Lezentauw

Re: I want to construct, with as little fuss and bother as possible... At a 1 day creation time, unless you have a year or so off in between adventures, I doubt that you would see 47 scrolls of each spell. Besides, there is more than just creating the spell. You have to get the materials first of all, and you need to be able to set aside that time to create the scroll without distraction. If you want a rule to limit the amount of scrolls, there are a couple of things that you could do. The first option is to use the resource point method. Or, you could create some formula like say the total AP/10 of spells cannot exceed the characters EGO score.

Re: Dwarves, Elves and Hobbits Need Not Apply! I agree with you on that. I really like it when you give multiple cultures to a given race, each culture representing a different nationality of said race. The only issue then, is coming up with all of those different cultures. Of course if you have over two dozen races, trying to come up with 3-5 cultures each may be quite a daunting task...

Re: Dwarves, Elves and Hobbits Need Not Apply! I remember Talisanta as a player, as Old Man stated it was a mind-bender, especially for when it came out. If I was to be introduced to a world with a lot of strange races, the most important thing to me, is for each to have a fairly developed culture. The development of cultures and geography should cause the fact that not every race in the world be present in every country in the campaign. So even if you have two dozen strange races, if you are only dealing with 7 to 10 races at a time, to me it makes it not only more plausible but easier for everyone to grasp... I also lean towards the "every race and creature has a culture". While the creature's may be more simplistic, it definitely is more than walking meat waiting for a hunter to kill... On a side note. I read that Dark Sun originally did not have some of the 'standard' races. I would of loved to see that setting, in the original concept, instead of including the obligatory races.

Re: battle Wear vs. Town Wear As to Legendary Items, there are tons of reasons why a PC would be allowed to keep it at all times. Nobles will want to meet the person who got it and see it at the same time. Nobles will be rushing with titles to grant, as such a legendary person would be desired to be their fold. A rep would be attained, that perhaps common guards would be afraid to ask said person to not carry the weapon in, of course said rep would be balanced by a neg rep of people gunning for the item... Legendary items are kinda off topic though. When it comes to standard weapons and armor of war, it is very feasible for them to not be allowed to be carried by commoners in a town...

Re: battle Wear vs. Town Wear I am just not sure why you would want to play with someone you did not trust. The GM can cheat the PCs out of anything at anytime they want. But, what is the point in that? The whole point as like Nolgoth has already stated, is for the GM and Players to have fun creating stories... On the other spectrum of things, a player cannot have his PC going around and do whatever he wants and not expect to pay a price for any actions that go too far just because he is a PC...

Re: battle Wear vs. Town Wear

Re: battle Wear vs. Town Wear The reasoning for doing this, is like the scene in LotR at Helm's Deep. At that point you see Gimli, Aragorn, and just about everyone else donning the heavy battle armors... Kamarathin actually has a rule for wearing armor, that in a sense makes it so people do not run around in armor all the time. I will let Maya go into detail about it if he wants... Myself, I prefer the social repercussions, as there are times that I want the guards and pcs to have that armor on... To show to the pcs, that armor is not acceptable at a standard, you first have to explain it to them and the reinforce it with the npcs. I have the town guard with no armor on, the only time they put armor on is for patrols, and even then that is light armor. The battle armors just are not seen except in times of war. The one exception to this, is royalty. A knight or higher may be accepted to wear armor, but it is going to be next to impossible for them to move freely or discreetly. They will attract the attention of the lower casts seeking handouts, and it would be expected of one of that station to hand out some coin to the poor. An unknown knight showing up at a town gate, will have to present writs that he has the right to bear said armor. Those that cannot prove they have a right to bear said equipment, can either take it off or risk going to jail.

Re: Spells As Skills GA that is one of the reasons why I went the route of skill familiarities for spells as well. In my campaign, casters have to pay points for a perk just to cast spells. Then, they have to pay points for the skill to actually cast the spell, along with another skill to represent their knowledge and understanding. All skills are at the "school", or as I call it "source", level. I did not want to punish them even further by making spells expensive to purchase as well, even at the divide by 3 rate... All of this, more than makes up the favorable cost advantages for the ability to cast spells. All of the above, I do not see a sword wielder having to purchase. All they have to pay, is a WF for the weapon or weapons they chose to use... Since disads do not matter in the cost, I use them in a different manner. The level of casting perk determines how many disadvantages are required for you to cast spells. If you chose to do more, then you get bonuses to cast the spell. You could take extra time, put more END into the spell, and other standard troupes of casting... The only disads that I require are the ones that makes sense to the description of the spell, at no bonus. As an example, if you had 'meld with shadow', you need to have shadows around you to meld with with... In my campaign, I do not allow spells to cause more damage than weapons. Casters must pay END to cast every spell.. I do not allow AoE, without also having the caster pay LTE for it. I do allow for ritual magic, where multiple casters can group together to accomplish what one could not do themselves. I did a lot of this for flavor for the campaign. By doing this, I reinforce the necessity for armies and siege equipment... What does the caster gain? He gains versatility.

Re: Long Distance Communication Looks like the "age of sail" situation is the one that makes the most sense to me. I could accept a light beam to transmit data and communications, but they only travel at the speed of light. This would make communicating for help pretty hard, unless the other ships are in the same sector.

It seems when you watch most show set in the future, the ability to communicate is almost instant without any lag. There are those certain episodes where the ship is out of communication range, but for the most part that is a rare occasion. While I do like space opera shows, the ability to always be able to instantly communicate with home base, seems a bit more than far fetched. I am wondering, if anyone knows, what are the "accepted" methods of long distance communications.

Re: Campaign Guidelines Form? The only version I have is a PDF...

Re: Medieval Diet One thing to keep in mind. During that time it was very rare for an inn/pub to actually have their own mugs. Every person that planned to have a drink out, carried their own mug with them. During this time mugs were very expensive, as each was hand made. For the most part they were either pottery or metal...

Re: Fantasy Art Thread Here is a rough sketch that I did for getting into practice of drawing again. It may become part of a bigger pic...

Re: Need a good name for Mind Control magic Why not just Sorcery? There are plenty of examples in books and such not, where a character would state "What type of sorcery is this?" Those times are usually referring when said character believed he was being tricked by fowl magics...

Re: Harassing the GM, your stories! I use to play with this one player that I believe trumps all in harrassing the GM... This player/GM was notorious for harrassing people until he got his way. He made up rules to protect his interest at all times. If a new GM was taking their turn, he would remind that person that they have to present something for the 'majority' of the group. Somehow his interests were always a part of the majority. When he ran things, he reminded players that he needed to run things that he would be happy running, even though he never gave anyone else the same freedom. Well, one night one of the players decided to run his World of Darkness campaign. The GM had alterations to how things worked in the world as they were presented in the books. I assumed that it was a mystery, and that we were suppose to figure it out and fix the situation. The abussive player though decided to argue with the GM about how everything that has been presented was in violation to the books for over an hour, and that he needed to know why the GM was being a jerk and not following the books or explain to him what was going on, before he would allow the game to continue... Needless to say, I was one of four players that never played with that group ever again after that night...

Re: What if spells were like weapons? Hmmmm, interesting question. Though I will have to say that players are always allowed to come up with new spells of their own, in the same manner as others have created spells. To do that you can either just use the KS[Magic Source] or have another skill called Spell Research as others have suggested. Either one though I would modify the roll by the AC of the spell.

Re: What if spells were like weapons? Here is the basis to my system, that I refer to as a skilled based system... Channeler In my campaign spellcasters are called Channelers. They take the ambient magical energy and draw it into themselves, molding it into the form they wish to use and then expel it as a spell. This is a supremely difficult task, one that the vast majority of people cannot perform. There are a few that are born with the talent for such things, but even they must use foci, chants, complex gestures or any number of other crutches to properly massage the magical energy into the forms they wish. On top of this, not all Channelers are born equal. Some require more crutches than others, there are even rumors of those so powerfully attuned, that they do not need any. All potential Channelers must choose one of the Magical Aptitude talents listed below. • Magical Aptitude: Minor – 5 points o Must have a total of -2 points worth of Limitations on all spells. All of which must chosen at character creation. The limitations must be the same across all known spells. • Magical Aptitude: Major – 10 points o Must have a total of -1 points worth of Limitations on all spells. All of which must chosen at character creation. The limitations must be the same across all known spells. • Magical Aptitude: Superior – 15 points o Must have a total of -1/2 points worth of Limitations on all spells. All of which must chosen at character creation. The limitations must be the same across all known spells. • Magical Aptitude: Supreme – 20 points o Does not require any mandatory Limitations All potential Channelers must also purchase the Magesight talent as described in Fantasy Hero for 5 points. The above choices give you the ability to cast spells, but not the knowledge or actual skill to do so. To make this happen you must understand the following. All spells are formed into groupings, called Sources. Each Source has its own methods for manipulation and use, a practitioner of Necromancy casts spells much differently than a practitioner of Elementalism. So, for each Source that you are able to utilize you must have a Power Skill and a Knowledge Skill that is representative of it. • Power: [Power Source] (EGO based) – 3/2 cost structure (Represents the characters actual ability to cast spells from that school) • KS: [Power Source] (INT based) – 3/2 cost structure (Represents the characters knowledge of that school) Once a Channeler has determined which Source or Sources they wish to manipulate, the Channeler must purchase a Spell Familiarity for each spell he wishes to cast. These Spell Familiarities operate in the same way as Weapon Familiarities do and cost 1 point each. The Channeler does not pay points for the spells themselves, only for the Familiarities associated with them. Spells When building spells for your Channeler you must keep the following in mind. • No Spell may have the Reduced Endurance advantage • All spells must have the following limitations, over and above the limitation requirements for your level of Magical Aptitude. o Costs Endurance o Requires Skill Roll (-1 per 10 AP) o Side Effects When you selected your Magical Aptitude level you had to choose a set of limitations that represent your characters particular crutches for casting spells. These do not change, ever. They are ALWAYS applied to all spells that you know and they are in addition to the limitations listed above. Spells have no limit on their Active Point cost. Spell Casting In order to cast a spell, a Channeler must have the Spell Familiarity for it, or suffer a -3 to the skill roll. The Channeler must make a successful “Power: [Power Source]” skill roll after subtracting the AP modifier. In order to cast a spell without a SF, the character must have "seen" it cast before. Each step down the time chart from the time seen is another -1 to the skill roll. If the roll fails, then the Channeler will suffer the Side Effects listed for that spell. If the GM deems it appropriate the Channeler can also use his “KS: [Power Source]” skill in a complimentary fashion. The limitations on the spells can also be tweaked in order to increase the chance that the Channeler will cast the spell. To do this, the Channeler can add on limitations at the time of casting. For each additional -1 point worth of limitations, the Channeler gains a +1 to the skill roll. As always the GM has final say as to whether or not a given limitation is appropriate. The reverse can also happen. Should a Channeler find himself in a situation where a standard limitation completely stops him from casting or slows him down too much, he can skip that part of his routine. However, for every -1/2 of limitations removed in this fashion, the Channeler suffers a -1 to the skill roll. The GM has final say as to whether or not a particular limitation can be temporarily removed.

Re: How to do Priests use magic??? I use Favors in my campaign, though it is not what most people are use to when they think of Divine magic. Once a character has Favor from a deity they will need to pray to use that Favor. Something along "Sif, Mother of Battle, I beseach thee to guide my blade on the field of battle today so that I may achieve victory in thou name." A prayer like this would give the character some CSLs during the major portion of the battle.

Re: Mecha in Star Hero Do you have Ultimate Vehicle? There is a section just for Mecha in it, though I am not sure how that compares to Gundam as I am not really familiar with it...

Re: Large Creatures Versus Head Shots I don't use Dragons for my games, if I did it would not be pretty for the players. Perhaps I have misunderstood the rules concerning size differences. I only applied the rules for the difference between the two opponents. As an example, a giant attacking another giant would follow the same rules as two humans fighting each other. Though, I have yet to through anything at the players that was not of the same size as they were... I am not sure just hitting the dragon in the head would suffice for me. IMO the head would be the most protected aspect of the dragon, save maybe the inside of the mouth, nostril, ear or an eye. Now when you consider coupling the fact that most dragons that we think of are considered incredibly smart, long lived, and quick with its strike from its head. IMO I would not use the size modification in it entirity due to SFX, nor the hit location table as written. IMO, the archer is not trying to hit the dragon in the head, that would produce the same result as trying to hit it in the chest. He is instead trying to hit the dragon in the eye. That is no longer the same proportion, and as such I would probably not use any of the size modification to the ocv due to porportion and movement of the serpentine neck. If the archer was trying to hit the dragon in the mouth, I would only use half of the size modification (as I would consider the mouth about half the size of the head), and use the stomach location as the damage result. If you want the ability to one shot kill a dragon to be a legendary shot, then it still should be. Especially when you consider that in this case the sfx of the dragon defenses should overrule the game mechanic of the hit location table and the size adjustments. Now if that dragon was to look through a door, with the archer ready with a drawn arrow waiting for the dragon to do something stupid like that, all bets would be off then...

Re: Daily Art Findings Cakes has a serious ability to draw people with a pencil. Check out the two Lohan pics in that link...

Re: Need Vehicle Help: Star Wars I am not sure whose this site is, boardname that is, but I got it from these boards... http://www.sysabend.org/champions/campaigns/StarHeroWars/index.html

Re: Star Hero versions of Fantasy Hero races? a spork?

Re: Cyberpunk resources? You could check out the ShadowHero stuff at www.starherofandom.com/. If I recall this is Aroo's site...

Re: A question of getting into Fantasy Hero GM(s) and Player(s) The easiest way to speed things up for character creation, is to have racial and professional packages. While most experienced Hero players have no need for professional packages, they are IMO essential to the new player. Especially if that player has played a class driven system before. A character using an Elven & Archer packages may use up 1/2 of their alloted points right out of the gate. Then they would only need to boost some skills & stats, and they are done. If you could make a pregenerated list of psych lim's that may help also. The best suggestion that I have come up with for creating characters, is to have the concept of the character figured out prior to creating a character. That also includes all of the background stuff, as it will help out with disads. At your discretion, you could allow for "mystery disadvantages" as well. Some times people figure out how they want their character to be after they start playing.