Quote from: Marleycat;75208470hp is nothing in 3x.

Agreed - whether that's a 70hp 7th level Fighter, or a smallish dragon.

I have been dithering about whether or not Harnmaster will be as good in play as it appears to be.  The combat card looks easy to use but character generation seems to exceptionally complicated.  

But it is on my bucket list to try out

WFRP 2e would be viable if you just disallow magic-users.  Or change the magic system a bit.

Yes, you could do the same with D&D; get rid of all the overtly combat-related spells for example.  But WFRP would probably take less work.

Quote from: Votan;752308I have been dithering about whether or not Harnmaster will be as good in play as it appears to be.  The combat card looks easy to use but character generation seems to exceptionally complicated.

One thing you might try, then, is the download section of lythia.com, which has an immense amount of free stuff for Harn.  Among them are several packs of NPCs, full sheets included, either intended for accompanying adventure packs or as standalone NPCs.  (One cute one is a thinly-disguised copy of the crew of Joss Whedon's Firefly series, revamped to being the crew of a merchantman.  Might want to start there.

Fantasy Hero (part of the HERO System, most famous for Champions) can handle low magic quite easily.  

Fantasy Hero 5e and 6e are quite good but require that you also have the core 5e or 6e1 & 6e2 Hero System Rules to play the game.

The Valdorian Age is a 5e Fantasy Hero setting for low magic sword & sorcery.  There is currently a Kickstarter for a new Fantasy Hero Complete that just hit funding levels with a few days to go.  It will be an all-in-one book that should follow the same basic format as Champions Complete except for running a fantasy campaign instead of supers.

re: Harn
Harn to HERO conversions have been done by regulars of the herogames forums. I am not familiar with Harn but based on the comments up thread I imagine it was to simplify combat (one of the few times I've ever referred to HERO as simple).

Quote from: Ravenswing;752596One thing you might try, then, is the download section of lythia.com, which has an immense amount of free stuff for Harn.  Among them are several packs of NPCs, full sheets included, either intended for accompanying adventure packs or as standalone NPCs.  (One cute one is a thinly-disguised copy of the crew of Joss Whedon's Firefly series, revamped to being the crew of a merchantman.  Might want to start there.

Thanks for the tip

Just wanted to add my voice to those who are suggesting RuneQuest 6. I just introduced a new group to it at the weekend and it went really well. We're playing stranded pirates on the Monster Island setting for a Swords & Sorcery "anthology" of games (linked one-shot adventures that characters can drop in and out of in a sandboxy setting). The game really went swimmingly, with character generation lots of fun - we handled it by discussing character concepts in advance and then me rolling up what the players wanted, as we just wanted to wade right in and play.

My only concern before about RQ6, having run it a few times now, was that the magic system and combat system might be a little complicated. Turns out that it's not really an issue; we've added just enough magic to make things fun, but still in a definitely low-magic setting. But any character can have access to a couple of charms, spells, or (in the case of one character) "almost preternatural abilities", using basic Folk Magic. This is ridiculously easy to run. Then just give each character who wants them a couple of spells, along with interesting roleplaying reasons for having them (we have one Pirate-Voodoo-Spirit-Animist, and one Acolyte of the Shark Cult of Ravashanoor!). But RQ works equally well with no magic at all. It's very modular, very scaleable.

The combat system also can be as complicated as you like, but even when you add in all the bells and whistles, especially the Combat Special Effects (Disarm, Trip, Stun, Choose Location etc), it actually runs really smoothly, even with people who've never played it before, and makes for pulse-pounding and tactical combat....

Seriously, I don't think you can go wrong with it, and I'm committed to converting as many players as possible from my local RPG group, who are mostly PF/D&D 3.5 die-hards ... (luckily some of them also play some Cthulhu, so they're quite familiar with d100 system. Still, it's very very easy to learn. Much easier, I fancy, than D&D). The skill-points advancement system is likewise very easy to pick up, and the fact that hit-points NEVER increase means that, like said upthread, there is no such thing as a non-scary combat, and a bunch of guardsmen with halberds or sword and shield is very threatening indeed. An alleyway encounter with some cultists of Zululun the Unforgetting left one character bleeding copiously and another with a nasty wound to the leg and a slash across the face that will leave a big scar. And that's just their first encounter! But they staved off death with judicious use of Luck Points, so lethality is not quite so bad as it was in the RQ2-3 days ....

tl ; dnr : buy RuneQuest 6. It's superb.

If you need to sell PF fans, then P6 for Pathfinder is perfect for your needs. In P6, a +1 sword is a big deal.

http://p6codex.com/

Quote from: Rincewind1;751391Don't use D&D.

I say this every day to no avail.

3.5 is particularly a bad choice for this sort of thing, but to suggest that you shouldn't use D&D at all is silly.

Look at Lamentations of the Flame Princess; it's very much "low magic".  A "rare magic items" game would work just fine there; and there aren't even some of the major and most powerful spells around (no fireball, lightning bolt, or raise dead, to give three examples).

Quote from: RPGPundit;7817113.5 is particularly a bad choice for this sort of thing, but to suggest that you shouldn't use D&D at all is silly.

Look at Lamentations of the Flame Princess; it's very much "low magic".  A "rare magic items" game would work just fine there; and there aren't even some of the major and most powerful spells around (no fireball, lightning bolt, or raise dead, to give three examples).

Verily.

BX to AD&D and even 2nd can very easily handle low magic settings or gameplay.

As I noted in an older thread here I believe. I played in at least one campaign where we were all fighters, thieves, and rangers minus the ranger magic. Magic was vastly toned down to the point I think we met all of one wizard at the end. Along the way we did meet a few druids.

E6 modified 3.5e would work fine, just don't use casters (or use, say, modified no-magic versions of rangers and whatnot)

E6:
Max level is 6, get another feat every 5000 further xp. Done.

The advantage is that, by level 6, a lot of the magic dependencies that creatures are designed to face haven't really shown up.

I'd also suggest moving to a quest/adventure XP reward system to discourage the dangerous 'get in a lot of fights' 3.5e encourages.

Plenty of reasons not to use D&D (= "I think the system blows"), but this isn't one.  I don't think there's a single RPG system out there that can't handle zero- to low-magic at all.  You just need to (a) lower expectations all around for what the party can handle; (b) adjust the XP system to not require combating power levels of opposition the party can't handle; and (c) write adventures where wits and cleverness, instead of widgets, are used to solve problems.

I've been asked on a number of occasions how parties in my campaign can possibly survive without ready access to powerful healing magics (which they usually don't have) or D&D-ish "thief" abilities (which they often don't have).  The answer's pretty basic: "I don't write scenarios requiring parties to punch through hordes of enemies, and I don't write scenarios which make or break on the parties' abilities to pick a lock or disarm a trap."

Quote from: Thanos;751383I have an idea for a low magic campaign. Ideally I'd like to use 3.5 as all my group have it already and it would make things easier. How every I'm finding the leveling system/hit points are making none magical weapons a problem. So... I'm looking for a way around that, either with a new rules set or (preferred) some modified system for 3.5.

The idea here is finding a +1/+1 weapon should be a big deal. Something along the lines of only the mightiest heroes have them.

Well, a literal +1 obviously won't be a big deal unless it's actually big relative to the probabiities involved. So instead you could just set it up so that a magic sword gets whatever seems a more satisfying factor.

Likewise, it's dead simple to double the damage dice for weapons, or give figures a level bonus independent of equipment, to speed up fights.

Presumably one reason you chose a version of D&D in the first place is that you like the character survivability in a high-combat campaign the hit point system provides.

I can't believe nobody has mentioned Midnight.

It's d20, it's 3.5, and it's low magic as hell, with rare but awesome magic items that feel extremely special.

It also has good rules for herbalism and lucky charms to address the lack of the usual potions and such.