Wild Homebrew Jam Winner: Reclaim Hyrule

Next in our series featuring the winners of the Wild Homebrew Jam is SirAston the Goron Bard’s new ruleset, “Reclaim Hyrule“!

While many Zelda games are focused around individual Heroes dueling monsters in forgotten dungeons, that isn’t always the case. Some games, like Hyrule Warriors, feature Heroes battling amidst massive armies; other games feature large army-vs.-army bouts in their backstories, or as a dramatic backdrop for important events.

To help your group incorporate that kind of experience into their game, SirAston created the Reclaim Hyrule ruleset. These rules serve to put Heroes into the fray of massive battles, where Commanders and their lesser lieutenants help direct their armies against one another. Such battles are won or lost by more than just the dint of any one Hero’s sword-arm – the Commander’s own tactical acumen and knowledge are what really stand between success or surrender.

Speaking with SirAston, he was able to share the source of his inspiration for this set of large-scale combat rules.

For gameplay inspiration, I mainly looked at the 4th Edition of Legend of the Five Rings and Monsterpunk. However, my true inspiration would probably be from a very unlikely source: The first edition of West End Games’ Star Wars RPG. It was a gift from my brother at an early age, and pretty much my introduction to the world of tabletop RPGs even though I didn’t realize it at the time, I haven’t really heard of both D&D and The Dark Eye at that time (note: TDE was and still is one of the most well-known systems in Germany, comparable to D&D’s popularity in the USA).

While I remember few things about Star Wars RPG, something always stuck with me since then: The advice to treat large-scale battles as a backdrop for the player characters, giving them opportunities to shine. That philosophy permeates through all of Reclaim Hyrule, letting player characters have a tangible effect via Acts of Heroism while supported by allies whose Ally Abilities will help, but not steal the spotlight.

I hope that Reclaim Hyrule will find use in some groups and that it will enrich their experience. If that happens, then my work has fully paid off.

To start including large-scale conflicts in your Reclaim the Wild game, check out SirAston’s rules here!