Fitz

Danny Devito. He'd be a natural

I've found that making magic cost long-term END, prohibiting 0 END powers, and placing major restrictions on the availabilty of END Reserves helps a lot with this problem. You can tailor the amount of magic you want your players to be able to use quite easily this way; if you find they're still acting as a one-man heavy weapons battalion, you can get rid of their END Reserves and/or make sure that all their magic requires Increased END. The only thing you have to do to make sure that these rather underhanded tactics are campaign-balanced is to ensure that the Bad Guys are labouring under the same restrictions.

Back in the days of the Raj in India there was a relatively common large-bore pistol in use generally called a "howdah pistol". The intended function of the weapon was twofold: first, to blow out the brains of your elephant if it ran wild, and second, to blow out the brains of a tiger if it jumped up on to your elephant. It was a double-barrelled break action (like a shotgun) and loaded .577 Express elephant gun rounds. At first, the same rounds as those used in the rifle were used, but it was soon found that their recoil was far too great for a handgun, and cut-down versions of the cartridge were produced specifically for the pistols.

I would suggest that you make a heading on a piece of paper which reads "House Rules and Clarifications", and beneath that, write "Physical attacks made by an imvisible character share the invisibility of the attacker except in the following cases: (etc. etc.)" And then give it to your players to read. I'm not trying to be cute or anything (OK, that's probably a lie) but I think it would be easier in the long run to handle it that way than to fart about with rule mechanics to achieve exactly the same thing. By the way: would this apply to arrows fired by an invisible archer? If not, at what point do the arrows become visible? When they leave the bow? When the archer releases the nock? When they hit the target? What about thrown weapons?

Hmmmm...... I think I like Lord Liarden's suggestion. (OK, Steve Perrin's suggestion). In fact, I think I'll try it. At least having the players roll their own dice might get them off my back about my stupendously high rolls all the time, and the cumulative +1 should help guarantee everybody some part in the action. Thanks

I've never been terribly fond of the Speed Chart and the mechanical effect it has on combat. Its only advantage, to my mind, is that it guarantees that a combatant with SPD 4 acts exactly twice as often as one with SPD 2. The big problem with it is that it encourages the sort of metagaming mindset which allows players to pre-plan their combats, to the grave detriment of the feeling of fast-moving chaotic excitement which combat should have. I've tried a couple of ways to get around this, to make combat less rigidly structured without doing away with the SPD system altogether. The first variation: Random Segment Determination , in which a d12 is rolled and those characters with SPD appropriate to act on that segment, or those holding an action, can act. This system was what I'd describe as a miserable failure -- it slowed everything down rtaher than speeding it up, and keeping track of passing time was a real pain in the bum. Second Variation: Random Phase Determination , in which a die is rolled each Phase of combat. Everyone with a SPD equal to or greater than the number shown, or those holding an action, get to act. When the die shows a 1, everyone acts, the Turn ends and they get their post-12 recoveries. This system was a qualified success, since it did speed things up and it was easy to tell who could and could not act in any given phase. Where it fell down was in the ratio of actions between combatants; because combats seldom go on for any great length of time (that is, the number of individual Phases is small), it's easy for low-SPD or even moderate-SPD characters to be left out entirely simply because of a run of high Phase-Determination Rolls. Over time, of course, the ratio of actions will inevitable stabilize, but who remembers how many times they got to clobber something in a session three weeks ago? Third Variation: Randomised SPD Bonus/Penalty : This is the system we're currently trialling. At the beginning of combat, everyone throws 1d6. A result of 1 means that character has -1 SPD (for that combat only), a 6 grants +1 SPD, and any other result indicates no change. Otherwise, the Speed Chart is used as per the published rules. This system has the virtue of simplicity, the down-side being that players have to keep track of which Phases they act on for 3 different SPDs -- their normal SPD, and one either side. We haven't play=tested this system for long enough to show whether it's practical or not, but I have an uneasy feeling lurking down deep that it won't really serve the purpose terribly well. Does anyone have any ideas any other kind of combat initiative system which fulfills the following criteria? 1) It must be very, very simple. 2) It must grant screen time appropriate to the character's SPD 3) It must be variable enough to provide a degree of uncertainty about exactly who gets to act exactly when 4) It must not change the system to the extent of removing or distorting the SPD mechanism completely 5) It must be simple. I mean it.

I'd like to see stats for generic siege engines, generic medievaloid shipping, camel trains, ox trains, and what-not. How much can an eight-ox wagon team haul, and how fast, and how far? I'd like to see guidelines on travel times in a pre-industrial society: for example, how far would a message rider be likely to travel in a day, as opposed to a huge 200-camel caravan? I'd like to see some in-depth examination of the likely effect of magic on a pre-industrial society. How would the existence of flying troops affect fortifications? How would magical scrying and divination impact on international relations? What about the impact of something as apparently trivial as permanent magical street lighting? In a similar vein, what about the implications of a world which is not merely interracial, but which might consist of perhaps hundreds of different intelligent species? What are the campaign implications of having the human race not be the dominant species? What about religion -- how can one go about creating a credible world in which gods are demonstrably real? What are the implications of having a milieu in which gods (and god-like creatures) physically appear and take part in the lives of their followers? How would this sort of thing affect the relations between secular and temporal rulers? How do you go about creating multiple gods, or pantheons of gods, without having to have your entire world erupt into permanent religious warfare? If it does, why would or wouldn't gods take part directly? There's lots, lots more that needs to be considered when creating a fantasy campaign, but now my brain hurts so I'll stop for a bit.