Chivalry & Sorcery Conversions for Hero?

[bigdamnhero]

Has anyone tried converting Chivalry & Sorcery over to Fantasy Hero? My Google-Fu seems to be inadequate. Don't care what version (on either end). Thanks,

[NuSoardGraphite]

Whats the setting for C&S? Fictionalized version of europe.

[Markdoc]

C&S is a horribly-designed rules-set set in the world of Merrie Olde Englande (and France) of King Arthure and his Rounde Table with vikings and tolkein-like races added in. It was horribly-produced as well - a dreadful gemische of different fonts in different sizes, and a spine that was apparently held together with baby-spit and hope. My copy fell apart after a couple of months and it lasted longer than most of my friends' copies because I handled it carefully. I had to rebind it with glue and heavy duct-tape.

 

That said, I just loved our C&S campaigns to bits and I still have the original duct-tape bound version 1.0 of the rules (and the companion that came out later) because it's very atmospheric, full of wonderful ideas and gaming advice and includes tables for any manner of things a GM might want. It was kind of a cult game when it came out, given the rather bland generic-fantasy nature of most of the competition at the time. It included sections on tournaments, courtly love, etc, plus a very atmospheric and grotesquely unbalanced magic system. It was obviously a labour of love for the producers, and shows that often atmosphere trumps mechanics.

 

It's hard to think of a game system better suited to conversion, honestly ... but I haven't done it myself. I have however, poached lots of ideas from it, including a magic system I used in my own Hero system games.

 

cheers, Mark

[Lucius]

C&S is a horribly-designed rules-set set in the world of Merrie Olde Englande (and France) of King Arthure and his Rounde Table with vikings and tolkein-like races added in. It was horribly-produced as well - a dreadful gemische of different fonts in different sizes, and a spine that was apparently held together with baby-spit and hope. My copy fell apart after a couple of months and it lasted longer than most of my friends' copies because I handled it carefully. I had to rebind it with glue and heavy duct-tape.

 

That said, I just loved our C&S campaigns to bits and I still have the original duct-tape bound version 1.0 of the rules (and the companion that came out later) because it's very atmospheric, full of wonderful ideas and gaming advice and includes tables for any manner of things a GM might want. It was kind of a cult game when it came out, given the rather bland generic-fantasy nature of most of the competition at the time. It included sections on tournaments, courtly love, etc, plus a very atmospheric and grotesquely unbalanced magic system. It was obviously a labour of love for the producers, and shows that often atmosphere trumps mechanics.

 

It's hard to think of a game system better suited to conversion, honestly ... but I haven't done it myself. I have however, poached lots of ideas from it, including a magic system I used in my own Hero system games.

 

cheers, Mark

 

I "poached" a magic system off it too. That was 20 years ago and I doubt I could find the notes, but here's the gist:

 

For every type of spellcaster you wants in your game, do NOT write up spells. Select a standard list of Limitations that they get for every spell, and figure out what those Limitations add up to: Some would come to -1, some to -1 1/2, some -2, on up to maybe -4. Some "schools" may have more than one possible value due to distinctions between the Limitations on Instant or Constant spells, etc.

 

Then write up a "universal" spell list of base Powers plus Advantages and perhaps some Limitations a given spell would always have regardless of who's casting it. For each spell, list what the Real Cost would be for a given Limitation value. This way you only have to write up each spell once, but you can quickly determine what it costs for any given wizard and how it works for them.

 

Now I'm tempted to try to implement such a system in Hero Designer, and I think I see how too...

 

Lucius Alexander

 

The palindromdary asks if I didn't mean "I think I see how to, too?"

[bigdamnhero]

That said, I just loved our C&S campaigns to bits and I still have the original duct-tape bound version 1.0 of the rules (and the companion that came out later) because it's very atmospheric, full of wonderful ideas and gaming advice and includes tables for any manner of things a GM might want.

 

It's hard to think of a game system better suited to conversion, honestly ... but I haven't done it myself. I have however, poached lots of ideas from it, including a magic system I used in my own Hero system games.

That pretty much sums up my thoughts. Horrible rules, but lots of neat ideas suitable for stealing. It's the latter I'm interested in, as I'm getting ready to run a low fantasy game set in "real" medieval Europe, so anything I don't have to reinvent is more time I can spend on plot & characters. I'd love to see the magic system you put together if you can find it?

 

For every type of spellcaster you wants in your game, do NOT write up spells. Select a standard list of Limitations that they get for every spell, and figure out what those Limitations add up to: Some would come to -1, some to -1 1/2, some -2, on up to maybe -4. Some "schools" may have more than one possible value due to distinctions between the Limitations on Instant or Constant spells, etc.

 

Then write up a "universal" spell list of base Powers plus Advantages and perhaps some Limitations a given spell would always have regardless of who's casting it. For each spell, list what the Real Cost would be for a given Limitation value. This way you only have to write up each spell once, but you can quickly determine what it costs for any given wizard and how it works for them.

Interesting idea!

[Markdoc]

That pretty much sums up my thoughts. Horrible rules, but lots of neat ideas suitable for stealing. It's the latter I'm interested in, as I'm getting ready to run a low fantasy game set in "real" medieval Europe, so anything I don't have to reinvent is more time I can spend on plot & characters. I'd love to see the magic system you put together if you can find it?

 

Well, it was all a long, long time ago, but I know exactly where to find it. It's in a big fat binder on my roleplaying bookshelf in the apartment in Copenhagen. I, however, am in another apartment Brussels (sorry, Mario, the GM is in another apartment!), and will be for some time

 

Fortunately, however, I reworked the system for another game, and those rules are online. Taking that, and what I remember, here's the basic structure. In C&S, magicians cast basic magic by creating an element (fire, water, earth, air) and then modifying with various aspects: Accelerate, Amplify, Concentrate, Intensify, etc. to make a wall of stone, fireball or whatever. In C&S, mundane things are resistant to magic, so to affect anything with magic, you need to make a Magick roll, which is opposed by the thing you are trying to enchant. For sentient targets, this is a simple 8- roll, unless they are skilled in magick, in which case it is a skill vs skill roll. So non-magick-users are almost always affected by magick, but a powerful magician can just shrug off magickal effects. For inanimate objects, there was a penalty to the roll, based off the Basic Magick Resistance of the target. It's so long ago I cannot recall the penalties, but the tables are in the book.

 

To simulate all that, I required magicians to use a VPP, with the limitation: Requires multiple skill rolls (-¾). The Magick skill is a a normal skill based on INT and is decreased by the difficulty of the spell (-1 per 10 active points) and it can be increased by spending experience on it. The VPP can only contain spells that the magician has learned (whether because they were taught them by their master or because they have learned them by research amongst ancient scrolls, from Devils, etc). This is a -½ limitation. There were other limitations as well, depending on what sort of magician you were (Wizard, Kabbalist, Alchemist, etc). 

 

VPPs are very flexible, but they are also expensive: it's hard to get enough oomph out of them to make effective combat spells in a typical fantasy game - particularly since a magician would need to invest quite a lot in skills. For a start, all those aspects mentioned above require skills. Not every magician will know all of these, but anyone who isn't a hedge wizard will know at least Intensify. Intensify is the Aid power. This is bought outside the VPP and defined as Aid to magical powers, any power, two at a time (+½), requires multiple skill rolls (-¾). It is possible to buy up the maximum on the Aid. Note that to Aid spells in a pool above the number of active points in the pool, the pool itself must also be Aided. Since the Aid can affect two related powers simultaneously, normally it will aid the pool and a single power. The Magician can use this Aid power to increase the power of his spells. But to change any aspect of the power (ie to add advantages), the Magician must make the appropriate skill roll: thus to add area effect to a spell, the Magician must make an Amplify skill roll. To increase the effect (ie: active points) of a spell, the sorceror must make an Intensity roll. If he wishes to do both, he must make BOTH skill rolls (that's why it's -¾). And so on and so forth.

 

Basically a magician can generate pretty much any spell he can think of, as long as he knows the basic power, but to build up sufficient magical oomph to do major magick, he normally has to spend several phases pumping up his VPP and the spell, and making an Intensify roll. Then he has to cast the spell by making a Magick roll against the target's magick resistance. In practice, this makes it easy for Magicians to do things like turn invisible, or Fly, but hard to directly attack people in a physical way. You are better off zapping them with a cumulative, invisible effects spell so that you can build up the effect, before they are aware that they are actually under attack (ie; a curse). Which of course, is exactly how medieval magicians are supposed to carry on.

 

There was a fair bit of other stuff that I cannot recall, but that's the gist of it.

 

cheers, Mark

[bigdamnhero]

Thanks Mark, looks interesting and reflective of the original C&S concept. It sounds like it would take awhile to resolve, tho - did you find it slowed down play much?

[Markdoc]

To some extent, yeah. Like any VPP you need a player who is at least capable with the rules, since they will be modifying things on the fly. On the other hand, C&S also had discrete spells, so you did not need to make everything from scratch.

 

So for example, the magician might have learnt "Zorch's practical conflagration" from a an ancient scroll: it's a fairly basic spell: create fire+amplify. He writes the spell in his spellbook. In Hero terms it is simply "RKA, AoE, explosion, 7.5 active points per DC" If he has a 20point VPP, he can cast a 1/2 d6 practical conflagration. If he intensifies the spell, and can squeeze another 2.5 active points out of his pool, he can cast a 1d6 practical conflagration... etc. Most spells are listed with either a simple cost, or a cost per DC so the question becomes "is my pool big enough to cast this spell (or these spells)?" If yes, cast away. If not, intensify until it is. If it's a cost per DC or dice of effect, the question is simply "How many dice of effect can I squeeze out of my pool?"

 

Since you could only cast spells that you know, the player would have the basic cost written down already, so it's not that hard to work out what the cost of the final spell was. If the magician wished to research an improved version of the practical conflagration - then he could do so ... and then write that down. So for example "Zorch's expanded practical conflagration" "RKA, AoE, Radius, 10 active points per DC". In general, magical research was something you did in your laboratory, not something you did on the battlefield.

 

Edit: with all of this dice roling, it usually took a magician a while to get a spell cast, but if they could do so, it was often a fight-deciding factor.

 

cheers, Mark

[bigdamnhero]

Edit: with all of this dice roling, it usually took a magician a while to get a spell cast, but if they could do so, it was often a fight-deciding factor.

That's the part I was wondering about; not the VPP mechanics per se, but Roll To Intensify, Roll To Cast, Roll To Hit, Now the Target Rolls To Resist... Just seems like a lot of rolls per phase.

[Markdoc]

That's the part I was wondering about; not the VPP mechanics per se, but Roll To Intensify, Roll To Cast, Roll To Hit, Now the Target Rolls To Resist... Just seems like a lot of rolls per phase.

 

Actually, it was more like:

First phase, roll to intensify

Second phase, roll to intensify again

Third phase roll, to intensify again ... and then roll to cast, then again to hit. At that point, your target rolls to resist, but if he fails (and if he's not a spellcaster he usually will) then he is normally ****ed. In truth, it normally didn't pay for a magician to cast attack spells like the practical conflagration, unless they were very powerful, because an ordinary archer could do more damage, faster. I just used it as a simple example. Instead they would use spells which their targets could not effectively resist, like a big area affect Flash attack, or an entangle, or petrify, so they only had to cast once to end any combat. But in general, C&S isn't your game if you want to play a combat mage. 

 

Not only is there a lot of rolling, as you note, but in most combat situations, any competent knight would slice your gubbins off long before you could get a spell powerful enough to stop him up and running. After all, Merlin was the greatest enchanter in the British Isles, and he spent his time lurking around in the background, offering advice, and helping the king sleep with other men's wives, not accompanying him into battle to cast lightning bolts.

 

cheers, Mark