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Probably because they don't need a specific deity for it-that is the usual war gods and the abilities they grant can suffice.

I don't think there is much is anything listed. Generally speaking it would probably be someone of high station who wants the dowry and/or a better relation with the Earl. You could probably justify any one of at least Bannerette ran, preferably higher, who isn't from Levcomagus. Are you looking for a rival for a PK to compete with, or some NPK rivlas to compete against each other? Most of the other heiresses are within reach of vassal knights, although some would be more difficult to achieve than others, and could still be pursued by those of higher station.

I certainly liked it. It was one of the few systems where a guy with a ready bow could shoot at someone 30 feet away before getting attacked in melee. In most games the guy with initiative/higher DEX gets to act first.

Yes, whereas RQ2 SRs were mostly for determining who attacked first, in RQ3 there was a stronger correlation for overall sequencing of actions. You know where every character was at any SR, and movement was integrated with spellcasting and melee. Characters could even change actions in response to what happened during the round, which you couldn't do in RQ2.

I know. I have both the Book of the Manor and Book of the Estate. I'm wondering if it's worth getting Book of the Manor 2.0 if I have Book of the Estate, since Book of the Estate is destined to replace BoM. I'm wmonder just what the differences are between Book of the Manor 1.0 and Book of the Manor 2.0.

Except that the setting wasn't really "designed" that way. Greg has Glorantha and decided to use RQ to simulate it. Later on he said that it RQ wasn't that good a fit, as as the creator of Glorantha he'd be the one to know. So RQ never really matched up with how things work in Glorantha and never really will. One out of five hits, to be more percise, athlough once you factorin for number of oppoents, modfiers and magic, your still come close to a special every five rounds or so. Have you played RQ/BRPO much? For a character to have 19 armor up is very rare, and he is supposed to be very tough for average and experienced warriors to hurt. Those hits that you are dismissing as bouncing off armor can knock a guy down, giving his opponents bonuses, and those special and crticasl come up often enough. The thing is this isn't like D&D where characters get whittled down, instead someone gets taken out of a fight with a serious wound. Now after years of playing RQ and related game systems I can say that it works. It might not work the way you want it to, but it does work. TO get it to work the way you want it to you would have to do a major overhaul of the entire system. THen don't play RQ. It's pretty much the poster child for Brittle characters. You might want to look at BRP and Classic Fantasy, where they increase hit points to better fit the D&D model. Truth be told most people don't fight on for very long or very well with anything more than a minor injury. Yeah it is. I'm toying around with a BRP variant that uses it. My goal is to keep the lethality for good hits, but allow for more nicks and bruises from glancing strikes. Flashing Blades did something along those lines with the average strike doing 2 points, but adding a damage die for a hit below half skill. It allowed a game similar to RQ to work without heavy armor or shields. Yes, and it is a design of the system. RQ was built off of experiences in the SCA simulating combat. It's not the heroic combat model typical of most RPGs, and it probably doesn't mirror combat in Glorantha all that well. Yeah, but RQ just never worked that way. If you want a single hero to be able to take on armies, like Harrek, either don't use RQ, or give him really high skills (his RQ3 weapon skills are at levels I never saw people reach in acutal play), and expect him to waltz through anything short of a crtical hit. Fine then deal with the consequences. Heroic PCs will ingore a lot of minor hits until they take a critical and drop dead. Sorry but that's just your opinion on what is well designed.I've seen quite a few games where sepll casters have limited magic and it wasn''t a design flaw, but it is a feature of the game or setting. Yes, but Strengthing Enchanment and such wasn't all that common. Basically you are pushing the envelope and unhappy with the results. Well, if you know what it does and doesn't do, then you should be aware that "nickel and dime" type wounding was not a design feature in the vast majority of version and variants. Only Superworld and the BRG Heroic Character option (something that didn't get used in any iteration of BRP previously. Yes, Pendragon did use it but it also increased weapon damage so it was a zero sum change).Combat in RQ, CoC and Strombinger is all quick and lethal. Feel free, but anybody who wanted the results that you want probably would have just used a system that was already designed to yield those results, rather than try to force BRP to work that way. For example, someone who wanted to run superhero campaign, with high powered characters would probably have an easier time of it using a superhero RPG than by trying to adapt BRP. If the Hulk punched a normal person in BRP, that normal person would be dead, and that's not how it works in the comics.

It does function. It just might not be functioning the way you want it to. Special successes, such as slashes, crushes and impales come up 20% of the time. Then there is the STR/SIZ dfamage bonus and magical enhancements such as bladesharp. So the guy with 19 armor should have a lot to worry about. Yeah, that is the problem with die adds. I think the original dagger damage of 1D6 was better. Part of the difficulty here has to do with how damage is handled in general. In most RPGs damage either drops you outright, impairs you in some way, or can be ignored. In real life, someone who can "fight off attackers" could bleed to death a while later. But you don't get stuff like that in most RPGs. One idea I had, a long time ago, was to reduce the weapon damages and just double the damage die per success level. So a weapon might do 1D4 or 1D6 or a normal success, 2D4/2D6 on a special, and 4D4/4D6 on a critical. Damage bonus modified the die size rolled. So someone who had a +1D4 db would just roll a die one step larger. The idea was that most weapons wouldn't do much damage on minor hits and glancing blows, but would get deadly when they connected in a vital spot (i.e. rolled a better success level). The orgnial version had another success level too, and I was debating between 1D/2D/3D/4D and 1D/2D/4D/8D. Well that's a false expectation on two levels: First off in RQ being experienced doesn't make you any more resilient. The idea isn''t that someone can take a hit that they couldn't before (as in D&D) but that they will be better able to prevent such a hit from occurring in the first place, than to improved dodge and parry scores. I once had a group of D&D players who constantly got butchered in RQ because they kept trying to judge encounters according to D&D standards-namely that a fight wasn't a "good fight" unless they had taken at least half their hit points in damage. In RQ, if you are getting knocked down to half hit points, you're in trouble. Secondly, people think that as their characters get more experienced they will find it easier to survive. That's not entirely true. What happens in play is that as the PCs get more experienced they end up facing more dangerous opponents. So lethality increases. A Runelord is more liekly to die from a lucky crtical hit than a novice, becuase his oppoents have a better chance of rolling a higher success level. THat's something that Greg said a longf time ago. If you want something differernt you will either half to houserule it or play something else, such as HeroQuest. Sure it does, depending on the style of play. If you want to do a full time dungeon crawl, then you are going to have a lot of casualties. Yes, magic can offset a lot of thins and bring people back from the dead, but basically that's RQ/BRP. There is always a slight chance that a lucky hit will kill off a PC. I know some people who play D&D that dislike RQ because of this, and like you think that it doesn't d well for long term play. I know other people who prefer RQ and Pendragon for Long term play because they find such danger to keep the game exciting. They consider "balanced" encounters to be boring because they know that there is no significant risk and they can fiogure out what the outcome is going to be before they even start the encounter. What must it be "balanced"? You seem to have strong ideas of how a RPG should be designed, and that RQ/BRP isn't designed that way. If that's the case, why do you want to play it? If "balance" is important to you, why not play an RPG that is designed to be balanced, as opposed to one that isn't? Well those are your your expectations, but that doesn't mean it is how the game was designed to function. Maybe you'd be happier with 13th Age Glorantha? It just seems to me that the game doesn't work the way you want it to, and that's that. THat doesn't mean it's wrong, it just doesn't meet your expectations. Well if you want a more powerful magic system find the original magic world. And you can bump up the refresh rate for magic points for POW/day to POW per 12 hopurs or even POW per hour. But, I'll warn you now that your results won't meet your expectations, because this system is designed to be more lethal than what you are expecting. There no steady decline in hit points like in D&D. If you don't like that, then you're really not going to like the the way the game plays.

Not really. I think you are expecting D&D results. In D&D a couple of points of damage here or there doesn't make that much of a difference, due to the increasing number of hit points and how injuries work (i.e. there aren't any injuries). In RQ any atttack that gets past someone defenses can disable a hit location or kill someone. So all those Runelords in RQ2 were always vulnerable to a high damage roll, special success (extra damage) or a critical (which bypassed armor) getting past their armor, and then probably taking them right out of the fight, if not killing them outright. So they weren't laughing. In fact, there is a well known story about a Runelord who got killed by a lucky hit from a trollkin. I think you misunderstand. The designers did consider how it would work. It's just that they considered that weapons and magical attack that got past defenses should be deadly. There isn't supposed to be a lot of wiggle room. This is very different from D&D where experienced characters can soak multiple hits and shrug off a lot of attacks. SO as you up the power levels the game is supposed to become more deadly, not less. What do you consider "balanced?". Someone who can do 4d6 damage in BRP is hitting harder than most rifles.

As soltakss noted. In a nutshell the way it worked was that you used sprit magic spells but has magical skills similar to sorcery. So it was basically sorcery but with spirit magic spells. And it was tied to the moon/glowline. My first suggestion would be Classic Fantasy.It was supposedly designed to help you capture a D&D type feel. Well you could get rid of it. I believe Sandy just used your magical skills as a form of limit instead. I've never seen a "high level" warrior in RQ shrug off 4d6 with armor and protection spells. But, if you want the original Magic World gave 1D6 damage per MP. The reason why no other version of BRP/RQ does this is because it makes spellcasters too powerful. Unlike D&D a 5D6 damage spell that blows past a warriors armor is probably going to kill or disable him. Don't we all, but I doubt we would all agree on just what is perfect.

That's pretty comprehensive. The only stuff you missed were RQ3 Lunar Magic (Spirit Magic that can be boosted in Intensity like Sorcery) and RQ3 Dragon Magic. Do you have an idea of what sort of magic you are looking for?

One simple solution would be that most elementals would seek to move to their own natural state/level and/or take the path of least resistance. So Earth wound want to go to ground, air would want to fly about, water would pour out of the wound. In that case only fire could be dangerous in an impales wound, as it would naturally seek to burn something. But, even then, the most flammable object around would probably be the shaft of the spear it was bound into, rather than a (mostly water) body.

Yeah, that precisely why splitting attacks isn't such a great tactic in RQG either. Bumping SR only seems to be worth it when you know the opponent is going to cast a powerful Battle Magic spell and you need to prevent them from doing so. In other words this would be exactly the tactic to use to stop something like Bladesharp 10.

I've been thinking of something along the lines of the following: The individual character award would be their geniality multiplied by the number of rounds. For instance, a character who earned 6 geniality at a medium feast would get 18 Glory (6x3=18). The "Above the Salt" bonus would be five or ten times (I'm undecided as to which) the number of rounds. The most genial character could just get a bonus equal to the above the salt award. This should work out to : Small Feast: Typical Award 2, Above the Salt 20, Most Congenial 45 Medium Feast: Typical Award 5, Above the Salt 30, Most Congenial 75 Large Feast: Typical Award 8, Above the Salt 40, Most Congenial 90 Royal Feast: Typical Award 13, Above the Salt 50, Most Congenial 115 I think that would actually increase the typical awards a little, and hopefully make participation more important for those who don't sit above the salt or aren't the most genial, the way how even a fledgling PK can get some glory at a tournament. But, it would also keep the awards for the winners down below 100 in most cases. And the math wouldn't be too difficult.

Except that the called shot is at half %.

Pages 272-273: The Constantin II REX Timeline inserts "433: Constantin’s next son is Aurelius Ambrosius, named for his distant relative St. Ambrose" in between years 423 and 426.

Well, with high skill reducing the opponent's ability this does become more common. Mostly. Land of the Ninja did have a work around, as did RQ3 "Attack on the Run" option. So there were ways around it.

Yes, but I think it might end of being too good of a benefit for the penalty. Yeah, the master swordsman with 200% skill who can split his attacks, acts before the 20% skill novice because the novice has a higher SIZ and DEX. It's why I used an opposed Skill roll with modifiers for reach in my variant.

Yeah, we never know if something innocuous ends up opening up Pandora's box. Oh, another method of doing somthing like this would be to use the success level. RQ3's Land of the Ninja did something along these line with it's Iaijustsu skill. On a critical the attack went off on SR1. I see the basic idea being okay until one gets past 100% and then becoming somewhat dangerous, as a skilled opponent could now strike before his opponent could cast combat (and skill enhancing) spells.

Thanks!

It makes a lot of sense to me. Obviously the advantage here isn't really how many SR one attacks earlier, but if the can attack before their opponent can attack, or cast a spell. IMO, with the way melee skills over 100% affect the opponents' melee skills, splitting attacks really isn't such a great tactic anymore.

Well, to "keep in coming" what is probably need is some sort of reach rule for weapons, where you could give each weapon a reach in meters. Then maybe your idea could be worked into a lunge attack that added reach. I did something like that for a BRP variant I'm working on awhile back, where the strike order was determined by opposed skill rolls, with each meter difference in reach worth an extra 100% to the skill for strike order purposes. It worked out nice for me because I could break is down to about 1% per cm, or 5% per 2 inches, 33% per foot, etc. Another take on your idea would be to reverse engineer the old RQ aimed blow rules namely: 1. Allow someone to attack on SR1 at half skill. Yeah, it still a "freebie" for the 5%ers and not much of a peanlty for anybody below 20%, IMO, but let's face it, at that point going first might be the only chance they have. 2. You could let the target shift hit location by 1 per SR boosted. So the attacker gets to attack faster, but the defender has a better chance of seeing where the blow is going to land (the attack hardly has a time to feint or try to misdirect) and could move to shift the point of impact-probably to the shield arm. Kinda. You assuming that the duck can get close to the giant. That's easier said than done. It's hard to get in close against someone with a longer weapon, unless you're willing to get hit to do so. That's also why shields and formations are so useful. Spearman versus Swordsman tends to go to the spearman unless you add shields, which shifts things in favor of the swordsman, unless you are fighting in formation, which shifts things back to the spearmen. .

Sounds like on the Buffy the Vampire Slayer TV series, where it was treated as a type of addiction.

Just a suggestion but instead of someone being able to adjust their SR directly this way, maybe they could only adjust their DEX portion of it? The reason being is that while they could act faster, they would still be under the limitations of the weapon and their reach (SIZ). Otherwise you could have a duck with a dagger get first strike against a giant with a tree.

Somewhat. But the problem is that once someone got a check they would be free to use as much magic as they wanted until it was time to roll for "improvement". That seems to go against the spirit of the idea.

In standard play, you wouldn't normally oppose a trait with it's opposite, you'd check to see if you passed one and if you failed, roll for the opposite. In Feasts you rolling to see which of the opposing traits wins out, and if you get any appropriate checks. While in normal play a character who fails two opposing traits is free to choose how he acts, he doesn't get the checks associated with a a successful opposed roll.