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  • Sep 21, 2026

    Let's Read DFRPG Adventurers: Wizard

    The descriptive text on the book paints a picture of the wizard as someone who’s very smug about being smart and about wielding magic that doesn’t rely on fickle supernatural entities. So at least on the fiction front, it’s business as usual.

    They do have plenty to be smug about. Their spell list includes everything that’s not specifically part of the cleric’s or druid’s central niches, and there are many situations that can only be solved with the help of a wizard. However, “an entire fight” usually isn’t one of them, as we’ll see below.

    Wizards become delvers more to find buried arcane secrets than to find money (though the later always helps). Because of this, they’re often the delvers with the best training to identify and handle those secrets.

    Basic Stats

    Wizards start with ST 10, DX 12, IQ 15, and HT 11. Their Perception is lowered to 12 and their Speed bumped to 6.

    This is the highest starting IQ of all professions, and the most specialized “caster” stat block we’ll see here.

    Advantages

    Wizards start with three points of Energy Reserve (Magical) and Magery 3. Magery is their “power talent”, and unlike most of the others doesn’t have a separate pre-requisite advantage because it has a “level 0” that acts in that function as well. Magery 0 is enough to learn most spells and lets you detect nearby sources of magic, but doesn’t add any bonuses to spells like subsequent levels do.

    Energy Reserve acts as a “parallel” pool of Fatigue Points that can only be used to power spells and arcane powers. It costs the same as Fatigue, and the main advantage is that it recovers concurrently with Fatigue. The other casters all have their own variants of ER as part of their optional advantages, but it’s factory-standard for wizards. It fits their theme to have vast reserves of magical power but to get winded easily from physical exertion…

    Discretionary advantages include mental stat boosts, more Magery or ER, stuff that makes you smarter than your IQ indicates (like Intuition and Language Talent) and stuff that makes you more magical (like Spirit Empathy or some custom traits we’ll see below).

    Disadvantages

    That Per reduction takes up some of our disadvantage budget, so we only need to pick -35 points of further problems. Part of these make you less physically strong, a few others make your nerve break easily in combat, and a bunch make you into different flavors of eccentric genius. Are you an absent-minded professor with a heart of gold, or a fantasy mad scientist?

    Of note here is Weirdness Magnet, which gives the GM carte blanche to come up with extra weird things during adventures that feel inexplicably drawn to you and generally make your life harder. If you need -15 points to reach your limit, take that and let your GM have some fun!

    Skills

    Wizard melee weapon packages are the classic “staff” and the somewhat novel “wand and shield”, which is such a good idea I have to wonder about the quality of the curricula of magic schools in other games. Wands in this game are a little heftier too, and can be used as light sticks with the Smallsword skill.

    For ranged combat, they can choose to go old-school and throw darts, wield a sling, or learn Innate Attack, which is what you use to attack with missile spells. Most wizards who have those spells will want the latter.

    Their primary skills are all about lore. They can teach, compose well-written texts, speed read, make proper use of research libraries, work with alchemy, dispose of magical hazardous material and recall all sorts of knowledge about a variety of magic-related subjects. Their optional secondary skills include the usual delver basics and also further intellectual pursuits, including Cartography for drawing those dungeon maps on the go.

    Spells

    You get to choose 30 different spells here, with a point spent in each.

    Wizards have access to nearly all of the full glory of the classic GURPS magic system. If you compare their spell list with the one present in the Magic supplement for core GURPS, you’ll see a few omissions. These are mostly stuff that the authors of Dungeon Fantasy thought didn’t fit with their intended flavor: Enchantment spells because magic items should be found as loot, and most teleportation because having casual access to that lets you skip too much of the game. And obviously, anything that’s part of the cleric’s and druid’s core niches is exclusive to those professions.

    We’re also back to dealing with prerequisite spells here. Spells are divided into Colleges, and each College has a prerequisite tree that’s a cross between a college curriculum and a skill tree from a game like Path of Exile or Diablo. If you want to learn Fireball, for example, you must know Create Fire and Shape Fire. The more complex and powerful a spell is, the more prerequisites it has.

    Bards have to deal with this too, but they only have access to a limited set of colleges. Wizards obviously have access to all of wizardly magic.

    Special Wizard Traits

    This is where you get the official description of Magery, which I gave you above. Magery is the whole reason to even play a wizard in the first place, but they do have a few other special tricks available to them.

    • Gizmos (5 points/level): Like the thief version, but for wizard-themed minor gadgets instead of thief-themed ones.

    • Improved Magic Resistance (5 points/level): Like the base Magic Resistance advantage available to everyone, this penalizes any spell cast on you. Unlike the base version, though, it doesn’t interfere with your own spells.

    • Wild Magic (21 points/level): Once per session per level of this trait, you can cast any wizardly spell as if you knew it at a level equal to IQ + Magery. If you succeed, have a point to spare, and already know the spell prerequisites, you can also permanently learn it then and there, though you’ll get a small penalty to cast it for the next month as you get used to it.

    Customization

    It’s all about spell selection! There are so many to choose from the sample builds mention whole colleges instead of individual spells. Examples given are artillery mages with area damaging spells, controllers with a large collection of save-or-suck effects, or thaumathologists that specialize in meta-spells and magic knowledge skills.

    Every mage wants extra Energy Reserves, and those quirk points can be used either for an expensive and high-capacity Power Item, or for more spells.

    The “This Ain’t D&D Section”

    As said above, wizards have plenty to be smug about, but this isn’t the same set of things that makes D&D wizards feel smug. The hardest thing for habitual D&D players to get used to here is the fact that they won’t be able to win an entire battle by snapping their fingers.

    Yes, DFRPG wizards have access to plenty of strong damage-dealing spells. And yes, they also have access to plenty of control spells that can stop a monster on its tracks. But casting spells takes time and energy.

    To cast that classic explosive fireball, a wizard needs to spend one turn casting the spell and from 0 to 3 additional turns growing it to the desired size and aiming it before they can attack. If the party is readying for an ambush, that big firebal is a great opening move. But if you start casting it during a fight, it’s likely the Knight and the Barbarian will have killed all enemies by the time you’re ready to throw it. Big area-effect control spells take a similar amount of time and even more energy to cast.

    DFRPG wizards really shine in the “utility magic” department. That’s where you’ll find most spells that are both relatively cheap and quick to cast, and do stuff that no other profession can replicate. The wise wizard keeps an open mind regarding their spell selection, and plans explosions in advance.

    The upside here is that you don’t have to worry about “spell slots” or any of that nonsense. You always have access to all the spells you know, and recovering your energy when it runs out results in “fifteen-minute rests” instead of “fifteen-minute workdays”.

  • Sep 15, 2026

    Let's Read DFRPG Adventurers: Thief

    Contrary to popular belief, Dungeon Fantasy isn’t all about fighting monsters: there’s also exploring the dungeon, looting the dungeon, and selling the loot back in town (sorry, couldn’t resist). The Bard takes care of the last of these very important activities, but for the others you want a Thief.

    Stats

    Thieves start out with ST 11, DX 15, IQ 13, HT 11. They bump their Perception to 14, decrease their Speed from 6.5 to 6, and increase their Move to 7.

    The four stats are pretty similar to the Martial Artist’s and the Swashbuckler’s, but emphasize IQ more since this is our official skill monkey.

    Advantages

    All thieves start out with Flexibility, High Manual Dexterity, and Perfect Balance, all of which are excellent boosts to anything involving tricky movement and most physically-oriented “thief skills”.

    They get 30 extra points for discretionary advantages, and their selection is actually a bit low on stat boosts: just DX and IQ instead of all four, and just Per, Basic Speed, and Basic Move instead of all secondaries. The rest of the choices are all stuff that offers further specialized bonuses to the same areas enhanced by the standard advantages. Thieves are one of the only professions that can start out with above-average Wealth, which gives them extra starting money and helps with selling loot in town. And they can pick Weapon Master (Knives) if they want to go in a fightier direction.

    Yes, “all knives” count as a single weapon here because their base stats are worse. If you take this, you probably want to wield them with the Main-Gauche skill instead of Knife.

    Disadvantages

    The thief’s mandatory disadvantage is one of Greed, Kleptomania or Trickster, explaining why they chose the profession in the first place. Discretionary choices can make them either someone who needs money fast and constantly to fuel a gambling or partying addiction, or someone whose anti-social personality and criminal record has locked out of getting legitimate jobs.

    Skills

    A thief’s melee weapon skill choices are the same as the swashbuckler’s plus Knife, though their skill level will be “only” 15 or 14 and they lack most melee support abilities. The most recommended option here seems to be “weapon and shield”, instead of the swashbuckler’s single blade. You’re not a god of parrying, so having a shield or cloak in your off hand is a big help.

    You do get a lot of mundane non-combat skills. All that sneaking and exploration stuff that’s secondary and optional for everyone else is part of your starting spread, at much better levels. You’re particularly good at the stuff that maps to D&D’s traditional thief skills: stealth, climbing, lockpicking, trap detection and disarming, etc. Also acrobatics and escaping from bonds.

    Your secondary skill choices are mostly more “niche” areas of spying and crime like forgery, poisons and lip-reading, and also include a selection of social skills.

    Special Thief Traits

    You get no enhanced advancement limits, but you do get a lot of exclusive mundane skills in your template and a few special traits:

    • Catfall (10 points): you suffer much less damage from falls.

    • Expert Backstabbing (2 points/level): Adds its level (which has no cap) to your ST for melee attacks that allow no active defense. That means they can’t see you coming: they’re unconscious, or you start your turn behind them, or you’re invisible, or you’re in a social situation where they didn’t expect you to attack. You need to put in the work to get into one of these situations maybe once per fight, but the extra damage will be worth it.

    • Gizmos (5 points/each): Each Gizmo lets you pull one small item out of thin air per session. This can be either something you have on your sheet but didn’t specify you were carrying, or an item you didn’t have subject to certain price limits (which are more generous if the thing is thief-themed). This isn’t magic, it’s advance planning combined with a little bit of cinematic trickery.

    • High Manual Dexterity (5 points/level): This is a Talent that gives bonuses to a bunch of common DX-based thief tasks.

    • Sensitive Touch (10 points): Gives a large bonus to perception rolls involving mainly your sense of touch, and to rolls where being good at “working by feel” is an advantage, like searching bodies, lockpicking and disarming some traps.

    • Silence (5 points/level): Like the Scout ability.

    Customization

    The book recommends three example skill and advantage selections that can take a generic thief and turn them into a sneaky burglar, a stabby assassin, or a smart and silver-tongued mastermind.

    Generally speaking, it’s all about your mundane skills here. Unlike in D&D, thieves never stop being relevant, even when there are utility spellcasters in the party. Utility spells usually don’t let you skip skill rolls entirely. Therefore, those casters won’t be casting spells on themselves to make the thief obsolete - they will casting spells on the thief to make them even better at their job.

    Your thief’s quirk points should be spent on more skills! There’s some sweet high-tier thief gear out there but it’s outside a starting character’s price range. But it with your ill-gotten gains after you start adventuring.

    The “This Ain’t D&D” section

    The DFRPG Thief is equivalent to the old school Thief class in terms of intended function and combat ability. The difference here is that their starting success chance in those traditional thief duties is much higher.

    You can take them in a fightier direction if you want, with access to Weapon Master (Knives) and to something that works a lot like the classic AD&D Backstab ability. But if your main desire is to have a cool sword and deftly weave through a fight while stabbing enemies in sensitive spots more or less at will, you want a Swashbuckler.

    That said, in games that allow “multiclassing” the Thief does have an easier time becoming a Swashbuckler than almost everyone else.

  • Sep 9, 2026

    Let's Play Hell's Rebels: Adventure 01, Scene 15

    This post is part of my solo Hell’s Rebels campaign.

    Intro

    If we were simply reading the book, we would already be done with adventure 01. But we’re playing, and there is a vital part of the adventure’s capstone dungeon delve that I’ve been putting off until now: the looting!

    I’ve ran this delve as a “brutal raid”, so our PCs were mainly interested in clearing the cultists infesting the place as fast as possible, and whenever they found some loot they just made a mental note to get to it later.

    Well, Nox has been defeated, and it’s “Later” now. The book doesn’t really mention how often the diabolists here checked back with Thrune, but I figure our heroes have enough time to gather and tally all the loot, though I guess they might need to call in a couple of Silver Raven teams to help haul it all back to base.

    I’m labeling this “Scene 15” because it’s technically part of the first adventure, but we’re not doing any Mythic stuff here this time around.

    [GM] Delver: The Lootening

    Unfortunately, the very fact that Thrune’s minions know where the Monastery is and have successfully raided it in the past means that they cannot use it as a base, so they have to stay in the somewhat cramped Wasp Nest for now. But they can still loot the place!

    I think we can abstract our actual procedure here. The PCs use a Silver Raven figurine to call their Freedom Fighters and Sneaks teams and strip this place bare. I’ll roll Perception for the PCs when stuff is hidden, but we can assume the teams take care of carting the loot out, and dropping Azvernathy somewhere beyond city walls with instructions to never show his face in this town again.

    The next section gives talks about the XP they gained from this delve. Then we get a high-level overview of what the PCs found, and what they did it with it after bringing it to the Wasp Nest.

    And finally, for the completionists, you get a full tally of the loot found in the dungeon, complete with costs and weights in the format I use for my home-brewed gear tallying script.

    [GM] XP Rewards

    I’m not sure I specified how I’m handling XP here. That’s in part because I hadn’t 100% settled on a system yet. I went with the one suggested in Exploits for a while but I think I’m going to go with something considerably more generous given the slow pace of play in this campaign and the lack of proper “sessions”.

    Every time the PCs complete a significant quest, they get 5 character points. If we have a capital-P part in a Hell’s Rebels book that has one single linear goal, that’s a significant quest. If we have something that’s labeled as a Mission, usually in the middle part of a book, that’s also a significant quest. So, for example, the Aria Park Riot was one such quest, then we had the various missions I played, and then the capstone delve was another quest.

    Additionally, every time the book specifically calls out a story-based XP award for something, they gain 1 character point if they achieve that goal.

    And finally, they get another 5 character points at the end of the adventure.

    We’re using this new system starting from the capstone delve in adventure 1. So at the end of this delve, they got:

    • 1 point for gaining access to level 2 of the dungeon.
    • 1 point for deactivating the Cubic Gate.
    • 1 point for recovering the soul tomes.
    • 1 point for discovering the clue within (see below).
    • 5 points for clearing the dungeon.
    • 5 points for finishing the adventure.

    That’s 14 points each, making all of them into 289-point characters (they were at 275 when they started the delve).

    We’ll deal with character advancement in a later post.

    [Player] Loot Disposition

    Obviously we’re taking the money right away and taking it into the common party stash. I want to use this to upgrade the PC’s gear, and most of what’s left when I’m done will go into the Raven treasury. Already that’s $8700 right there.

    Next we have our “art objects”, mundane but valuable items with no associated game benefits. We’re keeping the Victocora signet rings to hand off to Rexus, but everything else should be fenced. The rest consists mainly of books, with some miscellaneous fancy writing and reading tools thrown in. Urist will only part with the books if he’s sure they can go to someone who will make good use of them outside of Cheliax, but Jania assures him she can make it happen (and as the GM I confirm it). She’s going to talk to Lady Mialari Docur in the space between adventures, and I she will handle the rest.

    Our loot pile in this category totals a whopping $51250 and weights 43kg. The process of carting it around to various fences and selling it probably takes a couple of weeks, but we can sum up the results here. Per the standard rules, that amount up there is the loot’s nominal worth. Our heroes will be able to fence it for 40% of that value, or 50% if one of them can win a contest of Merchant vs. 15. Jania does win, so we’re looking at $25625 for the lot. 64 gold, 1 silver, 5 copper.

    Next we have our “tools”, items which have a game effect but are not what I’d consider “equipment”. This includes consumables like potions and scrolls, as well as the useful tomes we found and the Bookplate of Recall. I think we’re keeping everything here except for the Bookplate. I roll another Merchant roll for it, and it gets sold off for $5000 (12 gold, 10 silver).

    And finally we have our “Equipment”. Armor and weapons and things that can be worn and wielded for continuous effect. Here we have Nox’s and Azvernathy’s armor and weapons, the Headband of Will +1, the Ring of Swimming, a scroll belt, and a humble belt pouch. Total value $61134, total weight around 39kg.

    Our heroes are keeping everything but Nox’s glaive, which no one specializes in, and Raul’s shield which is redundant. That’s $240 (12 silvers) added to our party treasury. Art will take Nox’s Armor, Urist will take Raul’s mace and armor. Jade takes the Headband and Ring of Swimming, Jania the scroll belt.

    I’ll charge the group a $500 “refit” fee for the two suits of armor and the mace, which is roughly 10% of their value. They have to be cleansed of all that Asmodean iconography and Raul’s armor has to be adjusted to fit Urist’s dwarven frame. Total fee: $1500 (3 gold, 15 silver).

    [Player & GM] Detailed Loot Ledger

    This goes over each room in the dungeon that has treasure in it, and lists the treasure in detail. The list is formatted for both human readability and for consumption by a simple script I hand-coded to tally costs and weights, which is why you can see those big numbers in the previous section.

    We start from the entrance to the Phantasmagorium level (rooms E1 to E10), and then go through the Monastery level (rooms F1 to F7.

    Room E2:

    They looted this one on the way in during the delve. The Ring of Swimming used to be weaker than this, but I thought hey, why not go all in?

    • 4 x Silver Coin: $20, 0.01kg .
    • Ring of Swimming: Grants Amphibious but not Gills while worn. $25000, 0kg .

    Room E4

    We already searched this room on the way in, so this list is a reprise. The scrolls have already been looted, the rest is being taken now.

    • 1 x Gilded souvenir medal: $250, 0kg .
    • 19 x Silver Coin: $20, 0.01kg . (total $380, 0.19kg)
    • 1 x Scroll Belt: 10 waterproof compartments for scrolls. $60, 0.5kg .

    The scrolls are all universal and charged:

    • 1 x Scroll of Panic: 1m radius. Universal, charged. $400, 0kg .
    • 1 x Scroll of Bravery: 2m radius. Universal, charged. $400, 0kg .
    • 1 x Scroll of Curse: 1 point. Universal, charged. $300, 0kg .

    There was also a scroll of Deathtouch (2d, $200) but it has already been used by Jania.

    Room E7

    • 1 x Alabaster Snake Eye: $1500, 0kg .

    Room E8

    The party isn’t going to sell these rings, but I’m listing their value for completeness’ sake.

    • 2 x Victocora Signet Ring: $750, 0.1kg . (total $1500, 0.2kg)

    Room E9

    Perception -1 to search the room for left-over valuables. The PCs pass this the test, and so find everything.

    • 1 x Bottle of lead-based ink: $500, 0.25kg .
    • 5 x Miniature ivory doors: $50, 0.01kg . (total $250, 0.05kg)
    • 1 x Roll of copper Wire: $250, 4kg .
    • 12 x Silver Coin: $20, 0.01kg . (total $240, 0.12kg)
    • 1 x Diamond: $1000, 0kg .

    Azvernathy’s belongings were also left here when he was imprisoned on E10.

    • 1 x Balanced Dwarven Mace: enchanted with Puissance 1. $5450, 2.5kg .
    • 1 x Medium Shield: $80, 7.5kg .
    • 1 x Suit of Armor: DR 6 on body, DR 2 on limbs and extremities, no helmet. Lighten 1 and Fortify 1. |$4674, 11.7kg|.

    Room E10

    This is where Azvernathy was imprisoned, but he won’t be able to sneak any treasure on his person as the Freedom Fighters escort him away.

    The book listed below also contained a clue to opening the way to the Monastery, but we didn’t need it because Urist already knew the trick.

    • 1 x Book: This is an ornate tome sacred to the dead god Aroden. $1000, 6kg .

    Room F1: The Sacred Archive

    • Miscellaneous Books: $2000, 30kg.

    • Bookplate of Recall: Metal plate with space to write the owner’s name. When glued to the inside cover of a book it allows the owner to summon it to their hand once a day. |$10000, 0.01kg|.

    • 1 x Elixir of Water Breathing. Breathe water for 1d hours. $600, 0.25kg .
    • 1 x Paut: Recovers 4 FP lost to magic. $135, 0.5kg .
    • 2 x Scroll of Analyze Magic: Universal, charged. |$800, 0kg|. (total $1600, 0kg)
    • 1 x Scroll Silence: Affects a 3m-wide area for 1 minute. Universal, charged. |$600, 0kg|.
    • 1 x Silver Magnifying Glass: $1500, 0.25kg .
    • 1 x Owl-shaped Platinum Letter Opener: $800, 0.01kg
    • 1 x Ivory and Gold Bookmark: $200, 0kg .
    • 10 x Gilded Page: $100, 0kg . (total $1000, 0.0kg)

    Room F4: Artifact Recovery

    Dust of Emulation interacts with Use Magic Device and we don’t use that here, so let’s replace it with a dose of Paut.

    The PCs do find the secret panel, so they take everything in the list below.

    • Ruined Cubic Gate: Lost its magic but still worth money as a collectible. |$30000, 1kg|.

    • Tome: +1 to Hidden Lore (Magic Items). $500, 6kg .
    • Silver and mother-of-pearl ink pen: $2000, 0.01kg .
    • Platinum disc depicting a leering angel: $1000, 0.01kg .
    • 1 x Paut: Recovers 4 FP lost to magic. $135, 0.5kg .
    • Headband of Strengthening Will +1 : Bronze circlet that grants +1 Will when worn |$20035, 0.25kg|.

    Room F6: Common Room

    These books are a pile of mostly unredacted historical documents which can be worth selling to an interested foreign collector. The dead redactors don’t have anything of value.

    • History books: $9000, 7.5kg

    Room F7: Meditation Garden

    The books Nox was perusing here are soul tomes created by Yiliv the Scrivenite. They became mundane books when the original owners of their memories died, but remain valuable for the knowledge they contain.

    In addition to that knowlegde, they also contain stories about how the archive used to contain a copy of a section of the Broken-Winged Crane, a terrible eldritch tome about demons of all kinds. They also make mention of a scholar named “Trailbrazer Huni” who visited the place and convinced the archivists to let him study the book for a single hour. The PCs have not read this one yet, but when they do they should have no problem decoding the anagram and figuring out this was Thrune in disguise.

    We also have Nox’s possessions, originally described here.

    So we get this list, with prices and weights formatted for the use of my home-grown tallying scripts:

    • Soul Tomes: +4 to History or Area Knowledge rolls about Kintargo and Ravounel if consulted. |$16000, 10kg|.

    • Nox’s Armor: DR 7 to the front of the body, 4/2 everywhere else except the head. |$5425, 13.5kg|.

    • Belt pouch. $10, 0.1kg
      • 20 x gold coin. $400, 0.01kg (total $8000, 0.20kg)
    • Dwarven Dueling Glaive: Damage sw+2 cut (Reach 1,2) or thr+3 imp (Reach 1,2). |$400, 3kg|.

    Nox actually used a different suit of armor during the fight with DR 6/4 all over, as the stats I had for her were an earlier version. But let’s use the published one as loot.

    The Silver Ravens (End of Adventure)

    Includes Sentinel bonuses.

    • Rank: 4/5
    • Focus: Secrecy
    • Members: 22
    • Supporters: 28
    • Population: 11900
    • Treasury: $9400
    • Min. Treasury: $200
    • Notoriety: 5
    • Org Skills:
      • Loyalty: 14
      • Secrecy: 17
      • Security: 14
    • Actions: 2
    • Max Teams: 3+1
    • Danger Rating: 20
    • Active Events:
    • Teams:
      • Crow Sisters (bonus team)
        • Tier: 1
        • Members: 3
        • Actions: Earn Money, Gather Information
      • Freedom Fighters
        • Tier: 1
        • Members: 6
        • Actions: Reduce Danger
      • Sneaks
        • Tier: 1
        • Members: 3
        • Actions: Secure Cache.
      • Rumormongers
        • Tier: 2
        • Members 6
        • Actions: Gather Information, Spread Disinformation
    • Allies:
      • Laria Longroad
        • +2 to Recruit Supporters as long as she’s a member.
        • Leadership-12, Streetwise-12
      • Rexus Victocora
        • -1 Notoriety per Upkeep phase as long as he’s a member.
        • Administration-12, Public Speaking-12
      • Vendalfek
        • Grants use of the Spread Disinformation action even if no other team does the same.
        • If a team does grant the action, gives a +2 bonus to the skill roll for the action.
    • Officers:
      • Demagogue: Rosalia
        • May use complimentary skills on Loyalty checks.
        • Skills: Propaganda, Public Speaking, Leadership.
      • Partisan: Laria Longroad
        • May use complimentary skills on Security checks.
        • Skills: Strategy, Leadership, Tactics.
      • Recruiters: Urist; Arthur
        • May use complimentary skills on checks for recruiting supporters.
        • Adds rebellion rank to the number of recruited supporters, and this stacks with multiple recruiters.
        • Skills: Public Speaking, Streetwise, Savoir-Faire.
      • Sentinel: Jade
        • Occupying this post gives a +1 to the rebellion’s non-focused skills.
        • May use complimentary skills on any check used to resolve an Event.
        • Skills: any of the ones listed for the appropriate category.
      • Spymaster: Jania
        • May use complimentary skills on Secrecy checks.
        • Skills: Intelligence Analysis, Streetwise, Administration.
      • Strategist: Rexus
        • Occupying this position grants a bonus action. May use its complimentary skills on the bonus action.
        • Skills: Strategy, Tactics, Administration
  • Sep 8, 2026

    Let's Read DFRPG Adventurers: Swashbuckler

    While everyone else was… doing whatever it is they do, the Swashbuckler studied the blade. This is the template for people who like precision, speed and elegance in their fighting style, but unlike the Martial Artist prefer to bring an actual sword to a swordfight.

    The two templates share some of the same ethics, you could say. They emphasize the role of skill attained through countless hours of practice, and how that lets you transcend mortal limits. The Swashbuckler is less mystical about it, though, and its abilities are not tied to a specific power source or a set of rituals. After all, some of the most iconic swashbucklers of fiction live a life filled with booze and partying without losing any of their edge.

    Base Stats

    Swashbucklers start out with ST 11, DX 15, IQ 10, HT 13. They don’t modify any secondary stats, but their natural speed is already at 7.

    Advantages

    We get quite a bit to start with! Combat Reflexes, one level of Enhanced Parry with a specific weapon skill, Luck, Weapon Bond, and Weapon Master (One Weapon).

    We already saw a lot of those, and it’s notable that the swashbuckler starts out with Combat Reflexes, Luck, and Weapon Master. Enhanced Parry and Weapon Bond are easy picks for someone who intends to focus on one specific weapon from the start, boosting defense rolls and general skill level for a relatively cheap price.

    The table of discretionary advantages lets you choose 60 points worth and has the usual stat boosts, some social advantages and a lot of combat advantages oriented towards being really fast. They also let you expand Weapon Master to “Two Weapons”, “All Fencing Weapons”, or “All Swords”, though you mostly don’t need this unless the GM is really merciless about taking PC weapons away.

    Disadvantages

    The Swashbuckler shares a lot of disadvantage choices with the Bard, as the two often take inspiration from the same sources. Both could fit easily in the setting of the Three Musketeers or Cyrano de Bergerac.

    The main difference here is a set of choices that indicate your Swashbuckler’s motivation for becoming so good with a sword. Do they follow the Gentleman’s Code of Honor and thus are always ready to avenge an insult? Do they have an obsession with becoming the world’s best swordfighter?

    Have they taken a personal vow related to how they fight? That last one can be anything from the relatively harmless “I will only use my weapon of choice” to the more serious “I will never refuse a challenge to combat” or the nearly suicidal “I will never wear armor”. If you take that last one, be sure to boost your Parry and Dodge!

    Skills

    The offered melee skill packages are all the classic fencer loadouts. You either wield a single one-handed sword, or you can complement it with an off-hand dagger, cloak, or shield by spreading your points a little thinner. The sword will usually be a fencing weapon, but it doesn’t have to be.

    You could also take the “one sword” package and the Ambidexterity advantage to wield two of them if your swashbuckler is more Miyamoto Musashi than Zorro. In any case you also get the Fast-Draw skills for the weapons you chose.

    Your fixed skill list includes basic unarmed combat, throwing, and some social and mobility skills. The list of optional skills has the usual “delver lore” ones and lets you go deeper into mobility or socialization. Or perhaps you could take a more unusual backup weapon like a whip or lasso.

    Special Swashbuckler Traits

    Swashbucklers can improve Basic Speed by four levels over its base value, instead of just two. They also get access to a bunch of exclusive advantages, all of which are on their discretionary list.

    • Armor Familiarity (1 point/level): Fencing skills depend on mobility, and take penalties to attack and parry equal to your encumbrance level. Each level of this advantage lets you ignore one level of that penalty, which means you can wear heavier armor.

    • Daredevil (15 points): When you take a real and unecessary risk while attempting something, you get a +1 to all related success rolls, and may reroll critical failures, taking the second result instead. This is a mixed blessing, because it also incentivizes you to take those stupid risks for the bonus. The example in the book is calling out a challenge to the sleeping dragon instead of sneaking around it. Not the best idea in the world but hey, you’ll get a +1 to all rolls in that fight!

    • Enhanced Time Sense (45 points): You’re so fast you can see the world in bullet time. You always go before everyone else in combat, and you’re too fast to trigger delayed actions from people who don’t have this trait. If someone else in the fight has this trait, you figure out initiative order amongst yourselves, but you both still act before everyone who doesn’t have the trait.

      This is an upgrade to Combat Reflexes, and includes its benefits. You pay only the 30-point difference to get it if you already have Combat Reflexes.

    • Every One’s a Critical (15 points): You have an expanded critical range for your attack rolls, and if you don’t like the result rolled on the critical hits table you can reroll it and take the second result.

    • Great Void (10 points): When you retreat in combat, you can step an extra yard away from your foe. The defense bonus for retreating remains the same, but you can cover more ground.

    • Rapier Wit (5 points): This works exactly like the Bard’s Song of Humiliation, but it’s not magic and you don’t need to sing. You can use the highest of Intimidation or IQ for it, instead of Singing.

    • Springing Attack (10 points): If you can Concentrate for a turn to brace yourself, your next attack will do more damage, and you can spend 1 FP to take an extra step during the attack, either advancing 2 yards or stepping forward and then retreating.

    Customization

    Swashbucklers are all about being very good with one weapon or a pair of related weapons. Therefore, weapon choice is probably one of your most important decisions when making one. It’s sure to be a sword, and for a lot of characters it’s going to be a fencing weapon. Those are super expensive, so you want to use your quirk points to get the best sword you can.

    Armor is usually a secondary consideration, as you don’t want to get too much and suffer encumbrance penalties when fighting. That concern goes away if you happen to take a non-fencing sword or if you get Armor Familiarity.

    Speaking of that, your possible choice of advantages is extremely broad. A lot of them are about fighting better, but you’re already so good to start with you could instead branch into being the party’s backup socialite with Charisma and a positive Appearance. And once you get tired of improving your sword skills to new and more ridiculous heights, you have enough DX to become a good understudy to the Thief, or even “multiclass” into that archetype if your GM lets you.

    The “This Ain’t D&D Section”

    The simple fact of the Swashbuckler being here is already a big difference! The archetype doesn’t feature on any core book for any edition of D&D, though it’s often present in supplements. Often the Rogue class ends up taking many aspects of it in core books, in more recent D&D editions.

    Stylistically, the two games are very similar here, since they draw from many of the same sources. DFRPG’s more granular melee combat rules again come in handy, as you can differentiate a Knight and a Swashbuckler very easily without having to introduce new abstract concepts like Pathfinder’s “Panache” rules.

    Swashbucklers are incentivized to use their very high skill and relatively low strength to seek out and exploit enemy weak points, so this is the profession you take if you want to be a sassy git with a rapier and replicate the effects of “new-school” Sneak Attack.

  • Sep 4, 2026

    Let's Read DFRPG Adventurers: Scout

    Scouts are very skilled at sneaking and tracking, and are as good or better than Barbarians at surviving in the wild. But instead of getting stuck in melee like Barbarians, they love to reach out across the distance between people and touch their hearts (with arrows).

    This is ultimately a very simple template, but it also does its job extremely well, and it’s likely to be your main point of engagement with the DFRPG’s ranged combat rules.

    Base Stats

    Scouts start out with ST 11, DX 14, IQ 11, HT 12. Their Perception is increased all the way to 14, and their Basic Speed to 7.

    Advantages

    All Scouts have Heroic Archer and two levels of Outdoorsman. The former cements them as the profession most focused on ranged combat, as it makes their archery attacks much more accurate and lets them shoot more often. The second is the same Talent the Barbarian gets, and boosts outdoorsy survival skills.

    They have a further 40 points to distribute among the usual stat boosts and combat-enhancing advantages, many of which are focused on ranged combat. Among then is Weapon Master (Bow), which further enhances their damage and rate of fire with bows.

    Disadvantages

    The Scout’s disadvantages mostly involve traits that make them antisocial loners, though a subset here makes them devoted guardians of the wild instead. None are mandatory - build your own dysfunctional personality.

    Skills

    Scout melee skill packages give you an option to use a sword or a spear with or without a shield, or a staff. Very Robin-Hoody. Your ranged combat skill, which is the one you’re using most of the time, is Bow at a starting level of 18.

    A lot of the mobility and perception skills that are optional for everyone else are part of the basic Scout package. Unarmed combat gets moved to the optional section, which also contains a bunch of niche exploration skills no one else gets, except perhaps for the Barbarian.

    Special Scout Traits

    Scouts can raise their Perception to 25, and their Basic Move by up to 6 above its base value. They also get access to these special advantages listed below. Like the Knight’s special traits, these aren’t magic: the Scout is just that good.

    • Heroic Archer (20 points): A normal archer can shoot one arrow every three seconds or so, if they don’t stop to aim. An Heroic one can shoot every turn if they make the skill rolls listed in this advantage’s description, and those rolls are much easier for Heroic Archers who are also Weapon Masters of the bow. They also get the benefits of aiming for a turn without having to do so, and can ignore penalties from crazy positions or acrobatics while shooting.

      This is so necessary for being a badass archer in GURPS that every Scout gets it automatically.

    • Multi-Aim (6 points/level): Every level lets you aim at an extra target simultaneously, both for the purposes of gaining accuracy bonuses and for setting up “overwatch” with Wait maneuvers.

    • Silence (5 points/level): You can move and breathe noiselessly. Each level gives +1 to stealth while moving, and +2 while standing still.

    • Strongbow (1 point): Every bow has a “rated ST” - you need to be at least that strong to use it, but you don’t get benefits from being any stronger. This perk raises your ST by up to 2 for the purposes of shooting bows, letting you use “stronger” weapons and deal more damage than your muscle mass would indicate. It does stack with other similar enhancements - for example, if you have ST 11 plus this perk and an elven bow, you shoot as if your ST was 15.

    • Telescopic Vision (5 points/level): You can “zoom in” with your naked eyes! Each level increase magnification, helping observe distant targets and also shoot them.

    Customization

    The book offers three sample skill and disadvantage sets here: a bounty hunter loads up on antisocial disads, tracking skills, and even a bit more melee prowess because not every hunt ends with a bow shot. A ranger has Combat Reflexes and focuses heavily on the ability to travel and protect the wilderness, with disadvantages reflecting this devotion. And the sharpshooter is an assassin who min-maxes their shooting capabilities.

    The “This Ain’t D&D” section

    People familiar with D&D rangers will notice that there is no “dual-wielding scout” build here - that’s very much a D&D-ism. The Scout is first and foremost an archer. This and the absence of magic in their templates makes them a close conceptual match to the Archer Ranger from D&D 4e.

    If you want nature magic, you play a Druid. If you want to dual-wield in melee, you take one of the melee specialist archetypes and buy the Ambidexterity advantage. But if what you want is to turn enemies into pincushions anywhere from near-melee range out to the horizon, no one’s going to do it better than the Scout.

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