smiorgan

Meanwhile in Switzerland.... Smiorgan receives his copy of the gorgeous Mournblade kit d'initiation... This French rpg has already won me. I'm not going to stop with the starter set. There's a high risk I will buy all the beautiful books and boxes they have put out. If people care, I will post info on this game as I go on reading and hopefully playing it. Some basic info. It's not d100. And is not to be confused with the French edition of Mongoose Elric. They initially had some connection with Mongoose, but when the Mongoose license expired, they got a license directly from Moorcock. http://www.multiverse.org/fora/showthread.php?t=30016

LOL! Gli eroi della resistenza. You will have to put the resistance table as an option for the Italian edition of Revolution.

EXACTLY. My post was not serious, but, given that a serious discussion has started, let me toss my two cents... I think Rod's post is a perfect example of getting the Resistance Table wrong. To elaborate on Nick's eloquent defense, RT (or its formula) is an elegat way to pit any two non-percentile values and decide which one prevails in a single roll. So, it is well adapted to situations where, 1) you use a characteristic or resource that is not natively %, 2) you want quickly a definite result without going through several rolls and narrating an extended struggle, 3) the greater value has a large chance to prevail and 4) the eventuality of both contestants failing is impossible or not important, 5) the values pitted are variable resources that increase/ decrease. First of all the RT is a wonderful and flexible GM's tool and universal "saving throw" mechainc that lets the GM create monster or threats that attack any kind of charactersitic or resource with a given POT (potency). POT vs CON (poison, sickness), but also POT vs. magic points, vs. hit points (maybe hp of a given location). You can create all kinds of funny attacks. Here is an example: Worm of Doubt. This spirit creature destroys your faith pitting its POW 45 against your allegiance on the RT, if it prevails your allegiance score decreases by 1d6, which is added to the worm's POW. One good example of the flexibility of the RT is when you pit a rolled value against a characteristic: rolled damage vs SIZ to determine knockback. Also it's very easy to add the STR of several people trying to move an object with a big SIZ, and so on.

Whisker, I sent you a private message! Smiorgan

In this age of board coups, purges, and revolutions... I invite you to JOIN THE RESISTANCE! It is time for d100 players to OPPOSE dice tricks and reclaim their rightful place at the TABLE OF BROTHERHOOD! Since the times of the infamous MRQ1 every faction coming to power resorted chiefly to one policy in order to persuade you that they were new and cool: "We have done away with the resistance table!" 2006 Mongoose RuneQuest does away with the resistance table... 2009 OpenQuest does away with the resistance table 2014 Call of Chtulhu 7 does away with the resistance table 2015 Revolution ... BRP Essentials... ENOUGH IS ENOUGH. Stop being a passive charactersistic! We are already pitted in a struggle against the venomous potency of innovation for the sake of innovation! JOIN THE RESISTANCE!

Why, why everybody hates the poor table! I love it dearly! :-)

Supported! S.

I think this is a very sensible choice. I felt that Age of Chivalry was at the same time too much and too little. And I look forward to the Robyn Hode campaign.

LOL I have a certain fondness for that crazy cover we should ask Rick Meints for a limited edition of BRP with that cover! It really tells a story! Here's my take: Private Vasquez from Alien and the half-elf Yaqui uncle of Little Red Riding Hood were exploring the Aztec ruins once visited by Signy and Cormac during the RQ3 glory days. Vasquez had recovered Signy's sword, and they were so absorbed that they both fumbled (!) their Listen and Scan check when attacked by a flying saucer directly from the 1940s. Luckily for the strange pair of heroes the green little man in the saucer had a Laser Cannon 12% skill and failed both attack rolls abysmally.

Nope. It will look like D&D4 Essentials. It will have kewl powerz for everyone and will come in a box with cardboard tokens.

LOL, I'm still waiting for the "Castle of Eyes" mega-campaign for Stormbringer!

Very interesting points about the popularity of BRP. It seems you believe that the "less than 10%" figure was not entirely accurate. In fact, it surprised me a little bit. For some bizarre reason (possibly oversight) the old Chaosium catalogue showed publicly the sales data for PDFs, and BRP monographs did not sell less than CoC monographs. In particular, Classic Fantasy was selling VERY well. BTW, one of the "killers" of Magic World could be the upcoming Classic Fantasy, which occupies the same niche - at least seen from outside.

That's an interesting point. Regarding compatibility of BRP Essentials they are in a quandary: 1. They make it back-compatible with BRP gold book. This would help selling existing stock, and appeasing fans for which the gold book is the ruleset of choice. 2. They make it compatible with CoC7. So that certain BRP supplement appeal also to CoC players. 3. They make it compatible with RuneQuest, basically RQ-light. So you can maximise cross-selling with RQ players and, at the same time, offer a lighter alternative to the rather "heavy" RQ6 rules. 4. They make it its own thing. So that it develops its brand identity. That move would surprise me. In part, this is the result of the merger, in part Chaosium painted themselves in a corner by disregarding compatibility of CoC7 with BRP. That still baffles me. There are many innovations in CoC7 that could have been done in a BRP-like fashion obtaining essentially the same effect (e.g. % characteristic rolls) and seem to be different "just because". I have my own theory on why it happened, but I will keep it for myself...

Let us put things into perspective... Like many of you I have mixed feelings about the latest Chaosium developments. While I look forward to more Mythic Iceland goodness, Gloranthan RQ and general influx of new blood and new ideas, I lament the loss of MW, the end of the Alephtar license, and Ben not being with Chaosium anymore. Even with those negatives, the situation is MUCH better than it was, say, around 2002-2005. Let's turn back the clock... - Chaosium was already in a rather bad financial situation. - Call of Cthulhu was the ONLY supported d100 game, and it had gone largely d20 around 2002! - After the publication of the fifth edition in 2001, Stormbringer remained unsupported (except for the sole third party Corum supplement), with Michael Moorcock publicly lamenting that the license was mishandled. - RuneQuest was a ghost of the past. Nothing was in sight for it. We would have to wait 2006 to rejoice for a new version of RQ, a version that came out of a farcical playtest and whose combat system was simply broken in the most basic sense (as in "you can't play that"). I'm speaking of MRQ1, which has many merits, but not that of being a sleek implementation of d100. - Glorantha was supported via the rather ugly and enigmatic HeroWars. I still remember the bonus maps in the boxed set... oh dear! -Obviously, without MRQ's SRD there was no GORE, no OpenQuest, no Renaissance, Nothing. Zilch. Nada. No Alephtar, no d101 games, no Design Mechanism. Nothing to see here, move along! - We would have to wait 2008 to buy the uncorrected proofs of the BRP book. Uncorrected proofs! No, I mean, there were sentences that would not end. We would have to wait I don't know how much longer to play 'In Search of the Trollslayer" with pre-generated characters that got the BRP magic rules wrong! If we survived that, we can survive BRP essentials, MW being unsupported and CoC7's unnecessary but largely innocuous innovations. I'm sure! ;-) Smiorgan

All in all, it's a very sensible choice. The good: 1. With the slim booklet BRP goes back to its origins and purpose. Calling "Basic" the gold book was kind of a misnomer. 2. They keep in print the gold book via print on demand, That's very sensible. 3. They develop Mythic Iceland. Which is GREAT NEWS. Mythic Iceland was the best BRP setting, on a par with Alephtar's BRP Rome. It really deserves to be relaunched. 4. They try out new things, be they BRP or not. Things like 13th Age in Glorantha are a breath of resh air. The bad: 1. It seems they drop Magic World. I

I'd approach Loz about that as he posts in this forum and knows Stormbringer inside-out and is at the same time closely in touch/ working with the new Chaosium.

Sorry, I did not notice the other thread on Chaosium's translocation. Please remove the thread.

I hope they do a Worlds of Wonder hardback. Sadly, the Stormbringer material will likely remain unpublished. Just some wild guesses about what could be in there, in the early 1990s Chaosium announced two Stormbringer campaigns that were to remain vaporware forever: River of Tears - of which nothing is known Castle of Eyes - which was to be set in the world of Penelope Love's eponymous novel, which Chaosium published. You can see the novel in the same picture on the right! I've read somewhere that the novel itself was originally based on Love's own Stormbringer/ RQ Vikings campaign. But maybe it's more recent stuff, like Loz's Hawkmoon manuscript that Chaosium published only partially as a monograph. The unfinished manuscript of 'Straits of Chaos" - if it ever existed.

Chaosium has closed its brick-and-mortar office, and look at this picture of the translocation: https://plus.google.com/u/0/112389437586870813551/posts/D5eecysZKbn?cfem=1&pid=6198432447824214002&oid=112389437586870813551 Left of the Pendragon 1st edition box you can see a brown cardboard box marked as "Unpublished Stormbringer Materials". I'm very curious about its contents!

Chaosium as brick-and-mortar company is gone. The end of an era... Google + post: https://plus.google.com/u/0/114390571812620079517/posts/RKjnCc3kwuZ More photos: https://plus.google.com/u/0/112389437586870813551/posts/D5eecysZKbn?cfem=1

Wow! Paolo, I didn't see this coming! Very interested in seeing how it pans out. And I will as well be happy to support Alephtar where I can. Does this have any connection/ impact on the Italian language Rune Quest 6 programs of Alephtar?

To make experienced characters more powerful/ survivable try the following: 1- As in older editions of Stormbringer, let the magic-using characters increase their POW stat more easily (after POW:POW rolls against stronger opponents or after training immediately increase POW by 1d4-1 instead of using the normal method of rolling below 21). Furthermore, POW goes beyond the normal human limit of 21. High power is essential for lots of powerful magics, including Deep Magic and demon binding. 2- Every spell occupies 1 INT slot irrespectively of how many levels it has. This reverts to the Elric! rule and is crucial for using effectively moe powerful magic. 3- Having implemented the above critical fixes, use all the options in Advanced Sorcery. Including Arete rules for non-magic using characters. 4- Be generous with allegiance points, and, once per session, allow to roll under their allegiance to avoid a deadly blow (they are unconscious instead). You can also use the BRP Mythic Iceland allegicance rules with a starting allegiance of 25+1D6 to a specific deity. Mythic Iceland proposes specific allegiance benefits for the various Norse gods. They are easy to translate/ adapt to Golarion's pantheon. 5- Skills increase by 1d10, professional skills increase by 2d6.

Awesome stuff!

I'm very happy that Ben is still onboard (as we all hoped) and that BRP/ MW are still in Chaosium's plans. Slow trickle is not a problem as long as the quality is consistent and each game line has a clear direction. Such a situation reminds me of the old good days when Chaosium published several different games with variants of the BRP system. Stormbringer was not Elfquest, which was not RQ or CoC and Ringworld had its own rules and Pendragon was marledly different. There were family resemblances rather than a common core. Funnily enough with CoC7, RQ6, BRP and MW we go back to a situation that is similar to the old days: games based on similar systems, rather than on a generic core. Maybe the idea of the BGB as the core system is over but this is not a tragedy.

Great! I especially like the "just as RQ2 was" bit, if it's indicative of the spirit. RQ6 is a damn fine game and very apt to capture the Gloranthan feeling. I'd just love to see options/ advice for simpler and faster combat in the new book for those who are not inclined to bring the full depth of RQ6 combat to the table.