vagabond

While I agree that the lack of vehicle design is an issue, the differing technology isn't since technology should vary. After all, we cannot expect uniform technological breakthroughs throughout the universe. However, a nice Sci-Fi supplement would be nice. Ian

I think between Ringworld/Ringworld Companion, Cthulhu Rising, Operation Ulysees, and End Time, you can pull out enough info to get a good generic Sci-Fi supplement. Might also be worth looking at the 2300AD conversion. Ian

The default rule is you have a weapon skill which may be used to attack and parry with. That is what p.191 and p.69 are referring to. A single skill covers both. There is an optional rule that allows you to have separate attack and parry skills with each weapon, so that you can have balanced combatants, more capable attackers, or better defenders. Ian

That isn't what you complained about. You specifically brought up the following as problems with BRP doing Sci-Fi: which it did pretty well. Ian

Ringworld? IIRC, it did BRP Sci-Fi fairly well.

Some examples of very detailed "sandbox" worlds: Jorune Tekumel Talislanta Ian

I think what people are telling you is that in their experience, such a list is not necessary. Either enough info is found in the BGB, or they make a judgement call when the need arises. Ian

The other side is intentionally left generic. In the BGB, you are given Difficulty Modifiers - Easy multiplies the chance 2x, Average uses the chance unmodified, Difficult halves the chance, and Impossible tasks succeed only on a roll of 01. Also, the individual skill descriptions may mention situations in which Difficulty modifiers might be applied. But, in general, it is a GM and setting specific thing, and having some sort of chart to provide a generic set of situations and their difficulties would be near impossible. I suppose one could cull the skill descriptions for examples, but then again, the examples would be very vague, incomplete, and may not fit the GM's preferences or setting. Ian

Because, using tracking as an example, while the Inuit hunter would be much better at tracking caribou through the tundra, he would find tracking a person in the busy streets of Florence difficult. Conversely, a "PI" type in Florence could track a suspect in the busy streets, but struggle to track caribou in the tundra. However, both might be expert trackers with the same skill level. Ian

I'll just add that the Jams Bond RPG did quite well with multiplicative modifiers. Yes, it impacts higher skilled characters more, but it all works out, especially when you deal with degrees of success and if you use skills over 100. Ian

More thoughts occurred to me last night - to expound on this and thinking of Nephilim some: Sudden inspiration last night while doing dishes ... I think I know how I want to handle Isho. Rough idea right now, but I think it will fly. Isho stat not only determines how much Isho a body can store (modified by race and Isho weather), but also how much Isho a body can channel per round (again, modified by race and weather). In other words, Isho stat will determine how much Isho per round someone can pull into a weave or store in their body. That way, small quick dyshas can be cast in a single round, but more complex weaves might take more than one round to form. No roll is necessary unless something interferes during the weave. Also, while Shantha and native Jorune life will have good modifiers for both, other races may be able to draw slowly but store more or vice versa. For Muadra, they will be able to draw quickly (not as quick a sShantha), but store less proportionate amounts, thus they are highly susceptible to Isho storms and must kern (they draw more in than they can contain). I know this is somewhat of a repeat of earlier musings, but I think I have it really down in my mind and notes. Just need to play with the racial and weather modifiers some. Ian

I don't recall how TSR's GW handled pure strain humans? What advantages did they get? IIRC, not a whole lot. You could take some inspiration from other games/systems and make most energy weapons only usable by pure humans (a DNA/tuned biometrics safety switch). This doesn't mean that mutants cannot use such weapons, but that mutants weapons must be modified (and thus, potentially, become less reliable/stable, less powerful, more expensive) for use. Maybe additional skills and/or skill levels to represent living in some sort of "society" for a longer period of time and thus exposed to more formal training? Ian

I think the most simple answer is that for those weapons that are primarily used for subduing should have a note saying so, and keep the damage as is, but note that the actual physical damage is 1/2 or 1/4. Then add a rule for subduing based upon subdual damage as rolled when compared to total HP or hit location (so a Major Wound in subdual damage or subdual damage exceeding the HP for a specific body part might require a CON roll to avoid knock out or temporary disabling of the affected part). Then optional rules to use fatigue points or knockout rules. Ian

I'll see if I have it, and if not, I can ask Shannon if he has it somewhere. Ian

Dredging this up from the ashes - but I found Neville's stuff: http://web.archive.org/web/20050208015434/http://bookshelf.mcmail.com/runequest/index.htm Ian

The big questions are - what do you gain? And for how much work? And what do you lose? For me, if you put humans (and equivalent species) in a 30 - 70 range, how do you account for beings that go well beyond? Using a 1 - 20 range, super strong creatures (giants or giant sized, which can exist in a Sci-Fi campaign) can have STR of 50 or greater. Bumping up to a range of 100 representing extremely strong humans, those creatures now have a STR in the 200 - 300 range to represent something 5x as strong. I can see stat values getting out of hand very quickly. Especially if you tried to use such a scale in the fantasy genre where things already may have stats in the 100+ range, and to maintain the proper ratios, using the new scale, would be in the 500 range. People seem to make a big deal over "Opposed rolls", but the reality is they already pretty much exist by virtue of levels of success. Sure, the possibility of ties is greater since the ranges for each success level is generally greater than one point, but those ties can be resolved in various ways if desired (highest skill/stat wins for example). I hardly use the Resistance Table anyway as it only a crutch in my opinion - I can do the math in my head. But, I also find that using levels of success gives me a more consistent method of resolving things since I apply it to skill rolls as well - providing me with a "unified mechanic" anyway.

For the record, I am planning on implementing something using the Allegiance rules in this way to handle Drennship in Ardoth as well as other political and cultural ideologies (Thantier and their stance on non pure humans, Bronth and Woffen views of Iscin and Crugar, etc.) These Allegiances will have an impact on Etiquette/Interaction skills as well. I have also been digging into James Bond 007 for some thoughts on such interpersonal skills - again, Bond has some good rules for handling Reaction, Persuasion, Seduction, Interrogation, Torture and Brainwashing. Ian

Actually, you could simplify and combine Allegiance and polarizing viewpoints/ideologies if you have multiple ideologies. Instead of a polarizing sliding scale, you could just have individual Allegiances (similar to Law/Chaos/Balance in Elric!/SB5), but for those ideologies that are strictly diametrically opposed, in their description, create some sort of limiting factor such as Conservative + Liberal are never greater than 100, or once a character embraces Conservative, Liberal can never be greater than 1/2 of Conservative without losing certain ties to the Conservative ideology. Then, like Allegiance, you can set certain privileges or bonuses when a character's Allegiance towards a certain ideology hits various levels and/or when a certain ideology is embraced. This would allow a character to have multiple ties to various cultures/governments/ideologies that may not be diametrically opposed, but enforce limits when ideologies must be mutually exclusive. Ian

I gave this reply in another thread about UA Sanity mechanics : "I think you could do something with Allegiance, merging it with the Traits/Passions from Pendragon. Again. like Mankcam says, you only really need a binary "Morality"/"Immorality", set at 50/50 like Pendragon's T&P. As you perform actions that go against your "preferred" morality, you need to roll against the appropriate level, and gain/lose "points" as you teeter back and forth. You could then tie certain break points to SAN, to reflect something like the Joker's slip into deeper levels of psychosis and depravity as the weight towards "Immorality" grows stronger." I think it can apply to a political system as well. And, can allow for multiple factions, as long as you can define them in opposing pairs (though, I suppose with 3 factions, you could define 3 pairs so that all 3 can have some relative opposition scale to each other to represent varying degrees of opposition). Basically define "Conservative/Liberal", and set it according to the character's starting political slate. The opposing scale slides back and forth as you make decisions one way or the other. When trying to urge/convince people to work harder or go along with your plan/views, you can either roll directly against the current values, or use it as a modifier or cooperative skill, or perhaps even as an opposed skill (for example you could make a roll of orate vs. community trait, like a character with 80% conservative giving a talk to liberals would roll orate vs. conservative to represent the already existing slant against conservatism). Ian

While I like the Root/Branch skill concept (and agree - it mostly fits with modern/future settings, actually almost a necessity), another approach, and one that also works well across all settings, is to split skills into Root/Branch trees, but have the Root skill determined by the Branch skills - i.e. the Root skill is equal to the sum of 1/10 or 1/20 of all the Branch skills under it, so that as the individual expertise in the Branch skills increase, so does the level of general knowledge in the Root skill. Ian

Actually, since the books were also copyrighted separately in the UK, they are still under UK copyright, and therefore protected pretty much world wide by the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works. Also, I believe in the US only the first five novels have fallen into the public domain. Ian

Interesting - the preview shows art used by Chaosium to represent Oone the Dreamthief ... Ian

Elric! and Stormbringer did quote well with Major Wounds. Lopping off limbs and/or incapacitating them works just fine. However, the speed up and flow of just tracking overall HP instead of hit locations and individual location HP makes more sense to me for a fast paced Conan game (in my experience, hit locations and the additional bookkeeping slowed things down as opposed to only rolling on the MW table when enough damage is done - plus the additional excitement of "Cool, I scored a crit and a Major Wound - what did I do?!")

With HP calculated as (CON+SIZ)/2, an average NPC will have 10 - 13 HP. A critical hit can easily do more than that, and with the right roll on the Major Wound table (i.e. any MW that affects the head), it is easy enough to state that a decapitation has occurred.

IMHO, Elric (either Chaosium or Mongoose) + Cthulhu will get you what you need for good REH Conan styled gaming. The Chaosium version handles S&S very well, with skills above 100% to allow for more critical hits, and instead of hit locations, you have Major Wounds. Allegiance and Sanity can be tied, or even just yank the Corruption stuff from Mongoose's Conan. MRQII's Elric stuff works well too, as sorcery is a bit more risky, and pacts with demons and such play a larger role. Ian