Thalaba

There should be an emoticon for hitting the nail on the head.

In a game without feats, talents, ads or disads another way is not so obvious. Every skill has a human base% chance of success, so it seems to me that giving the rat-men a higher base % in these is a good way. But (just brainstorming here) maybe you could rule that for Rat Men using these skills, any rank of Difficult is equavalent to a human special, and any rank of Special is a human critical. That way the skills wouldn't be higher, but the odds of Rat Men pulling off super efforts would be. Last thing - you might consider listing the skills this would apply to, so there is no confusion in-game. Thalaba

You might check out Ashes to Ashes to see what Neorxnawang did with the magic system. I don't remember the formula and I don't have the book with me, but basically you do a little quick calculation and compare the result to the level of the spell on the resistance table, then roll that percentage. It's supposed to work with any BRP spell from any book, so it's quite flexible/freeform in that way. Thalaba

Speaking of which, would it be kosher to ask that the title text be smaller so it could not be read over my shoulder so obviously?

I'm another one who's had enough of the tired old elf/dwarf/hafling/orc cliches. But I do run a fantasy game which my players and I all enjoy. Technologically it's Bronze Age. Setting wise it's a fantasy world with analogues to many of our own world locations, including a large desert filled with ruins, civilizations hugging rivers, Ziggurat-like temples, all manner of beast men and minor demons, desert whirlwinds which hunt human souls, red sandstorms, slavers, chariots, nomads, tribesmen and ritual combats. In our game the Gods have all left and been replaced by assorted spirits, demons, and a variety of sorcerors (backshis, sahhars, and mystics) and idolators. It is inspired by Conan, Lieber, 1001 Nights, Marco Polo, Sumerian myth, and more. It's pretty far from mainstream fantasy, and a lot of fun. When my players encounter a new monster, they don't say "Oh, look it's a mummy - get out your torches" - they say "Spirit Mother, what new deviltry is this!?". All players are human, but the cultures are quite distinct, so there is no need for non-human races. Trust me, you can have a blast with non-traditional fantasy. Thalaba

When I came at 6:30 EST it was all fine, but now at it's after 9:30 EST and sloooww again. A forum administrator's work is never done, I guess. Thalaba

Thanks Trif, This has become my favourite RPG forum. Thanks for all your hard work! Thalaba

Indeed. At the last sale the monographs I most wanted were sold out, and Rome just became available for sale on the chaosium website - I couldn't make up enough product (even at non-sale prices) to get the free shipping because all the monographs I want are out of stock (both BRP and COC). It's very frustrating. When they do finally come back in stock, Rome will probably be sold out and I'll be kicking myself. Online shopping shouldn't be this difficult - I feel like I'm treading a maze. Maybe they should accept pre-orders on certain things. It might allow them to wait until they get a critical minimum number of sales before making the print run. Thalaba

Ahh. Any further hints as to what these might be? You mentioned a Mecha product already. What else is going on in the Alephtar Atelier? Thalaba

Or make them exempt from experience checks altogether and make them trainable or researchable only. Thalaba

Harwel, Looking at just a few of the stats in the book for 'fantasy creatures' that seem broadly playable, we get: Centaur: 3D6+6; 3D6; 4D6+12; 2D6+6; 3D6; 3D6+3; 3D6 Dwarf: 4D6; 1D6+12; 1D4+4; 2D6+6; 3D6; 3D6; 3D6 Elf: 2D6+2; 3D6; 2D4+4; 3D6+6; 2D6+6; 3D6+3; 3D6 Halfling: 2D6; 2D6+12; 1D3+3; 2D6+6; 2D6+3; 2D6+10; 3D6 And so on. This 'convention' you are talking about doesn't exist in modern BRP. The reason it doesn't exist it because it has been replaced with a different 'convention' designed to give different averages for different stats in different species. While this may be a 'problem' for you, for most it is a 'feature'. That said, nobody will fault you for not liking this feature, and several suggestions have been put forward on how you can change it to something more palatable to you, which you can take or leave. However, I find your continued arguments in the latter part of the thread weak and I think you are being deliberately obtuse for the purpose of baiting people, and so I will put up one more set of stats which I consider to be appropriate to your behaviour in this thread: 3D6+12; 2D6+6; 4D6+12; 2D6; 2D6; 2D6+3; 1D6. Thalaba

No, not at all. The three 'options' you presented are not optional rules but, in fact, three generic ways for the GM to interpret the results of the roll. They need to stay, IMO. The document is fine as it is, though a word version might benefit some. Thalaba

Yes, it refers to the volcano (Pyr) at the centre (axle) of a disc (flat). Thalaba

Since the original document that Harshax created was meant to present the BRP rules as-intended in a clear and succinct manner, I would counsel against adding a variety of houserules to the document. As Islan said, he finds all these variations on the rules confusing. Adding more options will not help in this regard. I do think that a separate document that gathers together a number of alternatives for resolving combats would be valuable, though. Such a document would require an editor to make sure that all the options presented were unique from one another, added something to the canon, and broadly applicable to the existing variety of BRP rule subsets - or at least some mention should be made of what kind of game or setting would suit that particular combat resolution method. Thalaba

Nice work, Harshax. In the table (and just for the sake of completeness), instead of "Highest Roller Wins (1)" should it read "Highest Roller Wins Normal Success (1)"? Thalaba

Yes, the key word being "winner's" degree of success. Now, I don't have the book with me to examine how it is written, so I won't comment on whether this is a textual problem or not, but from the sample of text you posted it seems quite clear to me. Let's take your example of someone (Player 1) with a 60% vs someone with a 40% skill (Player 2). Both roll. P1 gets 30% (a normal success). P2 gets 10%, which is a special. P2 has a higher degree of success, and so he's the winner of the contest. Because P1 also rolled a success, P2's (the winner's) success is dropped one level to a normal success. The end result is the P2 has achieved a normal victory over P1 on this opposed challenge. If P2 had failed his roll, then P2's victory would have been at the higher degree of success based on his initial special roll. The end result would be that P2 had achieved a special victory over P1 on this opposed challenge. If both P1 and P2 had rolled the same degree of success in the initial roll (ie. both normals, both specials, etc). the highest roll would win with a 'normal' success. This business of reducing the level of victory is only applied AFTER the winner is determined and once the winner is determined, his victory cannot be reduced below normal level. It is simply a mechanism designed to allow the determination of 'special' or 'critical' success in opposed roll situations, if you happen to want that level of detail. As for the grapple rules, if you want the effects to take place the same round, then just declare that this is the case - it's the easiest house-rule ever. I'm not sure what the other problems you have with the grapple rules are, as you haven't mentioned them. The core of BRP is extremely malleable and can be bent in a lot of ways without breaking, which is why people call it a 'toolkit'. But just like all other roleplaying games, it can't satisfy all of the people on all of the issues all of the time, and there may be quite legitimate reasons why you or others don't like it. If you like the game well enough that you want suggestions on how to mould it to your taste, let people know what, specifically, you would like to fix and what, specifically, your issue with it is and I'm sure you'll get umpteen suggestions. If, however, there are so many things about the game you don't like that it just won't work for you, then nobody will fault you for moving on to a more perfect system - we've all done it before with a variety of games. Thalaba

I think Pyraxleflat has a nice ring to it. Thalaba

Speaking of which, the Spica link in your sig seems to be broken.:ohwell:

Alas, the two books I most wanted (Outpost 19 and BRP Adventures in print) are no longer on the website and must be sold out, so no sale for me .

I agree, to an extent, with Gianni, too. I really like Tolkien. The Lord of the Rings is written with a very distinct voice that has never been replicated - the language conveys a sense of age, of innocence, of melancholy. It's not abook about heroism - it's a book about the little guy making do with what he's been given in life. And quite frankly Middle Earth remains one of the deepest of fantasy creations - it is alive for so many people because of the detail, and pretty much nothing else comes close (caveat - I think Glorantha comes close, but is less accessible as a setting). I suspect that's what Gianni means, anyway. I don;'t think Tolkien structured TLOTR very well, I don't like his rhymes very much, and I think there are long, boring stetches, but I still love the books and certainly don't think they deserve to be in a thread about "the worst fantasy books ever written". I disagree with Gianni that Lieber must be great because he's stood the test of time. He hasn't, really. Lieber is not a household name - he's only known to a rather small circle of fantasy enthusiasts and role players, and I would argue that this is mainly because his creations got pretty good treatment in Dieties and Demigods and this piqued a lot of people's interest. I think some of his stories are well written, and others (as I have shown by example) are less so. He is an average writer, in my opinion, but he sure had some great plot ideas and that's the main reason I like reading him. I much prefer Howard for the clarity of his writing and the poetry that lay just beneath the surface of his prose, but he had fewer fantasy stories to tell (in terms of variety). I also disagree that contemporaries cannot be found. The alternate earth books of Gavriel Kay are wonderful (especially the second book of the Sarantium series, and Tigana, and The Lions of Al Rassan). I also really enjoyed the Dragonbone Chair series by Tad Williams. But I do not attempt to compare these to the Lord of the Rings - they are completely different things. Tolkien wrote very much like the authors of the Golden Age of SF - his books are all about ideas, not about the characters. The main character in LOTR is Middle Earth. It's not Frodo who's memorable - it's 'Hobbits' as a whole. In classic SF, the books are all about "what if?" - the people are usually incidental - a means of conveying the larger idea. Contemporary writers put more effort into the people in the stories, and probably a little less into the Big Idea (vague hand waving around generalities, here). So if you happen to be a Big Idea person, you'd probably like the older books (as I generally do). If you like character and their interaction with one another, go for contemporary books. At least that's how I see it here and now. Tomorrow, I may have a different opinion. Thalaba

Well, that is the opening line to "The Seven Black Priests" from Swords Against Death by none other than Fritz Lieber. The tale initially appeared in Other Worlds in 1953. Good, scary villains aside, authors in glass novels shouldn't throw stones. Thalaba

I've long since thrown away the books that I thought were bad - Calix Stay and Garafax Greythorn (or something like that) ring a bell as just such books. Also, anything that was published as a D&D book. I recently read 'The Pastel City' by M. John Harrison and thought it was terrible - even though it's often cited with being wonderful (along with the follow-up, 'Viriconium'. I have seen both Moorcock and Harlan Ellison (authors I like and respect) speak fondly of these books, but I don't get it. And here's an example of some very muddy writing (IMO) from something I'm currently reading. An opening paragraph, no less: "Eyes like red lava peered from a face black as dead lava down the sheer mountainside at the snowy ledge that narrowed off into the chilly darkness barely touched by dawn." Any guesses who wrote that? Thalaba

Ah - judging by what I know of your interests, you might be thinking it's a fantasy set on bronze age earth - but it isn't. It's a campaign set in a fantasy world with bronze age trappings. And although I'm no scholar, I am aiming for a certain amount of real-world verisimilitude in the game, and so have researched (and continue to research) the our own Bronze Age. And because it's a fantasy world, I do let in a few anachronisms that I think are appropriate from the iron age (but iron isn't one of them - so far). We've got chariots, sickle swords, socket axes, slings and bows. Armour ranges from hardened linen and wicker though bronze studded, scale, lamellar and up to bronze panoply (no chain mail or plate mail). Horses are ridden in the north, bareback. Donkeys are used more in the south, for riding and for pulling chariots. Clay amphorae are the containers of choice. Magic spells are written in cuneiform on clay tablets. Cylinder seals have become magic talismans, and sumerian spirit bowls are used to trap spirits. There is no good or evil in the game - only self interest or communal interest on a sliding scale. Cultures clash over land, reseources, and beliefs, and each culture is different and distinct. The worship of 'gods' is widespread, but some of these 'gods' are spirits, some are demons, and others...? Many think the gods have left and will never return. Others think they never were. Some hate the gods they worship, others worship gods that hate. What is the truth behind the higher beings? This depends on who you are and where you come from. Because of the complexity and variety of the belief systems, I've come up with a variety of magic systems to help explain it. I'm using RQ3 spirit magic, working of tweaking RQ3 sorcery into something mysticism oriented, and I've developed 4 other magic systems to model various cultural tradisions. And I try to provide fairly detailed cultural information to my players. Inspiration for the setting and campaign comes from various historical sources leaning heavily on Sumerian and Akkadian stories, but also the 1001 Nights and the travels of Marco Polo (we just had a session involving the mythical Valley of the Diamonds, for instance). Fiction inspiration comes from Howard, Lieber, DeCamp, Hardy, and others. I also draw inspiration from music, like Vaughan Williams: Job, a masque for dancing. Not sure if that's you cup of tea or not. It's heavily inspired by history, but it's not historical. Thalaba

I just wanted to say thanks to everyone who posted in answer to my question. This has been very informative for me and quite helpful for my campaign. Cheers! Thalaba

Hello, Jumping on the character sheet bandwagon, I've decided to upload the sheet we use in my Bronze Age Fantasy Campaign. We play using a hybrid of RQ3 and BRP rules, and this sheet reflects its RQ3 origins, but with a modified skills list. I'm adding it to all the other character sheets available for two reasons: 1. It's in excel and it it does almost all the math and figuring for you. All of my current players are new to RQ/BRP and this sheets makes character creation a SNAP because it removes the need to calculate the damage bonus, skill category modifiers, fatigue, etc. 2. It has a lot of white space which makes it easy to read. More detailed information (much more detailed!) is available here: BRP Central - Downloads - Thalaba's Fantasy Character Sheet Please post in the discussion section if you have any comments or questions about the sheet itself. Best of luck with it! Thalaba