In 1997 I wrote a fantasy role-playing game entitled Vox Draconis. It was heavily based, mechanically, on the Mentzer edition of Dungeons & Dragons Basic. In 2008, I released a “second printing” that was just the same thing in PDF form instead of a Word document.
Vox Draconis is the predecessor of what is now called Ingenium, at least in spirit. The intent behind it was to create a game that cut away all of the extra bits in AD&D and streamline the gameplay for a focus on story. In this, you could call Vox Draconis one of the earliest OSR games.
Over the past four years, while working on and eventually releasing Ingenium and, in a few months, Eiridia, I’ve learned a great deal about what makes a good fantasy game.
For that reason, I’d like to remake Vox Draconis. The best things about Dungeons & Dragons were its simplicity, its encouragement of role-playing and improvised solutions, and its attention to the three stages of a campaign: Origin, Adventure, and Ascension.
With Ingenium, I took character creation and boiled it down to Three Words. With Vox Draconis, I’m going to focus on the Three Phases.
Phase One: Origin
In the Origin of each character, there is a basic story to define who they are as they set out on the path of adventure. Character creation doesn’t tell that story, but it hints at it. Attributes at this point are less important than a concept, and for this reason, characters don’t start out with any attributes at all. They are entirely defined by three choices:
1) Race – Character race is a vital part of who the character is. As such, this choice is made first.
2) Culture – A character’s culture is important in Ingenium’s Eiridia, but it’s not a distinct game mechanic. In Vox Draconis, it’s a core part of character creation, and is the second choice made.
3) Class – The final choice in character creation, Class is the most familiar choice players will make.
Each of the three choices will grant the player a trait and an ability. It’s these six things that take the place of attributes, skills, and the other trappings of other fantasy games.
Following this quick character creation, the players take part in one or two short adventures. These Origin adventures bring the party together and, instead of the later Reknown form of advancement, reward their actions with their last set of abilities.
Phase Two: Adventure
This is what forms the first half of a campaign in Vox Draconis. During the Adventure phase, the characters are making a name for themselves, gaining power, wealth, and prestige. In addition to rewarding players for killing bad things and acquiring treasure, Vox Draconis rewards players for developing character personalities, interacting with higher-level members of their Race, Culture, or Class, and setting in motion plans for the third phase. All of this adds to Reknown, a more complete reflection of character advancement than traditional Experience Points.
Eventually, the party as a group reaches a point where they have gained enough Reknown to advance to the final phase of the campaign.
Phase Three: Ascension
In this phase, players encounter a more fleshed out version of the final levels of Dungeons & Dragons. Characters start building their own kingdoms, magic academies, thieves’ guilds, and so forth.
The Setting
Another thing that made the original Vox Draconis unique was its hybrid setting. It combined elements of Stone Age, Bronze Age, Tolkienesque high fantasy, and Howardian low fantasy. Barbarians in facepaint and loincloths went toe to toe with tyrannosaurs, and knights magically bonded to dragons fought demons from other dimensions.
In this upcoming revision, the setting won’t be dropped as I’d originally planned. However, it’ll be split out into its own entity, much as I split Eiridia away from the rules that became Ingenium. The lessons I’ve learned from Ingenium will be applied here. That includes releasing errata more frequently than once a year!