor – 50 gold
You have +2 block while wearing this armor, and you decrease all rolls that relate to mobility such as climbing, swimming, sneaking, and enduring long marches.

It’s up to your gaming group to decide where to draw the line between light and heavy armor. Light armor typically includes leather armor, hide, and chainmail. Heavy armor typically includes scale armor and full plate. Everyday clothing doesn’t count as armor.

Equipment

Adventurer’s Pack – 10 gold
An adventurer’s pack includes the following: a backpack, a bedroll, a mirror, 5 candles, flint and tinder, 50 feet of rope, a piece of chalk, and a waterskin.

Ammunition Bundle – 1 gold
This includes 6Ud pieces of ammunition for a specific weapon (arrows for a bow, bolts for a crossbow, crystal fragments for a wand, etc).

Infinite Bundle / Returning Weapon – 50 gold
An infinite bundle is an endless source of ammunition—a quiver that never runs out of ammunition, for example. A returning weapon is ranged weapon that returns to the user after it’s been thrown—a boomerang or a chakram, for example.

Healing Potion – 50 gold

Drink this potion (doing so is a simple action) to instantly heal an amount of life equal to your toughness. Then, you become resistant to healing potions.

Lockpicks – 10 gold

These tiny tools are necessary to pick complicated locks.