Bismark

Re: Weapon poisons: show me what you use Now Old Man has got us back on topic after my earlier ramblings, here are a couple of obvious weapon poisons; they do, howver, have the disadvantage of not being available outside of tropical forests: 1. Curare, extracted from a large liana (vine) Potent muscle relaxant - just shuts you muscles down (basically the opposite of what the tetanus toxin does, and similar to what botulinus toxin does - 'flaccid paralysis' ). 2. Tree frog venoms such as Batrachotoxin - some frogs are not called 'poison arrow frogs' for nothing (although, given what uses the native peoples out them to, 'poison dart frogs' would be more accurate). Have a look at the following website - it has lots of gloriously unpleasant information (including structural formulae for the chemistry freaks [like me ] among us): http://www.kingsnake.com/toxinology/index.html

Re: Weapon poisons: show me what you use The bacterium that causes tetanus is actually killed by oxygen (which is of course a deadly poison if you don't have the enzymes to cope with it). The bacterium is usually found in the form of spores, which can survive exposure to oxygen (and can also survive boiling in water ) Therefore to get tetanus, either live ('vegetative state') bacteria have to get into a nice deep wound very quickly, or the spores need to get into the wound - when the top of the wound closes off the oxygen level will then drop low enough for them to germinate and do 'that nasty thing that they do'. Symptoms could be simulated by DEX Drain (the body loses control of its muscles and the spasming gets gradually worse), probably cumulative, leading to a complete inability to move as all the body's muscles attempt to contract at once (this can have really nasty side-effects like ruptured joints, torn ligaments and tendons, and even broken bones). Eventually the poor sap cannot breathe because, among other things, the muscles controlling the body cavity and diaphragm are merrily spasming away out of sequence . If you want the whole jolly story, here is a fun link: http://www.cdc.gov/niP/publications/pink/tetanus.pdf Now the Saxon (alleged) habit of tipping their spears and javelins with human manure opens a whole new can of worms (mainly the introduction of faecal coliform bacteria in to the poor victim's bloodstream). Now if the victim is well-nourished and in good physical shape, they will just feel distinctly unwell for a while and the wound will produce (as they used to say in the 'old days') 'laudable pus'; if the poor unfortunate is in bad shape the bacteria will have a merry time reproducing in his/her circulatory system producing a bacteraemia ("septicaemia") and chance of death within a couple of days is frighteningly high. The first case can be simulated with STR and END drains (if using Long-Term END, the ability to regenerate that will be severely compromised as well); the second case will be a bad case of 'what NOT to Drain' (STR, CON, END, STUN, BODY and even INT and EGO as the fever robs the subject of the ability to think lucidly). Cheerful, huh? Shallow wounds can be cleaned reasonably well - even unboiled river/well water is better then nothing for this, but [as MarkDoc said] it's the deep puncture wounds that cause the most concern as they are very difficult to clean properly.

The thread about PSLs and Hit Location (in the Hero System Discussion forum) set me thinking... It could be worse - if the Hit Location Chart was more 'realistic' and less 'cinematic' [is the head REALLY harder to hit than a hand or foot? - looking at the 'degrees of freedom' involved and the distances from the standard aiming point - no way]. The chart from Atomik FUZION a few years back had -5 to hit the head (and I think -8 to hit the hand); only 5 PSLs required there then... RuneQuest had 2 charts - one for melee and 1 for missile; the missile one had far too low a chance of hiting the chest (10%), but the melee one was the interesting one. In melee people really try to protect their head, neck, chest and (for want of a better term) 'giblets' (), and many blows end up being hitting where the leading arm or leg [particularly the thigh] would be (hence the popularity of shields and thigh armour or just big shields). As a result the head and torso only get hit when there is a catastrophic mess-up by the defender or staggeringly good (or lucky) shot/blow by the attacker. Alternative HLCs could be drawn up (if you are feeling adventurous ) to take account of this. Caution: If using a more 'realistic' HLC and wanting characters to actually stay alive, remember this: SHIELD BLOCK (where possible), WEAPON BLOCK (where shield blocks are not possible) or DODGE (if necessary). Also, you can use ye olde house rule of 'he hit you, but by less than the DCV bonus of your shield, and on a location normally covered by your shield, so he actually hits your shield [full on, doing normal rolled damage to it] - it may trash all but a really tough shield, but that is what they are for... Also, for head shots, a little bit of GURPS 'pirating' might be in order - give the head 1 point of internal DEF (one of the reasons firearms bods not using 'cannon'-type weapons aimed for the body rather than the head was not only for reasons of target size, but also because there was a very real danger of the bullet ricocheting of the skull and barely even affecting the target's ability to shoot back (especially if they were high on adrenaline - or PCP etc.). Anyone fancy the challenge of alternative Hit Location Charts? (melee with archaic weapons could really do with one)

Re: Limitations and the Silver Age Other silly weaknesses - the colony of Kryptonians that got isolated an which the LSH hero Mon-El came from; their weakness was lead (watch out for element transmuters - 'change costume to lead' -OUCH! - which was done by Element Lad in an LSH comic to a villain from said colony). Also, note how many incredibly silly Silver Age villains (like Metallo 'the man with the kryptonite heart') got revived in the mid-80s as comedy opponents for Blue Devil .

Re: TA: Wizards and Armor All the spellcasters in my campaign wear armour, and they all have an absolute minimum of 13 STR as well (the most recent spellcasters in the latest 'round' of my campaign - which are all 200pt characters - all have 20 STR ). The STR thing is just an idiosyncrasy of mine - I stat up all the characters for the players - and the players have grown to appreciate the extra STUN the STR provides, plus, as mages they lack the combat skill levels and Martial Arts that my fighters have [owing to a finite number of points to buy everything with], so when things go wrong and they end up in melee,every blow has to count and they have to be able to absorb punishment. The high STR also makes wearing serious armour a real 'goer' as it were. I use DCV (and DEX roll penalties where applicable) penalties for armour (typically -1 to -3 depending on the type), but allow a Manoeuvre in Armour skill (basically Penalty Skill Levels to offset the penalty), but with a limit on the number of those levels that can be bought (heavy armour like 'Plate + Chain' and reinforced mail will always have a minimum of -1 penalty to DCV, for example). The Long Term END rules are also used to prevent people wearing heavy armour all the time. The cost of spells and spell skills also prevents the mages from sparing points to buy down the END cost of their STR like ALL the serious fighters in my party do . Of course, when dealing with 'real armour', you can dial the 'realism' level to include such things as the construction of the armour (for example, it is much easier to do cartwheels in full plate than reinforced mail - the rigidity of the armour plates is actually an advantage in this case as it will not 'flop' everywhere). [Good] Plate is also severely underrated by giving it a straight 8 DEF - it is massively superior defensively even to reinforced mail [7 DEF in the rules as written]. As for stacking armour and force fields - that depends on the limits the GM puts on; for example, I made the force field Wizardry spell an 'advanced' one (meaning that you need to buy a certain number of points in Wizardry spells before you can access it). Given the fact that most of the party are not primarily Wizards, the extra point investment required (on top of the required Wizardry skill) is usually a disincentive. Necromancers have the easiest time as they can use Osseous Armour without having to go outside their chosen speciality (but that is OK as the only Necro in the party is a player who does not abuse the rules, and it makes the 'bad guy' Necros so much more scary). Despite some of the statements above, my 200pt characters are not totally OTT with fighting or magic as they usually have stacks of non-combat skills (I am always looking at published characters and go - 'why does he/she not have THAT skill when the concept means that he/she should really have it') and points disappear pretty quicky once you start stacking up the AK, CuK and other assorted Knowledge skills. Try doing a Steppe Nomad warrior sometime and count the skills that are required - scary. If players want to start off with magical armour to get around all the 'real armour' disadvantages, charge them points for it as if they were superheroes - that should make them think twice . Just a few ideas to mull over...

Re: Another Shotgun Question I'd like to see the ordnance range that the new Russian 23mm ( ) shotgun can fire... It's probably not practical, but I would like to see a HAFLA round

Re: Website recommendation: The Back of Beyond Miniatures courtesy of Copplestone Castings, I notice - in case anyone likes them and does not know this already [thought they might be, considering 'The Back of Beyond' is one of their miniatures ranges]. Nice Yetis - the dinosaurs are not at all bad either. There were some interesting articles in Wargames Illustrated a few years back covering Pulp-era conflicts in central Asia (oddly enough, titled 'The Back of Beyond'...) which might be interesting reading to any budding Pulp HERO GM's out there.

Re: Archery Ballistics Another thing to bear in mind with archery is that the payload matters as much as the launcher: light, bendy arrows (as used by a lot of steppe/eastern archers throughout history) are particularly bad at penetrating almost any rigid armour (and decent mail, or padded armour for that matter) at above short range, even when equipped with small AP-style heads (which they often were, to conserve valuable metal) and fired from an obscenely powerful composite bow. They will just shatter against iron/steel plate armour at short range. Load the same bow with a rigid, heavier arrow and see the difference... A side effect of this sort of thing is that light arrows are actually far too effective at stunning people wearing helmets in HERO - if the arrow does not penetrate the helmet, it should be a maximum of 1 STUN done as the arrow has neither the momentum nor the kinetic energy to cause appreciable blunt trauma in that circumstance (time to ignore the 'x5 STUN before armour' for head shots). In fact non-penetrating arrows will only cause noticeable impact effects if they are close-range or point-blank hits with heavy arrows (longbow arrows, Mongol AP specials, etc.). I encounter the above factors all the time in my FH campaign; eventually I decided that unless it was a point-blank hit, only BODY that penetrated the armour counted for STUN determination purposes.

Re: Valdorian Age world map (dear Mr Curtis...) Greyscale would be perfectly fine and dandy . Thanks for answering so quickly, given your recent move etc., etc.,

Re: Bizarre Spell Ideas My munchkin inner self has spotted something else potentially rather useful about this spell - it mentions living tissue as a defence. As it says nothing about unliving tissue - where are those pesky undead - "I'm comin' to get ya!"

I am starting a VA campaign soon and it occurred to me that it would be rather nice to have a colour printout of the VA map to put on the table (especially when I am trying to grab some new players at the beginning of the next academic year) The colour TA map I printed out from the colour bitmap that the 'map maestro' very kindly put in the 'free stuff' section of the website was rather effective at attracting attention last year (as the students were used to flashy colour RPG books like The Game That Should Not Be Named, a nice bright colour map piqued their interest). Therefore, I humbly beseech the master of all things cartographic to please, please, please (grovel, bow, scrape...) put a colour bitmap of Il-Ryveras on the website - I know it does not have the aspect ratio to make good desktop wallpaper, but it should look rather spiffy when printed in colour. Anyone else interested in this should join me in my quest

Re: Can someone satisfy my curiosity? Aside from the fact that the 'High Fantasy' genre is more popular than 'Swords and Sorcery', there is also the fact that the two most 'visible' S&S series are the Conan stories [to the general public] or Moorcock's Elric stories [to the fantasy book geeks]. Both of these settings have their own dedicated games (Conan and Stormbringer/Elric respectively) and the world backgrounds are either [quite- or very-] well covered by the materials for those games as well, so unless the GM or players have a violent dislike for the rules mechanics of those systems, they might as well stick with them. [There are also, of course the hints from Mongoose that they are licensing Fritz Leiber's Lankhmar setting - the third 'classic' S&S setting - for the new RQ4 game]. TA is pretty good as a 'pick-up-and-play' High Fantasy setting as it has a lot of info in it and most ideas can be put in there somewhere (there are obvious omissions race/culture-wise - but we are only dealing with one hemisphere of the planet, after all). It's also familiar to those who have played 'THAT OTHER GAME'. VA, by contrast, assumes a lot of background reading in the appropriate genre (note all the in-jokes in the street names of Elweir), and it covers, by default, one end of the S&S genre - the 'low magic' end. The world can be tweaked to a higher magic level, but still S&S, by setting the campaign earlier (dragon-riding Elves, indeed - wonder where the inspiration for that came from... ). The world is also nebulously detailed outside Elweir - if the GM puts in a lot of work, much can be done here (if you look carefully, there is a large mixture of cultures there which the GM can make use of - particularly on the continent of Pelosa), but it has less instant familiarity and playability than TA does. I am doing a VA campaign next academic year, but I am using the players I have in my TA campaign as a starting point, and running TA on alternate weeks. I have also tweaked VA a little to suit my own tastes (200pt characters, no Normal Skill Maxima [but with additional burdens on Sorcerors to compensate for this], and all the Skill Level restrictions retained). Last, but not least, there isn't a nice electronic (colour) map of Il-Ryveras on the HERO website that people can download, print out and show to prospective players [don't laugh - I got several of my current players based on them seeing my rather spiffy printout of Mr. Curtis' Turakian Age map] .

Re: Sectional Defences Inca bronze artifacts include medical instruments like trepanation knives (one was found dated c. 1400 AD) - oddly enough, this has become the subject of companies specialising in replica tools and weapons (e.g. http://www.aurorahistoryboutique.com/ahb.cfm?a=PA00002); as I mentioned, my original sourcebook has disappeared (probably temporarily - I need to tidy my place up); a brief mention turned up on a Missouri state university webpage (http://history.missouristate.edu/jchuchiak/HST%20350-Outline%208.htm) - I did a quick 'google'. The Inca empire was of course, absolutely vast (especially if you include all the subject and tributary regions), so I would be surprised if there were not notable tin deposits within its frontiers. About the only other metal-using pre-Columbian cultures I have come across are the Purempecha (called the Tarascans by the Aztecs) who apparently edged their wooden Maquahuitl-equivalents with copper rather than obsidian; the metal-using status of the Natchez (Mississippian) culture has been in dispute for a few years, I gather. I must stress that I work on some archaeological treatises but my main area of knowledge is the Mediterranean and Eastern Europe/Central Asia - I am just an 'interested hobbyist researcher' where other parts of the world are concerned.

Re: Sectional Defences If you want credible non-magical wooden armour - check out some of the Inca stuff. It's a bit basic, but was used for 2 specific purposes, both of which I will mention together because the construction method was pretty much the same: They used a circular shield about 1'/30cm (or slightly larger) made of planks of the 'ironwood'-type hardwoods found in that part of the world, and bound with bronze (they used bronze for helmets and weapons - including some rather nasty-looking axes and halberd-type weapons). Discs of bronze-bound ironwood (made the same way as the shields) were also used by upper-class warriors as armour (usually one covering the centre of the chest and occasionally one on the back), suspended by straps (I think they were leather straps, but as my book on the subject has 'gone walkies', I cannot check it). It is analogous to the leather-backed bronze discs used by various Italian tribes that fought Rome during the early Republic, but is probably better protection (ironwood is tough - it must have taking some heavy-duty lumberjacking to get it in the first place).

Re: Mediaeval 2-weapon fighting system - trawling for suggestions This particular martial art style is for dismounted combat only (dismounted combat being virtually a 'given' for 100 Years' War English knights and more common for French ones than is often supposed).

Hi folks While doing some research for my campaign the other day I came across an interesting mediaeval (mainly 13-14th century) 'martial art' - I class it as that because apparently few people were any good at it. This is the use of a demi-lance (cavalry lance cut down to 6-7ft length) in one hand and a knightly sparthe (1-H axe, in this case one with a spike on the rear) in the other, as used to great effect by Olivier de Clisson ('The Butcher') at the battle of Auray in 1364. While I have designed characters with 2-weapon fighting techniques before, they have mainly been swashbuckling types (like Temirese duellists for my TA campaign), so I am trawling for ideas here. The character using this will be used for Turakian Age, but I am also thinking of a VA variant as well. Things that come to mind include Weapon Bind for (for which the axe is useful). Obviously anything that makes the art useful against characters wearing typical 14th C. armour (brigandine on top of mail on top of arming doublet, bascinet helmet etc.) would be appropriate, but I am fishing for any ideas that might prove useful [not only suitable martial manoeuvres, but also the most efficient way of modelling the 2-weapon combat given that this is a standard 150pt Heroic character and is not a 'gamer' Martial Artist, but has to pay for all the classic knightly skills as well].

Re: The latest cliché? Well folks, I never expected this thread to run for this long. Respec' The latest development in my TA campaign is that the sneaky mage who always hides at the back was thinking of retiring (the player says that his character would be so unimpressed by the party's lack of tactical know-how that he would seriously consider leaving). However, since this particular game is going to change format next academic year (from a weekly campaign to an occasional 'episodic' style), and I am giving all the characters more points to raise them a power bracket so as to really differentiate this game from the VA camapign I will be running, the mage's player is designing a follower - an archetypal 'tank' "to show these amateurs how it's done". The only 'left-field' thing about this fighter is going to be the fact that he is a Lizard-man (well, his master [the mage] is a Serpent-Man, so it makes some kind of sense...). The new VA campaign is going to have some archetypes of its own, but they are 'mythical' rather than 'gamer' archetypes [including a Khorian warrior who is a direct rip-off of the Viking 'Brewmaster' archetype - magic healing booze anyone?]

While looking through an ancient tome (the 1978-vintage Swords and Sorcerors supplement to 1st edition Chivalry & Sorcery) I discovered a rather useful Viking archetype which would fit Valdorian Age adventures very well and increase party durability at the same time. This is the Brewmaster - someone who brews magic potions - but the kicker is that it is magic beer/lager/mead This archetype is not a very powerful as magicians go - basically it is a warrior with a useful hobby, so is brilliant for the 'Healing Potion supplier' kind of character without being too creepy and 'sorceror-like', plus there is great scope for amusing and genre-emulating side-effects ['yes, the potion will heal you, but you will be blind drunk for most of a day and have the mother of all hangovers afterwards']. The best bit is that one of the players who was ambivalent about playing anything other than a straight barbarian warrior for my upcoming VA campaign suddenly became very enthusiastic as soon as I mentioned the words 'magic beer' Must keep on digging through various 'barbarian' cultures to see if I can find other gems like this one...

Re: The latest cliché? BlackSword said: Been there, done that (I am ashamed to admit, in the case of option Oddly enough, I have put the idea to my players of running a Valdorian Age campaign for a while, and so far all their character concepts have been (a) sound and ( - by some fluke - perfect for producing a balanced party

Re: Alien Conversions The genetically-modifed being mentioned in my previous post was a feline - guess who got caught out by the forum language censor

Re: Alien Conversions If anyone wants to have a real challenge, try statting up 'Ixtl' from A.E. van Vogt's Voyage of the Space Beagle (also illustrated in Barlowe's book). [We are talking 'Galactic Champions-plus' power levels here...] Other van Vogt creations that might be worth working on are the Rull and the Ezwal from War Against the Rull, plus the genetically-modified '*****' from Voyage of the Space Beagle. From another source entirely, what about the Seltorians from Star Fleet Battles? [their ships look like mutant shaver plugs but they make a nice 'hive swarm' race].

Re: The latest cliché? The party make-up is definitely considered - but the players have a habit of choosing 'unorthodox' tactics (and not in a positive way). Last week they realised that they were trying to act like a standard party even though their capabilities were markedly different - charging into a ordered unit of Skeletons is NOT recommended if you are only wearing light armour, have no shield, and do not have an AoE melee attack (the character in question is fast enough that he could just have picked off one of the bad guys on the outside and then got out of the way, rinse and repeat...). I think that the player still acts as though another player (who departed 6 months ago) is still around - his character was a battle priest in double mail with an Axe of Cleaving, and could wade through lesser minions as if they did not exist, as well as having lots and lots of BODY and a very high CON, so he was incredibly durable. When the 2 front-line characters went into combat back then, the whole was definitely greater than the sum of the parts - the priest carved up minions and the other guy (a highlander Dwarf with an armour-piercing claymore) used to nail the leader.. The players who are not playing front-line fighters appear to have a much better idea of tactics and they have finally got their message through, so the problem has solved itself, but it took a while... And, for the record, all characters were designed by me to the players' exact specifications - I did not attempt to force them into any particular choices (sometimes their wacky character concepts are worth a fortune in entertainment value alone)

Have any of you come across the following phenomenon? The number of potential players I have come across of the last few years that seem incredibly keen to create characters that depart radically from standard archetypes has become so great that I wondering whether or not this is itself becoming a cliché... This can also cause party problems occasionally; no-one wants to play the 'boring tank of a fighter' but then the same people complain when the party 'front line' characters keep keeling over because they cannot cope with taking damage [fighters wearing heavy armour are apparently a 'cliché' ].

Re: weapon weights? In areas like this, it's the exceptions that prove the rule; there was at least one Mediaeval knight (cannot remember the name) who used a 2-handed sparthe [axe] with a head weighing in at about 19-20 pounds (9 Kg metric) ; this was, however, singled out as exceptional (it was a way to show how obscenely strong the guy using it was). What made things even more impressive was the fact that he used in it actual battles in the 100 Years' War. [As we all know, there is a world of difference between using a heavy weapon for a couple of minutes and using it for extended periods in a battle situation] An earlier example was the Syrian warrior 'Ahaz the Tall' (from early Crusades period), who had a spear/lance that one of the Knights who fought him (himself a pretty big Norman-type) could barely lift, let alone use, it was that heavy [unfortunately, the weight is not given]. I have seen 1-handed swords weighing in at 10 lbs/4.5 Kg, but these were practice swords for Mediaeval re-enactment; they were also deliberately awkward of balance. The idea was that when the people who had learned to fight using these things were given properly-balanced and weighted 'battle-ready' swords, they would think they were 'waving a wand around' (to quote a friend of mine who went through that training system).

Re: What I learned playing a cleric Battle priests with serious armour [7 DEF double mail ] and major-league weapons [1-Hex AE Greataxe of Cleaving ] a happy party make... (especially the party members cowering in the rear )