Old Man

Re: You practice what-o-mancy? It's more interesting to mix and match magic prefixes and suffixes. Necroturgy, thaumacation, evorery, sorcermancy...

Re: Imperium Romanum - A fantasy campaign Legend was a good Gemmell book. I read one whose title I can't remember, Quest for (mumble) or something, which I think was one of his earliest books; it sucked.

Re: A Thread for Random Musings A simple font change makes such a huge difference. OCR-A is wonderful. So is Sun Serif.

Re: The "Nice Happy" Thread Unless you're a doctor.

Re: The "Nice Happy" Thread Fixed that for ya.

Re: The cranky thread Try being sick, then getting only three hours of sleep per night because you've infected your 1-year-old who spends much of the night crying, puking, or both.

Re: Dealing with Stun, End etc in Fantasty Just about any GM running a Fantasy Hero game. Because in fantasy, BODY damage matters much more than STUN; attacks average half the power of those in Champions games; allowing armor stacking makes it really, really easy to make an essentially invulnerable character.

Re: Musings on Random Musings There he is! Where? There! What? Behind the rabbit? It *is* the rabbit! You silly sod!

Re: The Voice in Dune series Mind Control. Sorry, you can't do "Untie me, ungag my son, now kill each other please, thanks" as a PRE attack.

Re: The cranky thread No, a loaf of french bread.

Re: Musings on Random Musings Meggigag!

Re: The cranky thread I try so very hard to craft my emails so that they can't be taken the wrong way. To. No. Avail.

Re: Divide by Three /3 is little more than just using no framework, with a cost break. It doesn't fix the real problem of powers-miscosted-for-fantasy, and it introduces some serious granularity problems. The power difference between a 2cp spell and a 3cp spell would be huge. So I would start by dispensing with /3 and implementing x5, which is to say that the character would spend character points for "power points" at a 5-to-1 ratio, that are used to buy powers. This way they can buy about the same powers, but without the granularity that occurs when you apply -2.25 in limitations to your 30 AP spell, and then divide the result by 3 again. Then I would alter the magic skill to take advantage of this new granularity. The current system has two problems. The standard penalty is -1 for 10 AP in the spell, which itself is granular; spell AP generally stays within the range of 10-50, so spell difficulty tends not to be an issue. The bigger problem is that basing the penalty on AP overlooks the limitations. Why is it easier to cast a 20AP spell with no lims than it is to cast a 40AP spell with OAF and Extra Time 1 day? Basing the penalty on the real cost is more in keeping with genre conventions, IMO. (There is some potential for abuse this way, I know.) Then finally I would divide up magic skill. Instead of having one blanket skill roll that applies to everything in the mage's repertoire, the character might have to buy skills for each GM-defined magic "school", each of which has access to 8-10 of the available powers. So a spellcaster might be very good at Binding spells but less so at Finding. Magic skills would have to be cheaper, probably 2/2 or 2/1 depending on how restrictive the schools are. So this system would provide the cost break that magicians seem to need, yet improves on the original system by reducing granularity problems and providing incentives for casters to buy related powers for flavor.

Re: The cranky thread w00t, I just received the credit card bills for December! OMFG I really am boycotting Christmas next year.

Re: Running through the forest You know, when I see this thread title, I don't think Robin Hood. I think Little Bunny Fu Fu.

Re: Divide by Three On further thought, it occurs to me that the worst thing about /3 is that it's a glaring admission that power costs are out of whack in FH. If power costs need to be readjusted, would it not be better to adjust them individually? I've argued that certain powers are undercosted for a long time, while certain others are overcosted. Wouldn't it make more sense to admit that costs tuned for supers are wrong for fantasy, and adjust the power costs accordingly?

Re: Musings on Random Musings You can race, but no one will ever win.

Re: A Thread for Random Musings Fifty bucks for custom printed M&Ms.

Re: Divide by Three Yeah, the required tightness of the SFX is purely a function of the campaign. Were it a high-and-common-magic campaign, then tighter SFX would be justified, whereas such tight restrictions would be too limiting in a Western Shores-like setting. And then in a really rare-magic campaign, ECs or other cost breaks would not be justified at all. Well, I disagree to the extent that I don't see /3 altering character design except to the extent of giving mages a cost break. Certainly, but the cost of the advantage must vary depending on the nature of the campaign. An absurd example would be "Suppress all mutant powers", which surely should cost more in a supers game than in FH. You are of course correct, but since (IMO) magic wielding characters need a cost break of some sort, why not use a framework that helps avoid some of the game balance issues I've encountered?

Re: Dealing with Stun, End etc in Fantasty I would argue that plate armor is assumed to have underlying leather. Without it, the DEF of the plate is reduced, especially wrt STUN damage. Of course, historically this was not always the case. Lorica segmentata, IIRC, was not really padded, with just a double layer of linen tunic under it.

Re: Divide by Three Genre consistency depends on the subgenre, but my position has more to do with game balance. I am so sick and tired of people trying to duplicate Duh N Duh in FH. Go play D&D if that's what you want. As for special effect, I see no problem with "sorcery" or "priestly magic" as EC special effect definitions. You argue that the EC is a cost break like /3, and then in the next breath you argue that cost breaks for magic are arbitrary. So what you're really saying is that neither ECs nor /3 should be used? The point you are overlooking is that the EC is indeed a cost break, but the value of that cost break is proportional to the number of powers in the EC. The player is therefore encouraged to buy more powers in the EC to maximize the benefit. My perception of the genre is that spellcasters ought to be able to cast more than one or two spells, and so I like to incorporate a mechanic that guides character development in that direction.

Re: The "Nice Happy" Thread A pound a week is excellent progress, and is the most you can hope for if you want to both stay healthy and keep the weight off.

Re: The cranky thread I guess it could be worse, if it was your coworkers that were venting gas at irregular intervals.

Re: The cranky thread Just pour the excess on the two people you share the office with.

Re: Divide by Three Of course there is no reason to not have attack spells; your comment is disingenuous. ECs can be abused, but it's hard to do so, and at least the EC serves to nudge character construction in a genre-consistent manner. The problem is the combination of a poor genre player with a mechanic that does nothing to discourage him from being poor. He can indeed get the same character more cheaply with the EC, but now he is intentionally passing up the potential savings offered by the EC in order to keep his poor-genre character. It is inferior, because it is arbitrary and non-Hero, and does nothing to encourage balanced construction of magic-employing characters.