Lezentauw

Re: Dragons

Well, I'm biased... I'm starting an Iron Kingdomesque campaign and there, Dragons are few and far between... all descendent of Lord Toruk (not a god, but powerfull enough to give magic to his "priests", mostly Necromancy and Necrotech)...

 

They're all Unique and to give you an idea of the power they have, the "lamest" is, in D&D terms, CR 30.

 

Drakes takes the place of "regular" dragons...

I think that I am pretty close in that regard. Though for me even Drakes are extremely rare...

Torwards the end of my D&D days, I remember doing a run where the group actually wanted to go into a Dragon's lair to kill the foul beast. I tried to tell that that was a bad idea with me running the session, with the intent on them going after a Dragon. They insisted that their PCs could handle it, and that I would run the session in a manner that they would enjoy the rewards more. Unfortunately none survived. A couple of the players loved the outcome, and refused to let the session be retconned into a dream. A few of the players were a little more than upset.

Re: Dragons

I kind of liked Dark Suns approach. Only one true dragon exists. While I like dragons I cannot imagine a world with a lot them around. At least not unless it is a world with a high death total for every other species.

Re: Black Cloud (character art)

Sweet drawing

Re: Talislanta Hero [6E]

If you are interested in getting the PDFs for Talistanta, at least last I checked, you can go to their website and download them.

http://talislanta.com/

Re: Real Costs for spells and how you handle them?

More t the point - and far simpler - is that the mage can very easily render crossbow guy irrelevant. Who cares if your foe has a 2d6 RKA' date=' if you are invisible? Or Desolid? Or can generate a 10 PD barrier? While you can have a 2d6RKA, no ramge modifier, so you can kill him long before he gets in range. Or a 1/2d6 RKA AVAD, Indirect, so you can kill him at your leisure from behind your magical shield. Or a simple TK spell so you can lift him 50 metres in the air and then drop him Or more mundanely, just use magic to make him ineffective and use your [b']own[/b] crossbow.

 

Even if they are on the same team, if magic guy can do something as effective as yer standard fantasy fireball, crossbow guy is going to spending his time buffing his nails and pouting, unless magic guy is constrained in some way*: having extra points to spend on CSLs doesn't cut it when the other guy has explosion or area affect on his 2d6 RKA.

 

cheers, Mark

 

*In D&D, for example, they make him physically weaker, remove his ability to use armour and weapons and ensure he only has a limited number of charges per day .... and he's still generally more effective.

In my skill based magic system, I don't want AoE spells like fireball being thrown around constantly. I prefer for combat to remain personal. If I was to allow such a spell, I would require the spell to cost LTE, and yes I require all spells to cost END.

If you want to limit your casters in a skill based system, to the number of spells they can cast, make them use an END reserve with a reduced recovery rate. That will at least make them consider what they cast. Another solution, if you don't want to deal with End Reserves, would be to make all spells cost LTE. Not many people are a fan of that solution though.

One thing that I have seen for a lower end system, is to impose penalties for the amount of magic being sustained. If your mage is invis/desolid/or behind a magic barrier, you could impose a -2 to the skill roll of the next spell for each active spell. Or you could make the END cost the penalty to the next spell cast. That would make it harder for a mage to use every spell in his arsenal at the same time.

Those are some quick ideas, not saying they are the right asnwer...

Re: Campaign Building Blocks: General Musings

I will have to say, that this is the first time that I have ran into a Stat min for spells. It is not a bad way of doing things to increase the power of the default spell. I am still kind of leaning towards the Enhanced Success and Reduced Success options in APG for RSR.

I do like how you are using 3 stats for Magic Dalt. It is an interesting way to incorporate 3 stats, and yet use the default INT as the casting characteristic.

Re: Campaign Building Blocks: General Musings

I could see using PRE for spell casting if that's what you want. Personally I like EGO for that sort of thing if INT isn't going to be used. It gives EGO a bit more to do in a campaign that may lack a lot of mental powers and since I see EGO as a better representation of willpower or force of will or whatnot I think it's fitting. Just a thought.

The magic system I have created, I use Int to represent the knowledge and learning the spells. Then I used Ego to actually cast the spells, like as wolfe stated, it does have a better representation of willpower

Re: Companions of an Uncertain Fate

Well it is official. I have orientation this Thursday, and I start working on Monday.

Re: Campaign Building Blocks: General Musings

Ok, here's what I've come up with:

 

1) Campaign Standards and Power Level (This is based closely off of Nolgroth's current game. Credit goes to him)

 

100 CP/25 Disads

CHAR Range: 8-13 (start at 5, must be bought to at least 8. GM freebie +5 BODY so it starts at 10 to avoid random fatalities)

Speed: 2-3

CV: 2-5

DC: 2-9

Def/rDef: 4-8/2-5

Active Points: 10-45

Skill Points: 10-50

Skill Roll: 8-/13-

Something that I have thought of, is there a need to start everyone at 5, and then make them buy up to 8? Why not just have everyone start at 8 from the start, and give them 20 less points to spend?

- Luck Chit system, as utilized by Manic Typist in our last DC game, to help survivability.

I think a Chit/Karma system has some potential, though I have not used one in Hero.

2) Magic System (Inspired by KillerShrike's Vancian system)

 

-"Sorcery" pools with a predefined amount of active points per pool "level"

- Pool brackets must be purchased in progressive order

- Number of known spells is determined by [(PRE/5) +4]

- Progressively decreasing activation roll that burns END/STUN/BODY in that order by predetermined values (so if the caster had 1 STUN left, and cast a spell, the spell would burn through the rest of his STUN, and then BODY)

- New spells require a successful PRE roll to learn

Wondering why Presence is being used to determine how many spells can be learned, when Int seems like a more natural fit...

Perhaps it could be Int to learn, and Pre to cast?

Re: Companions of an Uncertain Fate

Well first of all, I was considering a monster campaign. As Sav kinda pointed out, my intentions looks to be changed due to a job offer.

On the job front, I do have a 'wiz-quiz' and lift test on Monday. As long as I pass those, I should have a job offer. The job being offered is a 2nd shift job, so my availability for gaming looks to be changing. Right it looks like the only good day may be Sunday, and I am not sure at how good that is. Sunday is always the last day for tests and projects to be turned in. The day shift during the week is not always the best, as that where I hope to do the bulk of my studying.

Oh yeah, with summer here, Saturdays are just bad.

Re: Not D&D

As an example of a published setting, The Wheel of Time comes to mind. The only supreme being is the 'creator', and there is no involvement that being. I really don't recall anything religious based in that setting.

Re: Companions of an Uncertain Fate

If you want the open table feel, then you can leave them.

I really do not mind them being only visible to the owner of the token though. If you were playing at an actual table, you are not going to see all of that information.

Re: Companions of an Uncertain Fate

No matter how you figure the skill rolls, the biggest limit is the skill roll maxima. Right now you have it at 13-. That is no different than what Valdorian age did. Here is the question you need to answer. What is the top percentage that you want people to succed their skill rolls at? A roll of 13- is 83.8%, 14- is 90.74%, and 15- is 95.37%.

When it is all said and done, the PCs and the NPCs are affected the same. You just need to find the top percentage that you want.

I think that there just have been a lot of high rolls, that you are seeing.

Re: Not D&D

Well the OP could take it to a point that is a bit further than most fantasy campaigns. There are those that say that the distinction between Fantasy and Science Fiction is pretty small. What would stop the OP from creating a Fantasy based campaign, where magic has become the new technology, rather than science? If most things could be explained in terms of magic, that would reduce the civilization from using 'dieties' to explain things they do not understand. And, that would push the campaign into a general direction that the OP is seeking.

I was watching something on tv about the Greek dieties, and that the people during that civilzation period would explain what they did not understand with the dieties. A good example of this was storms. Instead of saying that a storm was created by a diety, you could then say that when certain flows of magic collide, that the collision is responsible for the storms. These flows of magic, are also way too strong and wild to be controlled by any single or group of magicians...

Re: Anyone running any online games?

I just heard from Sav. He thinks that he should be able to make it around 7:30 to 8:00 CST as his daughter's last game is at 6:00 this week

Re: Malthesitic Fantasy Universes

The discussion of religious systems in RPGs make me wonder about campaigns where the deities are all hostile to life -- on other words, a Maltheistic universe where the purpose of creation is to create sentient beings so they can suffer or for some other evil reason.

 

There would likely be no good priest types, because they would serve evil gods. States that are actually concerned about citizen welfare might be smacked down by "natural" disasters. Divine Intervention is always hostile to the intents of humans. The afterlife, if there is one, is universally hellish for everyone regardless of their level of faith.

 

In such a campaign, the cards would be stacked against the PCs from the moment of their birth, yet they might still find ways to bring hope to the world. And if it is, in fact, possible to kill a god then trying ceases to be an evil scheme.

 

Thoughts?

I think in certain way, this is exactly how Dark Sun was setup. You had the Sorceror Kings, and the Dragon. They were in a sense the high powers of the world, and yes it can be ran as a pretty hellish campaign. As for true dieties, I don't remember there being any. Rather the priests got their powers from the elements.

Re: Anyone running any online games?

ALright I logged in and out as you requested

Re: FANTASY HERO -- What Do *You* Want To See?

On the magic system front specifically (since that seems to interest many folx):

 

--I've already added one, a really neat one that I think many of you will like and adopt/adapt in some fashion, that riffs off a suggestion that was sort of tossed out there in one paragraph of the 5E FH text (and that's still in the 6E FH text, of course)

 

--I've already added one that's an adaptation/genericization of the Tuala Morn magic system, which I think works really well for many campaigns

 

--I am considering adding some more, depending on how much time I have. In fact, I had to make a list of potential ones, since I had so many ideas! The two most likely at this point are (a) a system specifically designed for Low Fantasy/S&S games with minimal magic, and ( a sort of "psionics"-based system loosely inspired by Kurtz's Deryni novels. One that I've rejected is what you might call a "spell tree"/spell prerequisite system; I really wanted to do one, but it would simply take too much of my time, too much of Fred's time, and too much page space, so it ain't happenin'.

 

One of these days we'll probably do a "Book Of Magic Systems" that collects all the ones we've published between two covers (and updates/expands them as needed), so maybe some of the rejected/non-feasible ideas will find their way into that tome.

If you do consider adding another magic system, I would like to see your take on a skill based magic system. I have created one, and it definitely took some thinking out of the box to get it to work. I like how Tuala Morn's magic system used talents to determine how strong the magic a person could cast, just not sure how I would add that to my existing skill based magic system. I prefer skill based systems, as they usually tend to be cheaper, and that reduces the need to start out with high amount of points.

Re: Spell System

Another option is to simply leave it all costing END - which removes the "Oh' date=' we had one encounter and now I'm out of spells, we have to rest... in the middle of the dungeon..." issue common to D&D games. They have list of X spells prepared, some might have charges but most just cost END, so they only have X spells per encounter rather than per day.[/quote']

 

I prefer to only use charges to reflect consumable spell components. For the most part Endurance does the job good enough. If you feel that this would allow casters the ability to cast more spells than you want, then have them buy an End Reserve, and all spells need to go through that, and then reduce the time rate of the recovery...

Re: Anyone running any online games?

Ummm, ok Nolgroth, and here I was getting on to say that I cannot make it tonight as well. Looking forward to next week.

Re: 6th edition Min Str

I love it. More thought has gone into your weapon chart than into any official Hero weapon chart in the past fifteen years.

 

I always assumed the +1 OCV for swords had to do with their ability to both cut and stab, but I'm interested to see how your sword pierce maneuver turns out..

Correct the sword can be used multiple ways and to me it is one of the better weapons to parry with. So the +1 OCV helps with all of that.

I was reading that at the end of the Middle Ages, the armor was starting to make slashing weapons useless. So swords incorporated sharpend tips so they could stab weak points in the armor, and puncture the armor better. I am not sure how true this actually is, but it sounds good enough for me. It is the reason I am including the new maneuver, which will allow for swords to be better at handling high armored foes than an ax.

I wonder if you could get the same effect from a counterweight on the back of a single-bladed axe?

I may take this into affect, and modify the weights of the larger axes. They will either have a double blade, or can add a small hammer head to the back for the counter balance. I think the smaller axes are fine though without it...

Re: 6th edition Min Str

Other than looking cool and increasing the weight? Not much really...

I am looking for a semblence of realism, while at the same time leaning more torwards a form of balance and ease of use. You will notice that certain weapons are not on the list for swords, but you can just use the stasts of one of those listed easy enough. No real need to list every weapon, when a simple chart will do just as well. As an example, a scimitar is nothing more than a side sword. So you use the side sword stats, change the name, and move on...

Re: 6th edition Min Str

Ok, I have working on my FH campaign again. While I don't mind the weapon chart in 6E, I don't totally agree with it either. So here is what I have come up for a weapon chart. Right now I only have axes & swords done, but let me know what you think.

HTH Weapon Chart
Weapon   	OCV	DMG	Stun	STR	Wgt	Size	B/D	 Notes	
Axes
Hand Axe	+0	1d6	0	8	0.6	S	3/4	Thrown, #
Small Axe	+0	1d6+1	0	10	0.9	M	4/4	
War Axe         +0	1.5d6	0	13	1.2	M	5/4	
Francisca Axe	+0	1.5d6	0	13	1.2	M	5/4	Thrown, #
Battle Axe	+0	2d6	0	14	1.6	M	6/4	1 .5H
Great Axe	+0	2d6+1	0	18	2.1	M	8/4	2H
*Axe Spike	+0	1d6	0	+1	+.3	M	+0/0	AP, Back spike, #

Weapon   	OCV	DMG	Stun	STR	Wgt	Size	B/D	Notes	
Swords & Knives
Knife		+1	.5d6	0	6	0.4	S	2/5	Thrown, #
Stilleto	+1	.5d6	0	6	0.7	S	3/5	AP, #
Dagger		+1	1d6-1	0	8	0.8	S	3/5	Thrown, #
Rapier		+1	1d6	0	10	1.0	M	5/5	AP, #
Short Sword	+1	1d6	0	10	1.1	M	5/5	SM
Side Sword 	+1	1d6+1	0	13	1.2	M	5/5	SM
Long Sword	+1	1.5d6	0	14	1.7	M	6/5	1.5H, SM
Great Sword	+1	2d6	0	18	3.5	M	7/5	2H, SM

# = +1DC per full 6.25 STR above STR Min
AP = Armor Piercing, reduces rDEF by 1 per base DC of weapon. 
1.5H = +2 to STR min if used 1-Handed.
2H = +3 to STR min if used 1-Handed, for giant races.
Sm = Can use new Sword Pierce maneuver with this weapon.
Back Spike = A spike that can be added to the back of a small or war axe.

The Sword Pierce Maneuver is in concept right now. What the intention is to allow the user to sacrifice some of the weapons base DC for AP. The amount will be predefined by the ability, but this will allow for certain weapons such as sword to show their versatility.

Re: Dwarves, Elves and Hobbits Need Not Apply!

I really loved the Dark Sun setting. I still have the 2nd Ed boxed set and I think the 1st Ed boxed set is in my brother's garage.

I think that I still have both box sets for Dark Sun. I did not always get to play it when it came out, but it was refreshing to see a new take on all of the standard races. What was interesting to note, the new races were the cool races to play. No one really wanted to play a dwarf, elf or hobbit anymore. They were more interested in playing a Thri-Kreen, Mul, Half-Giant, or Aarakocra. Well at least in the groups I played the game with anyways...

Re: Anyone running any online games?

I wonder what is causing that. I don't remember Brad's getting that high