Adventurer Conquer King System Imperial Imprint (ACKS II)

[Acrux]

An updated version of Autarch's Adventurer Conquerer King system launched a Kickstarter campaign about a week ago, and it's already at over 5x funding. I don't know much about the system, but here is the original ACKS SRD: https://tkurtbond.github.io/ACKS/acks_srd.html

This is being reported by some of the more "based" websites around - I don't know if that translates to this system being any good or not, though.


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Friends,
As you know I have spent the last 9 months in a remote monastery atop a mountain in Greece* writing the 3-volume 1500-page Adventurer Conqueror King System Imperial Imprint (ACKS II). Today the time has come to Kickstart it.

This is my magnum opus; given its size and scope I do not imagine creating another project of such magnitude.** If you have ever enjoyed playing tabletop games with me, reading my writing, or otherwise are a fan of my work, I hope you’ll head over to Kickstarter to check it out. If it fires your imagination, please lend your support!



*Technically a breakfast nook near my kitchen but it’s marketing copy so exaggeration is permitted

*Until next year

[rusty_shackleford]

HQ approves of ACKS

Also, from what I know the game is quite good which makes libtards seethe because the author is very right-wing according to them, anyways. And not in the "boomer conservative" way.

[WhiteShark]

I haven't played it yet but I've been perusing his rules for warfare in Domains at War: Campaigns and they are very detailed. This guy conducted a war scenario with eight different factions controlled by real players inside his ongoing campaign. The winner also wrote up his experience here. The GM's writeup isn't amazing but it showed that the warfare rules seem to work and make sense in practice, though he admits he abridged them a little for the sake of newer players.

One big thing ACKS seems to have going for it is that the economy is wholly integrated and reasonable from the individual scale all the way to domain play. Apparently acquiring trade goods and then trekking to another market to sell them at a profit is totally covered by the game's procedures. The individual character mechanics also appear to be mostly compatible with B/X, so classic and OSR material can be used with little adjustment. I'm not personally a huge fan of how simple Basic-style characters are, but even so, there's a lot of good material in ACKS even if you're just mining it for ideas.

[rusty_shackleford]

(the real reason is they hate the creator's politics, obviously)

[WhiteShark]

I've been meaning to post this for a few days, but I discovered recently that Mr. Macris has a blog with some great stuff on it:

A Manifesto in Defense of Simulationism
The Philosophy of Simulationism
The Map is Not the Territory

The above three do an excellent job arguing that the real core and foundation of TTRPGs is simulation of a fictional reality and explaining why people enjoy that. Really good reads and the first I've seen anybody put it into clear philosophical terms.

What Makes an RPG Fun?

Strongly related to the first three, this one is about the necessity of (real) player agency to the enjoyment of TTRPGs.

Player Skill and Character Skill
Syngergizing Player and Character Skill

The above two are about the different ways RPG systems approach the player/character divide and the best way to unify the two. Probably not a new concept to an experienced roleplayer, but his synthesis is the most comprehensive I've seen.

On Wargs and Wolves
On Wights and Wraiths
On Orcs and Ogres

These three are about the nature of various creatures in Tolkien's universe. Apparently one of Mr. Macris' home games using ACKS was set in Middle Earth, so he did his research thoroughly. It's possible the above won't be new to a real Tolkien scholar, but all three had interesting facts of which I was unaware. According to the third article, Tolkien had at least 8(!) different theories on the origin of orcs in his world; I won't spoil the answer but I think Macris makes a good argument on which Tolkien would ultimately have gone with.

That covers most of the good written stuff on his blog. Unfortunately, at least for me who prefers reading to watching, he's mostly switched over to making YouTube videos now. He also has a philosophy blog of which I have not read much but the recent articles discussing historical pagan monotheism were interesting.