jursamaj

I used to be intent on creating a good map of the real stars around Earth. I gave up.

The problem is that the galaxy is dominated (in numbers) by very small dim stars. But we have trouble finding those. So they are drastically under-represented in any catalog of stars. And the bigger your map, the bigger the stars that are missing near the edges.

Now, my goal is to translate an re-purpose some scientific software that simulates the motions and evolution of a cluster of stars. Well, it's a back-burner project, so progress is slow.

The STR vs. X resistance roll answer was given to another question than the dwarven one

But if the X depends on the boulder, isn't it SIZ in disguise?

Night of the CometClassic Fantasy is seriously plucking at my purse strings, although the other half of my brain keeps saying "No, you traitor, write your own BRP version of Moldvay/Cook B/X, the real D&D!"

Altho I started with the Basic Set back about 1978, and played a lot of AD&D 1st ed., most of my games have been in my own game worlds, with various house rules (I'll tell you about my d% hot-hit table replacement sometime), I feel no particular loyalty to the system. I'm sick of class/level designs. That's why I prefer BRP.

And, yes, the quote, the avatar and the screen name are all from Night of the Comet...I'm, like, totally from the '80s, y'know? :cool:

I love the movie, but I don't remember "DMK".

I'm rather stuck in the 80's myself. Of course, that was the best time of my life, attending college and spending every spare moment on RPGs and computer games.

The dwarf will no longer be small. He might be shorter than an average human, but with a STR of 24 he'll be wide as a warhammer dwarf, packed with heavy muscle. He would be much harder to carry than the guard ...

Hmm... in some games, dwarves have been described as denser than humans (in more than one sense ). Magic throws a kink in the strength = mass = size idea.

In my opinion, a simplified RPG should only have four stats, with the following significances:

STR (Strength, Length, Mass)

DEX (Agility, Speed, Constitution)

INT (Reasoning, Concentration, Perception)

POW (Willpower, Spirituality, Charisma)

A bit over-simplified for my taste. How does constitution in any way relate to dexterity? How does spirituality relate to charisma? Or perception to reasoning?

Well, that's almost exactly how it will be in d100rules. APP will still be called APP, but it will be short for appeal (stolen from RQ4), which is basically the same as chararisma.

I dunno. I've always thought charisma/appeal (beyond appearance) is more skill than stat. <shrug>

Actually, you can patent game rules. They're considered an invention. Check out US patent number 6,017,034 which is a patent relating to collectible card games. Fortunately, most rpg publishers have not pursued patents for their games, meaning all you have to deal with is copyright (and you can't copyright game rules, just their artistic expression). Apparently, there's so much in-breeding of ideas in RPGs that it would be fairly hard to patent most conventional RPG "technology" now.

And I am not a lawyer, so take all that accordingly.

Interesting. But as you say, few patents have been obtained for games. You're definitely covered on the copyright part:

Games

I wonder if this would break anything. The bases from which the text is extrapolated (RQ3) are not open contect. It is not possible to patent rulesets, and the text is different so copyright does not apply. But I would not call it "fair use".

Wasn't there any other option for it? Like making it OGL by claiming it is an adaptation of MRQ?

"Fair Use" is a defense against what otherwise would be copyright violation. As this text doesn't quote or copy RQ, it doesn't apply at all. And as you note,you can't patent or copyright game rules, only their specific artistic expression. Thus, no legal justification is needed at all. In fact, claiming one could itself put you on dangerous legal ground.

The illustrations will be copyrighted, but the textual content will be released to the public domain.

I just thought of something: if you literally release the text as public domain, then by definition, the OGL doesn't apply. PD means anybody can use it for anything, without even attributing it to you.

Just something to think about.

Hmm... Anyone else who did that looking at it the first time?

Yep.

Heh. Burp, drool... it's all good.

Welcome to BRP Central Bruce!

BRP is definitely worth checking out.

Grim and gritty, and no battlemats whatsoever!

What's wrong with battlemats? It's been a rare game for me that we didn't use a battlemat & minis (including BRP-based games).

In my early days, my "battlemat & minis" were an Othello board and scribbles on the white side of tokens!

...the thematic struggle, rather than being between Law and Chaos, is between Life and Unlife, so the main opponents would be the undead and those aligned with them.

Hmm. I've long wondered: why do we so often set up "thematic struggles". Does life (which fiction is based on) really have any theme? Every person has their own ideas on what's important. For most people throughout history, it's just been getting through from day to day.

I think a lot of it comes from D&D's alignment system. It forces everybody to stake a position on 2 struggles (good/evil & law/chaos), and makes everything revolve around that. But take, for instance, the knights in Britain & France. Each side thought it was right, both "served God", yet neither was in any objective sense good or evil. They were simply national opponents. The only real theme there is Us vs. Them.

Similarly, humans vs. orcs isn't really about good vs. evil. It's just Us vs. Them.

Meteoric Magic Item System of Doom

I just had to google this... nice work.

Paper books are good, but on the other hand, you can do a text search on a PDF...

Where practical, it's good to have both.

When not gaming, thinking of gaming, or trying to teach dice mechanics to my cat, I write historical fiction and historical fantasy novels (see sig).

You should know better than to try to teach a cat anything, unless it wants to learn.

In addition to the 2 previously=mentioned RQ games, in the past we've played several stripes of Cthulhu (*with* and *without* Cthulhu) /Modern Horror drifting toward a cyberpunky near future using BRPish mechanics; a Shadowrun game using same; a cool Highlander/ World Newton game uisng same; and a Cyberpunk/ Rifts game using CP2020 mechanics.

"World Newton"? What's this?

My name is Jerry Barrington. I'm 42 and currently live in Ohio, USA, but hope to remedy that within a few years.

I 1st encountered BRP as RuneQuest 3 back about 1985. I also have Elfquest, Ringworld, and Call of Cthulhu. I've played several game systems, and read many more, but I don't think I've found one better than BRP. Altho, I have a great fondness for Traveller, but that's because I like classic SF. Currently, I'm working on a non-system-specific star system generator, and might someday run a game with my stars plus BRP. >:->

Well, I've run out of things to say. I doubt I'll visit here real often, as life keeps me busy. But I'll try to check in at least every couple of weeks.