Asterix d20?

[Jukashi]

Ok, I don't know how many people here would be familiar with the adventures of the Gaul, but I was going through my old possessions today when I found some Asterix comics, and the idea struck me; how would I turn it into an RPG?

The game would be set, of course, in the same era of the comics, which is the time of the expansion of the roman Empire. There wouldn't be much magic around; what magic does appear in the comic seems to heavily revolve around item creation, the main example being Getafix's strength potion. (Although, the description of it's effects is that they become "invincible", so there may be some hefty combat bonuses as well.)

And of course, with the lighthearted tone, the mechanics for combat would be changed, with characters merely becoming "beaten up" when they're defeated, rather than dying.

Anyone have any thoughts?

[Behold_the_Void]

The potion doesn't make them invincible, it gives them super strength. They have to remind Obelix of this fact several times when he suggests taking on forces far larger than he'd be able to.

While the characters all carry weapons, they rarely use them (Obelix being the exception, since the potion's effect is permanent on him he's never needed one). Basically, they're all warriors/fighters with hugely enhanced strength (enhanced constitution and possibly enhanced dexterity might also be worth considering) whenever under the effect of the potion.

Really, by the way the characters fight most of them have the Improved Unarmed Strike feats, as well as Superior Unarmed Strike for some of them. Makes sense since Gauls like to brawl.

Most of the Asterisk world can be expressed in pre-existing mechanics, or possibly with D20 Modern Past, which is designed for lower magic. Honestly, I'd make it a low-level setting, with 5 being about the highest level you're going to get (this would be for Asterisk and Obelix, who are probably two of the highest level characters in the setting). Most of the Gauls are likely above-average level (2-4), and the romans are low level but well trained (a good number of fighters, some level 2's, etc.).

[Jukashi]

The potion doesn't make them invulnerable. In the comic, this is differentiated from being invincible on several occasions.

The potion also seems to have an effect on speed, so there's probably a Dexterity bonus as well; this would also account for why they don't get hurt when using the potion - they attack first due to an increased initiative, and take out most of their opponents immediately thanks to their massive strength bonus, and then have some increased AC for those that remain. If you were feeling really generous, you could also let the potion give them some extra attacks per round.

Damn, that's one game-breaking potion!

There are other magic-like effects in the game; Cacofonix apparantly has Control Weather on his spell list. :smallwink: And of course there are other druids with other potions and such around. And in the 12 Tasks of Asterix, there was a quite powerful wizard.

Romans wouldn't be the only possible enemies; you've also got Warrior brigands, and the Warrior/Barbarian normans and goths.

Finally, you'd have a new weapon: Menhir.:smallbiggrin: 3d8 damage, requires Strength bonus of +5 or higher to effectively wield?

[Behold_the_Void]

Using a Menhir is an improvised weapon, probably.

The Druids are mainly focused on potion-making. There are a few casters, but not a whole lot and definitely not high-level uber D&D casters.

The question is though, what would you do for this campaign? Obviously you can't play as Asterisk and Obelix, and they're the ones that go on all the adventures.

[Jukashi]

That's just because they're the main characters of the books. The Asterix Game Books, which are of the ol' choose-your-own solo adventure type, have Justforkix as the player's character; and you could easily see side characters such as Cacofonix, Fulliautomatix and so forth having their own adventures if events conspired that way.

After all, with Asterix and Obelix out on adventures to distant locales the whole time, the other gauls probably do get their own stories; we just haven't seen them. So you could easily give some other characters an adventure. and of course, you don't have to use gauls; you could run characters who are british, corsican, egyptian, and so on.

Of course, then the characters don't get any magic potion, but these different locales might have their own local equivalent; for example, the british druid Valuaddetax made a potion that gave the drinker immunity to harm for a time (He actually said "immune to pain", but I imagine that includes not taking damage because I don't think he was stupid enough to put his hands in boiling oil just because it wouldn't hurt). So each home location, as it were, could have its own magical gimmick for the plaer characters to have.