Trifletraxor

But a related setting!

SGL.

You know that when you are lying on the ground, attacking is Difficult. Why should modifiers for knowledge be more vague?

Because the body of knowledge is so vast that it is impossible to write down modifiers for all the possible things players may ask for?

SGL.

Man, I must say your setting and campaign have me tempted. I love that you focus on scenarios and campaigns and not loads of "handbooks" and rulebooks. The review of your stuff is VERY good, as are the C&C articles found in S&P. From a drought period where I had to make all scenarios myself, for a dead system, I now have lots to chose from. I've ordered "The Laundry" with its scenario book for BRP, Pavis Rising for MRQ and I'll get the new Sartar books for HQ. Being a glorantha and BRP fan, C&C should fall back in the que, but it certainly tempts me more and more. I might just go for it after my Hârn/Rome/Cthulhu campaign finds a suitable ending. Using drools to power the game of course (not a dead project, just slow!). Keep up the good work Cakebread & Walton!

SGL.

This is exactly the issue I have with a generic Knowledge roll. What is really important is how the GM feels about the subject, and this leaves the system open to abuse.

Just to clarify, do you mean that GMs not ready to make the GM calls would leave the system open to abuse by the players, or that the GM would abuse the system as he'll have to much control?

I am trying to address this with a neat solution that tells you what to roll and when to roll. Playtest will begin soon, and I am really tempted to make everything OGL and make the SRD available long before we "freeze" the rules into a published product, so that everyone can give feedback.

Looking forward to it.

SGL.

I don't know. I've never had it happen. I wracking my brain now trying to think of something that's not covered by a knowledge or other skill and can't. Can you?

There's no knowledge that can't be covered by a knowledge skill, but usually you end up with some generalized skills which you need to modify. For example if a character wants to know something about a troll god and has almost no prior experience with trolls, and wants to use his world lore or general knowledge skill. You would end up having to give him a hefty modifier, and this is often the case, as generalized knowledge or lore skills don't really cover everything to the same degree.

One thing that does happen is when I ask if they succeeded in a roll, they'll often say "Yes, I made an 'easy'" which sounds like a 'yes' but really means 'no'.

Sneaky!

Right, but then you're just replacing a list of knowledge skills with a single knowledge skill and a list of modifiers, which boils down to the same thing, in my mind.

Yes, that's exactly what I've done (except the modifier list, I just use easy, normal, difficult, very difficult and impossible as I see fit, as I do for all skills). I've allways used a lot of modifiers when the players call for knowledge or lore rolls. It's always been a question of "How likely is the character to know this?". That question has always been more important to me than the character's actual skill. Dumping the skills and reducing it to a modified INT roll boils it down to that question alone. It's a GM's call.

This doesn't get away from skills, but here's how we handle languages: We have a single skill called 'Languages'. Each PC automatically knows their own language, plus they can know one other for each full 10% they have in languages .

This basically eliminates the common language skill problems. I like it. I've removed languages as skills too, replacing it with a list of languages and a 1-5 number giving the degree of competency, but your solution is a good quick fix.

In theory you could do the same with 'knowledges'. For each 10% in the broad skill of knowledge, you could add another discipline you no longer have to roll for. If you want you could divide it into more than one category, too. You could have a single skill called 'Science and Nature' and another called 'Humanities', each with its own set of disciplines that could be listed beneath it.

That assumes you know 100% of everything within the disciplines you don't have to roll for. I find knowledge to be a bit too complex to be solved that way.

However, I'm in the "More Skills" camp rather than the "Fewer Skills" camp.

I know. I was there before too, but now I'm in the reductionist camp.

I can see the problem of having a situation where a knowledge skill is required that nobody has, but the same could apply to any skill - need to pick someone's pocket but don't have the skill - tough!

But you could still try! Modified sleight roll, DEX roll or whatever.

I am not keen on using a Knowledge roll as a way of abstracting all knowledge/science situations - it makes it a very powerful characteristic and means that the GM or the players need a list of modifiers for every situation. It's a very cumbersome approach, in my opinion.

I'd still say your background and the GM's evaluation of your chance of knowing the specific piece of information would be what's most important, not the actual stat itself, though a high INT would help. No modifier list would be needed, as no such list can be made for all situations. But the GM would be needed to make frequent judgment calls, which you also really need to do when you have a list of knowledge skills. Of course, you would need to be comfortable with this, but then it's a very quick and easy approach.

I don't, however, advocate replacing Lore or knowledge skills with INT rolls, because knowledge is learned and Idea rolls are for problem-solving. Know rolls make sense, but I don't like EDU because it's too generic.

I don't like the EDU stat either, as it adds to little to the game. I'd say knowledge would still be learned even if you use INT rolls. High INT would give you some higher chance of remembering a previously learned piece of information, but your background, education and training would still count more.

A PC with a high EDU knows everything and someone with a low EDU knows almost nothing if you rely on Know rolls, unless you introduce a lot of GM-fiat modifiers based on the character's background - and then you're back into flying by the seat of your GM-pants. Which is fine if you and your players are comfortable with that.

I'm not quit sure what the word "fiat" means, but I think that's what I'm suggesting. Flying by the seat of your GM pants!

SGL.

I've never played RuneQuest, so forgive a newbie's query ... but why would "Lore" be handled any differently than Knowledge or Science skills in BRP's Big Gold Book? I mean, Lore: Potions is the same as Science: Pharmacology, just a different genre. Surely a character could keep studying and "bone up" on such subjects to improve his skill levels over time.

Lores and Knowledge skills are pretty much the same thing. What I'm having problem with is the concept of knowledge as a skill.

My answer to questions like this about what skills to include/exclude is always the same: What do you imagine characters will do during the game? If they'll never use Mineral Lore, or even if they'll only use it once, why bother including it at all?

What do you do when you run into "knowledge" rolls for which there is no skill?

Lores aren't checkable, but when it comes time to roll skill checks, the GM will award checks to lores that would naturally have stood a chance of increase. Area Lores, for instance, would be granted a check if the PCs had spent a lot of time in that area. Animal Lore might increase if the PCs just completed a journey in the company of drovers.

That is a good idea.

We only use Idea rolls (intx5%) to simulate the power of Reason.

I've started rolling stat rolls on the d20, but modify the stat rolls as normal, difficult (half stat) and very difficult (need a critical roll). I've almost stopped using the idea roll to simulate the power of reason though, as my players started asking for it every time they couldn't be bothered to think for themselves.

I suppose if I wanted to use a characteristic to simulate lore rolls, I'd introduce EDU as a stat separate from INT and use that. That way someone could be foolish but well educated, or very smart but not necessarily know much about the world.

I don't think the EDU stat adds much. You can still have foolish but well educated and smart but ignorant characters using INT rolls. The foolish but educated guy would have normal or even easy INT rolls in all the fields that his education covered, while the smart and ignorant guy would have mostly difficult or very difficult rolls (at least in the areas in which he knew little).

But except skills, have anyone of you experienced with other ways of handling knowledge?

SGL.

Yes, I do see problems in it. This way, an INT 18 character knows almost everything in the Universe, which is not correct.

The INT 18 character wouldn't know everything in the universe, as the GM should modify the INT roll. Something the character should know would be an easy roll, something he would probably know would be a normal roll, something he could know would be a difficult roll and something he'd most probably wouldn't know would be a very difficult roll. High INT would be an advantage, but the background history would be what really counted. The GM would need to make a lot of "GM's calls" though.

but I will soon suggest (and publicly playtest) a new approach to the problem.

Please do!

I don't like lores as skills, as they're so different from all the physical, mental and magical skills. INT rolls modified by what the character would be expected to know suits my purpose at the moment. I'm pretty much using it the same way I used lores earlier.

SGL.

I'll be there! With my company of infamous norwegians!

SGL.

So, how do you handle Lores and knowledge? My first houserule back in the days was to allow improvement rolls for lores too - as knowing something critical for a certain situation would "stimulate" the character to learn more. Now I've dropped them all together. Former Lores I now handle as INT rolls, with modifiers based on how much knowledge the individual character would have on the general subject. Do you see any problems with dropping Lores as skills?

SGL.

Just got a copy from Chaosium (thanks Chaosium! )! Haven't opened it yet though. I'll handle it over to our western GM who handled the Aces High scenarios. Should kick-start that campaign!

SGL.

Seems like my problems are going away. After a near party wipe playing through the fist part of OpenQuest Savage North campaign, with only two characters barely escaping (with 1 HP left each!), the player of the most sociopathic character that got decapitated in the fights at Frosthold declared that he wants to play a "knightly" character next, totally opposite his former characters. The two who survived are currently under a charm by a priestess of a fertility/grain/healer goddess so they'll be on their best behaviour too, shellshocked from the experience and very happy to be alive.

SGL.

Handbryggeriet: "Triple Tiger" or "Aquevit Porter". Just amazing!

SGL.

Devil's Gulch is a typical town of the American Old West from 1870 through 1885. It is a collection of buildings set along a single dirt road with side streets where private residences are found. It features saloons, a bank, a general store, and a church. Most buildings are made of wood, though some boast of a brick addition or a stone foundation). Hitching rails are found in front of most buildings, and water troughs are set sporadically along the main street. Train tracks form one of the town’s borders. On the outskirts of Devil’s Gulch are mines, ranches, and box canyons perfect for hiding desperadoes. The cast of characters includes gamblers, gunfighters, a preacher, a blacksmith, and a nymph du prairie (that’s a prostitute to those in the know). If you make Devil’s Gulch a base of operations for your Wild or Weird West campaign, the players may be interested in taking on the roles already filled by NPCs. There are many players who would jump at the opportunity to play the town sheriff or even the established gambler.

The basic layout of Devil’s Gulch is suitable for an historical campaign set in the American Old West, but there are many suggestions included for placing the town in the Weird West. You can modify the setting even beyond the author’s suggestions: Devil’s Gulch could be easily transferred to a steam-punk setting in which the town is an outpost of the new British Colony on Mars; perhaps it is populated with humans and grays, and the real trouble comes from tribes of xenomorphs roaming the Martian landscape; or maybe Devil’s Gulch is an immersive amusement park created by an evil gunslinger with superpowers, just waiting to test his skills against your heroes! The town is a tool to use and transform as needed. Also included is a fold-out town illustration and diagram with major establishments identified. On the other side we offer a broadsheet touting Dr. Farnam's Astounding Medicine Show.

By Troy Wilhelmson. 88 pages. Published by Chaosium October 2010.

Nice!

Do you have any plans for a GM screen?

SGL.

No, my apologies - we were originally intending to add some in, but we ran out of room so we didn't provide any. I wonder, would it be something people would like to see? If so we could either make available on our website or in a future S&P - which would you prefer? It won't be very soon though (possibly not in time for your campaign, as we have multiple deadlines looming...). Maybe we could publish some of the Adventurers from one of our playtest groups?

Yes, some characters made for the start of the campaign available from your website would be very nice. My C&C campaign won't be starting this year, as I don't have any of the C&C supplements yet and lots of other stuff to play first, but with the quality shown in S&P and your focus on scenarios and campaigns, I'm very likely to purchase C&C and its full campaign later.

The more detailed the characters and their background history the better. I often find my players have some problems starting play in a new setting with new characters, as the characters are somewhat blank slates without developed personalities and they don't like to change settings. But detailed pregged characters made for a new campaign can fix that in a heartbeat and throw them directly into play.

Hi Peter!

Read through the scenario in S&P #83 and was wondering if that scenario with its premade character could work as a start for the Kingdom & Commonwealth campaign or if they were to high-powered? If it's not a good start, do you have some pregged characters for the campaign starting in the world book?

Also, do you have some introduction for the players to read through? A document of maximum 10 pages to get them straight into the setting?

SGL.

Are your players making their characters “evil, murder, hack & slash types” or are they just primarily concerned with accumulating power and min-maxing?

Their not "evil", unless that's what accumulates power.

How about asking such players to bring along a spare character "to avoid interrupting the game when the troublemaker is executed" ?

Hehe, I like!

3. Keep your PCs poor! Don't place big treasure troves in the game, and keep horses, armour, etc expensive.

I thought I'd try the other approach. They just got more desperate when the treaseure was low.

5. Keep the monsters and enemies dangerous. Don't pull blows in a fight. If they feel that every fight is dangerous they will stop picking them indiscriminately. If the dice declare that a PC dies - then he dies.

No problem. Killed one last session. 26 metre fall and godbye!

f this advice doesn't help, could you maybe provide some examples illustrating specifically where things went wrong and what you'd like to change?

Might be an idea. They're not stupid, so it might work.

We once had a similar player. Since his character's behaviour caused problems

for the characters of the other players, their characters finally threw his charac-

ter over board during a sea voyage and strictly refused to accept any new cha-

racter of this player as a party member.

Meavil!

SGL.

I think he means 'nothing more' ie the present or future tense

That was the intention yes, bit unclear.

SGL.

To just dip back to the original topic of this thread: "How do you think BRP is doing?"

I think it's doing great! Thanks to Alephtar Games and Cubicle 7, we have a steady supply of high-quality supplements, and the big fanbase produces monographs for a ton of different topics. Even if Chaosium did nothing, BRP is pretty much set.

SGL.

Clockwork & Chivalry is also supposed to have some new blackpowder rules.

SGL.

The Laundry now has its own discussion thread in the Supplements & Monographs section. Please continue the discussion there: http://basicroleplaying.com/showthread.php/2083-THE-LAUNDRY

Cheers!

SGL.

Many thanks Rust I think I'll go for Griffin Mountain.

I'd recommend going Borderlands has a nice link to Griffin Mountain, so you could chain them onto each other. The gloranthan classics are really great! Buy them all!

SGL.

Do you not like the one we're currently thrashing out in the (now rather hi-jacked) Alternative Experience System thread, then?

Oh... The discussion has moved far ahead! Yes I do like what I see!

Go the RuneQuest way. Have the players play within their social groups, and not as freebooters. They will have to adapt to their group's value system, or struggle to change it. In both cases, they will have to check their morals and behaviour in order to obtain what they want (more combat effectiveness).

That is a good idea. I'm currently on route to move them into the republic of Tharda on Hârn (which will in effect be Rome - so I'm going to use BRP Rome and Cthulhu Invictus for inspiration). The plan is to include more political intrigue, and maybe make them wealthy enough so that it's not longer a prime goal for the characters.

Hopefully you can find a way to give your players what they want while still getting what you want out of your games (it is, sadly, entirely possible that what they want to get out of gaming and what you want are incompatable - but hopefully you'll find a way to make it work. Good Luck!).

It's my old gaming group, and we've run some quite fun campaigns before. It's only lately I've had some problem with the motivations of the group, but it might be that character generation is done too quickly, so the players don't get into character enough, or it might just be a motivational problem from my side.

'Power' being not just POW, but any skills and such? A game-mechanic for traits which augmented their skills would be that sort of power. So then they'd want to go out and act in their chosen personality, in order to get it - wouldn't they?

Yes, but I still haven't found such a mechanic.

I would suggest trying to give them an emotional attatchment or relationship of some kind. An npc brother, sister, family member or wife or husband.

Something along the lines of what Paolo suggested. Sounds like a good idea, I'll work on that one.

You could also do something dramatic in lines of consequences for unwantonly violent behavior. One group I had killed peasants indiscriminately in the wilderness during their travels. They went to a village, were proven to be the killers, and they got attacked by mobs of pitchfork wielding peasants. They ran into a house, which the peasants set on fire and burned the PCs alive.

I like it!

SGL.

It does look like a mighty fine setting. And the best part: A linked campaign on the way with six 96 page scenario books!!? If this was BRP, it would be in my hand allready. As it's not, I'll wait for some reviews of the scenarios before I jump on the wagon. Very tempted allready though...

SGL.