HOL is an acronym for Higher Order Logic. It is an environment written in the programming language ML which allows for interactive theorem proving.

HOL stands for Human Occupied Landfill. It was published through White Wolf's Black Dog Game Factory divion (i.e., the game supplements they made where there was no doubt that this was meant for adults), through a subsection named, delightfully, Dirt Merchant Games.

It was published in 1995, and written (literally, by hand) by Daniel Thron, Todd Shaughnessy, and Chris Elliott, except for bits with the Wastem, which was apparently a concept of Glen Whelden.

While HoL does, indeed, rip apart just about every RPG known to man, it also pontificates on a very important point:

It's a roleplaying game, stupid. Feel free to make things up.

This in response to the upteen different gaming companies out there (TSR, WoTC, White-Wolf, Palladium, Steve Jackson Games) which will easily supply your need for 2 or 3 editions of the same game, spread across a billion different copies. Because you know, in your heart of hearts, that that money in your pocket needs to be in theirs. Several times over.

Or you could simply run with a cool idea and make up shit as it comes to mind. Be original. Do what comes naturally. React favorably to bribes from the PC's. You get the idea.

So the rules, powers, skills, and abilities in HoL run on a fairly "it's 3 in the morning and we had to fill these 5 pages, here's some ideas, make up your own as the need comes to you" type of thought process.

Not to mention that the entire book is hand-written.

The book opens with the "claimer":

    "THIS GAME WILL FUCK YOU UP. WE SWEAR.

    It will make you take drugs whose chemical composition is beyond the spelling capacity of this Author. You will begin a prosititution ring made up of fourteen-year olds and destitute nuns. Eventually, of course, you will most likely leap from the balcony of your local theatre with seven running chainsaws strapped to various parts of your body. There's a good chance it will be the matinee of BAMBI as well.

    So, if you feel like ending your days by becoming the center of attention in a big, hard, humming chair, please read on. And buy all the supplements too.

    Thank you for your time, worship the Antichrist, and have a nice day."

It's a family book, in other words.

The Settings is that this Intergalactic Evil Empire TM (Confederacy of Worlds, or C.O.W.), has sentenced your character, being unworthy of society, to a planet sized waste dump, there to live out the remainder of your meaningless existence as part of somebody's television show. Though you can still go to Church And Munch to get your sins forgiven and get a Happy Meal.

The book also suggests Patterson, NJ as a real life comparsion for the actual setting.

Doing things amounts to rolling 2 D6s and adding any applicable skills or traits you might have, and hoping the result is above 15. Rolling snake-eyes allows the Holmeister the wherewithal to dispose of your character immediately in the most amusing manner possible.

Damage involves charts which look complicated, but aren't.

Distances are labeled in terms of anything from "really not far" to "kinda far" to "really, really far".

Combat skills range from parrying to dodging to beating to yelling at an opponent "Holy Crap, what's that thing over there??"

Also includes rules, at length, for Crotch Soccer.

Stats are Meat (toughness and strongness); Feets (your ability to run screaming from the terror perpetuated upon you by the Holmeister); Mouth, which is your ability to cajole, whine, diplomacize, and just plain scream to get what you want; Greymatta is both intelligence and common sense; and Nuts is your ability to defy your intelligence and common sense in order to do something extremely stupid and death defying which may, in fact, work.

Skills run in a general list like Operate starship and chew gum at the same time, sudden philosophical tangent, languages and mumbled slang, make someone stop living with your fist, making sharp things go through soft things which scream and bleed (a personal favorite), making anything you say sound more important than the voice of God, Running blindly into eternal damnation (because you think you can win...the list goes on. You get the idea. We hope.

Find big weapons. Eat a Wastem before a Wastit eats you. Discover for yourself why HoL has no women, how to find your car in the parking lot of the local (only) Church-n-munch, survive the ravages of the Sodomy Bikers, and live to create another character. Or at least order out for pizza.

Or, of course, you could always just play Truncheons and Flagons

This game was out of print for a fair amount of time, but they finally acquired the rights and have begun publishing it on their own. You can find the site to order both the main book, and the supplement Buttery Wholesomeness, at http://www.cabil.com/hol.htm.

Hol (?), a. [See Whole.]

Whole.

[Obs.]

Chaucer.

 

© Webster 1913.

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