Looking for an OSR d20 chimera

So im thinking of running a game for some newbies and im in knots what system to run.
A hybrid is fine.

Specifcation:

Survivable 1st level characters.
Or, damn it, useless 1st level but everyone starts at 2nd

Epic10 ish - ie a low powered , low/mid magic world

Unified xp table

Milestone levelling (because i think that xp-as -reward doesnt actually work)

3E multiclassing concept

d20 resolution , mostly

A verisimmilitudonish approach to encumbrance and stuff

Quite fond of AD&D magic user spell hassle

No Minis

Setting: vanilla , bit could be sold on weirder if the rules support the setting


Notes
B/X too weak ( ditto the hacks) (?)
AD&D / 2E too baroque
3E too complicated (?)
5E too playercentric (?)
c&c dont like primes

Check out Beyond the Wall and Other Adventures by Flatland Games

Fighter d10, Rogue d8, Mage d6
Built to 10th level, iirc
Each Playbook* has own xp chart (but each class* also has a one/two page description)
D20 resolution, can be 5 save, or 3 save mechanics
Spells are different - ‘cantrips’ are cast on DC, and can be reused if passed. ‘Spells ‘ are things like fireball, but are leveled, and take a long time to cast. Rituals are in between. Different casters have different access to cantrips, rituals, and spells.
Vanilla setting, which is built out on chargen using Playbooks

Playbooks are your ‘character concept’. So things like Witch’s Prentice, Young Woodsman, Would be Knight (there are dozens). Then the class will sometimes combine fighter and rogue, or rogue and mage (mages are spellcasters, including healing, there is no separate cleric).

You roll on your Playbook to create stats, skills, spells, abilities, connections to your starting village, connections with other players. Everything you need is in the core book.

I really like the system, it’s simple, OSR ish, with some modernisms thrown in (ascending AC), but keeping the power level low ish, and reining in magic, etc. I think that Flatland Games has free downloads of some of their Playbooks so you can see what they look like.

They each work on their own XP chart, but if you’re using Milestone, it shouldn’t change much, they’re all pretty close together.

Interesting, but seems tied to save-your-own-village play rather than supporting freewheeling murderhoboism.

(Ive got shelves of 1E material)

NN said:

Interesting, but seems tied to save-your-own-village play rather than supporting freewheeling murderhoboism.

Click to expand...

The same system also powers two other games from the company: Grizzled Adventurers (experienced elderly heroes going out on adventures -- think Pratchett's Silver Horde) and Through Sunken Lands, which is a sword and sorcery take and definitely supports muderhoboism.

That said, other than multiclassing, Shadowdark fulfills most of your requirements. It's exceptionally easy to teach newbies, runs fast and lean, is easily compatible with pre-4E D&D and has an XP system designed to encourage murder hoboing.

Characters get XP based on how big of a treasure haul they find and then are encouraged to gamble that money on the carousing table when they return to town for more XP ... which means they again need to go out and find more loot. (It's the same gameplay loop as in the early Fafhrd & The Grey Mouser stories.) But nothing will break if you switch to milestone leveling instead.

You'd want to skip the optional 0-level funnel (I do, myself) and start characters at level 1 with maximum hit points and tell everyone to be careful. Survivability ramps up pretty fast from there, so long as everyone takes the game world seriously.

NN said:

Interesting, but seems tied to save-your-own-village play rather than supporting freewheeling murderhoboism.

(Ive got shelves of 1E material)

Click to expand...

Sure, that's the set-up, but the game (aside from chargen and the village focus at the start) can really go anywhere, including freewheeling murderhoboism (believe me, my group are dyed in the wool murderhobos). I usually run my games as sandbox hexcrawls, and the players are free to do whatever they want.

I'd also second Shadowdark as a very good system.

NN said:

So im thinking of running a game for some newbies and im in knots what system to run.
A hybrid is fine.

Specifcation:

Survivable 1st level characters.
Or, damn it, useless 1st level but everyone starts at 2nd

Epic10 ish - ie a low powered , low/mid magic world

Unified xp table

Milestone levelling (because i think that xp-as -reward doesnt actually work)

3E multiclassing concept

d20 resolution , mostly

A verisimmilitudonish approach to encumbrance and stuff

Quite fond of AD&D magic user spell hassle

No Minis

Setting: vanilla , bit could be sold on weirder if the rules support the setting

Click to expand...

Dungeon Crawl Classics is everything you ask but the multiclassing. While it's famous for being gonzo, it doesn't actually have a core setting and the rules are incredibly flexible.

NN said:

Survivable 1st level characters.
Or, damn it, useless 1st level but everyone starts at 2nd

Click to expand...

This is one of the hardest/easiest. Almost any TSR or OSR game has fragile 1st level characters, but simple house rules to mitigate death are common and easy to add in. Death Saves, Only Bleeding and Unconscious Until At -10, Starting HP = Con score, various Wound/Injury charts to roll on at 0HP instead of simple death, etc.

Newer games like Worlds Without Number or The Nightmares Underneath or Knave normally make characters a bit tougher to start out with.

NN said:

Epic10 ish - ie a low powered , low/mid magic world

Click to expand...

This is pretty common. Shadowdark, Five Torches Deep, Dungeon Crawl Classics, Shadow of the Demon Lord, and a lot of other games do this. Although DCC has a higher power scaling within that range, as I recall. A 5th level DCC character is usually substantially stronger than a 5th level D&D character, to my understanding.

NN said:

Unified xp table

Milestone levelling (because i think that xp-as -reward doesnt actually work)

Click to expand...

Unified XP tables are common in the newer OSR games which aren't actually just clones of TSR editions.

Milestone leveling would just be you telling the PCs when they level up, right? So it works with any game that's got levels. You just throw out whatever XP system the game comes with.

NN said:

3E multiclassing concept

Click to expand...

This is rare, IME. The Goblin Laws of Gaming allow you to mix and match class levels, though by the book you only get up to four class levels/templates. Shadow of the Demon Lord or the less-dark updated variant Shadow of the Weird Wizard apparently use a similar concept, though, where you choose a Novice Path to start out with, an Expert path at level 3, and a Master path at level 7, and are allowed and expected to mix & match.

NN said:

A verisimmilitudonish approach to encumbrance and stuff

Click to expand...

Does this mean you'd like a slot system, say, so encumbrance isn't just handwaved or a weight counter without consideration of where stuff is carried?

The slot system in the GLOG is pretty good. Knave 2E has a slot system, and injuries or fatigue take up item slots! Which I think is pretty elegant- as you get more tired or injured you can carry less stuff. Here's a neat location-based one from an OSR blog I found a while ago.

NN said:

Quite fond of AD&D magic user spell hassle

Click to expand...

How do you mean? Like having to memorize and being vulnerable to attack and losing your spells while you're casting?

NN said:

No Minis

Click to expand...

That's pretty easy. Most OSR type games are designed to support Theater of the Mind rather than battlemat combat.

NN said:

Setting: vanilla , bit could be sold on weirder if the rules support the setting

Click to expand...

Sounds like you'd like Shadow of the Weird Wizard better than Shadow of the Demon Lord, say.

I might suggest having a look at Shadow of the Weird Wizard, Worlds Without Number, and Knave 2E. Knave is actually classless, but that means you can also mix and match capabilities.