Custom Rules

Much of the North Marches is an amalgamation of rules and mechanics from various places, here is an attempt to put some of that down. The following rules are either adding to or modifying the rules of Green Ronin's Dragon Age RPG system.

General Rules
While the world is persistent, each session in self-contained. The party always start in the safe city of Brightwick, go out on an adventure and return home. If the party are still out in the wild when the session ends, they are presumed to have returned off-screen and will need to start from Brightwick again next session. Note: Dane is known to make exceptions to these rules.

Abilities
All abilities start at 0 and players have 10 attribute points to spend, one for one, to increase them. No attribute can be lower then 0 or higher than 3.

Backgrounds
While all the characters in the North Marches are human, there are a wide variety of upbringings so choose a background that sounds like it fits best and ignore if it tells you you are an elf, dwarf, or qunari. Also ignore the extra languages that come with that. Each background comes with a table of attribute increases and focuses, you can either choose to pick one result from the table or roll twice and gain those results (re-roll if you get the same result both times).

Classes
There are three classes to choose from (Warrior, Rogue, Mage) with opportunities to specialize your character in disparate ways as you advance. If that's not enough for you, or you don't see a specialization that fits, talk with the GM and try and work something out.

Each class comes with a starting hit point value, subtract 5 from that result.

Adventuring:
When a party returns to the safety of Brightwick, They have the opportunity to earn an XP for each of the following questions they can answer in the affirmative:
 * Did we learn something new and important about the world?
 * Did we overcome a notable monster or enemy?
 * Did we loot a memorable treasure?

Stashing:
When an adventurer is in Brightwick, they can choose to stash away some of their hard earned cash for their eventual retirement (hopefully)

For each 100sp you put away, check 1 box in your stash and mark 1 XP. Once you stash treasure, you no longer have access to it. You may stash valuable items as well as coin, even if you don't know how much they're worth: the GM will tell you how many boxes to check off after you've socked them away. If you die, your final score is the number of boxes checked in your stash box. Try to do better next time!

When you mark the last Stash box, you've saved up enough to satisfy all your worldly needs, or those of the cause which you are pursuing. Tell everyone how you spend your Stash and retire with the satisfaction of having lived to tell the tale.

When you start a new character from scratch after your previous character died, roll them up as usual. Then, for each Stash box you had marked off on your previous character, gain 20sp.

Writeups:
If a player writes a recap of the previous session from their character's perspective, they can qualify for extra XP.

Health:
After a good night's rest (a minimum of 6 hours of sleep, not wearing armor, with some form of bedding out of the elements, not restless), you may recover 1d6 + CON hit points.

If you have been hurt and have not yet received healing, someone else can perform a Cunning(healing) check (TN13). If successful, you may recover a number of hit points equal to the dragon die of the roll.

Mana:
After a good night's rest (a minimum of 6 hours of sleep, not wearing armor, with some form of bedding out of the elements, not restless), you may recover 2d6 + WILL mana points.

Downtime Activities
The world persists and time passes between adventures/sessions (usually a week or two). While in Brightwick, characters are skilled enough to procure a job that supports themselves with a place to live and food to eat but no extra income.

At the beginning of each session, the characters present have the ability to choose one activity that they have engaged in during their off time. If there is a cost associated with the activity chosen, the cost is payed and then the benefit is applied.

Town Upgrades
Various parts of the town can be improved or upgraded as a downtime action. This provides a benefit for all players, usually by unlocking new downtime activities.

Level 1, Cost: 100sp
This investment of time and money will establish a permanent business arrangement that will allow the apothecary to receive the ingredients for minor health potions.

Minor health potions will be available for purchase at the Apothecary in Brightwick. In addition to that, the following new downtime activity will be available : unlocks Apothecary upgrade Level 2

Level 1, Cost: 100sp
This investment of time and money will permanently improve the weapons smithy, allowing for faster and better quality production.

Characters can now purchase custom weapons, personalized cosmetically to the users liking (within reason) for a small additional fee. If raw materials are provided, a weapon can be created out of them for a reduced fee (e.x. an arming sword could be created out of a large chunk of red iron, giving the end result an intimidating blood red blade).

unlocks Weapon Smith upgrade Level 2

Level 1, Cost 100sp
This investment of time and money will permanently improve the armor smithy, allowing for faster and better quality production.

Characters can now purchase custom armor, personalized cosmetically to the users liking (within reason) for a small additional fee. If raw materials are provided, a suit of armor can be created out of them for a reduced fee (e.x. a suit of leather armor could be created out of a bear pelt, giving the end result a ferocious ursine appearance).

Unlocks Armor Smith upgrade Level 2

Level 2, Cost 500sp
A donation is made to the Temple of the Highest Six, expanding the small alter to heroes lost in the northern marches and their great achievements.

If a player's character has died while adventuring, all subsequent characters of that player have the following downtime action available to them. unlocks Monument of Heroes Level 3

Level 1, Cost 200sp
This investment of time and money will permanently improve the selection at Brightwick's library and pay for an intern, freeing up some time for improved study by the resident librarian-researchers.

Adds the ability to hire a better researcher during the "Research a Subject" downtime action. For 25sp, Choose a single subject or question, roll the appropriate lore (at a minimum of +4) and discover information about that specific subject. Only knowledge that is available can be gathered this way (knowledge that is unknowable or unavailable cannot be gained in this manner).

Unlocks Library upgrade Level 2

The Academy of Mages
Level 1, Cost 200sp

Being listed among the donors for The Academy of Mages, even as a minor one, has it's privileges. The cost of identifying magic items is halved to 25sp/Item identified.