Ian Absentia

15 hours ago, Ian A. Thomson said:

Turned out to be a 'meh' idea 🙂

Are we still talking about Blade Runner 2049 seven years later?  If so, I feel that it's a film that, like it's predecessor, will be most appreciated in retrospect.  Once again, the audience largely mistook the A Story for the B Story and the B for the A, and thought it was supposed to be an action movie.  It's a transcendental love story, like the original, hidden in plain sight.

!i!

The overall number doesn't matter to me.  For the sake of orderly progression I prefer to arrange my dungeons alphabetically, room-by-room, with a different monster in each one.  For D&D, beginning with Aboleth, concluding with Zombie.  If they weren't intended to be encountered in that order, they would not have been organised in the book thusly.

!i!

2 hours ago, tooley1chris said:

Am curious why some undead have a CON score (vsmpires) while others do not (skeletons)

Relative to Hit Points, it's the amount of meat on their bones?  Dead or alive.

[Edit: Confirmed, BRP BGB p.346.  "Skeletons have no CON, and thus have only their SIZ as HP."]

!i!

Annually, I feel overwhelmed by the flood of New Year's memoriams*, when I know it must be happening throughout the rest of the year.

We're all mayflies.  Smoke 'em while you got 'em.

And...be kind.

!i!

(*Daily, if I make the mistake of visiting a certain other game forum. :p)

4 hours ago, soltakss said:

Sell well.

Receive adequate support from its publisher.

!i!

As stated by others (because it can't be emphasised enough), what really sets RQG apart from its forebears is Common Rune Magic and its broader availability.  I really like Passions and Affinities, but it's Rune Magic that opens the doors and windows.

!i!

1 hour ago, hipsterinspace said:

In the core rules your loyalty passions are what you use to secure support from a patron or group, so it reflects that it would be more difficult to secure their support

Which makes Loyalty (Clan) 40% better than no Passion at all.  So crime does pay.

Which I believe is at the heart of the original question.  It's clear that every Praxian begins play with Loyalty (Tribe) by default, but not Loyalty (Clan).  How do you damage a reputation that doesn't exist?  We've had discussions elsewhere about the point at which a low Passion is effectively a flaw, but the problem being that this sort of approach suggests default Passions for anything and everything at 60%.

!i!

27 minutes ago, PhilHibbs said:

Agreed, "not yet". 

Let me put it this way.  Aside from my days of playing HQ, I've never before had a starting RuneQuest character capable of being lifted by the winds of Orlanth and shining with the light of Yelmalio deliver a crushing spear-thrust with a modified to-hit upwards of 150%.  It was a path that promised Bigger Things to Come.  Which I've gathered is the intent of the design.

Metaplot is fun to read, but don't let it shut down my party.

!i!

On 12/31/2022 at 6:56 AM, Summersong said:

See, this is an approach I never got. Not everything, everywhere, has to be about you, all the time. [...snip...] ...it's a big world, full of people.

I don't mean to suggest that the players' characters must be the focal and pivotal heroes of the setting.  And in earlier editions of RQ it was fairly clear that they weren't expected to be.  But in this edition they are made party to that level of power.  Sure, it's a big world and there are lots of stories to tell, but deferring to Argrath by default shouldn't be preordained.

In the last RQG campaign I played, I voiced my ambition to eventually track down and defeat Harrek, and maybe even raise a Golden Moon.  The GM and his friends laughed and told me that it wouldn't happen, couldn't happen.  Yeah, it would be a big swing, but being told that it conflicted impossibly with the metaplot was a total ****-block.

That's what I mean when I say that Argrath occupies a position that the players ought to have, or at least have open to them.  I realise that it's not currently fashionable to reassure everyone that YGWV, but, yeah, it will, and it should be encouraged.

!i!

55 minutes ago, mfbrandi said:

I think the problem with Argrath is that he stands for the metaplot, for the future already written.

The problem I find with Argrath, given the elevation of heroic level escapades in this version of RQ, is that he occupies a position that the players ought to have.  In earlier editions, you were lucky to be one of his followers; in this edition, he's stealing the limelight.  Jar-Eel and Harrek less so, as they're generally presented as antagonists (unless your game originates from their POV, I suppose).

!i!

On 12/15/2022 at 1:19 PM, AndrewTBP said:

Given how strange the Spirits illustrated in the Bestiary are... 

So, I read that as "Sports Illustrated", which, in regard to all things mammalian, led me to envision the annual marsupial swimsuit edition.  Strange indeed.

!i!

On 11/20/2022 at 5:38 PM, dan2448 said:

As an aside, I am also wondering whether the chrome armored master villain on the cover of the Superworld boxed set was "Dr. Dread" from the introductory adventure?

Yes!  Compare the cover painting with the assembly of villains depicted on p.30 of the Gamemasters Book.

Opening my boxed set after several decades, out spills reams of write-ups of pretty much every popular Marvel character c.1984-86.  There are a lot of disadvantages I wouldn't allow these days.

!i!

7 minutes ago, Baron Wulfraed said:

For what I paid in rent over 30 years, I should have owned the apartment!

Which is why land "lordship" is a fundamentally criminal enterprise.

!i!

Does anyone else see the mopey Truss-face in the head of lettuce?  That'd be the head on the right.

!i!

Not as such, that I'm aware of, though several related titles touch on the topic:  Mythras Firearms, M-Space, Luther Arkwright, Rubble & Ruin, Destined.  Overall, it's not difficult to adapt the cultures and careers from Mythras to other eras, but, no, it's not curated.

I do know that a number of us have discussed running Monster Island in more contemporary genres, so I'll flag down @Raleel.  And @hkokko for good measure, in case there's some compiled list of genre alternatives that I've missed.

!i!

11 hours ago, Atgxtg said:

But then they lose out on the history and details that make the setting appealing in the first place.

We've read the books, haven't we?  Or at least watched the movies and/or television series?

11 hours ago, Atgxtg said:

I've seen more than one gamer drop back into D&D mode while playing in Middle Earth. 

I've seen more than one RQG character never get through the Homeland/Family History process.

I just reject the idea that one is missing out on a lot by moving past just sitting there thinking about playing.

!i!

4 minutes ago, Atgxtg said:

You kinda lose some of the charm of the setting that way [ignoring Family Histories]. As Middle Earth is a setting with a detailed and extensive timeline, I think it would be better to redo the family history tables to reflect the setting. It would be great to be able to tie the PCs to the great battles and events of the age. 

I'll agree with you, provisionally, which is why I suggest that if you enjoy them as an intellectual exercise one should have at 'em.  But if I've seen one major impediment to people playing the characters that they want in RQG, it's the pre-play Homelands/Family Histories mini-game.  If it's not already published, it's a lot of work to come up with one of your own.  I recommend that players get on in there and play, and not worry so much about canonical timelines.

!i!

Right, which is why I think the answer to the question of "Why use RQG?" is because "It's what I have in my hands, and I like it."  So, for Middle Earth:

• Selectively carve away the magic systems.  These are largely NPC options.
• Download a copy of the KAP character sheet to reverse-engineer the Rune Inspirations to resemble Personality Traits.
• Don't worry about super-detailed Homelands or family histories, unless you're interested in them as an intellectual exercise.  Use Homeland Base Passions (p.27) and Skipping the Family History (p.29).  Focus on the basics for each of the very few Middle Earth "homelands".
• Combat will no longer be overwhelmed by magical pumping, though Passions and Inspirations will still hold sway.  If anything, this should help combat run faster and more smoothly.
• Plenty of the creatures in the Glorantha Bestiary have Middle Earth counterparts if you ignore most of the flavor text.  Elves and dwarfs are pretty much elves and dwarves.  Tusk Riders and trollkin are your common grades of orcs/goblins.  Great Trolls/Cave Trolls/small giants are trolls.  Giant spiders will always be giant spiders.

!i!

1 hour ago, Mugen said:

Question is : why chose RuneQuest rather than any other BRP-based game out there ?

This.  Reading through the responses, I found myself wondering: Why not King Arthur Pendragon instead?

• Emphasis on heroic ideals and passion?  Check
• Magic-infused world, but largely as backdrop?  Check
• Definitive, cultural/regional stereotypes?  Check

Yes, these are all things that one can tease out of RQG, and if you prefer the combat mechanics of RQG to KAP, you might just want to.  But then, you might just want to 'port the Personality Traits mechanics from KAP, which aren't tied to world-specific mythology, over to any other BRP-based game that already features Passions and a cleaner-running combat engine.

That said, I can see someone looking at their copy of RQG and saying, "You know, I should be able to do something with this book, but I don't really get the setting..."  A lament not specific to RQG.

!i!

Now, to that Combat Style you're making, add the Unarmed Prowess or maybe Daredevil traits, and elevate that street brawling to something a little more refined.  Play with it!

!i!

28 minutes ago, Nick Brooke said:

Sure. If that’s your group’s idea of fun, have fun with it. And if that’s your player’s idea of no fun at all, ignore it and do something that’s fun, instead. That’s all I’m saying.

Yeah.  Only that's really not all you're saying.  Farts aside, you've been trivialising opinions and assigning a lot of motive to people who're trying to make sense of contradictory messages about cult membership.

!i!

14 minutes ago, ThornPlutonius said:

Mythras already has "passions".  There is no need to add them.

I was thinking more on this, and perhaps the intent was to include the fellow traveler of Passions in KAP -- the paired Personality Traits (which see use in RQG as Rune Affinities, but didn't make their way to Mythras).

!i!

More beard on that impious lout!  And where are the feathers?!?

!i!

I use the term loosely.  The follow-on from the Mongoose licensing and the commonalities that result.

!i!

5 hours ago, Soccercalle said:

...add things like Passions from RQG.

No need -- they're already there in Mythras.  One of several OGL gifts that keeps on giving.

!i!