The Legend of Zelda Adventure System

Aside: If you like ‘zines, you might consider backing “Silver Swords” on Kickstarter. They’ve hired me on to write an article for the first issue, and I think you’ll like what I’ve got brewing.

---

In 2012 I had a head full of dreams and a blog full of dumb filler posts that nobody should ever subject themselves to. That said, the seven people who did read my blog back then might remember the couple months I spent bloviating about a game called LOZAS. It was going to be my attempt to combine the first four Legend of Zelda games with OSR rules. It got as far as a 14 page rough draft before my Fear of Finishing™ kicked in, and I abandoned the project forever.

Anyway, I spent the last couple days redesigning the whole game from the ground up. You can download it as a pdf if you want, but I’ve also printed the entire text of the rules below.

I want to be clear that this is a completely theoretical game at this point. The closest I got to playtesting was asking my friends what they thought of it, then ignoring everything they said and typing it up in a way that felt right to me. I’m not presenting it as a finished product, but as a basic engine that I think could be interesting. I wanna play it and talk about it and make it better. Maybe if we ever get it up to version 1.0 I could write a second document with monsters and items.

Or maybe nobody will care, and maybe I don’t care as much as it feels like I do. Maybe I just needed to exorcise the ghost of all that pointless hand wringing I did back in 2012. Maybe I’m only saying this because I’m afraid someone will call me stupid, and I want to give myself an emotional escape route.

People are complicated, amirite?

The Legend of Zelda
Adventure System

This game depends on an experienced referee. One who is comfortable arbitrating the details of rules and worlds at the table. Rulings should be grounded in the logic of Saturday morning cartoons, so that a skillfully swung butterfly net can deflect a ball of magical energy, and places can have names like “Death Mountain.”

Basic Play

The referee describes a situation, the players make decisions about how they interact with that situation, and the referee determines the effects of their actions. Actions which are obviously simple or impossible should be resolved by fiat. If the result of an action is not obvious, the referee should ask the player to roll whichever ability check seems most appropriate. A healthy environment of back-and-forth questioning and negotiation will help everyone maintain a clear picture of the shared imaginary space of the game world without feeling cheated.

Ability Scores

Each character has their own Power, Courage, and Wisdom score represented by a number of six sided dice. By default each character is balanced between the three attributes, with 2d6 in each. If they wish, players may choose a “Strong” attribute with 3d6, and a “Weak” attribute with only 1d6. During play the referee will often ask players to test one of their three attributes. To do this, roll the associated number of dice. If any of dice show a 5, the action is a partial success. If they show a 6, the action is a complete success. If they show two 6s, they are a critical success. If they show three 6s, they are a mega critical success. It is left to the referee to interpret what these degrees of success mean in any given situation.

Classes & Leveling Up

Adventurers start with 3hp, and are able to add an extra d6 to any roll once per hour of play.

Sages start with 3hp, and are able to cast a magic spell once per hour of play. (See “Magic”)

Soldiers start with 6hp, and deal double weapon damage on a successful attack.

Whenever a Great Monster is slain, those responsible are illuminated by a benevolent gold light which increases their hp by 1.

Items

Each character may carry 6 adventuring items. Trivial things like rupees, keys, ropes, torches, and rations may be hand-waved.

Weapons available to low level characters deal 1 damage on a successful hit. Fortunate adventurers may discover weapons which deal 2 damage eventually. Weapons which deal 3 damage are legendary.

Armor reduces the damage a character takes in a single round by 1. Note the limit is “per round,” not “per attack.” Rare magical armors may reduce damage by 2.

Shields offer no passive benefit for merely holding them, but may be used to actively deflect attacks.

Other make up all manner of weird and wacky stuff for your players to find. Curious items should be the primary reward for any adventure that doesn’t end in slaying a Great Monster. They are the primary method by which characters gain versatility as they progress.

Adventure

The overworld is all grassy fields and beleaguered villages and spooky forests. Here the players can explore in any direction, and travel is generally safe enough that the referee can skip ahead to the next interesting thing they encounter. Scattered throughout the overworld are entrances to the underworld. Ancient temples and crypts where exploration is more limited, and environments are dangerous enough to require the player’s constant attention.

Monsters

Every creature that challenges the players should have some trick for defeating it. Most can be defeated without it, but discovering the trick makes the process easier. One creature might electrify itself to harm anyone who attacks it. Another could be heavily armored, but take double damage from its own reflected projectiles. Any creature without a trick should be able to talk so that parley can be its trick. An average monster has 2d6 in each attribute, 2hp, and attacks for 1 damage.

Great Monsters have many tricks, and much more hp than normal monsters have. They are sources of great evil which poisons the world around them, and live at the bottom of underworld dungeons.

Combat

Attacks are usually made with a Power check, though it’s not inconceivable that players attempting something risky might make a Courage check, or that players attempting something tricky might roll Wisdom. A referee’s obligation to be flexible in their responses to the players does not end when combat begins.

Death occurs at 0hp.

Magic

Sage magic is supportive and helpful. To use magic in a selfish or harmful way is corrupting, and frequently drives the magicians who cast it to villainy. There are four forms of magic:

• Knowledge: Enables communication, or the discovery of new information.
• Creation: Conjures simple objects. Nothing with complex shapes or moving parts.
• Movement: Grant movement to thing which normally has none, or enable a creature to move in ways not normally possible.
• Deception: Project illusions into the minds of others.

Spells are cast by picking one of the four forms, and describing a desired effect that follows from it. Magic is not an omnipotent force. The more simple and direct and local and limited a spell is, the better it will work. It’s the referee’s job to assess the spells Sages describe. They may determine the spell is not possible, and ask the player to describe a simpler spell. The referee might also choose to assess costs or risks for casting too-powerful spells. Perhaps they will drain the sage’s hp, or have a chance to backfire, or a chance to disrupt the ability to cast future spells during this session. Player and referee should make every effort to be clear about what they’re attempting, and negotiate spell effects with one another in good faith.