What if you were not the hero? What if the one who would fulfill the prophecy, the one holding the sword of legend or the staff of wisdom was NOT you?
What if you were just a regular joe living in a fantasy land, trying to make a few coppers doing whatever needs to be done.
Offer your services to the "main character" in a number of different ways. Participate in tactical combat, solve puzzles of traps, and locks, butter up nobles, and ladies at court.
random musing about rules.
Negative effects
Poison - must overcome a survial roll each round until dead or until the poison passes.(stamina check?)
Bleed - must overcome a bleed survival roll each round until dead or until the bleeding stops. Each level of bleed creates a bleed survival penalty, vs the bleed roll. Applying bandages can stop the bleeding after 2 rounds. Applying bandages and balm can stop the bleeding in 1 round. (stamina check)
Blind - unable to see in either one or 2 eyes. Of course blind is less effective on a creater with more eyes and more effective on creatures with less eyes. Creatures which are keen of hearing or smelling cannot be blinded.
Dismemberment - Loosing a limb, causes the Bleed effect, and a cripple effect based on what was lost. A lost leg doubles the action points required to walk. A lost Arm causes the weapon/shield to be dropped and the arm to be unusable.
Warrior skills Expert/Master melee ads +1 to melee roll Expert/Master shielding adds +1 to shield roll 360 shielding can protect against flank attacks.
Rogue skills Flanker +1 to hit if flanking, can be countered by 360 shielding Backstabber +2 to hit if attacking directly behind.
Sling - kills if rolling a 6 (headshot) if stone or clay bullets are used a headshot can be deflected by a "helmet roll". Iron and steel bullets do not need to defeat a helmet roll unless the helmet is also iron/steel. If your attack roll is lower than 6 then the attack cannot be fatal. The following are possible 5, knockout, 4, knockdown, 3 blinded, 2 bruised.
Chop - Chop is bladed force cuts. It partains mostly to Axes. Chop has a bonus against shield rolls, and can kill with a 5+ Chop can also cause bleed 2+ and dismemberment with a roll of 4.
Slash - Slash partains to slashing weapons, like swords, sabers and the cutlass. slashing does not offer any bonus against shields or armor. It does however add more bleed points than other weapons, and a better kill threshold. a 4+ is fatal.
Maces/Hammers: heavy weapons that are good at bashing armor. They are slower, and have a -1 penalty to the defensive roll. They have a starting bonus of +1 against armor. Maces require a 6+ to kill, and can cause bone breaks at 4+
Piercing: Anything pointy is piercing (including sword thrusts) piercing has a bonus against armor. Some weapons like awlpikes, war picks and bodkin arrors have an additional bonus against plate armor. It requires a 6+ to kill, and anyting else just causes +1 to bleed.
Defensive rolls are executed by the defender of an attack. The defender will first try to dodge or parry an attack. if that fails, they can still attempt to block with their shield, or glance the blow off armor. if all else fails, and the attacker scores a direct hit, the defender dies, or gets the "Bleed" status. Heavier armor can reduce "bleed" to "Bruise".
Defend/dodge/parry roll - your first line of defense is to no be there. Evade your enemy or parry his weapon with your own.
Shield roll - protect yourself with your shieild. Shields are weak against axes, but strong against peircing, and can cause the weapon to stick.(disarming an apponent if rolling a 6 or higher)
Armor roll- last line of defense is to protect your vitals with your armor. leather or higher allows for an armor roll. you get a penalty if not proficient(also a dodge penalty) Chain adds +1 to an armor roll but is vulnerable to piercing.(-1) and axes(-1) plate adds +2 to the armor roll but is also vulnerable to peircing (-1)