Pen and Paper Mario Rulebook Table of Contents
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Pen and Paper Mario RuleBook Table of Contents Letter From The Creator pg. 1 Game Mechanics pg. 2 Combat pg. 4 Skills pg. 6 Earning and Spending XP pg. 8 Items and Equipment pg. 9 Abilities pg. 13 Status Effects pg. 14 Characters pg. 15 Adventuring Rules pg. 17 Bestiary pg. 19 Adventure: A Little Trouble In The Big Top pg. 28 Battle Map pg. 36 Character Sheets pg. 37 Paper Minis pg. 45 Pen and Paper Mario is a fan creation written by David White based on popular characters from Nintendo Co., Ltd. All images and names of characters and locations, unless expressly stated are TM & © of Nintendo & Subs. Used without permission. Letter From The Creator I’ve always loved telling stories and I’ve always loved creating. If I’m not creating, I don’t feel right. Something feels off if I’m not busy writing or drawing or being otherwise creative. When I was younger, I made some board games out of old pizza boxes and I even got the chance to recreate one of these board games in college as a creative project (one of my favorite collegiate assignments), but I never tried to create my own RPG. I’ve done a few fan made adventures and modules in the past, mainly Events for Marvel Heroic Roleplaying (all of which are featured on Marvel Plot Points), but this is the first time I have tried to make my own roleplaying system from the ground up. I drew a little something from a couple of my favorite tabletop roleplaying games to make Pen and Paper Mario. Inside, you’ll find influence from City of Mist, Dungeons and Dragons, Pathfinder, Edge of the Empire, Savage Worlds, and Ryuutama; some influences being more obvious than others. I kept the main mechanic of Pen and Paper Mario simple to accommodate both younger players and those more experienced players that love a simplified tabletop experience. While I love more detailed or “crunchy” games such as Dungeons and Dragons, games like that lend themselves more to power-gaming and I have found myself more drawn lately to games that have a narrative focus rather than ones that are preoccupied with explaining every minutia of complicated combat. I tried to blend that focus on narrative roleplaying while combining a fun and interesting battle system similar to most Japanese RPGs. Picture your favorite Pokémon game. You spend time exploring, wading through grass, and riding a bike as a pixelated sprite, but as soon as combat starts, the screen dissolves and you enter into a very different mode – almost as if you are in a completely different game. That’s what I wanted to capture in Pen and Paper Mario. I, of course, also drew a lot of influence from “Paper Mario” for this game (as is evident in the title, the enemies, and the artwork). Anyways, I hope you enjoy Pen and Paper Mario! Play it, have fun, be creative and make up your own adventures! Let me know your thoughts about the game too at my blog Same Kind of Nerdy As Me. I intend on revisiting this system in the not-too- distant future; maybe writing new adventures or campaign settings. A larger project I’d love to do is making a longer adventure featuring characters from across the Nintendo Universe. It just depends on if I have enough time. Stay nerdy, y’all! 1 Game Mechanics Pen and Paper Mario’s core game mechanic revolves around rolling a six-sided die (d6) along with a second die (d4, d6, d8, d10, or d12) to accomplish a task. Occasionally, you will add a static number or additional die for an ability or item that you have. Below is a brief description of the different sections found on the character sheet and the mechanics therein. • HP – Heart Points, these represent a character’s overall health and resilience. HP can be reduced by environmental hazards, but will most commonly be reduced by enemy attacks during Combat (see the Combat section for more info on the mechanics of battle). Certain items and abilities can restore a character’s HP. Staying at an Inn completely restores a character’s HP. If a character loses all HP, they are K.O.’d. • MP – Magic Points, these represents a character’s magical capability. Certain characters have abilities that require MP to use. If a character does not have enough MP or is otherwise depleted of MP, they cannot use their Abilities. Certain items can restore MP. Staying at an Inn completely restores a character’s MP. • Attack – This value represents the character’s prowess in combat. Each character starts with a certain Attack die value that can be increased by spending XP. Characters roll this die when using the Attack Action in Combat. • Magic – This value represents the character’s magical power. Each character starts with a certain Magic die value than can be increased by spending XP. Characters roll this die when using magic Abilities in Combat. • Armor – This static number represents how well guarded a character is. In combat, if an opponent rolls equal to or higher than your Armor value, you take damage to your HP. Armor can be increased by equipping gear, using specific items, or by using the Defend action in Combat. • Speed – This represents how fast and quick your character is. In Combat, this value is used to determine Initiative. • XP – Experience Points, these represent a character’s competence and growth throughout the adventure. A character may gain XP in Combat or by completing story objectives, and may then spend their earned XP during their downtime to improve their character. For more info on XP, see the Earning and Spending XP section. • Coins – Coins represent a character’s wealth. Coins are gained by defeating enemies in Combat or by completing story objectives or through clever roleplaying. Coins can be spent at Shops to buy gear and equipment. • Abilities – Characters have Abilities that they employ along their journey. Abilities can be passive or active. Passive abilities are always in effect, like Mario’s Jumpman Ability, but active abilities must be activated by spending MP. 2 • Skills – Skills represent the basic and fundamental abilities your character possesses. Characters begin the adventure with a set dice value for any given skill. As a character progresses and gains XP, their skill values can increase, representing their increasing competency in that skill. See the Skills section for more info on Skills. • Equipment – Unlike Items, which can only be used once, Equipment are permanent articles that the character wears on their body. There are four slots for Equipment on a character: Head, Body, Arms, Legs. Only one piece of Equipment may be placed in any given Equipment slot at a time, making the process of choosing which Equipment to wear and take with you on your journey an important one. See the Shops section for more info on Equipment. • Items – Items are one-use articles that can be used to help your allies and sometimes hinder your opponents. There is only a certain amount of Items that you can carry (10) as shown on your character sheet. So, choose wisely when stocking up at the Shop or divvying out loot from your journey. 3 Combat Combat in Pen and Paper Mario is different from most RPGs. At the start of combat, players place their character in one of two regions on the Battlefield Map: the front row or the back row. The front row is reserved for melee characters while the back row is for ranged or magical characters. Characters on the back row can only be targeted by ranged or magical attacks, unless the front row of characters is otherwise defeated, leaving the back row open to melee attacks. At the start of combat, each player rolls a d6 + their Speed to decide Initiative. This will be the order in which characters act during combat. Initiative ties are broken by rolling a d6, with the character with the greater amount rolled going first. This tie- breaking roll does not replace the character’s actual Initiative slot, but just determines where the character goes in an Initiative slot shared by other characters. Unlike more complicated RPGs that host a slew of actions, moves, or attacks you could make in a certain round, characters may perform only one action on their turn during combat in Pen and Paper Mario. On their turn, a character may do one of the following: Attack, Magic, Use an Item, Defend, or Switch Rows. • Attack – The typical combat action. The character makes a melee or ranged attack at a single target by rolling 1d6 + the character’s Attack die (+ any additional modifiers granted by items or abilities). If the result is equal to or greater than the opponent’s Armor, the attack hits. Attacks always deal 1 damage unless otherwise specifically stated by an item or ability’s description. Additionally, a character may activate a non-magic Ability by spending MP as their Attack action. The Ability action is resolved as an Attack action, but with any additional effects as stated in the Ability’s description. • Magic – An action very similar to the Attack action, except that Magic actions always require a certain amount of MP to execute. If the character does not have enough MP or is otherwise depleted of MP, they cannot execute Magic actions until they regain enough MP to do so. Magic attacks are resolved by rolling 1d6 + the character’s Magic die (+ any additional modifiers granted by items or abilities).