Barbarians of Lemuria

[Yora]

Barbarians of Lemuria is a relatively rules-light RPG aimed primarily at Sword & Sorcery campaigns. While it has its own setting, the rules themselves are an entirely generic game that works with pretty much any fantasy setting, as long as powerful spellcasting is not a major part of the game. For something like Conan, Lord of the Rings, or even The Witcher, the magic rules seem entirely serviceable. And it seems to have a really quite high reputation for Sword & Sorcery games.

Also, one of the earlier edition is free. The current one certainly looks much prettier, but I'm not sure how much the rules have been updated between them. Spellcasting was definitly changed, though. At just 23 pages, the rules in the free version are indeed quite brief.

I only had a first look at it yet, but it really looks quite simple.
For character creation, you first put 4 points into four attributes. Strength (strength and endurance), Agility (dexterity), Mind (intelligence, wisdom, will), and Appeal (charisma, persuasion, presence). 0 is the average, but players can also put one attribute at -1 to get another point to spend.
Next, you put again 4 points into four combat abilities. Brawling, Melee, Ranged, Defense.
Skills and classes are represented as careers. Again, you select 4 careers and distribute 4 points between them. If you don't put any points into a career, it has a score of 0. While a career with a score of 0 gets no bonus to dice rolls, it still indicates that the character has basic knoweldge of the appropriate field, which other characters might not.
Hit Points/Lifeblood equals 10+Strength score. At 0 the character is unconscious, at -5 he's dead.

At the end of each adventure, a character gets 1 advancement point, which can be used to increase either an attribute, combat ability, or career, or to learn a new career at a rank of 1.

Playing the game is quite simple: If you want to do something with an uncertain outcome, roll 2d6, add your attribute plus either your combat ability or career that is appropriate for the task, and reach a Target Number of 9 or higher. (The Defense ability is substracted from the attack roll of an enemy that strikes you.) Damage minus armor rating is the amount of damage the character takes on a hit. And that's pretty much it.

Magic I havn't entirely figured out yet, but there's four degrees of spells.
Cantrips are the most basic spells and cost 1 spell point.
1st Magnitude spells cover most uses of magic and cost 5 points, but can be reduced in cost by suffering additional limitations like long casting times or material components, to a minimum of 2. These points are recovered at the end of the day.
2nd Magnitude spells cover things that would be impossible for a person without magic. They cost between 10 and 6 points, which are recovered after a month.
3rd Magnitude spells are the most powerful rituals and cost between 15 and 11 points, which are permanently lost.
Since the amount of spell points you have is 10+Magician career rank, 2nd and 3rd magnitude spells are really expensive.

I quite like it so far. Has anyone played this game in practice?

[Thrudd]

The mechanics sound nice. I like the idea of powerful magic permanently draining spell points. I'd look into getting it.

[Chambers]

I saw the Kickstarter and wanted to back it but if I recall correctly it was a little pricey for the physical book level. It does sound like a pretty neat system though. I'll check out the free pdf's.