Baron Wulfraed

Until that Sword of Humakt beaks you in the knee 😱

Somehow... Lankhor Mhy

Where it gets complicated is the weapon type variations. The core critical statement (bolded in the book) is just (all extracts from pages 203-206) Under "Special Damage" one finds Impaling weapons: An impale does twice the weapon’s normal rolled damage. That is not 2xrolled, but roll+roll (given example: 1D6+1 -> 2D6+2) -- and then add any damage bonus (damage/magic bonuses are not doubled)... and weapon is stuck in target Slashing: The slashing weapon’s damage should be rolled normally twice and both results added together. Essentially same as impaling, but weapon does not get stuck in target -- but there is a later clause about "incapacitating" the target Crushing: The weapon damage should be rolled normally and the regular damage bonus for SIZ+STR (if any) should also be rolled normally. The maximum damage bonus from STR+SIZ, if any, should then be added to the result. Least effective -- if you don't have a damage bonus, you gain nothing from a crush. (The critical at least gets you maximum damage vs rolled) Summarized in the sidebar on page 203.

Using the Kopis as your example was probably the worst comparison you could choose. The Kopis is Single edged, on inside of curve Curved (drop point, fat belly) In contrast, most of the other swords are Double-edged Straight (or at worst, leaf shaped) Nearest kin to the Kopis is a falcata or Gurkha Kukri, maybe a machete -- pretty much a chopping weapon. Scimitars are longer, and curved in the other direction, optimized for slashing cuts. In contrast, the khopesh has the cutting edge on the outside of the curve, and does not have a "fat belly" The short sword, while double-edged for "hacking", is also optimized for close combat thrusting. Broadswords, OTOH, aren't really thrusting weapons due to the length/mass, for the most part being chop/hack (difficult to even do a proper "slash" without breaking at the wrist -- the scimitar curve keeps the cutting edge in contact without breaking at the wrist). A scimitar skill might be transferable to a khopesh, though the balance is likely much different. Let's not mention the rapier -- which is mainly a thrusting weapon with just enough edge to allow for some "hacking", but not enough mass to do much real damage from the side. Rapier hilts also tend to be designed with a "handedness" -- you just can't swap hands with a rapier; the hilt/guard won't fit around the off hand. You can't "back-hand" a Kopis (ie: swing past a target, and reverse direction without rotating the wrist to bring the edge back into the reverse stroke).

Critical is double MAX (rollable) damage following the roll modification for weapon type under Specials.

Even ignoring that minor discrepancy, that whole chapter has some unreasonable items. Consider the difference of Critical, Impale, and Parry of a Critical. (unparried) Critical ignores armor -- but if the target is not wearing armor, that means the difficult-to-achieve critical is the same as a normal hit! Impale (easier to achieve) does rolled damage (with damage bonus) PLUS MAX weapon damage, and "If the blow failed to penetrate armor, it is not stuck and there is no need to extract it." implies that against an unarmored opponent the impale does more damage than a critical. Parried Critical -- the attack does DOUBLE ROLLED DAMAGE. For an unarmored opponent, with only a small parrying object (say a small shield), it may actually be better to NOT parry the attack. A small shield absorbs 8pts -- an attacker who does 8pts has as much damage go through the shield (double rolled => 16, minus 8 for shield) as would hit if unparried. But any die roll that qualifies as a Critical should also qualify as an Impale -- so at simplest a critical should ignore armor AND do rolled damage PLUS max weapon damage. And restricting "special" (20% of normal chance) to impale-only is somewhat unfair. It assumes weapon is lodged in the /armor/ (see above italicized clause). A large club could do much more damage than an "impaled" blade -- the latter may have penetrated armor, and slipped between, say, a pair of ribs, so may be stuck just cutting into a lung. The club could have broken multiple ribs, and driven the bones into the target's body where the bone fragments may continue to do damage as the target moves. As a result -- the group(s) I used to play in basically used: Critical: MAX DAMAGE and IGNORE ARMOR (I don't recall if we used double max damage, don't think so) Special: /any/ weapon with a 20% of normal attack roll -- rolled damage plus max weapon damage, but account for armor; blades get impale detriment [having to roll to get weapon back] Parried Critical -- nothing special, just a parry absorbing damage. RQ:RiG applies (paraphrased): Critical: Ignore armor, does maximum impale/slash/crush (per appropriate section of Special -- note that slash/impale is effectively double max weapon damage plus bonus, crush is max weapon plus double max bonus) Special Crush: Normal damage + normal damage bonus + max damage bonus (so meaningless for characters with no damage bonus) Slash: Roll weapon damage twice and sum, add normal damage bonus, any magical bonus is also only added once Impale: as with Slash, but then has impale detriment

How nice -- something else to be called RQ4 (I've mentally, once I caught up to some 25 years of changes, counted the two Mongoose releases as 4 and 5, and Mythras would have been RQ6... So RQ:RiG would come up as 7 in that sequence). 😱 I was mostly focused on the facet that a 1Dx (x being even) sequence did produce steps of 1 when looking at the average of many rolls. Including 1D2 makes the first step a bit large (0 => 1.5) but would buffer the jump from a 1D4 (0 => 2.5). Hopefully one doesn't need to go beyond 1D12 (I don't know of any single die between 1D12 and 1D20) -- a programmable calculator, sure... Switching from 1Dx to using two or more dice changes the distribution... Among other things, the lowest roll is equal to the number of dice, and the average roll will become much more common: 2D6 one has just 1/36 chance of a 12 vs 1D12 having a 1/12 chance [3/36]; 2D6 rolling 7 is 6/36.

The average of ... 1D4 => 2.5 1D6 => 3.5 1D8 => 4.5 1D10 => 5.5 Other than the initial jump from no damage bonus to 1D4, the progression for the rest IS in steps of 1, based upon the average of available rolls. The variation a die roll provides adds "excitement" and possibly story elements ("I took his head clean off" vs "the sword twisted in my grip and just scratched his neck").

That's half the fun of RQ2... And my Gamemaster used the system I've adopted for characteristic rolls -- Best 3 out of 4 D6 (RQ2 didn't use 2D6+6 for SIZ and INT, one of my characters was only around 5 feet tall, swinging a 4.5 foot bastard sword one handed [low SIZ, 18 STR and whatever DEX was needed]) Fumbles (and other combats) I remember from the mid-80s: Sprain ankle (I seem to recall), helmet twisted around, lose three rounds to get it straight. So I sat their for three rounds resetting my helmet while a troll-kin is taking free swings at me... AND MISSING EACH TIME. I got the helmet straight, picked up my weapon -- and troll-kin surrendered in shame. Hit nearest friend, do max damage (this was the above shrimp with the bastard sword, and we'd had time to increase skills and armor by then). Based on discussion of who was standing where, the "nearest friend" was just behind me on my off-side -- which means I had to have swung round-house, gotten dragged by missing the opponent and twisted around for the sword to hit said friend. As I recall, between armor and chest HPs, my hit left him with one HP in the chest. Basically held together by his spine. Not quite a fumble, and with more advanced characters than beginners -- I had an elf using a rapier from the back of a trained horse (wimpy elf -- he had to take strength training to use a bow, since one had to have bow skill before being allowed to grow an elf-bow as I recall). Had a fight with another mounted opponent. Our horses were doing more damage to each other than we were -- in fact, both horses were killed in the same melee round [had some jokes about that as my /stallion/ was taking a bite out of the other's hindquarters, which came down from a rear&plunge on my horse's head/neck]. Both of us managed to roll clear of the falling animals and got to our feet. Opponent took a look around before combat resumed, and realize he was the only one left from his side, my party was standing around watching... Another surrender. And one great mistake... Our mounted party, at the time not realizing how effective a double row of set pikes could be, charged the pikes. Lost at least half the horses. We tended to run two characters so if one was killed we still had a role in the session. Out of my two, one lost horse, but recovered on foot [think it was the same bastard sword shrimp]. Foot character started up between the two lines of pikemen, basically taking one swing at each in passing. Remaining mounted character was about two strike ranks behind, zig-zagging the horse across the lines, taking swings at the opponent the shrimp had just moved on from -- so opponents had choice of defending against shrimp with big sword, or defending against mounted character with damage bonus; at that short range, pikes weren't of any use. ADDENDUM: out first characters basically were allowed to wander from town, and our first fights were with the keeper of a "troll-bridge" -- after the keeper had been replaced a few times we concluded it was cheaper to just pay the few coppers to cross [by that time we had enough to afford it]. Roving bands of troll-kin were the most common enemy until we'd gotten to a middle level and made initiate status, and started encountering broos [my GM's bad punning: they were led by a chief named "Mila Waukee"] The highest any of us reached was just up to priesthood (RQ2 cults had both RuneLord and RunePriest for Humakt] -- and I had to buy my way into the priesthood (donations to cult earned x% to the chance of acceptance -- so donate enough to bring success to 95%, no need for more as 96-00 is still failure)

"Draconic Eurmal" escaped Glorantha and ended up in Equestria, under the name "Discord" 🦄🐲

RQ2 (and the "Classic" reprint) generates characters that are basically 15 year old (kids by modern standards) likely using a tree branch as a mace/club wearing the equivalent of a heavy carpet for armor <G>. I don't recall my group ever using the "additional experience" rules. RQ3 made "additional experience" standard, based upon "parents occupation" and a 1D6 (or was it 1D4) roll to determine age and corollary occupation increases -- one roll per skill per year). Starting characters in RQ2 need to run at least a game year as lay member before even attempting to become cult initiate. RQ:RiG assumes a flat age of 21 by end of character generation, so occupation and cult skills are single numbers representing accumulated skills over the years. So... RQ2 beginners tend have skills in the 25-40% range. RQ3 tended to have skills in the 35-50% range. RQ:RiG tends to be 75% or greater (as my first generated character reveals -- 115% Broadsword).

So, if unmolested, a character with a battle axe (1D8+2 => 6.5 pts average damage) only requires 5 hits to breach the wall... If they have the common +1D4 damage bonus, it only takes four hits to breach. I'd suggest it is time to take up residence in some caves as the cave mouth is more defensible than multiple potential breaches spread across a long wall.

I'm not that crude... The other two ducks I practiced on are Hua'rd and Drake Anatidae. My dog pack also has a Lycaon Pictus, and Kai O'tei (the latter being an entertainer -- stretching Issaries "communication" skills; Eurmal might have been more appropriate but I couldn't play to the restrictions).

Just some more musing on that data set. It is commonly accepted that, for a normal distribution, 95% of the data falls within +/- 2 standard deviations of the mean. That means each tail holds 2.5%. So... 78.6 + 2x7.5 => 93.6 -- pretty close to that 92 point cut-off in the rules for adding 3 pts. Any character with such a sum is already in the upper 2.5% of the population (and anyone with stats <63.6 is in the bottom 2.5%) The sidebar suggests rerolling if characteristics average 12 or less -- but 7x12 is still only 84 So 95 points total (BEFORE RUNE modification)... Basically everyone is "Batman" (I'm not going to load up R and check books on how to extract probabilities matching values) -- probably in the top 2% if not higher. Think I'll stick with my modified rolls (which is what my GM used in the mid 80s). They allow enough variation in characters to make some interesting to play (the occasional wimp vs the beach bully -- if anyone remembers those advertisements), while averaging just below the 92 point range (ie; an average below "Batman"). Sure, there is a potential for a "Hulk" (to cross comic franchises) to pop up. Like my "Varg Fenrirson" light cavalry at 114 (with Rune modifiers) vs "Dhi Ngo" scribe at 90 (with Rune assist) [or "Phydeaux" philosopher/sorcerer also at 90].

BamBam was adopted -- he's really a Neanderthal living among "normal" people. 🙄

No, as I didn't generate characteristic sets -- only raw 3D6 (and modified 3D6), and same for 2D6+6. The first 36 (I'm sure no one wants to see all 10000) rolls are: The headers use "r" for straight roll, "b" for "best n out of n+1". Of course, only INT and SIZ use the 2d6p6, everything else is the 3d6 -- and as the skewed plots point out, it is INT and SIZ that gets the most benefit from the "b" version. One could take five rows of the 3D6 and two rows of 2d6p6 from the above, and repeat a few times going down the list. For the shortness of the list, randomly selecting ("with replacement") a row for each characteristic would allow better results to be determined (mean and standard deviation for each pair of sets). Okay, you got me curious. Using the data set I'd generated for the first comparison, I just scratched up a Python program to load that set, then select rows randomly to fill five 3D6 and two 2D6+6 slots (for both straight and modified -- using the same row for each type), summed the "characteristics" and generated a few statistics on them. I generated 10000 such sets of characteristics Straight Rolls - Mean: 78.6146 Standard Deviation: 7.463379733318169 Max: 103 Min: 49 Modified Rolls - Mean: 90.1627 Standard Deviation: 7.1495412652862145 Max: 114 Min: 64 I've run it a few times now, so picking different sets of rows, but the results are coming up fairly consistently -- upper 70 for straight, and around 90 for modified. Histograms attached. The results do feel a bit low, almost as if the die was 0..5, not 1..6 -- but... def rollnd6(n): return [random.randint(1, 6) for x in range(n)] For comparison, two more runs (no histograms). Straight Rolls - Mean: 78.4442 Standard Deviation: 7.4754581536826725 Max: 107 Min: 51 Modified Rolls - Mean: 89.9858 Standard Deviation: 7.144501574656908 Max: 115 Min: 63 Straight Rolls - Mean: 78.4146 Standard Deviation: 7.437152544071984 Max: 109 Min: 50 Modified Rolls - Mean: 90.003 Standard Deviation: 7.171536383049963 Max: 118 Min: 61 Note that those results for "straight" rolls are mathematically valid. The average for a D6 is 3.5, 3D6 => 10.5, 5x 3D6 => 52.5; 2D6+6 => 13; 2x 2D6+6 => 26; 26 + 52.5 => 78.5. If one is rolling fair dice per the rules on page 53 of the book, practically everyone is going to be adding 3pts (which only brings the average to 81.5 -- still much below the "92 points or less" clause). Even using the Modified rolls, 50% of the characters will qualify for the 3pt addition! .1

Page 73 (emphasis is from the book): Assumption is likely that one has sacrificed POW as an initiate during the "prior experience" period.

Spent the morning generating 10,000 random rolls of 3D6, best 3 of 4D6, 2D6+6, and best 2 of 3D6 + 6. No, I wasn't sitting at a table with dice and a log sheet <G> Python program that randomly generated the N+1 rolls, summed the first N for the nD6 case, THEN sorted the four and selected the last N (ascending sort) for the n of n+1 cases. Wrote them to CSV file, and pulled in R statistics package (I could likely have generated the data using R, but I'm not that familiar with its programming language). At the simplest view, the means for the best n from n+1 only went up about 1.5 points (3D6: 10.5 => B3of4: 12.2) (standard deviations actually tightened up). However, histograms do show some skew, so that mean may not be the best representation. The skew is most visible in the best 2 of 3D6 + 6 case, not as visible in the best 3 of 4D6 samples) For the best 2 of 3, there is about a 15% chance of getting an 18, vs 33% for a 15. The straight 2D6+6 shows about 5% for 18, and 35% for a 13. For the best 3 of 4, about a 6% chance for an 18, 14% for 14; straight 3D6 shows 1.5% for 18, and 13% for 12. (for some reason -- these plots are a pain; either the min 3 is not plotted, or the max 18 isn't). Boxplot attached (I hope). Left two are the 3D6 variants, right two are the 2D6+6. The thick bar is the median (not mean), and the boxes span the 25-75% quartiles. Shows the spread tightened up for both "best of", and also shows how skewed the 2D6+6 became -- the median is at what was the 75% level of the straight roll mode.

Wow... Generous... Yes, I do use the Best n from n+1... But no rerolls. The dice were very favorable when I generated Varg Fenrirson (yes, another stupid name; I have a whole pack of canid named characters I've generated for practice -- Would never attempt that name in a Norse setting [Wolf, son of the Fenris Wolf?!]). He's the one that managed a +25 manipulation/weapon modifier.

From the Red Book (emphasis mine):

I'm sure the +20 manipulation/weapon modifier will be put to good use...

One fault (in my mind) of RQ:RiG unifying attack and parry as just a single weapon %age. RQ2's separate %age values would make defensive-only usage obvious...

<snort> One of the (too many) characters I generated for practice has Hate (Lunar Empire) at 90%. Mother was eaten by the Crimson Bat... I joked to my relatives that this character would use "My name is Akn'Ard*, the Crimson Bat ate my mother, prepare ..." on encountering a representative of the Lunar Empire. * yes, my names are atrocious -- pronounce that one as "A(h) Canard"... He's a duck

Hopefully not what French "mal" represents 😎 (Mal de mere, malaria, malfeasance) OTOH -- it might apply for Eurmal, Malia, and a few others...

And with a +1 per excess point applied to characteristics, the kid is going to be an unmanageable terror 😈