Lord Twig

Greyhawk was the orginal D&D campaign. Greyhawk and Forgotten Realms share the same dieties and a lot more. I don't consider them successful settings really, so much as more sources for new spells and prestige classes (prestige classes are the D&D equivalent to a CCG). Dragonlance was probably the most successful of TSR's settings, and one that didn't fit into the D&D rules, but got shoehorned.

I think we are working with different definitions of "successful". Dragonlance was good, and certainly more original, but as a game world it actually fell rather flat. The fact that the characters from the books solved every major crisis was a problem when you rolled up your characters and were ready to save the world. :ohwell:

I was talking about successful from a business point of view. Forgotten realms, Greyhawk, and now Ebberon, have sold very well and are therefore successful by that definition.

:focus:

I think BRP would do a good job of supporting a more grim and gritty or street-level superheros, and that could be pretty cool.

That kind of goes along with Atgxtg's point of not forcing the genre to fit the system, but fit the system to the genre. So, don't try to force High Fantasy or High Superheroics to fit with BRP, focus on what BRP does well. Think of heroes like Batman, Daredevil or the Punisher. Marvel's Cloak and Dagger would fit pretty well too. I'm sure there are more examples out there.

We had a Zorak Zoran with a riding prey mantis for a while. We left it with the horses outside while we investigated a cave and were down there longer than expected. When we finally came out we found the mantis got hungry and ate the sorcerer's horse. The sorcerer was upset, but Mr. Zorak Zoran just laughed at him.

Every night after that the sorcerer would cast a high powered Palsy on the Mantis when it was his turn at watch. Eventually he hit the head and incapacitated it. A little work with a Damage Boosted sword and the mantis ceased to be a threat to future horses.

The Chalana Arroy had to step in after that to cool things down. The Hero Quest we were on required a diverse group, so we knew in advance that there might be some inter-party troubles.

I would agree that most licensed settings would not work well with D&D, or more specifically, the D20 system. But I don't thing it is accurate to say that settings have not done well for D&D.

Greyhawk, Forgotten Realms and Ebberon may be remarkably similar in many respects, but they where not forced to fit the D&D paradigm. They were designed from the ground up to fit D&D. Subtle but important difference. They were not forced to fit, they were custom designed to fit, and they have all been incredibly popular. (Note: I fully realize that Popular does not always equal Good.)

By contrast WotC managed to get the StarWars license and instead of forcing StarWars to fit D&D, they changed their rules to fit StarWars. It is still class and level, but there is a whole lot of flexibility in each class. Equipment is not that important. They made changes so that lightly armored Rebels had a chance against the heavily armed and armored Stormtroopers. While not terribly realistic, it is true to the source. They changed the damage system. Added a new system for Force powers. Really they did a lot to make the game fit the setting.

As for what Chaosium should do, I think they should design their own campaign world from the ground up. Basically do exactly the same as D&D and create a world that fits their system. It would be quite different from any D&D settings just because of the differences between the two systems. This would allow them to highlight the system's strengths and would not require a major re-tooling to get it to fit someone else's preconceived setting.

You are the one who is setting your style above others.

Actually, no, he is not. He is saying that a lot of people enjoy the tactical or mechanical side of RPGs and that it is no better or worse than the Role-Playing aspect.

You kept stating that combat is the primary goal and that not focusing on it (youtr style, apparently) does a disservice to most "end users".

Again, no, he did not say that combat was the primary goal, he said that "game designs that don't pay attention to that (combat) are serving most of their end users badly". Saying that you should not ignore combat is far different than saying that it is the primary goal.

I'm saying that there are other ways to approach situations in gaming besides fighting.

And as far as I can tell Nightshade is saying that it is perfectly fine to do so if that is what you want to do.

You're the one saying that RPGs should be devoted to combat, and that any other way is some sort of exception that won't work for most people.

He didn't say that RPGs should be devoted to combat. Where did he say that? He did say that RPGs that didn't focus on combat don't work for most people (but not all). Again that is different than saying that RPGs should be devoted to combat.

If that's what you think, why don't you just play D&D? Sounds to me like it has everything you desire. A game that based around combat, and play flows from one fight to the next, and better still is supported by the majority of gamers.

From what you have been stating, I don't see why you would want to play a game like RQ/BRP that wastes so much time and pages on things like skills, cults, and cultures, all of which detract from the thing that you hold above everything else, combat. Just think how much more fighting you'd get in an RPG with with a lot more "encounters" each session.

This is just being rude.

First, there is nothing wrong with D&D. I never liked AD&D 1st and 2nd edition, but found the update to 3rd to be a vast improvement. Others would disagree, that doesn't make anyone wrong. It just means we have different tastes.

Second, it seems you are implying that he should go play an inferior game (D&D) because he is not advanced enough to play RQ or BRP. Please correct me if I am wrong! But the tone I am getting from your post is not very polite.

I actually do use it some times. Usually for short messages just like this one.

Further, copyright is distinct from trademark. Trademarks CAN lapse, and require vigorous defending in most jurisdictions. Copyright generally persists until a period after the authors death (typically seventy years), and within that time frame cannot lapse, even if the work is out of print: copyright can only be explicitly relinquished.

Exactly, the copyright for the RQ3 rule books did not lapse. As I said before, the contract that AH signed to publish Chaosium's copyrighted books lapsed. When it did, the copyright reverted to Chaosium.

What I told is that the WORDS are belonging to Chaosium.

And no, RQ name does not belong to GS because he paied Steve Perrin and al.

Chaosium, not Greg, payed them.

It belongs to him because Chaosium sold it to AH, that AH let it's right lapse, and Greg was faster than anybody else to grab it.

Yes, the words belong to Chaosium. This is because of the way copyrights work. See above.

Greg did not have to pay Chaosium, Steve Perrin, or anybody else for the RuneQuest name. He just had to pay to register it as a Trademark. (I think you have to pay to do that?) You are right that Avalon Hill (and Hasbro) let the Trademark lapse and Greg jumped on it. He then licensed it to Mongoose. So I guess the only reason for grabbing the Trademark was to sell it for money. :ohwell:

SO, if we say that OGL is not the way to go, but a "compatible with Basic Roleplaying" mark, and a "needs the Basic Roleplaying rulebook" statement, is there anyone here that can argue that would be a bad thing?

SGL.

Personally I think this would be the way to go.

You're making the error of conflating law and ethics. In many people's minds there's no direct relationship.

I stand corrected.

Really, how so? It is a OGL MRQ line, even if it has more in common with CoC.

It probably isn't any less ethical than the BRP monograph's. They used a system that was sold to Avalon Hill. But, since you can't copywrite rules (and that is fact, look it up) pretty much anything from any RPG is open provided it isn't a trademark, special term, or setting specific.

GORE is perfectly ethical. Mongoose made their rules OGL, and GORE took it. That's the way it goes.

Chaosiums monographs are also perfectly ethical. Hasbro let their contract for RuneQuest expire. The trademark became open and Greg pounced on it. (Not sure why he did if he wasn't going to do anything with it.) The copyrighted text reverted to the original owner, which was Chaosium. So Chaosium is the rightful owner of the copyrighted text. They made the monographs available to enforce their copyright and so they could claim that it was not "out of print". This helped them to hold on to the copyright while they worked on the BRP rulebook.

Jason or some others with more knowledge of Chaosium might correct me on some of this, but I am pretty sure this is the case.

I seem to recall that Ars Magica released an "Open" rules set and they lost their shirt.

I agree with Atgxtg, going OGL with BRP is a mistake. Having people publish low-quality supplements is the least of the worries. The biggest problem is a stand-alone core book using the BRP OGL with no mention of BRP at all.

Think of Mongoose's Conan book. They have essentially re-published D&D and don't have to pay Wizards a dime. Wizards can't do anything about it because the system is "Open". Of course Wizards is big enough that they can out produce Mongoose and, more importantly where Mongoose is concerned, put out better quality books. Mongoose is good at turning out a lot of books, but most (but admittedly not all) are of low quality.

The last thing Chaosium needs is a publisher to by a product license (like Stargate or maybe David Edding's Belgariad or anything really) cut and paste the BRP OGL rules into it and then just added a few flavor pages and some monsters and release it as their own.

I agree with you on the first point. Regardless of how rare magic is, it will be common for the PCs to have at least one spell caster. I don't think there is anything wrong with that.

I disagree with you on the second. You mention that it is a 'role-playing' game. I will mention to you that it is a role-playing 'game'. See the difference?

Sure it is up to the GM to ensure that everyone has fun, but why make it harder for him if it doesn't have to be?

I think part of the problem is that you are seeing spell casters as being "supernatural" and everyone else as being "mundane". Why does someone who wields a sword have to be mundane? Sure the Archmage is powerful, but the master swordsman in the group is so good he can cut a spell from the air as if flies toward him. Why not? It is a fantasy game after all.

As one who had great hopes for MRQ and saw them dashed, stomped and beaten to death by Mongoose, I can tell you exactly what is wrong with MRQ in a highly biased, but none the less accurate manner.

In fact I have actually attempted to "fix" MRQ and posted it on a wiki site that can be found here.

Some of the big problems:

*If you had a high enough skill in Resilience you could keep fighting even after your head was severed. (It's just a flesh wound!)

*If you fought in full plate you had -42% to attack and parry, but if you were naked you could take a -40% to ignore the plate armor your opponent is wearing and keep your full parry. (And the woad wearing Orlanthi rejoiced!)

*In MRQ if your skill goes over 100% your chance to overcome a novice with 20% actually goes down. (Talk about overconfidence being a weakness!)

*In RQ spirit combat was power vs. power, or, in other words, spirit vs. spirit. In MRQ you needed a magic weapon to beat on it. (Well, that's the way D&D does it.)

There are numerous other problems and the books are riddled with errors. Examples don't match rules. The rules have constantly been changed, but no reason has been given as to why. They certainly will not admit that things are broken. It is absolutely a quantity over quality issue.

On a personal level, I loath that skill rolls are now handed out by the GM like experience points. I don't like Legendary Abilities, which are obviously an attempt to cash in on supplements by putting out books with more powerful ones the same way that Wizards does with D&D feats. I don't like Hero Points, at least not in RuneQuest. And finally the rules for Divine Magic and Sorcery that came out in the Companion (which I unfortunately spent money on) are the worst attempts at a magic system rule set that I have ever laid eyes on.

But hey, I'm not bitter...

* I've suggested before that the spirit, divine, and ritual magic from RQ; some de-Lovecraftized Call of Cthulhu magic; the Ki powers from Land of Ninja; more info on demon summoning from Stormbringer (4th edition); and some of the expanded magic from The Bronze Grimiore and The Unknown East would make a kick-ass BRP Magic.

I notice you didn't include RQ's sorcery rules in there. Personally I love the flexibility that they had, though there were a few fixes needed. Why would you not include those? To much magic already? To similar to other system? Some other reason?

You want something that is more representative of the contents of the book?

(I'm terrible :shocked:)

I have pulled Gloranthan Chaos into other settings and it works fine. Even if you have a standard Good vs. Evil setting, where Evil tries to corrupt the Good, you can always add the Chaos that "just wants to destroy everything".

As for memorable chaos features...

Similar to "how would the body expel gas?" is the "how would the body spray acid?" That Broo that ran up and grabbed his member wasn't so funny when he started to spray the party with acid. Not only was it painful, it was really gross! The perfect Broo!

Speaking of magic. I was wondering how it played with the variable armor. Does a Protection 4 (if there is such a thing in the BRP rules) still add +4 armor?

So average protection would be:

leather 1D6-1 = 2.5

half plate 1D8-1 = 3.5

full plate 1D10-1 = 4.5

w/helm 1D10+2 = 7.5

So leather is a bit stronger and plate a bit weaker.

Then, what the heck!?

Melnibonean half plate 1D8+4 = 8.5

Melnibonean full plate 1D10+8 = 13.5

With +4 and +8, doesn't that kinda defeat the purpose of rolling?

Anyway, I am in the fixed armor camp.

The variable damage covers angle of attack and Specials and Criticals would be hitting weak points or unarmored areas. Armor is designed to minimize weak points and gaps. Sure there is going to be some, but armor is designed to minimize those as much as possible.

How effective is a dagger vs. full plate anyway? There is no way you are going to shove a dagger through a metal plate. You are either going to have to jab at the seams (Special), or you are going to stab through a gap (Critical).

I find it interesting that the example was made that "even the sorriest specimen of goblinhood can skewer the big knight in plate armor" when talking about variable armor. We have played with fixed armor for years and the number of times that some lowly bandit or militia (or trollkin or zombie or feral broo, etc.) has taken out a location of even our most heavily armored warrior is frightening. Specials and Criticals are not to be discounted.

Can we get some examples of what kind of dice is rolled for armor using the variable system?

In RQ3 soft leather was 1, stiff leather 2, ringmail 4, chain 7 and plate 8. What would the same (or equivalent) armors be in the variable system?

I have put up a consolidated list of questions and answers from the "Q&A with the new BRP Author" thread in the wiki.

It can be found here:

http://basicroleplaying.com/forum/showthread.php?t=166

I have done some basic editing and categorization, but it is far from done. It is open to other people if they would like to help edit it.

Some of the editing was to make the questions make a little more sense in a FAQ format. I hope no one is offended about my changing their words, I tried to change as little as possible. I did not edit or change any of Jason's answers.

Again if there is anything there that you don't like you are free to edit it!

It is killing me as well.

The only saving grace of the situation is that the longer it takes the more I am sure that they are taking their time to do it right. I would rather have it late than riddled with errors.

I took all of the questions and answers from this thread and created a new wiki page with the consolidated list. It can be found here: http://basicroleplaying.com/forum/showthread.php?t=166

Unfortunately I wanted to format it better and maybe arrange things into catagories, but I don't have the access to edit it.

Also, I am not sure how to link it (or where) from the main wiki site...

Help?

No idea.

It's not a Chaosium product, so it's really up to Chris Helton and the gang at Seraphim Guard what portions of the core rules to use or change. I don't know what the licensing guidelines are, but I'd be surprised if it allowed Chaosium to dictate what optional rules are present in the game design.

Actually I did not mean to suggest that Chaosium would dictate the optional rules used. You said that you submitted a checklist for the optional rules and that's what I was asking about. So I guess the answer is "Yes, there is a checklist that Seraphim Guard can use to tell us what optional rules they are using." If they choose to use it of course.

Thanks!

Trying to stick to the question/answer format...

Do you know if campaign or setting books will include all the rules needed to play or if the BRP core book will be required?

If the BRP core book is required to use setting books, is there an easy method to indicated which optional rules, if any, are used by a setting? Something like a form that can be filled out that shows all the optional rules used.

For instance, the Deadworld setting that is coming out. Is there a simple, standard way to know if they use Sanity or not? Hit locations or not? etc.

So you and all your players actually kept ticking off FP points every round, applying the subtraction of skill percent when it dropped below zero? To me it was way too much bookkeeping.

Yes. What was to bookkeep besides ticking off the rounds? It takes approximately one second to tick off a fatigue point. Honestly battles rarely lasted so long that the negatives came into play, or if they did it got up to maybe -5% after 8 or 10 rounds or so. That is a pretty long battle in RQ3.

So if you had a 82% spear attack (because, you know, spears are awesome) and you rolled a 37, you hit. If you rolled a 79 you check to see what your negative fatigue is. If it was -3 or less, you still hit.

Honestly we didn't have to check that often, but people missed due to fatigue enough that they tried to avoid it. Endurance or Vigor spells became required spells for heavily armored characters, after Strength of course.