Welcome

Welcome to the "House on the Hill", a four-hour freeform (or theatre-style, live action) roleplaying game for 34 players. It's set at the House on the Hill, a hotel situated just outside the small, fictional village of New Dunnottar, somewhere on the New England coast. What marks the game out is that it is two games running in parallel. Both games take place in the hotel, but one is set in the present day (2008) and the other 80 years ago in 1928.

You can play in either run of the game.

This Page

The aim of this page is to provide a brief introduction to the game and how it will be played. Unlike my other games, the background pages are quite small since there's no imaginary universe for me to describe. In fact, since the game is set in the "real" world, there are only three background pages:

• The Hotel in 1928
• The Hotel in 2008
• A short history of the Hotel

The remainder of the site is dedicated to the actual details of the game itself, namely:

• The Rules System
  • details of the very basic rules that will be used in the game, including how to go round beating people up (not that anyone would want to do that)
• Casting Information
  • information on casting and links to the casting form
• Costuming in the 1920s
  • costuming hints for the 1920s run (thankfully not written by me)
• History of the Game
  • details of how the game came to be

Characters

What you won't find on this site is your character sheet. In order to be cast, you will need to fill in a casting form. Please note that you can only be cast if you have already registered to play the game. To register, you must go through the organisers of the convention at which the game is being run. For more details on where the game is being run, please see click here. If you are thinking of playing the game or if you are registered but haven't yet read it, you should take a look at what to expect from my games and what is expected of you.

When you are cast, your character sheet will contain details on:

• who you are with a full background and character motivations
• what your aims and objectives are
• who you know and what you think of them

Players who are new to freeforms might link to click on this link.

The Rules

There are very few game mechanics or rules per se as the entire action will take place in the House on the Hill and consist largely of meeting people, talking to them and finding things out.

On the odd occasion when a character might want to do something that the player(s) involved can't actually roleplay, then the rules come into play. Basically, if you want to do something special, you will have a description on your character sheet that says what you can do and how you might do it. If not, and you think you ought to be able to do something, go and see a referee, who'll tell you what to do.

One area, for example, where rules are used is combat. Combat is, of course, frowned upon and not a good idea, largely because you'll get arrested!

However, if there is combat, then the rules are quite simple. If you want to shoot somebody then off you go. The referees would prefer it if they were there when you actually shoot someone, but in case of emergencies the basic principle is as follows. Draw your weapon, point it at your target and shout "Bang!". If it's not obvious who your target is, also shout out their name. If you have been shot, please fall over in a suitably dramatic fashion. A referee will decide on the extent of your injuries, but please remember, guns are nasty things and they tend to kill people.

Hand-to-hand combat is slightly more complicated. Each character will have a hand-to-hand combat rating of 1 to 3 (1 being your average man in the street and 3 being a trained killer). There are various bonuses for weapons, surprise, etc. If you're involved in a hand-to-hand fight, then compare your skills. The person with the biggest total wins. Simple really!

For a more thorough discussion of the rules, please click here.