GM Resources

Generally when creating something your group to engage with, they will be fighting NPCs that follow similar rules to normal character creation. Many will be under geared or will have their stats & skills distributed in a more balanced way. Some may not have any combat skills whatsoever. Playable races & other intelligent races are the dangerous foes. Bullet pointing them can end with an unprepared party getting absolutely destroyed. Just be aware of the fact that people can be the most dangerous & unpredictable foes a party will likely encounter throughout their adventures as you toss your group into the fray.

Adjust The Dials

When engaging in combat with new parties or parties that have had new characters created to replace old ones — there is no straight forward formula. The way a party learned to engage combat with each other can be thrown out of tune when a new character is added. It’s not a power level thing. Not even a combat level thing. Players will expect others to play into their strengths & aid them by filling in any weaknesses they have in combat. The new character may not fit that role the same way, throwing off the dynamic of the party until they can establish their party’s new combat tactics.

Best practice is to slowly introduce a party into combat. Give them an easy challenge with more straightforward tactics initially. Allow the party to learn the dynamics of the system, habits of other players, & characteristics of the characters they are with. As they learn & grow; add enemies that use more tactics, more weapon switches, more stat variations that lean into their individual builds. Not quite a bullet point, but fairly close to it. Perhaps you can have an NPC with bullet pointed stats & skills as a boss fight for them, with fodder around the boss to keep the combat engaging. But try not to put anything in front of them that doesn’t give the party any chance at winning.

Find the sweet spot. Adjust it to a level that engages the players. Mix it up when needed. Turn it up & down so they have a mix of easy & challenging battles. If a character dies & gets replaced with another, turn the dial down a couple notches & find a new sweet spot for the group.

Monster Races

When creating a custom monster race, the normal stat limits sometimes won’t make sense. Almost all monster races have zero in their Mind stat. This means they cannot learn any skills. So for some of these monsters to be truly terrifying they either need raw numbers, special abilities, natural weapons or armor, or stats that go higher than what is normally allowed for character creation.

Each monster would still be built using the 4 main stats. However there is no rule for how many points they get distributed to them. The creature size modifiers can effect HP & damage bonuses. Pay close attention to their total “Hit Bonuses”, “Damage Bonuses”, Armor, & HP as you create them. Once the creature size & stats are spread, most of those details auto fill. Building this way allows you to grant combat levels to them to adjust the dial without recreating a new version of it each time. Simply padding HP with combat levels can make a moderate threat into something problematic very quickly.

Your monster’s “days of food” that it needs to survive can determine if they are in competition for hunting & trapping in the zones that they roam in. If resources are already tight, adding a monster into a area can force the players into “fight or flight”. Even if the monster is not directly attacking them.

If your group fights them, make sure there are rewards. Perhaps the hide might be exceptional. Perhaps parts might be traded for trophies. Perhaps some parts might be usable as replacements for armor, weapons, or cloth. Such as Land Drake scales that can replace a Tier 8 metal ingot for armor, giving it a distinct visual quality that says, “we kill the monsters that you have nightmares about”. Natural material replacements for ingots cannot be broken down into ingots. Make sure the player marks clearly when special materials are used in construction of items. And don’t forget that for risky battles they most definitely will earn experience.

Adding an Aggro mechanic is not necessary, but it can help the players learn to anticipate actions when they engage with that type of monster again in the future. This adds the feeling of knowledge & experience to the players themselves. It can make it so that, while first battle against it might had been clunky or chaotic, future battles against the same monster would feel coordinated & refined in comparison. Eventually the players will develop tactics that are especially effective against it, which is a good feeling. It should impress NPCs whom have knowledge of the dangers those monsters impose.

Example Aggro mechanics might be things like: “lowest total armor”, “lowest body stat”, “smallest creature size”, “least visible weapons”, “closest enemy”, “most visible weapons”, “whomever dealt the last blow”, “whomever dealt the most total damage”, etc. It only needs to be something that would be measurable by the monster itself — usually something visual. These mechanics aren’t usually applied to playable races. For playable races, each individual is individual.

Adding details like social behaviors, preferred terrains, or aggression can help story telling & immersion. Adding descriptions to appearance is a must. Adding a fleeing mechanic for many monsters will make sense. Such as, “it runs away after it loses half it’s HP”. But also, some monsters could be mindless enough to fight to their last … I guess zombies don’t breathe. But you get the point.

This section is primarily tips for a potential GM. It isn’t required. But will help get you started on your first adventure in Eos.

“The player characters are the main characters of the story. The rules of the game only exist to accommodate their story. Dying might be part of their story”.

Time is Dynamic

Sometimes a character’s story is told moment to moment, hour to hour, & day to day. Sometimes, there may be a lull for weeks, months or even years. While combat with this system is “moment to moment” for each round spent. The time spent harvesting, crafting, & learning outside combat should usually be determined by the group running those characters.

It’s not unheard of for a group to settle down in a town for the winter. Building relationships with the townsfolk & hoarding supplies for their next adventure once spring comes. It’s also possible that story won’t wait for them to seek it out & will seek them out instead.

When time passes, the characters don’t press pause. They’re still working, playing, & practicing their arts. That’s why the passive skill points exist. As a character matures, they grow. They get better at their crafts — even if it’s just passing interests that are not part of their daily work. The players can just summarize the work their doing. The relevant “autopilot” tasks don’t require role-playing. Time just goes by. If events are planned within that time, pause the timer, role-play the event. Then let the party decide if they continue passing time or if they want to change their plans. Be flexible with time jumping forward… especially the boring parts.

The GM’s job is to narrate & be the hearts, minds & souls of all the NPC’s, monsters & creatures of the world. Character development doesn’t just occur from rising skill points alone. Their true personality becomes more clear as they face challenges with their party. They may be small. Like opening up a shop in town. They may be challenging weather that requires someone to stand up, put their boots on, & walk into the snow — Because someone has to get those supplies back to town before people starve to death. Or… There may be an unavoidable conflict from a greedy baron trying to obtain more power… or a den of Kobalds that have been raiding the local farms… or a new mob boss in town. Make sure your players have things to interact with. Even if they would prefer to ignore them, the option is there for them to decide.

Random Encounters

If your group is traveling through a zone that doesn’t have predetermined threats, rolling for a random encounter may spice things up a bit. Having them select a difficulty range could give you an idea of how much trouble they’re ready to get into. Have them each roll 1d20 & select any number rolled from among them. 1-5 could be a low encounter, 5-10 moderate challenge, 10-15 very challenging, & 15-20 could be a massive encounter. You’re the GM. You can adjust these numbers or set your own to better suit your needs.

A massive encounter would not just be a single combat scenario. It would be like spotting an old cavern in some ruins, “off in the distance”, far away from the main road. This encounter could require days spent scouting & learning the area, with sporadic attacks from the local inhabitants. A smart group will come up with plans to defend each other when resting. I guess… a smarter group might just keep walking down the road. But the group that succeeds would be rewarded with knowledge, loot, & experience.

Generally experience is rewarded for participation. Show up, get a stipend. But if a player wants to push the limits of their character, seeking out more experience through battle or wit is the accelerated path. Greater experience rewards exist. The greater the risk, the greater the reward. What exact amount that is — should be determined by the GM. Too fast or too slow can stifle character development. Sometimes struggling a little bit adds more character… to a character… so to speak.

Overarching Plot

The default game world uses disruption in the timeline. An NPC from ancient times who mastered time magic spends his life jumping from timeline to timeline. His goal is not apparent, but he’s clearly trying to make a different future. He pulls characters forward in time, wiping their memories. They are all a blank slate. A new person… A new character. Often with nothing but a few items in their possession. The first people they engage with are their new party. With only a faded memory of their last scene before the jump, they have more questions than answers. Maybe these strangers will help figure out “what’s going on here?”.

The plot beyond that is the world the GM prepared for them. The story of the characters & their interactions with that world around them. Were they meant to slay that baron? Or was it the discovery they made of a lost artifact while grave robbing at the catacombs? The mysterious time-traveling NPC’s motive becomes a whisper… as they learn, adapt & grow to the world that they’ve been moved to. They create their new life. There they create their own story.

That Power Non-Player Character(PNPC) with magic, magic, & even more magic, has a few notable things about him. He is a mage. To those who can see it, he glows like the sun. His age isn’t the same every time. He might have waited 10 of his years before he decided the next person to add to his pile of “your group”. He is Human. He already knows your actions before you do them — Because he’s seen them all. Every timeline. Every you. One thing each character is sure of is; whatever he got them to agree to before they were transported through time… well. They agreed to it. What was it? And he disappears as quickly as he appears. He is, honestly, a plot device.

As a PNPC plot device, he can be summoned by the GM to drop replacement characters near the party. This is useful when there is no other explanation of how a new character would organically be wandering around in the middle of nowhere. Those touched by the PNPC’s magic automatically have a commonality. They are an exclusive group. They’re probably the only ones alive at that time. That commonality can act strongly to bind them together as a party. His part of the story beyond bringing your characters together… is something for the longest lived races to hypothesize. No one else will live long enough to see the fruit of his labor.

If a character is created with higher levels than usual for character creation, they are usually built with a backstory from whatever area your group is currently in. Perhaps they grew up there, or perhaps they recently traveled there. Remember when you replace player characters that it should make sense… Also realize that new character build with a backstory would need a reason to go along with the group if they already have a life, & plans, & goals. It’s not always up to the GM to work out the details. Sometimes a new character built this way might just go on their merry way & part with the group the same day they meet them. Good story telling should reflect realism.