Lord Twig

Okay, hold up. I just noticed that Dodge refers you to the "Attack and Parry Matrix". So is that supposed to be the "Attack and Dodge or Parry Matrix"? All those "or"s would make a lot more sense! One would be for Parry, the other would be for Dodge. Still would need some work though. For example: Special vs. Failure = Attack does normal damage, has special result by weapon type Special vs. Fumble = Attack does maximum damage in addition to rolled damage, has special result by weapon type, or parrying weapon or shield takes 4 points of damage. Target rolls on the fumble table. So a Fumble dodge turns a success into a critical, but a fumbled parry blocks the damage (though your shield takes 4 points) and you have to roll on the fumble chart. I would rather he just failed his parry! Edit: Also, would the defender get his armor against any of those?

Reasons I was doing page flipping. I looked up the Parry skill on page 71, which referred me to page 191. That's fine. Looked up Shield skill on page 78 which referred me to "Parry" on page 191 (again fine), Damage ratings on page 261 (fine), Knockback rules on page 197 (fine), "Attack and Parry Matrix on page 191 (actually on page 193), Melee Weapon Parry Fumble Table" on page 194 (okay), and "Shields" on page 260 for more information. (Huh? Okay, I guess you talk about shields specifically here instead of parrying in general.) However, there is also a "Shield" entry on page 203 that is not mentioned under the Shield skill. Here it says, "If a shield parries a special success such as a crushing blow, the shield automatically takes the full amount of damage to its hit points." That is different than what is said elsewhere. On page 260, it says that "AP/HP are only used if the shield is struck by a special or critical, or is worn slung." But on page 215 under Broken Weapons it says, "A weapon or shield will break if it is used to parry an attack that exceeds the weapon's hit points by at least 1." When exactly would that situation come up? As far as I can tell a weapon doesn't do damage if it is parried, or maybe you do roll damage if an attack is parried? Honestly I think it would be easier/better to just keep the 1 point/2 point/4 point to damage a shield or weapon when parrying and not worry about how much damage the attack does.

Trying to figure out BRP parry has been an exercise in page flipping. On page 191, It says that a character with a weapon of shield can "parry a blow", but nowhere does it say exactly what that means. A sentence that says, "If the attack is parried the defender takes no damage" or "all damaged is blocked" or "the defender subtracts the AP of the armor from the attackers damage" would go a long way to make things clearer. So, I believe a successful parry blocks all damage from a successful attack. (Or the attack is blocked so the attacker doesn't do any damage. Subtle difference.) Hmmm... Actually the whole "Attack and Parry Matrix" needs to be redone I think. Reasons given below. Attack vs. Parry = Result Critical vs. Critical = Defender blocks damage, no other result. Special vs. Special = Defender blocks damage, no other result. Attacking and parrying weapon or shield both take 1 point of damage. (If there is no other result, how come both weapons are taking damage?) Success vs. Success = Defender blocks damage, no other result. So, equal success level equal no result, unless they are both specials, then they both take damage? Isn't that a little confusing? I think making it a standard "if tied no result" rule would be much better. Attack vs. Parry = Result Critical vs. Special = Defender blocks damage, no result, or parrying weapon or shield takes 1 point of damage Special vs. Success = Attack does normal damage, has special result by weapon type, or parrying weapon or shield takes 2 points of damage. In each case the attack beat the defender by the same degree, but we have very different results. The inclusion of "this OR that" is terribly confusing. Maybe in the first case it was supposed to be and? Again the "no result" doesn't make any sense. For the second, perhaps you roll damage and compare it to the AP/HP of the shield? If it exceeds the shields AP/HP the shield is broken, if not it takes 2 points. Why does a Critical vs. Special do 1 point and a Special vs. Success do 2? Attack vs. Parry = Result Special vs. Failure = Attack does normal damage, has special result by weapon type. Success vs. Failure = Attack strikes defender, defender's armor value subtracted from damage. This suggests that a Special will ignore armor, which I know isn't right. Perhaps it should read: "Attack does normal damage, defender's armor value subtracted from damage and has special result by weapon type." And the second should read: "Attack does normal damage, defender's armor value subtracted from damage." I think it is important that the exact same phrase be used when you have effectively the same result. The Shield skill refers you to the "Attack and Parry Matrix" on page 191, but it is actually on page 193 (Jason has probably already caught this one).

What number? If I may ask.

In every round you act on your Dex rank. You can move up to 30m if that is all you do. Or you can move 29m or less and act on 1/4 your Dex rank. If you move 15m or less you can act on 1/2 your Dex rank. If instead you attack on your Dex rank you can also move up to 5m at the same time. If you can take additional actions, such as firing a gun multiple times a round, each additional action happens on your Dex rank -5. So if you had a Light pistol and wanted to fire 3 times you would need a Dex of 11 or better and would act on Dex, Dex-5 and Dex-10 ranks. This is a quick and dirty explanation based on my reading the section 5 minutes ago.

Really you shouldn't buy the 0 Edition if you want a rule book. I bought mine for a "sneak peek" and as a collector's item. When the finished book is out I will buy that one as the rule book that will be used in games. Not sure what you mean buy adding something that wasn't there before. RQ3 Player's Book, pg 34, heading "Skill vs. Skill". That is the opposed roll rules for RQ3. The exact same machanic is in BRP as an option, but honestly the default meathod is much better. Sounds like you will want to choose one of the other options then. The range from very simple (both roll, high successful roll wins) to slightly harder than the default (Both roll, compare degree of success, reduce winer's success buy losers. If same degree of success each player subtracts their roll from their base skill, highest margin wins.) So really it can be complicated with more detail or quick and easy, at your option.

I don't think the example represent an "average" soldier. The NPCs were created with the same system that you would use to create your heroes. So the sample NPC soldier is a "Hero Soldier" or what your character might look like if you were to make hero with "Soldier" as your background. Look at the other examples as well. All of them have characteristics well above average.

Hahaha! Good one!

I don't remember what thread, but I asked Jason about opposed rolls since I was confused and he cleared it up. The rules as currently written compare the degree of success to see who wins. Critical beats a Special etc. Then the loser downgrades the winners success depending on his own success. It then goes on to say that if they both get the same degree of success then the higher roll wins. It was my error that I then applied the previous rule that the the loser would downgrade the winner's success resulting in a Fail/Fail result each time. When I read it now it is perfectly clear that that is not what was intended. Jason explained it to me then said that he would add some wording to make it clearer. Again, even without the additional wording, if you read it correctly it is pretty clear what is intended. I really don't understand why just having rules for opposed skill rolls would be a deal breaker. Nothing says that you have to use them. There is also an entire page of optional ways to do opposed skill rolls if you don't like the default. It really doesn't matter how you do them or if you use them at all. It won't make any difference in any published material, a skill will have a number next to it regardless of which system is used.

I have always enjoyed Fantasy settings. Modern and SciFi settings never really did it for me. For Superhero games I would probably use Champions.

What if both sneaker and spotter have 200%? Who subtracts what? If the sneaker rolls first then subtracts 100% from the spotter, the spotter will still have a 100% chance to spot him (or 95% chance). But if the spotter rolls first the sneaker will have the 100% chance to sneak past. What happens if they both have 100%? The sneaker may always make his sneak, but the spotter is always going to spot him regardless of whether he makes it or not. Or if the sneaker has to fail a roll for the spotter to spot him the spotter will almost never get a chance, even if he has 1000%.

You know really I don't see calling Power Points PP as an issue. D&D does it for Psionic Power Points (PP) and no one has even mentioned it that I have ever noticed. Honestly when reading my mind just replaces PP with Power Points subconsciously.

How about the skills? Are you supposed to round up or down for Specials and Criticals?

Quick one. I could not find a "dagger" in the weapons list. I found knife and sai, but not dagger.

For the record, there is an option to divide the skills by 5 and then use the Resistance table. One skill would have to be declared "passive" and the owner of the "active" skill would roll to determine success or failure. I am somewhat confused by your attitude badcat. Are you saying that if the BRP rulebook, by chance, just happened to do things exactly the way that you do in your game you would buy the game? But since it doesn't you are not? :confused:

I have realized that I was over thinking things and the default method makes a bit more sense now. So the way I understand it. First check level of success, Critical beats Special beats Success beats Failure beats Fumble. Then the loser, if successful can downgrade the winners success one level for every level of success achieved. If both get the SAME level of success then highest roll wins. In this case you do NOT downgrade the success of the winner, which would result in a Failure every time. Now for another problem I noticed. For skills over 100% the only benefit you are receiving is increasing your chance to Critical or Special. So if I have 200% vs. someone who has 100% then if we both succeed I can't roll over 100% so the extra 100% I have is not helping. By contrast if you use the "roll low" method (a.k.a. "best margin") then if I roll a 85 vs. the other guys 30 the 200-85=115 beats 100-30=70.

Hi Jason, On page 174, 2nd column, under Special Success, it says to round fractions down, but there are a couple errors in the example. First, it says 65/5=13.6, but I believe you mean 68/5=13.6. Second it then says to round up to 14. To add to the confusion the table on page 173, Skill Results Table lists the chances for Critical, Special, and Fumble, but it rounds Criticals and Specials up. Under Fumble on page 174 it does not say to round up or down, but it does round up in the example. Personally I was fine with the old method of using standard rounding for everything. Which is to say .5 or higher rounds up and anything lower rounds down. But I understand the change. Math is hard after all.

You know, this is the first game board that I have been to that has made me feel young. Usually I am one of the oldest gamers around (37), here it is like I'm a spring chicken.

So the number is slowly creeping up there.

Point taken. Glad to hear that most of your orders went smoothly. It makes me feel a little better about possibly order more things from them in the future. It seems we have a least a couple different theories on why the 420 number. I won't try to guess myself.

Ugh, I have been sick and dealing with two sick kids at the same time. Family always comes first, so take all the time you need. :cool:

Possibly, but that is not what the rules say. I believe these were taken from Stormbringer 5. How do they work there?

P123, 2nd column, 2nd paragraph, 1st sentence: "Once a spell is dismissed, it must be reacquired the sorcery from your character's grimoire." Doesn't sound right. Also, regarding sorcery. You can have a number of spells equal to your Int, but on P128 under levels it says: "If the number is a range, the spell's level is variable, and the players can choose how many level of the spell their characters have in memory and are able to cast." What does that mean exactly? It doesn't matter what the level of the spell is to store it in your Int, each spell only takes 1 Int, correct? Is there any reason you wouldn't always just have the maximum in mind? If you did have, say, Sorcerer's Strength 3 in mind, could you cast it at just level one instead? Or would you always have to use level 3?

Regarding old people with kids. I have my 20th high school reunion coming up. Think I might actually go to this one after skipping the 10th. But I will have to find a baby sitter for my boys, who will be 4 and 1 when it comes around. I expect that some people there will have kids that are considerably older. Not sure if they will have grandkids by then, but I suppose it is possible. Oh, and my wife is 4'11", so putting things up "high" is a relative term.

Regarding Chaosium shipping. Chaosium is not book seller. They are a game company and publisher. It is four guys (to the best of my knowledge) in a tiny office (I assume) working on something more for the love of the job than the financial rewards (I would be amazed if they made that much). The fact that they are not good at customer service does not surprise me in the least. I have actually found few people that are good at customer service, even in an industry that is primarily about customer service (IT). Odds are they rarely actually see their customers. Really their customers are game stores. It also sounds like Chaosium might have taken a loss on their "Advanced Reader" copies. So far only up to number 75 has been reported. That leaves 345 books unaccounted for. They might be able to sell them at cons or something, if any are coming up.