How To Play Mork Borg

How to play Mork Borg.

 

Hi everyone, this is a special how to play episode of Firebreathing Kittens podcast. I’m the game master for an upcoming session using the rules for Mork Borg. This episode is a summary of what I learned after reading the rule book. Hopefully this will be a handy guide for how to play for my players, will help me organize myself, and will be useful for you listeners, too, who are looking to play your own Mork Borg game.

 

I’ll organize this how to play guide into sections.

1. Game category

2. Combat rules

3. Zero hit points

4. Abilities

5. Magic

6. Omens

7. Building an example character

8. How to level up

 

Game category. Mork Borg describes itself as a doom metal album of a game. A spiked flail to the face. Rules light, heavy everything else. It’s set in a world driven insane by accurate prophecies foretelling the end of days. You’ll face goblins, trolls, and blood drenched skeletons. How will you react to the certain impending death of the world? By robbing graves for soil-stained wealth, or facing down the apocalypse, hoping it can be fought? You can play as character classes, such as the esoteric hermit, occult herbmaster, or gutterborn scum. Your character might be a nihilist, someone who stutters when lying, an inveterate bug eater, or maybe you’ll tap into the magic all around you and call down some arcane calamities of your own.

 

This is Mork Borg. A tabletop roleplaying game famous for its artistic rule book. Bright yellow, darkest black, blood red. I encourage you all to check out the rule book even if only from an art perspective. You’ve got nothing to lose because if you don’t like the art style, the creators offer a free bare bones edition that has all unusual layouts removed. It’s just black font on a white background. But that would be a bit sad. I first heard about Mork Borg from a conversation about which tabletop roleplaying game had the most beautiful rule book. Mork Borg and the spinoffs it has inspired are really something special. So if you haven’t browsed this rule book, give it a try. Maybe hearing this explanation of the rules will help smooth your experience. I dunno, let’s get into it.

 

Combat rules in Mork Borg. All the dice rolls in Mork Borg are made by the players. That includes combat turn order, players attacking an enemy, and when players are defending against being attacked. Everything. The game master doesn’t ever have to roll dice.

 

The word initiative means turn order during combat. A player rolls a six sided dice, also called a d6, for initiative. A one, two, or three means the enemies attack first. A four, five, or six means the players attack first. If there are multiple players, they all roll a d6 and add their agility modifiers. Higher rolls can act first.

 

Attacking an enemy goes like this. First, roll a twenty sided dice, also called a d20. Next, if you’re attacking with a melee weapon add your strength modifier to your roll. If you’re attacking with a ranged weapon, add your presence ability modifier to your roll. If the result is 12 or higher, you hit. Roll your weapon's damage dice, something like a d4, d6, etc. Lastly, if the enemy has armor, roll for the armor, which will be a d2, a d4, or a d6, and subtract the armor roll from the damage.

Defending when an enemy is trying to hit you goes like this. First, roll a d20. Next, add your agility modifier. If the result is 12 or higher, they missed you. If the result is 11 or lower, they hit you. Roll for their damage (a d4, a d6, etc). If you have armor, roll for your armor (a d2, a d4, or a d6) and subtract the armor roll from the incoming damage.

 

Rolling a twenty or a one on the d20 when attacking or defending are special. A twenty on the to-hit dice is a critical hit. A critical when attacking means you deal twice as much damage and the enemy’s armor or protection is lowered by a tier. A critical when defending means you get a free attack of opportunity. The opposite of a natural twenty critical success is a natural one critical failure, a fumble. Fumbling when attacking means your weapon breaks or is lost. Fumbling when defending means you take twice as much damage, and your armor is reduced one tier.

 

Enemies don’t fight forever in Mork Borg. If they’re at one third of their hit points, or if their leader gets killed, or half the group is eliminated, the Game Master will prompt a player to roll two d6. If the number is greater than the morale number of the enemy, they surrender or flee.

 

Those were the combat rules. Here is an example round of combat. There’s a prowler out, a lawless good for nothing crook banished from civilization. Low on resources, allies, and basic decency, the prowler seeks retribution, and coin. This particular one is a liar who enjoys stealing one single item from people to mess with them mentally, and they love getting the credit for other peoples’ exploits. All of those personality traits come from random tables in the rule book, which is a neat way to quickly customize your enemies. Anyway, the door to your inn creaks and the prowler pokes their head into the room where your party is sleeping, having gained access by lying to the innkeeper saying that they were a late arrived member of the party. The prowler looks around the room at everyone’s sleeping forms. They reach into a bag and remove a single item, just Keftar’s zweihander sword. The prowler smiles to themself and begins to creep out of the room. But before that can happen, let’s roll for initiative. One of the players rolls a d6. It’s a five. The players each roll a d6 and add their agility to determine their turn order. Keftar has a six and is going first, Brint has a five and is going second, and Vrakh has a two and goes third. Keftar’s sword is in the prowler’s hands, so the first thing Keftar wants to do is a strength roll to grapple the sword out of the prowler’s hands. Keftar rolls a d20 and adds their strength modifier. If it’s a twelve or higher they succeed. It’s a fifteen, success, Keftar wrestles their sword out of the prowler’s hands. Brint’s turn is next. Brint wields a whip, but when he rolls a one on the d20 dice to hit, Brint’s player roleplays that as meaning the whip is hard to wield in this small rented inn room. Brint raises the whip overhead, and it catches on a lamp. A natural one on the d20 means the weapon breaks or is lost. It’s hopelessly tangled in the lamp. The last player to act is Vrakh’s player, who fires their short bow. They roll a d20 and get a ten. Adding two from their presence modifier, Vrakh’s player whoops as they get a twelve overall, meaning Vrakh’s arrow hits the prowler. Vrakh’s player rolls a d4 and declares that Vrakh has done three damage. The GM knows the prowler is down from 8 HP down to 5 HP. They’re still above 3 HP, so they don’t ask a player to roll for the prowler’s morale check. The prowler lifts a filthy shortsword and swipes at Brint who is still tangled in a lamp. Brint rolls to defend, adding their agility to a d20. That’s a seven overall, below a twelve, so the prowler hits and deals five damage, leaving Brint with exactly zero hit points. Thus concludes a round of combat in Mork Borg.

 

What happens when a character has zero hit points in Mork Borg? Brint is at zero hit points, so this is a great example. Roll a four sided dice, also called a d4. If Brint rolls a 1, they’re unconscious but will wake up after d4 rounds with d4 hit points. If Brint rolls a two they’re going to lose a limb or an eye, and can’t act for d4 rounds, then after that regain d4 hit points. If Brint rolls a three, they’re hemorrhaging and will die in d2 hours unless they get treated. All tests are a difficulty rating of 16 the first hour and 18 the last hour. And lastly, if Brint rolls a four, they’re simply dead.

 

Thus ends the example combat for Mork Borg. Let’s talk about resting. First off, if you’re infected, you’re not going to heal at all when you rest. Instead, you’ll take a d6 of damage every day until you get healed. But assuming you’re not infected, and that you have food and water, then you can catch your breath to heal a d4 of hit points, and you can get a full night’s sleep to heal a d6 of hit points.

 

Every Mork Borg character has four stats. Mechanically, these modifier scores are what you add to or subtract from your d20 dice rolls. How do you know if the thing you attempted was successful in Mork Borg? Roll a dice, add your stat’s modifier to your roll, and if the number meets or exceeds the difficulty rating, you succeeded.

 

There are four abilities: toughness, strength, presence, and agility. Toughness is used for resisting poison, enduring heat and cold, and surviving falling. Strength is used when you’re striking with a melee weapon, grappling, crushing, or lifting something. Presence is the ability you use when aiming with a ranged weapon, perceiving things, charming someone, or wielding a power. Agility is what you add to a roll when you’re defending or dodging an enemy’s attack, balancing, swimming, or fleeing.

 

Here is an example of testing your ability in Mork Borg. You fall out of the window of an inn. The cobblestones below are rushing up at you. Roll a d20 and add your toughness modifier. If the result is twelve or higher, you pass. If the result is eleven, ten, nine, etc, you fail. For example, a fourteen on the dice minus one toughness is a thirteen overall. You’re fine, you land with a thud but stand up having taken no damage.

 

Magic in Mork Borg might be something your character is able to wield depending on which class they are. It’s present either as a power or a scroll. If your class can wield magic, then each day you roll a d4 and add your presence modifier and that’s how many times that day you can cast it. For example, if you roll a 2 and have a presence modifier of plus one, then you can use your scroll three times today. When you go to wield a power, roll a d20 and add your presence modifier. If you get a twelve or more, you cast the spell. If you get an eleven or lower, the power doesn’t work and the caster takes d2 hit point damage, and becomes dizzy and can’t use powers for an hour. If the d20 was a one, then that’s a fumble. If you fumble when casting magic, you roll on the arcane catastrophes table and one of twenty terrible things happen. It’s possible that the earth could decay around you like wet flesh. You sink three feet and cannot climb out without help. Clinging to you, screaming and biting, are d4 translucent, crayfish-like children with your face. Or it’s possible that a gnashing gap-toothed mouth splits open on your neck. It spits out your secrets and inner thoughts. And something the GM knows that the player might find out, is that it can be silenced to sleep only with blood. Or, as a last example, light itself despises you. If you gaze upon a candle, lamp, or torch, it goes out.

 

Omens. Omens are like the Devil’s Luck if you’ve played Pirate Borg, or Glitches if you’ve played CY_BORG. They’re a limited, daily refreshing resource you can spend to change the outcome of a dice roll. Your class will clarify how many omens you get each day or, if you don’t have a class, you get d2 omens. You can spend an omen to do one of five things. You can spend an omen to deal maximum damage with one attack, or reroll any dice, yours or someone else’s. You can spend an omen to lower the damage dealt to you by a d6. You can spend an omen to neutralize a crit or fumble. Or lastly, you can spend an omen to lower one test’s difficulty rating by four. This can really impact the outcome because the standard difficulty of things is twelve, really simple tasks are six, and nearly impossible tasks are eighteen. You can change that by spending an omen.

 

When you build a character in Mork Borg, you will either choose or randomly roll for a class, abilities, weapon, armor, hit points, and name. Let’s build a character together. Every character starts with a waterskin and d4 days worth of food, which rolling for it is two days of food. Let’s roll a d6 and two d12 dice for your three starting equipment. The dice show a six, a ten, and a twelve, so this character has a donkey, a sealed bottle that deals d10 damage once, and a tent. It’s optional in Mork Borg to gain a class. Let’s do that, since this is a demonstration. Rolling a d6, we’ll build the class called, six, an occult herbmaster. They begin with two d6 times ten silver, which rolling for it is eighty silver. They also get d2 omens at the start of each day, which for today is one omen available to spend.

 

Occult herbmasters are as tough as wood. They get three d6 plus two for their toughness, which rolling for it is ten plus two is twelve, which translate to a modifier of plus zero. Let’s roll three d6 each for the other three stats. Agility is a nine, which is also a plus zero modifier. Presence is a seven, which is actually a minus one. And lastly occult herbmaster strength is rolled at a minus two, so that would have been a fourteen but it becomes a twelve, which is another plus zero. Hit points and carrying capacity are both calculated from the strength modifier. Occult herbmasters have HP equal to toughness plus d6, so for this character that’s a, rolling for it, four. Only four hit points, oof, yes, this is a brutal game with high lethality. This character’s carrying capacity is strength plus eight normal sized items with no problem, so that means they can carry eight items such as a crowbar, lard, a scroll, or a torch, without problem. I guess a tent and a sealed bottle put this character at two. Or maybe the donkey is carrying the tent, not sure. Yeah, let’s go with that, that makes sense.

 

Anyway, continuing on the class page, the instructions say to roll a d2 for a weapon. That’s a two, a staff, a melee weapon that uses the strength ability and does d4 damage. Occult herbmasters also get a d2 on the armor table, so that’s a two, light armor, subtract a d2 from all incoming damage. This character is carrying a portable laboratory, and continually searches for frequently expended ingredients. Yeah, that donkey is definitely carrying the portable laboratory. It says every day, this character has the materials to create two randomly determined decoctions and can brew a total of d4 doses. If unused they lose vitality after 24 hours. Neat. There’s a table here for what could randomly get brewed. Let’s roll a d8 for today’s decoctions. A one and a six. The one is a red poison. The drinker must pass a toughness test with a difficulty rating of twelve or lose a d10 of hit points. Oof. The six is Fernor’s Philtre. It’s a translucent oil that must be dabbed into the eye. It heals infections and gives a plus two on presence tests for d4 hours. Neat. The class gives us one more thing. This occult herbmaster was, rolling for it, probably raised in an illegal midnight market. That ends all the things from that class page.

 

There are some optional tables on pages thirty nine to forty three, so let’s roll for them. This character gets two terrible traits which, rolling for it, they are shrewd and bitter. They have a physical impediment which, rolling for it, is that their face is resting maniac face, which makes it hard to make friends. They have a bad habit, rolling for it, they have a permanent phlegm deposit in their throat. They continuously cough, snort, and spit. They’re also in massive debt. The debt is being traded to successively more ruthless groups. The last instruction in character creation is, quote, “Name your character if you wish. It will not save you.” lol. There’s a table on the front inside book cover, so let’s roll a d6 and then a d8 for their name. This is Merkari, the occult herbmaster. Merkari has four hit points, a plus zero in toughness and agility and strength, and a minus one in presence. Merkari has a red poison and a Fernor’s Philtre, and also a sealed bottle that deals d10 damage once. Merkari’s donkey is loaded up with a tent and a portable laboratory. Merkari doesn’t have a lot of friends, partly because of their resting maniac face, partly because they’re a shrewd and bitter person, partly because they’re in debt, and partly because they continuously cough, snort, and spit. That’s Merkari.

 

Leveling up in Mork Borg affects three character aspects. You get more hit points, you find an item, and you change your abilities. To get more hit points, roll six d10. If the result is equal to or greater than your current maximum hit points, increase your max HP by d6. Six d10 is at least six, so the first time we level up, we’ll increase Merkari’s four hit points by a d6 for sure. Roll on the table on page 33 to see what item you find. It could be a scroll, or some silver, or nothing. You can use the scroll to cast magic, spend the silver on a better weapon, or get nothing. And roll a d6 against each of your four abilities. If the result is equal to or greater than your modifier, increase it by one. The max is plus six. But unlike most games where leveling up can only improve you, if your d6 is below your ability modifier, decrease it by one. If you roll a one on the d6, always decrease your ability modifier, to at most a negative three.

 

For players in the upcoming game session I will be GMing, you can triple your starting silver money so you can afford to buy a few things. We’re at ten percent of maximum power level at this time in the year, so that amount of money won’t be able to afford much, but it’s slightly more than a starting character. Also, you’re welcome to do one level up advancement, if you’d like. I do acknowledge that leveling up can decrease your ability modifiers, so you don’t have to if you don’t want to.

 

Hopefully this little rules chat helps my players build their characters and understand how to play. For everyone listening, if you’d like to hear an example adventure, the episode of Firebreathing Kittens podcast right after this is a demonstration of us playing Mork Borg in a oneshot game session. We invite you to listen to it to hear an example of Mork Borg in action. We encourage you to find the Mork Borg rule book yourself, and play a game with friends.