Swift d12: First public goblin playtest

I've been working on the Swift d12 system for several months now, and have already run several closed playtests, but at the weekend I ran my first public playtest. Manuel and Heike resumed their usual roles of Maeson Crispyface and Izzy Toecutter, and as always Manuel helped me out with props for the game and assisted the others with the rules. There were also two first-time Swift d12 players - Michael (who had also played in the Savage Worlds goblin playtest I ran back in September) returned to play Skally Finback again, and Christos (who I'd not met before) played Big Brak.

Photo of the game by Manuel Sambs.

As there was a 7 hour time slot, I prepared two adventures to run back to back. The first was Head Hunters, which I'll probably be turning into another One Sheet, while the other was Kick Off, which is also the third episode in the Plot Point campaign.

Head Hunters involves the goblins being sent on a headhunting mission - they have to headhunt new recruits for the tribe, and also headhunt some interesting new heads for the chief's collection. There was a short cameo appearance by a couple of goblins based on Harrison Hunt and Nikk Lambley, and they'll be making a bigger appearance at a later date. The adventure incorporated some new custom cards for traversing the Great Forest, inspired by the Ambush Cards I used for Dungeon Squat.

Kick Off involved the goblins playing a competitive game of "kickball" on top of a mountain during a heavy thunderstorm, using a severed head instead of a ball. The adventure is called Kick Off because of the football theme, but also because it kicks off the war against the humans, when they discover that the head belonged to the human king's only son and heir. The kickball rules worked pretty well, although they did result in a PC death (well, incapacitation really) when one of the goblins got struck by lightning.

Feedback on both the system and setting was pretty positive, although it was suggested that the abilities and skills be more clearly linked together on the archetype sheets. I will have to have a think about how best to present the information, but the mechanics held up well - they seem solid and intuitive, and the combat resolution was fast. The revised wound system is definitely an improvement over the old approach.