Nick J.

I just had a thought about character social skills versus player social skills. I've always sort of envisaged the player as being that little voice that lives in the back of your character's head -- that one that is always the most witty, self-assured, convincing and suave version of him/her. Invariably though, some people open then their mouths and they say stuff like "ummm," "ah . . .," "erm," stammer and flub and generally come across as completely unpersuasive no matter how smart they sound in their own head. That's where the skill roll comes in for me in a "Fast Talk" or "Oratory" check; it's the translation between a player's super-convincing and utterly logical attempts to sway and their character's ability to project that into the game. So by all means, encourage players to roleplay their conversations in the 1st person and that always comes first in my games before the dice ever come out -- I don't let people say stuff like, "I use my oratory skill." They have to tell me what they want their character to say in either 1st (preferable) or 3rd person or it doesn't happen. Same goes for hyper intelligent players and low intelligence characters; maybe the player is just that hidden force that somehow makes every coin toss come up heads, or pulls your biscuits out of the fire by sheer dumb luck. I can't remember where I read it/saw it/heard it, but it was something like, "Having a character with low intelligence isn't supposed to be a suicide pact." That said, I'm always super impressed by players that have enough self-discipline to play it dumb even to the detriment to their character.

Same here . . . I just don't see those goals as mutually exclusive with organic 'learn-by-use' skill rolls. I try to build in a certain amount of downtime (winter is a real thing) and give out enough opportunities for characters to enrich themselves so they can afford their training if/when they decide to pay for it. That doesn't prevent things from happening and it doesn't prevent characters from developing in my experience.

No offense, but this just feels like a hammer looking for a nail to me. There's already a mechanism for players to get the skills they want outside of organic 'learn-by-use' and that's paying for, or otherwise obtaining training from a tutor/mentor. To each their own I suppose. I wouldn't object to some kind of optional system being outlined in the new rules, but as a relative new-comer to d100 games in the last couple of years I can't say it's been any detriment to the games I've run (Magic World). So far in my experience, players typically stay in-character and don't do a lot of meta-gaming.

Sounds like some real Kickstarter, stretch goal material right there! (Sadly, it wouldn't be the craziest thing I've seen creators try to fob off in a crowdfunding round)

Thanks for that. I missed the kickstarter, so I don't ever think to check that project page.

I honestly have no idea. I'm a fairly recent arrival to the world of Glorantha. I just know that you can get all of the Gloranthan Classics title except P&BR in print form on Chaosium's webstore. Nobleknight is out of stock, Ebay sellers charge an arm-and-a-leg and I couldn't find a copy for what I consider a reasonable price. So I broke down and did some PDF-fu and made my own. If/when it comes available through Chaosium I'll buy it in a heartbeat.

For products that are long out of print, it's possible to take a PDF and create a private project with a print-on-demand service (like lulu.com) I did that with Pavis & Big Rubble because all of the aftermarket copies I've seen were north of $200 U.S. That said, if Chaosium ever decides to release another physical copy of Pavis & Big Rubble I'd gladly buy a copy; the POD version is OK, but the quality is nowhere as nice as my retail Borderlands and Griffin Mountain books. For the record I don't condone making copies of books that are still available from the publisher and you should not try to sell these for profit.

@Jeff I really dig that example. It kind of makes me want to take that as a base and mashup some of the "Spellburn" and "Corruption" mechanics from Dungeon Crawl Classics to come up with something really crazy

@MOB One more note on Fantasy Grounds calendars. The calendar feature is only available in rulesets based on the 3.0 CoreRPG codebase. BRP for Fantasy Grounds is based on an older codebase and doesn't have this feature.

It can be fully modified according to setting. In fact I've custom edited the xml files myself to create a 13 month "lunar" calendar for an alternate earth setting I use in my homebrew. I was just thinking that as part of a purchased ruleset this would be a nice feature to integrate for a Gloranthan based game.

@Rick Meints @MOB @Jeff A request: when RQ4 gets ported to Fantasy Grounds, can the holy days and seasonal effects on spells be integrated into the calendar that comes with that software? That would be super helpful for tracking these things during play (and that VTT is the only way I play games these days).

Well, since everything in that thread is pure speculation and not an official announcement. All we have to go off for now is Chaosium's comments from GenCon that they are "in talks" with MM. If Chaosium is able to reboot Stormbringer I suspect it would be easier to market than Magic World and might keep the flame alive by going back under its original banner. I for one would be thrilled to support a new Stormbringer since I missed the boat back in the day and those old books and supplements go for a pretty penny and I can't even get PDFs. Presumably backward compatibility would be retained to some degree, allowing MW and Advanced Sorcery plus all of the fan-made stuff to be retained. We'll see I guess?

Being most familiar with Magic World, it kind of reminds me of "deep magic" from Advanced Sorcery. Although I must plead ignorance on how sorcery was handled in RQ2 and other editions so I can't compare it to that. Interesting in concept for sure.

You'd have to call it something else. Like "Adventure in the Million Spheres" or some-such and focus on the full gamut of the Moorcock Multiverse (Jerry Conenlius, Von Bek, Oswald Bastable, etc.). If it's Stormbringer it needs to be faithful to the original games or you're going to have a minor revolt.

He's an unabashed Runequest fan too. His "Early D&D is Rubbish" videos were pretty entertaining (and now that I think about it, his praise of Runequest got me mildly interested in checking out d100 gaming).

Can you guys take this into PMs?

You would almost certainly use a shield with a Bronze Age rapier. You "parry" with that.

When I was a d100 neophyte a couple of years ago, RQ6 was the first thing I read (got it in a Bundle of Holding deal) and it did not 'click' for me in any way shape or form. MW on the other hand was just about perfect in terms of helping grok actually running a game with it. Two years on, I think highly of Mythras/RQ6's design aesthetics, editing and nuance, but I still can't see me ever running it. These are two very different games to me (as smiorgan mentioned above) and unless Chaosium's new RuneQuest blows my socks off I don't see any other games replacing Elric!/Stormbringer/Magic World to scratch my d100 fantasy system itch right now.

I'll just go ahead and link these videos: And just because I love Neil Burridge's stuff and it's great to hear craftsman talk shop:

I get the sentiment. Regardless thanks for all of the hard work you put into the various things you produced. You made my life imminently easier as a first time d100 GM.

Yeah, I gathered Ben had moved on from the RPGnet thread. Anyway, I don't harbor any ill-will toward Chaosium's new management. Businesses aren't charities and you all had to do what you think is best (and I'm looking forward to the new RuneQuest).

Well I am glad that Chaosium is still going to keep selling the line via pdf even if they aren't going to support it officially. There's no such thing as a "dead game" so long as there are people still willing to play it.

As a life-long D&Der who came to d100 gaming very late (like in the last 2 or 3 years) MW was the only ruleset that immediately clicked for me (I think the first I ever read was RQ6 picked up in a Bundle of Holding). Sure it has its rough spots (art and layout) but without it I don't think I could have ever considered warming to the idea of running RQ6/Mythras or perhaps Chaosium's new RQ4 (or whatever the hell it's going to be called), MW was the perfect game at just the right time to show me a better way to run a game. Whatever game I run in the future I'm sure I'll take parts of it with me; e.g. I suspect I'll keep the (Con+Siz)/2 HP convention and the variable Armor over hit locations, because I like it that much. Much respect to Ben Monroe for what he was able to put together. A real pity new management couldn't figure out some way to keep him on and keep supporting MW, but that's life I guess.

As somebody who is a very late comer to Runequest, I'm glad to hear Guide to Glorantha is getting a reprint. My wallet on the other hand? ...

Go ahead and put me down for one strong "hell no" on converting to d20s. Cheers!