Chaot

SB5:

Melnibonean - min/ave/max

STR 2d8+2 - 4/11/18

CON 2d8+2 - 4/11/18

SIZ 2d8+4 - 6/13/20

INT 2d8+8 - 10/17/24

POW 2d8+8 - 10/17/24

DEX 2d8+4 - 6/13/20

APP 2d8+8 - 10/17/24

Half Melnibonean - min/ave/max

STR 2d8+2 - 4/11/18

CON 2d8+2 - 4/11/18

SIZ 2d8+3 - 5/10/19

INT 2d8+5 - 7/13/21

POW 2d8+5 - 7/13/21

DEX 2d8+3 - 5/10/19

APP 2d8+5 - 7/13/21

Edit: To add min/ave/max

I'm assuming that Pow determines connection to the Force.

Something to take a look at is the optional rule from Gods of Law on POW use. It was originally designed to give non spellcasters some use of POW. The short of it is that a character can spend a point of POW to bump up their roll to a higher success rate. This POW regenerates like MP.

Rename POW to Force and MP/PP to Force Points. Someone who's not trained in the force can tap into their unconscious connection and spend Force to bump up their roll. This drops their Force total down, leaving them more vulnerable to someone trained in the Force. A jedi maintains his or her total Force but uses Force Points (MP/PP) for their powers.

Just an idea.

(By the way, yesterday I was sick as a dog. I fell in and out of 'A New Hope' on tv. Even though it's the one with the crappy cgi inserted in it, I was struck by how much better it was than the new films.)

I don't think the systems are 'equal,' but each has it's strength. I've run games with the three that you're thinking about using and it went well. The psychic didn't feel disenfranchised by the mage, ect. The power scales are definitely different though.

So, in short, they do work together. They're not balanced against each other. As long as you give your players equal time at the table and introduce conflicts that allow individuals to shine, you shouldn't have a problem.

You can find Worlds of Wonder if you poke around the links section.

And welcome to the fold. May you crit more often then you fumble.

I think Jason ran a Star Wars game awhile back. It would be a shame is someone were to post some notes...

Out of curiosity Marcus, how's it coming along?

You know, may be I should go back to trying to finish the rewrite of that epic Stormbringer campaign I was planning to offer for a million spheres...

Epic Stormbringer campaign? I think the answer is a definite, "Please, yes?"

I should be able to rattle off the Riposte rules. As is, I'll have to look them up.

uhh, I like it!

Unfortunately, I haven't spent much time doing Arthurian fantasy.

The old parry/dodge rules for example.

I'd actually really like to read Lynn's original post on that rule. My understanding was that the PC got a -30 every additional time they Parried or Dodged regardless of which one they did first. Meaning, if a PC had a Parry of 80% and a Dodge of 40% and they used their Parry and then had to Dodge their Dodge would effectively be at 10%.

I would say Nick's interpretation is correct, and well defined by the rules.

You'll note that I agree with Nick. But I would argue that it's not well defined since there's errata out there that is contradictory.

Still, I think Summoning and Allegiance rules are a welcome addition to a game. I'm just pointing out potential pitfalls.

Ahh, SPQR!

I meant to buy this years ago. One could do worse than give Mr. Perrin their money. Especially for his rules set.

Err, no you don't.

Yeah, you do. Here's the official FAQ from Lynn Willis.

Q: Does casting a spell add to your Chaos score? The table on pg. 109 doesn't say so (though this may be because of a typo).

A: Under earning chaos points on pg. 35 we note that casting magic earns Chaos points, and on pg. 76 we say "learning or casting even a lawful spell adds a Chaos point to the adventurer's score." but nowhere does the text seem to say how much! Thus on pg. 109, mark that you earn 1 Chaos point each time a Chaos spell is cast and neither earn nor lose Balance or Law points for spellcasting.

And, given the passage I quoted, it's clearly against the rules anyway - in spirit if not the letter.

Completely within the rules. I'm the Rat-King. I'm a harbinger of Chaos. I see through the eyes of rats to bring disorder every where and further the agenda of the Dukes of Entropy!

Yeah, I don't play by those rules either. Learning a spell gains you a Chaos point, just like like gaining a skill at 80% and every 20% after that gains you Law points. But it's not the writer's intent, it's my homebrew.

I don't even follow the Allegiance rules. I just tell my players to list every significant thing that they did that falls under Law, the Balance, or Chaos. For every action they list, they get a point in the given tally. Every once in a while I have to contest their list, but in general, they're fair. It also gives them more control over their characters.

Note that I'm giving Tywyll worse case scenarios that are all by the book. None of the stuff that I posted would fly in my game. (Except for the horse thing. I'm all for upgrading the PC's armor.)

Mind, it also wouldn't be an issue as I'd throw anyone pulling such a stupid stunt out of the group anyway...

So, you'd throw me out for following the rules?

As I said, these are extremes. The reason why I'm bringing them up is because Tywyll was worried about an unbalancing issue. I'm letting him know about the extremes.

Humm... I may have to rethink this. Any suggestions on limitations? Maybe I'll have to read the Corum limitations.

Nah, I'm just rules ranting. I've not had demon summoning be an unbalancing feature in my games. Though, as I said before, my player's usually negotiate with a summoned demon instead of binding them.

I'll have to check, but I don't think there are binding rules in Corum. It's pretty much making a pact with the demon. Again, I'll have to check because I've only used the rules occasionally and it's been awhile since I've browsed the summoning rules.

There's a nifty rule that augments Allegiance. If your Chaos points are above your Law or Balance points you have a chance of gaining a Chaotic feature. For every point that you have in Chaos above the other two tallies, you have a 1% of gaining a Chaotic feature. So, say Grognard the Barbarian has Law 24, Balance 08, Chaos 37. He gains a point of Chaos because that's the way he rolls, upping it to 38. Every time he gains a Chaos point above Law or the Balance, he has to roll a d100. Because his Chaos score is now 38 he has to roll above a 14%. Otherwise, he gains a Chaos feature. I've incorporated CoC Sanity rules in addition to the physical mutations given in Corum.

So, yes, don't let my extreme examples of foreboding doom deter you. Add the demon summoning rules. Just be aware of the extremes. And take another look at Corum.

Know what's even crazier than the Demon Summoning rules? Allegiance. According to the rules, every time you cast a spell you gain a point of Chaos. If you're committed to Chaos and you reach 100 Chaos points, you're eligible for Apotheosis. You're now a Champion of Chaos, which means that every time you die, you have a good chance of coming back to life. You'll lose a point of CON and some skill points. You also get double MP points and you have a POW x3% chance of contacting your patron Duke of Entropy.

Which means I can roll up a character and choose Rat Vision as a spell. It's a 1 point spell. I get 1 point in Chaos for beginning with that spell. I move into the sewers and start casting Rat Vision. Say I have a 16 POW. My spell will last for 16 combat rounds. That's not a whole lot of time, so I can easily cast 16 MP per day and pass out because I have no MP left.

Let's say that I only cast 15 MP per day, because I don't want to be unconscious in the sewer. In a week, seven days, I'll have accrued 105 Chaos points. Woot! I'm a Champion now! Apotheosis is mine! All using the rules as written.

Additionally, all character's start with a horse, which is valued at 2,000 LB. Put some points in Bargain and sell the horse. Get yourself some good armor.

These are my munchkin issues with Elric!/SB5 as written. But I've been running it for years and the only thing my player have tried to do was the selling of the horse. That's fine with me because they invest in armor and I like to keep my PCs alive.

I've also house ruled that you gain a Chaos point when you learn a spell, not when you cast it. I also use the optional rule that when a skill goes over 80% and every 20% after the character gets a point of Law. When I'm feeling really mean, I institute the Corum Allegiance rules...

Yeah, they're really freaking powerful. Still, each summoning requires at least 9 MP according to the rules (1 for each attribute but APP and 3 for POW).

If I were ever a player in a SB5 I would arrange to have at least a 18 POW. I'd have to roll at least a 15 and put it into my POW, then redistribute the three points to make it 18. Very doable. My two goals would be to learn Brazier of Power and Summon Demon. Once I had those, I would set up my power source. Now, I don't have my book in front of me but I believe that would cost me a point of POW and net me 34 MP (17 MP in the Brazier and my own 17 MP). I think Summon Demon costs 11 MP (1 for the spell, 10 for the attributes since I'll be summoning a greater demon). That allows me to summon a 22 MP Demon Armor since I need 1 MP to stay conscious.

Actually, I just got my book, so let's see. That gives me a demon bonus of 4d10+1d4. I'd bind it into some Sea Leather, so it would be 1d6+4d10+1d4. Let's make the Sea Leather blacker than the blackest night, with a big red Chaos symbol over my heart. Black is very slimming.

Next up is my Great Sword. I'm down to 16 MP with 17 in my brazier. I now have 21 MP available for my Great Sword's damage bonus. Now I've got a Great Sword that does 2d8+4d10+1d2. It's no Stormbringer, but it'll get the job done. I can no longer cast spells, but I really don't need them anymore. I'm a killing machine that is pretty untouchable.

I might want to get some loaded dice though. To Summon a demon you have to succeed in your Luck roll. If you fail it, you lose your POW point. Still, at the POW levels I'm talking about your lowest roll is going to 80%, so the odds are in your favor there.

I also need to succeed on the POW:POW roll. The demon's POW could be as low as 4 or as high as 32. The average is 18 so it's much more of a gamble, but still possible. Actually, I'm going to increase my spell list to three. I'll also learn Bonds Unbreakable so I can get the POW ticks on a successful use against an opponent with an equal or higher POW than me. This will kick my Great Sword up to 2d8+4d10+1d4 and eventually allow me to bind a greater demon as a servant.

It takes planning, patients and luck, but it's doable. It's also an extreme and I've never had a player try it. In fact, most of my players steer clear of summoning demons. When they do summon them, they usually summon an entity and negotiate with it. In years of playing, I think I only had one binding. Now I use the demon summoning rules from Corum for everyone who's not a Melnibonean or from Pan Tang, so the extreme is much less of an issue.

So, is it unbalancing? Depends upon your game world and the other magic systems there. It also depends on how your players use/abuse it. Is it a welcome addition? I think so, even though I modify it with the Corum rules.

And, as soon as Marcus gets that Gods of Law monograph uploaded to his site, you'll have some pretty cool mechanics to combat Chaos with!

Besides POW and INT, the item demons don't need stats.

You need to spend 1 MP for each stat except POW and APP even though it's not actually used. You don't need to spend any points for APP. You need to spend 3 MP for POW for a minor demon and 4 for a major demon. So 8 for a minor demon, 9 for a major demon, plus 1 for the Summon spell and 1 to stay conscious.

Or HarnMaster. I guess my point is, if it's going to be simple why make a distinction between thrusting and sharp. Pointy and blunt seem to be enough in my opinion. I get the differences between slashing, impaling and bashing. I just wonder if introducing those differences is necessary for a striped down system.

I will add one skill that I forgot. Brawl. When I use a stripped down system, Brawl includes Grapple and using impromptu weapons; broken chair, broken glass bottle, sand in the eyes, wrestling moves, etc.

I think the point is to give the PCs a wide range of available weapons without worrying about increasing too many skills. It's what makes it simple.

I did a very basic for of this for a nostalgic D&D/BRP game. The categories were 1-Handed, 2-Handed, 1-Handed & Shield, Missile. It worked great for the style of game I wanted.

As for dividing skills by weapon styles, couldn't you just combine the slashing and thrusting weapons and keep bludgeoning on it's own? Or would that make the slashing/thrusting weapons too appealing?

But I do find magic that's slightly more subtle than your average fireball more interesting. Something that puts the magic back into spells.

Ah, I think I see what you mean. An Elric! suppliment, The Unknown East, has a system similar to Ars Magica. You basically have two wheels of magical discipline. One is composed of Actions, one is composed of Effects. A mage is skilled is skilled at one of the disciplines on the Action wheel and one on the Effects wheel. Things that the mage is skilled at take fewer magic points to effect than things that are farther away on the given wheel.

So, let's say the mage was skilled at Diminution and Fire (keep in mind, I'm traveling and I don't have my book in front of me). This mage is good at minimizing something and with things having to do with fire. He can put out a fire with very little effort. He can Control fire with a bit more effort, as Control is down the wheel from Diminution. He can stop a flood with considerable more effort, as water is on the other side of the wheel as water. He can control the path of water with a substantial effort as Control is down the wheel from Diminution and Water is opposite of Fire. He can make someone pass out with a little bit of effort using Diminution and Spirit (or Flesh?).

Anyway, you get the point.

Another system that's more interesting than 'point and click' is the Chaos Melds from the Corum book. Basically, the mage has certain effects that they know. They combine these effects into Melds to cast a spell. The resulting spell is determined by what the individual effects do when they're combined. This can result in some pretty flashy stuff, but it's more interesting than utilizing a list of spells.

If you can track down a book called Maelstrom, you may also want to just steal it's magic system. It's very low key. It involves the principles of Sympathy, Ritual, and... and, um, all those other magic theories that I can't remember right now (again, the books not in front of me here). It has four ranks. the first subtly plays with probability. You're running from a mob, say. What's the chance that the people in front suddenly trip up, giving you those extra seconds you need to get away? The fourth rank is much more along the lines of, what if my arch nemesis just happened to have a massive brain hemorrhage. Fourth rank magic is also a lot harder to pull off.

Nice thing about Maelstrom is it's very easy to just plug it into the BRP system.

Are we talking about the battle spells from Elric!/SB5 as point and click magic?

See, I view that as the secrets that the grizzled veteran hands down to the terrified newbie. "Invoke the Lords of Entropy in this way and they'll aid you in battle. If you're good, they'll turn your blade into a blazing inferno."

Or, I think of the gnarly, tattered beggar focusing on the first time he bit the head off of a rat. This focusing his mind and allowing him to see through the nearest rat's eyes.

It's folk magic, and doesn't need the complicated rituals that summoning does.

That said, it's been awhile since I've read Liber Ka, (and I believe I know have two copies of it if anyone wants one). It was definitely more hermetic than most systems, but I didn't have the main rule book to give me perspective the first time I read it, and it's been about three years since I've picked it up.

I view the DEX roll as either a fast reaction or getting out of the way, not as trained acrobatics. Therefore, I say keep it. I'm not sure how much impact it will have in game though.

So now I'm thinking about capoeira. I tend to combine rolls when two skills overlap. An example, Brawl plus Acrobatics equals Capoeira.

Elemental tattoos? Can you explain what this is exactly? Tattoos that are binding enchantments for elementals?

Gah! My book is gone again. I'm starting to thing that it slips between the veils of the six spheres at the will of the Balance. Maybe I should have bought that second copy...

I wanted to look at the book so as to answer you correctly. Instead, I'll have to go from memory. This is probably partially wrong because it's how I used them in a game, not necessarily how they're written. I'm sure someone can come along and correct my errors.

They're actually not binding enchantments. They're more like spells inscribed on your skin. They allow a non spell caster to have access to spells. A Sailor would be smart to get Breath of Life inscribed on his wrist.

Here's how I used them. Any spell can be inscribed as a tattoo. To activate it, it costs MP and requires a Luck roll. Tattoos are reusable and don't count against your INT limit for spells.

I've also allowed tattoos that boost a PC's skill level up to 20% at 5% a MP. Getting a tattoo in my game gives you Chaos points equal to the full potential value of the spell or skill. So, if the tattoo is something like Rat's Vision, it's going to give you 1 Chaos point. If it's Hell's Sharp Razor, it'll gain you four Chaos points. If it's a skill tattoo it will gain you four Chaos points.

Again, that's how I ran it. Not necessarily how it's written.

Who's got it? Who's used it? What do you think?

I've stolen bits and pieces from the expanded world for a kitchen sink Fantasy game that I used to run. I've also lifted the various magic systems from the book.

Both of my children are asleep and I don't have to get ready for work yet, so here's a story. I'd been missing my Corum book for about ten months. I had figured that it was either lost forever or that someone had walked off with it.

I think the big Chaosium 30% off sale was announced on a Wednesday. I was still missing my book, but I put off looking at Chaosium's site. That Saturday I was sick as a dog. I think it was food poisoning. Being largely confined to the bedroom, I decided I needed something to read. I was in the mood for Moorcock. So, I picked up my hard copy of Fabulous Harbours and, lo and behold, there was my copy of Corum. It was slightly bent and very dusty, but it was welcomed like a long lost friend.

About five hours after I had found the book I signed into Chaosium's website for the sale. That's when I saw that they still had Corum books available. Had I not just found my Corum book, I would now be in the position of having two of them.

Anyway, I find that a lot of my players enjoy Elemental Tattoos. As a GM, I've used Fetishes a lot, but my players seem to shy away from them. I've only had one player to use Chaotic Melds, and it was in a short lived game unfortunately. I haven't really played with Contrivances yet. When I get my Lods of Law campaign off the ground for an extended period I'm going to integrate them.

I've stolen the pact rules for YKers and Pan Tangians. Melniboneans get to run with the Demon Summoning rules from Elric!/SB5. For everybody else, it's a bit scarier.

You can post them in the download section as docs or pdfs or whatever or you can post them in a thread.

Looking forward to seeing it and welcome to the forum.

(which I'll reformat to match the other two in style)

Oh hells yeah! A Gods of Chaos that's not a Courier font manuscript? Very cool. I'm glad these monographs aren't going to drop off into obscurity.

Nice job Marcus.

I voted no (meaning yes).

Go ahead and use Chaot if you want.

The example boxes and side notes have a slight parchment look. I would bet that was what SDLeary was referring to.