badcat

Thanks, Jason. I for one am not confused any more. I think.

Well, here is an interesting bit. There have been studies done to determine the chance of one shot stops (not fatal, fight ending), and the ratio of average damage from the CoC damage ratings vs. average hit points is actually very close to the real life statistics. Average hit points in CoC, call it eleven, so a major wound is about six, a .45 does 1D10+2 or average seven-eight, with a 'stopping' percentage on a failed CON save of around seventy-ninety per cent...which is about the range of one shot stops for the .45 ACP in real life shooting incidents. It is a fair simulation of the results of real life gun combat, in other words. And it is playable, although it does not take everything into account your average gun hobbyist might like, like ballistics and recoil, etc. The hallmark of BRP, reasonable and playable without going into bean-counting mode. Oh, a rifle will most likely kill a human on a solid hit, and sure enough, a .308 does 2D6+4, or eleven average. So an average human is at zero hit points if he takes an average damage hit with a high powered rifle. That real life study shows 98-100% one shot stops with a high powered rifle cartridge, by the way.

Nah, I'm getting confused too:D

Nah, Joseph, not that interested in GURPS. It just looks harder to get the 18 in GURPS than in the SB5 form of BRP, and I was making a *casual* comment in relation to that. Not a big deal. The question about over 18 in the conversion is what I had in mind, but if they scale that close maybe it wouldn't matter all that much. There is that damage chart in GURPS, though. How would that compare? Would the base damage with weapons not quickly outstrip the BRP damage bonus? That's more what I had in mind with the term 'superhuman'. Sorry if these are stupid questions, but I don't know GURPS well enough to have a good idea of how the factors would scale between games. Idol curiosity and making conversation, and trying to be sounding post for Aycorn...

I don't really like multi-genre games that much, usually. In fact I would rather have seen an expanded Magic World. But that's OK. I am very happy to have BRP sans settings. I think the reason Jason doesn't consider this a 'toolkit' multi-genre game is that the whole purpose of the book was initially to gather all the BRP rules from the various setting books into one place. So essentially it was not the intent, but the final book resembles the toolkit games up to a point. That close to it, Jason?

Yes, I have always used values similar to what Enpeze just posted, but my group would always just apply what seemed right and logical, playing each situation by ear. I don't remember ever using a formal list or anything like that, it just seemed obvious. I have never seen them but I understood there were formal rules for those sorts of competence levels and all in one of the CoC supplements, one of the Keepers' Compendiums, if memory serves.

I guess so. My question was in reference to the PCs, mostly. I am thinking about converting Dark Conspiracy, and I have been thinking about this myself. It's not as easy as Space 1889, for instance. I will probably scale the 1-10 stat scale to 1-6 and have them roll +2D6, just use 2D6+6 for SIZ. That is likely how I would do GURPS too (the SIZ, anyway). Critters, yes, guesstimation. GURPS is scaled differently, compared to BRP, I believe. A 12 ST is likely a lot stronger than a BRP STR 12, for instance. ST 18 in GURPS would likely be superhuman, right?

My thoughts too. I suppose the difference is that the BRP options are truly just options, and the actual (hopefully minimalist) system is fully independent. I am not sure what the difference might be from GURPS or HERO, myself. Jason, if you are around you might want to address this.

How do you determine SIZ?

I am thinking of converting Dark Conspiracy. It always seemed like a BRP version of that would be like CoC without the depressing bits, if you know what I mean...a good session of BRP DC might play like X-Files. And it could use most of the rules in the new book.

I thought it was high too, and then it occured to me that maybe it included some sample scenarios. But no, Jason said not. That's a lot of rules...

I fear there is no point in trying to sell BRP to 3.5 or Exalted players. It will sell itself enough to fly as is...or not. The simple, brutal fact is that (as others here have pointed out) WOTC and White Wolf have the lions' share of the market, most kids prefer cards or computer games, and it most likely isn't going to change. I am going to do my part to expose others to BRP by trying to run it at a local game store, but believe me I ain't expecting any miracle nor do I think catering to those with 'modern, edgy' tastes by trying to make BRP more attractive to them (and likely compromising everthing that makes it the system I love) is going to help. Popularity isn't important to me, anyway. Especially when it comes to that crowd. If BRP became something they found attractive and interesting it would be time to move on, because BRP would be something as different from what it is now as 'D&D 4E' is going to be different from Dungeons and Dragons. That's just the way I feel, because I have been insulted to the point of ridicule too many times on sites like rpg.net for any sort of reconciliation of tastes or for there to be any possibility of common ground. 'Popular' be damned. Oh, as to what you said about 'trendy' mechanics...one of the great ironies of all this nastiness about grognards and obsolete games is that as far as I can tell you can duplicate most any system mechanic I have seen with BRP and have an easier time running your game at that. But BRP is something that came out in 1978 and something that old has to be obsolete and dorky...so a game that has edgy 'artwork' and has reinvented the wheel with clunky dice mechanics that are different has to be better...how can you fight that level of ignorance, even if you want to, Joseph?

The only times I have gone to rpg.net for months was to check on the progress of BRP...now I don't have any reason. My blood pressure is much improved.

Second that! I have been tempted to pick up the Petty Magic even though I don't have MRQ.

As I thought, based on you previous answers. Thanks.

So, try to imagine how little I care. They have games they like, no point in ruining BRP so they can like it too. It's simply not something that matters.

For case 1, I have lately used a skill base derived from related stats, ie Dodge at DEX x 2, but expanded so that all default skills have a similar base (much like MRQ). I have most of my gaming life used the SB1 bonus system and usually have skills begin at bonus or 5%, whichever is greater, minimum 5% for defaults. Both worked well enough. Case 2, I do believe that the Keepers Companion for CoC did indeed lay out parameters for what was professional level, hobbyist level and so forth for skills, and gave specific rules for what percentage a newly graduated doctor (for instance) would have in the various necessary skills and so forth. Also, there were some very nifty rules governing that sort of thing in Elric!/SB5, usually involving increased competence in what you could do with skills at 100%+. Seeing as how Jason just said the other day that the base system in the new book is a combination of those two rules sets, I think we are going to be gold for that aspect of the game. The skill explanations and parameters should be much better defined than in any previous version of BRP. At least that is what I am expecting now.

I have always been puzzled when someone says something like that, the part about percentiles having no connection with what the character can do. There are all kinds of ways to sort it out, of course. The primary one being...you can do whatever it is no matter the percentage score with no roll, until a situation comes up which will have significant consequences: then you roll. And then you have several mechanisms in place to adjust and/or modify the roll...+/- modifiers, critical/special levels, halve or double the chance, roll two skills at once even (do you climb the wall quietly?), resistance rolls. I cannot understand why this isn't a no-brainer to some people, I really can't. Even more irksome to me is the refrain I have seen so very often over at rpg.net, in particular, that BRP is old, obsolete, out-of-date. And doesn't have useful 'new' mechanics like the ads/disads as you mentioned. Snort. Truth is the system is so easy to modify you can add any of that stuff without breaking the system. If you want to. Other games are very intricately designed and many break down if you take away some of those 'essential' mechanics. Essential to them, not BRP. I am sure you can name some of those other games. BRP has always been the best 'sweet spot' for me, the best combination of elegance, 'realism', playability, robustness. Not too complex, not too simple, but it can be made complex or simple if that is what you want. I don't want to trash somebody elses' fun, but I will never be able to understand why some people are so down on such a great game. I really hope the new book is still the BRP that some of us understand and appreciate, and never gets 'modernized'. Personally I believe it can stand the test of time just as it is, like chess, even if it is never as popular as certain other games. No need to ruin something good to keep up with the Joness.

All true, and bitterly, and probably the best kept secret in rpg history.

It is easy. You could take the Arcanum and Magic World alone and whip out a quick start magic system in half an hour, fully scalable and with loads more punch and flavor than any D&D 3.5 low level mage. And from there you can scale it as low or high powered as you want. Even the hit points are easy. An old trick from GURPS, limit fireball to 3D6 on the target hex, then add a second ring for 2D6, a third ring for 1D6, like an explosion under the CoC rules (I usually made that a 6 point spell, nonvariable). Dangerous but not always fatal, esp. with armor; but it can be scaled higher depending on how dangerous you want magic to be. Use major wound level or hit location, distribute damage evenly for the latter. An average roll does a couple of points to each location (target hex, with minor damage to other members of a group in the spells' area of effect). More power, more dice...spell damage could be very potent, but at the risk of running out of magic points, a convenient way for the GM to keep control of the game. You control it, not the rules. No out of control damage inflation..unless you want it that way. Lightning bolt, 2D6 to a targeted location, plus 1D6 from a secondary location where the bolt exits (usually a 3 point nonvariable). Again, dangerous but not overwelming. Elemental magic missile spells, doing 1D8 or 1D10 damage but with varied effects according to the type, fire, ice, stone, etc (usually 1 or 2 points, nonvariable). Sleep (1+ points, depending on how many targets the mage wants to attack at once, POW vs. Pow each). The targets may have Countermagic, in which case you have to overcome the Countermagic first to get through. Demon summoning, to have the demon teach a spell or abduct someone...but you have to strike a bargain, using the demon's true name or other form of coercion, from safe inside your circle of protection. Want real power? Mass rituals to your favorite god with high joint POW sacrifice to achieve whatever you want, as with the Elemental Lords in Stormbringer (for instance). You can let your imagination go and not be constrained by someone elses' imagination. That is the real power of BRP, IMO, just the sheer flexibility without the complexity, stiffness, or constraint in other systems. BRP allows any power level. I hope anyone who has run it outside the stock settings realizes this.

You are wrong about the system not supporting 'D&D style' magic. I ran a game for years with an expanded magic system cobbled together from the hints in Stormbringer and Magic World fleshed out with the old Bard Games' Arcanum, that blows the magic in D&D away. Not only the standard stuff but alchemy, summoning/bargaining with demons, magic duels, the whole fantasy magic portfolio...much better than your average D&D, AND you can do more with it. Try it sometime. It really is not fair to BRP or accurate in general to say it can't work for a full fledge magic oriented game by comparing a couple of very narrowly focused settings to the likes of Greyhawk, and saying the system is inadequate. And I am betting that for every one who turns BRP down because it doesn't share the little subsystems that are considered necessary by a lot of gamers these days, there are many more who might look at an easily understood and approachable system like BRP as a breath of fresh air. Come to think of it, there are a lot of throwbacks to a simpler style of rpg coming out right now, for a fact. I don't think BRP is going to fail because it doesn't embrace all the strange little dice and 'social mechanics' and such that have become so common the last dozen or so years. All IMO, of course.

Not for me. I find having the numbers behind the concept in front of me handy, and there is another consideration. Sometimes you get a player who would like to play but is intimidated by hard-core roleplaying (such as described above) and will be hesitant to participate, through shyness or what-not. My style has never included great expectation of a certain style, including 'getting into character', etc. If someone wants to do that, fine, but someone else (myself included) might just want to look at it as a combination board game and mode of group story telling. I don't like to pressure my players to perform, but encourage them to get what they can out of it. There is no one best way to do these things, and it seems that 'sheetless' style gaming as described would take the fun out of it. Just me. I want a relaxed gaming experience and that sounds like anything but.

So long as we don't give into what 'everyone else' wants to the point that it becomes not BRP any longer. Anyway, it does look like Jason has put a lot of optional rules into the game that promise a great deal more flexibility in the style of play. I worry that if Chaosium tries to please everyone they will wind up pleasing no-one.

A race of demonoids which has specialization as a racial feature like insects...scouts, warriors, flyers, queen, drones. But are reptilian. Anyone remember Almuric, by Robert E. Howard? Morlocks, for a different underground race. You can rip off Tekumel, there are some very bizarre and different races in that, for sure. Like the Ahoggya. Make elves just as good as the Tolkien elves, but throw in a monkey wrench like having them take double damage from cold iron. No wonder they are declining in the face of human civilization and use bows...

Arrgh. Previous post in answer to Joseph Pauls' last post.