Jump to content

K Peterson

Member
  • Posts

    319
  • Joined

  • Last visited

  • Days Won

    3

Everything posted by K Peterson

  1. There's also some info on skill categories buried in the "Keeper's Toolkit" section in the 6e core, on page 141. The section references "Skill Classes" and suggests a way in which substances/hypnotism/magic might affect a broad group of skills.
  2. Thought skills are broken down as a category in the CoC6e core book. Page 316, under Play Aids. (CbG 3e was a 6th edition release). Basically, the category includes: Accounting, Anthropology, Archaeology, Art, Astronomy, Biology, Cthulhu Mythos, Geology, History, Law, Library Use, Medicine, Natural History, Navigate, Occult, Pharmacy, Physics, and Psychoanalysis. I have no idea if these skill categories were included in 7e.
  3. Besides getting your product out there quickly, your choice in publishing partner - and what they can offer you - is very important, IMHO. Maybe the most important factor. Though I've criticized their mechanics (now and in past threads), The Design Mechanism are a solid game company that clearly puts every effort into producing the best product possible. You only have to look at their catalog from the past few years to see the level of quality that they produce. Lawrence is a quality and experienced guy to work with, and I'm sure his input/direction will only make Starships better. It sounds like your mind is already made up. But if you're still wavering I'd say make a comparison between publishers and what they've already released. Will this or that publisher produce what will meet your needs for your product?
  4. I don't own Jovian Nightmares, but it looks like it fits based on the description. Fractured Hopes, as well. Swords of Cydoria might count, but it seems more along the lines of Science Fantasy or Planetary Romance than pure science fiction. Depends on how you classify science fiction, and how willing you are to blur the edges of genre.
  5. I think you should do what's best for you to get your book out there. I'd agree that you've got an unknown commodity waiting for the release of BRPE, and when all is said and done, perhaps it won't be a good fit. Hard to know, and you'll have more waiting to do before you'll have an idea. Time wasted waiting, I think. Not me personally - but that's because it's too complex for my needs, and the fact that I don't like the combat action / special effect economy any more. But that's just me, and there are plenty of RQ6/Mythras fans out there that would eat it up. An OpenQuest 'backbone' would be interesting, and something that I might utilize as-is. A Revolution D100 compatible-product would absolutely repel me. Saying that though, I'd still be tempted to buy BRP Space, regardless of system used. I liked what I'd read of it months ago. I'd just be more inclined to scrape out much of the mechanical guts and substitute something more like OpenQuest, the BGB, or a tweaked version of CoC6e.
  6. Ringworld comes immediately to mind. (It's not a BRP 'supplement' but neither is River of Heaven, for that matter). Also, there have been a number of Chaosium monographs produced over the past 10 years or so. Operation Ulysses and Outpost 19 come to mind. I've never seen a BRP version of Jovian Chronicles, unless it was some kind of fan-created conversion. Jovian Chronicles was originally a supplement for the Mekton Rpg, and then became it's own game line in the later 90s. Produced by Dream Pod 9 and used their proprietary Silhouette d6 system.
  7. As a follow-up to this: I emailed 'customerservice' yesterday and got a response back that day. The shipper was notified of the mistake, and I told that the missing bundle was going to ship that day or the following day. An applause to Chaosium for some quality customer service.
  8. Bummer. That saves me an hour drive.
  9. I received my package from Bang Printing today, which was awesome, but unfortunately it doesn't look like I received the right items. Not as awesome. I ordered the Leatherette bundle and the 'regular' bundle, and ended up with the Leatherette and the scenario pack.
  10. Which store is this? I don't usually make it down that way very often, but I'm up for a road trip if what you say is true.
  11. 3rd is definitely a beautiful edition. For me, it has the most evocative cover art of any edition - that preceded it or followed it. I snagged a copy off Amazon 2 years ago from a 3rd party seller for $33, which I thought was very decently-priced. The going rate now seems to be about $50-60. I'd be tempted by a "CoC Classic" Kickstarter, but that'd be tempered by the fact that I own both the 25th and 30th anniversary editions of CoC. While not thin volumes, and being for 6th edition, they are beautiful books as well.
  12. I think that's a fumbly, awkward way to try to fix the real problem - which is bad GMing. I agree that bad GMing is something that we've all dealt with (or been justifiably accused of). - and it's something that should be corrected - but I'm not convinced that mechanical enforcement is the right technique to get the job done. The FP method you describe appears to put some shackles on the GM to enforce the right behavior - the right GMing method to enforce story-hooks and setting. You are obligated (required) to pursue this by these mechanical means. Perhaps it's a good method for beginning GMs who have no point of reference. But I wonder if it has any value for experienced GMs who are 'halfway-decent'. As an analogy, I guess I've viewed mechanical-enforcement-of-GM-behavior to be a little like putting training wheels on a bicycle and then never taking them off - regardless of the GM's developing competency.
  13. I think that's an excellent point. The framework already exists to resolve these kinds of situations without the need to bolt on additional mechanics, and an economy, that may, or may not, affect the underlying game. It's an intuitive method of resolution that can reward player creativity and have grounding within the setting. In this case, the player agency results from what has been defined, not by something that is pulled out of thin air, IMO. The player has invested their skill points (or pursued training) in a Blacksmith skill to give them an advantage in play. They could have spent those skill points elsewhere to reinforce another aspect of the character's culture or his general capabilities. But, he or she made a conscious decision to emphasize this capability and can reap the rewards by leveraging it in play, creatively. Personally, I like Fate/Hero points for the use as survivability mechanics, for the campaigns where characters are considered 'heroes'. I think they work very effectively in that case. But I've never used them as any means of story-editing because they seem so disassociated from the play experience.
  14. I received a shipping confirmation from Bang Printing early this morning. Probably end up receiving it by next Thursday or Friday.
  15. I think that the answer is really going to come down to "it depends". It depends on who BRP/RQ releases are being marketed to. Is it being marketed to a 'new-rules-wave' audience, or to those with more of a simulationist bent? Or somewhere in between, or closer to one pole than another? It depends on the degree that story-driving/story-editing is emphasized within the rules. How far away on the traditional-rpg/story-editing-rpg axis a BRP/RQ release travels. I think that there are shades of grey between the poles on the axis, but the further down the axis you travel, the amount of story-editing elements that are included - and the types of story-editing mechanics included - in the rules set, will inform the incompatibility for the traditional gamer that uses this BRP rules set. I think that there is definitely a dividing line of incompatibility that is reached, but there are some story-editing, rules-milestones along the path that can be incorporated before that line is crossed. Well, true, to a point. But we are talking about a 22-year gap in rules development between RQ3 and these traditions that have developed over the past 10 years. It's not like we had any middle ground where there was any kind of rules evolution that took place between RQ3 and MRQ1. The new tradition was incorporated at a distinct point, and a fate point currency was likely inspired by rules design from the prior 5 years.
  16. I agree with you (though not so much with the inspiration for the consistent core). It does make sense, and it would be weird if it wasn't the case. I'm looking forward to a Design Note, or hell just a forum post where Chaosium covers this topic.
  17. Yeah, I've felt similarly in the past year. There are times when it bothers me a little, and other times where I feel I've got a lot of Chaosium/d100 Rpg material already; do I need anymore? Sure. Things change. Publishers release new editions, but you're not interested in following on that divergent branch. They focus on specific game lines that you're not interested, and leave others fallow. But again, I have enough d100 Rpg material on my bookshelf to run campaigns for years or decades, and still not exhaust it. Do I have any dependency on Chaosium now? Perhaps the time is better spent using what I've got, developing and presenting the campaigns I want (or have wanted) to run, and cease being a consumer for now.
  18. Yeah, I received a notification yesterday from Bang Printing that my order had been accepted and that processing was pending.
  19. That's sound pretty damn weird to me. I'm sure it's accurate.. but weird. To each their own. I started with 2nd edition in 1985, found 5th/6th edition to be the most appealing as time has gone by, and was terribly disappointed by what I saw of 7th edition - a few years ago, and upon final release. I guess I'm the guy on the other side of the fence hoping that New-RQ won't use any game mechanics inspired by 7e. In any case, this is dragging this thread pretty far off course. I'm going to refrain from commenting further.
  20. Well, sure. Your entry point into an Rpg's life-cycle(?) / edition-timeline is going to be a huge influence on your preferences and what you consider to be fiddly, odd, or intuitive. If you haven't played 6th, 5th, 3rd, or prior editions you're not going to have the familiarity with what are the advantages (and, yes, disadvantages) with those editions compared with 7e. For the record, I don't believe in using fiddly modifiers in task resolution when I can avoid it. I prefer modifiers that line up more with BRP's easy/hard difficulties - which is basically halving or doubling skill based on circumstances - or, for the most part, just sticking with the special success range (20% of skill level).
  21. Well, no edition change of a beloved game will ever be "universally liked" by every member of a fan-base - especially when significant changes are made to core mechanics. A publisher will always face the situation where some fans choose not to adopt the edition; some fans accept the new edition unquestioningly - to have the latest, supported edition; and some fans who think that the rules changes are a natural evolution of the mechanics. Division is inevitable. My main point is that I've seen a number of posts on the design note threads where people have suggested CoC 7e mechanics that should be adopted by CRQ4. And it seems like just wishful thinking, because the mechanical separation is intentional.
  22. Has there been any indication from Chaosium that the new RQ will model any changes at all that were developed in CoC 7e? Maybe I missed a design note post somewhere, but I have yet to see where the systems cross over on any similar ground. If anything, New-RQ seems to be moving on a path further away from CoC 7e. Last year, I expected that Chaosium would integrate their game lines so that New-RQ would be based upon the CoC 7e baseline. Consolidate the systems so that players of CoC 7e could transition easily to New-RQ, and present a new iteration of BRP. (And I expected that strategy would kill my interest in New-RQ, as it already has done for CoC 7e products). But, the game lines have kept their distance, mechanically-speaking. I haven't seen any comments about New-RQ using Luck pools, advantage/disadvantage dice, build, and degrees of success like CoC 7e. The separation in design has been a little baffling to me, but I imagine that Chaosium has a good reason for it.
  23. Doubles-rolled-under-skill-level are used as criticals in Delta Green: the Roleplaying Game (the recent, Kickstarted edition). In addition, to an 01 being rolled. And it can be a very intuitive method when you get used to it. (The same is true of using doubles-over-skill as being fumble values). However, a 22 could be considered 'low enough for a critical' if you're only using 01's and doubles as crits. For example, with a skill of 56, crits would occur on an 01, 11, 22, 33, 44, 55. A 6% chance. It gets more complex if you're including the 01-05 range, and doubles, and trying to rope in special successes.
  24. I think the downside to that is that the precalc leads to an extremely 'busy' character sheet with values filled all over the place. Replacing the time spent doing-math-in-play with scanning-over-a-jampacked-sheet for the value you need.
×
×
  • Create New...