u/Bogus_Whale

For those who are unaware, OSR stands for Old School Roleplay, and is often based on the 1970s version of D&D. They are notable for their light and interpretive rules and are a lot of fun for new players, or veteran players looking for something fresh and (in my experience) much more engaging. After getting a copy of Obojima, I set out to make an OSR conversion or ‘hack’ for the beautiful world that 1985 games developed. The OSR I run—which this hack is based on—is David Black’s The Black Hack, however this hack should work with any OSR with only minor adjustments. I highly encourage anyone who uses this hack to purchase a copy of the Obojima rulebook, as it will give you much more than this hack does, and allows you to run a campaign effectively. This hack was developed as a companion to the official rulebook and world. I hope you enjoy!

You can download the hack here.

Note: I intend to make a character sheet to accompany this hack, however in the meantime, OSRs are classically played with blank ruled sheet of paper, and I believe doing so really adds to the ambience of the Old School playing.

For those who are unaware, Obojima is a recently developed place setting for 5e D&D. The world is highly based on the whimsical worlds of studio ghibli, as well as Japanese and Pacific Islander folklore. After I obtained a copy of their rulebook, I set out to make an OSR conversion or ‘hack’. This has taken me the better part of the last month, and I believe I have gotten it to a place I am happy with. As noted in the document, I highly encourage anyone who uses this hack to purchase their official rulebook for running a campaign with their world. Alternatively, if you cannot afford their steep price of $30 for a pdf of the rulebook, a certain popular book archive might have what you seek until you are able to support the creators.

Download the hack here.

I mainly run a modified version of the Black Hack, but I am in the middle of converting Obojima into an osr, and I want to incorporate potions. However, I would like some references for how other osrs handle potions, or how they might be homebrewed.

Obojima’s potion system is revolved around ingredients having an ability score for 3 categories. Combat, Utility, and Whimsy. You take 3 ingredients and add up all of the ability scores. The highest score reveals the potion’s category and potion itself. For example, if you have Amber (C:9 U:5 W:4) Bamboo (C:3 U:3 W:3) and Earwax (C:0 U:0 W:0) and brewed a potion from them, you would get Combat: 12 Utility: 8 and Whimsy: 7. Since combat is the highest, it would be a combat potion, and it would be the 12th potion on the combat list.

This just seems rather complicated, and might disengage players, or make potions an after thought. I intend to go through and narrow down the potion list, but if anyone has any recourses or strategies on how they handle ingredients, I would appreciate it!