vagabond

In Stormbringer 1 - 4 , if you rolled up a beggar from Nadsokor, there

was a very interesting disadvantages table circa 1981.

-V

And yet D&Dv4 is top RPG dog at Amazon day in and day out

currently. No other FRPG comes close (Dark Heresy is the closest,

and it is far behind). And, as far as RPGs go, Star Wars is the nearest

competition.

D&Dv4 is still the 800 lb gorilla. People said the same about 3.5 when it came

out, that they stopped buying and playing, etc. But it still sold very well,

and many of those that complained came back into the fold. I suspect

the same will happen with v4.

-V

I use:

Specials: Skill / 5 rounded down.

Criticals: Skill / 20 rounded down.

It's quick to calculate.

:beetle:

Even quicker, using the above formulas as a base,

Specials are approximately the Skill's hundreds and

tens digits multiplied by two (i.e. 87% is 8 * 2 or 16%

though if you divided it out correctly it's 17%) and

crits are approximately the Skill's hundreds and

tens digit divided by two (i.e 87% is 8 / 2 or 4%,

which is the same as 87 / 20 rounded down). This

works perfectly well above 100% as well, with say a

skill of 163%, specials are 16 * 2 or 32% and crits

are 16 / 2 or 8%.

-V

One of the main reasons I have never liked doubles as crits is

if you have a 98% skill, your only two failures are 99 and 00,

both of which are now fumbles. I don't like that a "master"

in a skill can only make catastrophic failures, and has a 2%

chance of doing so.

-V

Why shouldn't they be harder to break? They are larger and designed

to withstand the punishment. Weapons are smaller and not really

designed to block crushing blows.

-V

Isn't there some form of old BRP where shields take damage, like in RQ, while weapons just break or not. Is that SB 1-3? It was simple, but resulted in a lot of broken weapons in combat.

As I posted above, in Elric!/SB5, weapons break if their AP/HP are exceeded

by the blow, while the shields lose AP/HP if the damage inflicted exceeds

their current rating. Weapons weaken purely as a result of a superior attack

(or parry) regardless of damage inflicted, shields do not suffer the same.

And, as far as SB1-4, the rules were pretty much consistent. The only fix

I believe was in relation to demonic weapons. Originally, they never broke.

A fix was put in place later that lessened the immunity. I'll have to check.

-V

OK, first, consider the cost of summoning the demon. Minimum 9 MP, more

likely 30+ MP to summon a "demon of attack" with skill of 100% and 2d10

damage bonus. Plus the POW vs. POW contest to bind. That's significant

risk over the sorcerous artifact. Also, to even summon a demon with

100% or better skill, it has to be a major demon with a minimum of 4d8

POW for an average of 18. That's a pretty steep POW vs. POW test.

In another thread, I posted how to get a demon with the minimum MP

spent, it would take about 19 MP IIRC (Minimum 9 MP to summon, plus

10 MP for the 100% attack/2d10 damage). But that leaves 4d8 POW

and 1d8 for the rest of the stats. 1d8 STR, DEX, SIZ and CON does not

make for a very "combative" demon. I'd houserule that you'd need at

least 3d8 in all of those, so add another 8 MP. Also, a demon of combat

without appropriate armor also sounds unlikely - I would houserule that

armor must closely match attack/damage as well. Say another 7 MP

to get solid armor. We're now looking at 34 MP minimum.

Now, using the Elric! rules, an equivalent demonic bound weapon would be

an eternal bind, not a regular bind. So, that's 3 POW sacrificed, not 1 .

I believe there was a correction to the Elric! rules somewhere, but the BRP

book does this correctly. The 1 POW bind is not permanent, it is short term.

So, unless you want to keep binding the demon to the weapon after each

bind lapses, you keep spending the 1 POW.

-V

I prefer the original Elric!/Stormbringer 5 rules.

IIRC, it went like this:

Any impale attack vs. critical or less parry results in the parrying

weapon losing 4 HP - shields are not affected.

Any critical attack vs. regular or less parry results in the

parrying weapon losing 2 HP - again, shields are not affected.

Reverse the results for critical parry vs. success or less attack, attacking

weapon loses 2 HP.

Regardless of the above, any successful attack vs. the same level

or less parry, roll damage. If the rolled damage exceeds the parrying

weapons HP by 1, the parrying weapon breaks, and the excess damage

is applied to armor/HP of the defender. If a shield is used, any rolled

damage in excess of the shield's HP is subtracted from the shield's HP.

When the shield reaches 0 HP, it breaks, and any excess damage is

applied to armor/HP of the defender.

Of course, with a parrying weapon you had a riposte opportunity, and

shields gave decent missile fire protection.

Stormbringer 1 - 4 made things slightly easier. Any critical attack resulted

in the parrying weapon breaking. Any critical parry resulted in the attacking

weapon breaking. Critical attack and parry resulted in both weapons

breaking. I believe shields were immune, but I'd have to check. Also, you

had unlimited ripostes if your attack and parry skills exceeded 90%.

-V

Another issue - while Dodge may normally seem to be superior to

Parry, check out the differences between them on their respective

fumble tables. Dodge uses the Natural Weapon fumble table.

It appears to me that a fumble has more significant risks - lose

1d3 rounds, lose actual HP, etc.

-V

If you use the Riposte rules, parrying can give you an extra free

attack.

-V

I would, if you can find them, peruse the Elric! supplement Unknown East

which uses a kind of "power word" magic system that will do much of

what you seek, as well as the Stormbringer 5 supplement Corum, which

has a similar system.

-V

Some of the supplements listed on the Home page of this forum will

be full blown books and not monographs. Whether or not this fulfills

your desires is yet to be determined and out of the authors' control.

-V

As far as I know there were no refs at Gen-con UK for BDRP even though they had freestuff to give anyone who would (couldn't make it due to money problems). Was no one told here? (seem to remember they were).

A real dropping of the ball there by Chaosium I think.

What about places like drivethrough RPG? people like free stuff...

Chaosium really throws their support behind things like Continuum and

Tentacles, and they had had some some success running games at Gen Con

Indy. I believe some demos were run at Gen Con UK, but the call for refs

apparently did not succeed. And, they do a number of local (to them) cons

like DundraCon and KublaCon.

-V

Well it seems like in the BRP book, attack and defense seem to be considered to be rolled at the same time, because a failed attack with a fumbled defense results in the defender still being hit (see parry fumble table).

I believe that only applies if the Attacker is successful.

IIRC, the Attack/Parry Matrix, if the Attacker misses/fumbles, the Defender

does not roll.

-V

Well, for example, I was recently running a survival horror game with BRP. Players would keep on making shots at enemy monsters who did not take much interest in defending, but their offensive skills were kept low in order to highlight "survival" part of it. Or, a character charges forward with a melee weapon to go one-on-one with a monster. With other games that have static rather than active defenses, I normally just say that the monster dodged or the attack only winged it. But with active defenses, I find the act of imagining the battle more difficult when an attacker just "misses".

There is no need to defend yourself if someone misses.

That said, there is no need to roll for defense of the other side misses.

So, in practice, the attacker and defender both failing their rolls should

not be an issue.

Now, what you can do is if the attacker fumbles, and you choose to make

the defender roll for defense as well, and they fumble, both trip over each

other. Or, if the attacker fumbles and the defender misses, the attacker

falls into the defender, and the defender cannot get out of the way

quickly enough. The attacker suffers the fumble, the defender is in a

neutral state after shrugging off the attacker. For both attacker and defender

failing their rolls, they bump into each other but easily recover, or the

attackers failed swing and the defenders failed parry put them both out of

position harmlessly.

-V

The question is one of degree.

If it hadn't have been specified in the text, I wouldn't have thought much about it, but the book does mention the difficulties of running campaigns with powered and non-powered types together.

I believe that statement was made with respect to supers and non-supers,

and has to do with scale.

If the difference between wizards is similar that in games like AD&D, then well, I'm not overly worried. But if the difference -is as mentioned in the rpg book- something that has to be addressed, then I'm not sure I'd choose this system to play a fantasy game.

Yes, when talking fantasy, the difference between spellcasters and non-spellcasters

is similar to D&D.

Once again, I haven't read in detail regarding this issue.

That said, I'd love to run some old TSR D&D modules using this system, and wonder if it'd be a good choice for this style of fantasy.

I have used BRP to run a Dark Sun/Athas game, where everyone can just

about use psionics, but those that really practice psionics and sorcery

can become tremendous powers.

I am also working on my SkyRealms of Jorune conversion where Isho

users can certainly overpower non-users if not held in check by the

gamesetting (i.e. laws restricting use and penalties that are enforced).

-V

I've read that powered characters often are too powerful when compared to non-powered characters.

So if this is the case, can it be said that in a fantasy campaign, wizards won't work well with fighters?

I am having trouble connecting the above query with the subject line.

What do the two have to do with each other? Party balance is not

required for Fantasy RPGs.

-V

For completeness:

Elric! Melniboneans:

STR 2d8 + 4

CON 2d8 + 4

DEX 2d8 + 4

SIZ 2d8 + 4

INT 3d8 + 8

POW 3d8 + 8

APP 2d8 + 8

Stormbringer 1 - 4:

STR 3d6

CON 3d6

DEX 3d6

SIZ 3d6 + 3

INT 3d6 + 1d10

POW 3d6 + 2d6

CHA 3d6

-V

I agree with much that has gone before.

RQ (and BRP) stats for Elves do a grand job of putting numbers to sentient, motile plants but not Melniboneans/Menastrai/Vadhagh/Eldren/Eldar/Sidhe/Fae/Eldarin

I disagree, I think Elric!/Stormbringer/Corum did a fantastic job of statting up

Melniboneans, Menastrai and Vadhagh. The Menastrai stats were done by

Loz Whitaker - referenced below.

The author of MRQ's Elric games is on these boards so I'll leave it to him to post (or not) his rules for them. As with Chaosium's version they use d8s not d6s (for quite cool mechanic/background linky reasons) which may nor may not suit.

I don't think Loz would mind posting of the numbers. There is so much more

to generating a Melnibonean character.

STR 3d8 (drop lowest die) + 2

CON 3d8 (drop lowest die) + 2

SIZ 3d8 (drop lowest die) + 4

DEX 3d8 (drop lowest die) + 4

INT 3d8 (drop lowest die) + 8

POW 3d8 (drop lowest die) + 8

CHA 3d8 (drop lowest die) + 8

I'll see if I can find the Elric! values, they differ slightly from SB5.

-V

Yes, you are a loser

Seriously, the editor that was originally assigned to the mono has dropped

out for valid reasons, so there has been some delay in getting things

put together.

Which kind of means we're all losers - until the the mono is released.

-V

Ah, well, I would not really want to call that an explanation ...

Otherwise, while I do see your point, I think you are missing one of the

basic differences between (at least "hard") science fiction and fantasy:

In my opinion Science Fiction does require details, explanations and plau-

sibility, because this is the "science" part of it, if you neglect this you

have just average fiction.

That's part of what I am getting at. "Hard" Sci-Fi is a different animal.

Sci-Fi with a Psi Adept is not "hard". It may be Sci-Fi, and it may border

on Sci-Fantasy, but it is not "hard" Sci-Fi.

So, for Sci-Fi (not "hard") with a Psi Adept, imagining that his telekinetic

powers act like a giant wedge being driven into the ground 10 feet below

and lifting that chunk and shaking it, that is all the detail you need - the

same as a sorceror doing the same with a spell. In "hard" Sci-Fi it doesn't

work because there is no Psi Adept.

So, again, the detail is not "required" for Sci-Fi in general. Traveller does

quite well with copious amounts of handwaving.

-V

That doesn't mean you get to blow off the point where the paranormal interacts with the non-paranormal there; if you can (i.e. its utterly irrelevant) then I'm back to claiming you're running science fantasy and the question is moot.

We're talking Psi skills, right? That right there throws the whole Sci-Fi -

Sci-Fantasy issue into disarray.

Have you ever seen someone drive a pick into a rock? And then see that

piece of rock crumble or shift?

Now imagine a billion picks slamming into the rock 10 feet below the surface

in a circle.

Nice earthquake, huh?

Did we need any geophysics and and talk of plate tectonics ? Nope.

And yet with the fantasy wizard, the same explanation suffices.

-V

Here,s an example that occured in a fantasy campagin a few years back, and shows how much trouble a little scientific knowledge can cause (or the lack of it).

Our group was travelling downriver from City A to City B, when one of the players noticed that the river was flowing from the sea to the mountains-in other words, water was flowing uphill.

Now since nearly everyone knows that water flows downhill the group got sidetracked while we were all trying to figure out why this particular river flowed in the wrong direction.

Tfe real cause was the GM messed up. Our character explained it away as some sort of mangical spell, and didn't mess with it. We also avoided drining any water from the river for fear that it might flow backwards inside us, or makes us float away.

Now in a Sci-Fi setting, some sort of explanation would be needed, requiring the creation of some sort of high tech device that caused the effect, and a reason why anyone would have gone to the trouble to do so.

And in the Fantasy world the GM didn't have to come up describe the

spell that caused the river to flow uphill? Or a reason why?

Again, in both cases, it isn't truly needed. In both cases, the players may

want the detail, Sci-Fi or Fantasy, it doesn't matter.

Again, it's up to the group whether or not such detail is necessary, regardless

of genre. But in reality, it isn't required. And often times, leads to more conflict

when a player challenges the detail because the GM and player have

conflicting views of how things work.

Miss with an arrow, you might take out a person. Miss with a phaser, you

might take out a person. Why does the city block come into play? Because

there's something there that will blow it up? If there is a stockpile of volatile

chemicals that will ignite blowing up the whole city block, then you are in the

same boat with a flaming arrow. Again, no differentiation necessary.

-V

Once again, it depends ...

In a science fiction game you may well have a character with geology, pla-

netology or seismology skill, and this character's player may well ask for a

plausible explanation of the events in more or less scientific terms, because

this is what his character would look for.

And, in my above example, the GM would be perfectly justified by saying

"There is no plausible explanation". Because, while the character may have

geology, planetology, or seismology skills, he does not have paranormal psych

skills. Not everything can be explained by the laws of physics if you are

bringing psi skills/powers into a game.

But, yes, it depends. If you are going for a hard sci-fi setting, you can

supply details if that's what everyone wants. But, that is not necessary.

What happens when the GM is at a disadvantage in the scientific knowledge

arena, and a player, with or without the scientific background, has his

scientist character ask for detail? Does the GM need to provide the detail?

Or, can he just handwave it away saying the character learns whatever it

is he wants to learn and leave it at that? That's not the system, that's

not the setting, that's the group's onus.

The issue is not a BRP one, but an RPG one. How much detail do you need?

If you need a lot, than that's up to you. But the same holds true for

any game - GURPS, Hero, d20, Traveller, etc. As you said, supplements can

provide the details, but it is still up to the group to use them.

-V

Actually, the moment you have a player who wants to do something unusual, and knows anything about seismology at all, yeah, you do. You can blow that sort of thing off easily in fantasy (after all, there's no way for the character to know that most likely); its much harder in anything that preports to be a modern or future style setting to do that.

The GM and or player needing to have knowedge (or having knowledge) about

seismology has nothing to do with it. The setting is provided by the GM. The

level of detail is left up to the GM. The reality is there does not need to be

a fault line, molten lava, etc. described at all.

The PSI Adept concentrates, succeeds at his Difficult telekinesis roll,

and the ground shakes. Yes, you need to define the powers, but that is

no different than defining the spells in fantasy. But, there is no need for

details about seismology, fault lines, and geological requirements. The

telekinesis power creates an energy field with sufficient volume, and "shakes"

that volume of space i.e. the power provides the physics.

Yes, you can provide the detail if you want, but when you're talking hi-tech

and psionics, you've already committed to a certain amount of handwaving.

-V