frogspawner

What is the Questworld idea?

I still like the 'gates between worlds' concept. (Was that it?) We could just have general rules for how the gates would look/work, and then I think we could do without an overseer (or, rather, each author would oversee their own world/universe). Do you see any problem with that?

I like keeping Fate Points as a seperate pool that is not tied to POW or Pow Points or any other in game statistic (spellcasters never seem to get any lucky breaks, what is up with that?).

I see what you mean, that Fate points are 'meta-game' but Power points are 'in-game'. So using PP as part of the Fate mechanism (as I have just changed to) is a bit odd. Having swapped, I think you may well be right! But we'll see how it goes...

If an infintinite number of monkeys can eventually type up the complete works of Shakespeare, you'd think I'd get through a sentence like that without a typo.:mad:

No! Your typos can be gems - let them flow!

(And there's no need to be jealous of your infinite colleagues, you pull your weight... )

Sorry to be negative but, on reflection, I'd prefer something clean, fresh and non-litigious. We don't all live in Norway, y'know!

But I do think that we, BRP fans collectively, should have a go at collaborating on a new BRP setting (or world, or multiverse...)

But what flavour?

Maybe for some spectacular or heroic action? Anything that would significantly boost a persons ego?

From Bunnies & Burrows... getting the girl? Very cinematic! (To clarify: one per girl, not per occasion! )

Depends on what Fate Points (fatigue points?) means. I would say it should cost a POW at least to get out of one (shift up or down, or otherwise change it), as the gifts have that much and impact.

Yes, the cost should be significant. BTW, do you use (permanent) POW as Hero/Fate Points already? That seems quite a neat method...

Like when or chaos group got hold of a bunch of vials that gave chaotic features - a good one on 1-4 and a bad one on 5-6 on the 1d6. Man that was fun! It went approximately that way with the group too. 4 increased their powers considerably, 2 became roaming monsters!

I could however, see using the points to modify the die roll when the geas is first rolled, so you ended up with something else.

Oh, yes I meant when it was first 'given', naturally.

I am a bit learly of the all or never personalty traits in some games. They are very hard to roleplay properly without shades of gray.

Hopefully, the Pendragon-ish personality rules I'm about to inflict on my players will be sufficiently 'grey' (and they're for volunteers only).

Likewise I think the "distrust" in "distruct all non-Humakti" must be tempered with a gain of salt. ... It's distrust, not raging paranoia.

It was years ago, but maybe someday I could try playing it like that and 'resurrect' that Humakti character...

(PS: Nice typo! "destruct all non-Humakti"?)

OK (following on from a point raised in the Balance thread), would it be a valid use of Fate Points to get out of an unfavourable Geas (assuming FP were being used in such a setting) ?

Actually, this strikes me as a GM/player problem, not a system problem. ...

You're dead right, of course. In fact, I felt the GM had fiddled things a bit and rushed him to Initiate status anyway (perhaps seeking balance with other characters? I can't remember). So I just took it at face value, and said the character wouldn't return to a now-distrusted group - much more logical to just stay with his Priest (and me roll up a new one). But thanks for your interest.

The "get out of a Geas" question is one for the Fate Points thread. See you all there!

Yeah. Both methods have thier advntages, flaws and fans.

A point/build type of creation gives you more control, and lets you play what you want to play, but limits you in reaching certain character concepts.

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Come to think of it, the old Yelmalio gift that gave a 90% spear skill could completely disrupt a GM who wanted "balanced" characters.

I prefer a system where you have a few points, rather like Fate Points, to spend in character creation which can be used to tweak the character as you prefer (better stats, better heritage...). If you don't, you can spend 'em to get a few extra skills instead.

As for Gifts/Geases, yes, they're a menace! I once had an interesting character (Humakti baboon) who managed to reach Initiate status, raised his Int like he'd always wanted - and got the geas "distrust all non-Humakti". The other players' characters weren't Humakti, so he was out of the campaign. For me, it killed him stone dead - worse than any critical, because you can't Dodge/DI out of it... or could you spend a Fate Point?

This is the last post I'll make to this thread, as I'm going to significantly reduce my presence on these forums with the completion my BRP edits.

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"What's the point if the fans will hate it before they see a word of it? Who needs the hassle?"

I think he's stressed, guys. I hope you're ashamed of yourselves!

I'll walk you through a combo of the options...

• Hit Points Per Location in addition to general HP... I don't use 'em
  
• Fatigue Points and Sanity... I don't use 'em
  
• Armor per Hit Location is easy enough to add, but what if the GM wants random armor? ...I don't use 'em
  
• Heroic Hit Points doubles HP ...I don't use 'em
  
• Splitting Attack and Parry Skills... ...I don't use 'em
  
• Skill Category Modifiers - ...I don't use 'em
  
• Simpler Skill Bonuses - ok, I do use a version of these (called "characteristics")
  
• Increased Personal Skill Points, Cultural Modifiers, EDU/Knowledge rolls, etc. - ...I don't use 'em
  
• Skill Ratings Over 100% - ...I don't mind about 'em (just means it's a tough NPC or a TOUGH one!)
  

From that it looks like the emphasis (or in most cases, de-emphasis) Mr D has been giving BRP is pretty much in line with the way I like to play my games. And this from an RQ2 Grognard. So, for what it's worth, I reckon 'the boy done good'.

Many thanks for the examples. I'm happy with the mechanism now.

This I think, is a really good idea!

Ta. Your mention of QuestWorld/gateways sparked it off. I think the 'gates-between-worlds' idea is the best approach, though, so let me try to convice you...

I never have been that big a fan of world jumping, as it's difficult to create a believable universe from it, having f.ex. fantasy and hard sci-fi in the same universe would break the suspense for me. Also, creating the "new Glorantha" would more work than a single person could handle, it would need cooperation. With everyone having their own world, the effort would be divided into several different projects. I think a roof over the project would need to be made, whether it was fantasy or sci-fi (which I think would need to be two different projects). It would need to be inclusive enough to cater most people needs too. To allow both high fantasy and fantasy earth aspects in the same setting, some event may have happened, with worlds collided. Everyone could pick a part of the world to develope, or develope parts together. Magic-lite areas could be explained by their god giving them some sort of protection from magic.

But, just like the authors retain control over what is canon in (their original version of) their worlds, the GMs have control over where gates used in their campaign can reach. Some GMs could run a "No Sci-Fi Worlds" policy, others "No Magic Worlds" - no problem. If it's all one world, that's a bit difficult.

Obviously I'm interested. Sadly my own world is made from bits of various other commercial works (Harn, Moorcock, Tolkien, Glorantha, Dragon Warriors, Cthulhu... - yes, 'colliding worlds' is a good excuse, isn't it? ). I'd have to spend months bowdlerizing it or be sued by half-a-dozen corporations, I expect.

As for dividing the effort, I'd hope that a fairly small number of worlds would emerge as favourites, and effort would naturally be concentrated on them. Since my world is too derivative for publication, for example, I'd be happy to be inspired by someone else's fresh vision and try to add to it.

Looks like the first step was to define the physical world and lock in the design. ... Apply a little imagination and bang!..instant gaming world with a high level of consistency.

Well, consistency might be a problem, but GMs can pick and choose worlds to avoid anything they think too inconsistent. However, some world-building GMs, or maybe even most, would prefer a totally blank canvas, I suspect. With 'gates' they can simply use their existing world as-is. That's faster than instant - it's already there!

Good example, thanks. It's fine then - they're not doing the same job, but the separate job of assisting.

Odd because I don't usually like straight percentage plusses (or minuses) to rolls, but in this case it seems difficult to get around.

In Bond, if you use the right equipment with the right setup and have some degree of Fire Combat skill playing sniper is easy.

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Besides, being able to spend the points to improve rolls allows heroes to get off those badly needed "defuse the bomb or we're all dead" rolls. Plus you can occasionally fleece a bad guy at the tables and then steal his girlfriend.

But IMO they shouldn't be able to make shooting the bad guys even easier just by spending Hero Points. Ditto fleecing, girlfriend-stealing and whatever they should do on their own, I'd say. (Maybe in Bond it's ok - I guess that's more like story-telling).

The "do this or we die" thing is defensive, though, so that's fine. Just like Luke's Death Star shot...

Oh! I've only just realized how the mechanism works: they do both roll. But if the 'helper' succeeds, all they do is give +10% to the 'real' roller (or +15/20% if they spec/crit). Right? Hmmm - seems a bit odd to me, but OK.

Regarding Cooperative skill rolls (this may not really be worthy of it's own thread, but I didn't want to clog Jason's "Typo's" thread in this critical and no doubt highly stressful weekend):

A quick query about the Cooperative skill rolls on pg.173.

The benefit of having someone help you is that it adds 10% to your roll (or 15/20% for special/critical success).

However, that means somone with a very low skill level, let's say 5%, who is aiding you could be adding 10% or even 20% to a score.

This seems wrong to me. Intuitively, I'd argue that someone with virtually no skill is probably a hinderance to someone with skill. "Will you stop trying to help me?! You're just getting in the way!"

Would it not be wiser to say that only someone with a reasonable amount of skill (say minimum of 10%) can potentially aid in a cooperative skill roll. If they get a critical success and add 20%, that's just a fluke that should be allowed as it will rarely happen.

The assumption is that the higher-skilled character is essentially saying to the relatively unskilled character "Okay... you don't have much skill... but here's exactly what you need to do if you want to help me."

It could also be regarded as offloading "busywork", enabling the higher-skilled character to focus on execution of the primary task at hand. For example, a master chef might ask for unskilled assistance chopping or performing some routine task while he or she works on the stuff requiring a high degree of expertise.

The low chance of a character with a skill of 10% or under successfully being able to contribute to a cooperative task is the balancing factor.

If the GM feels it's not plausible, then he or she is free to rule that a character without an appreciable skill cannot aid in a cooperative task, as is stated in the first sentence of that section.

I would figure most things would benefit from another set of hands. Even if it is just "Hold theses screws; don't loose them", or "put pressure here."

BTW, Is there a penalty if the assistant fumbles? I could see that too.

"I thought I told you not to loose the screws"

If they're both doing it, why can't they just both roll? Two chances to succeed (and fumble...), in proper proportion to their skill.

Alternatively, the lower-skilled could just be at a disadvantage (i.e. skill x1/2).

Villains got Survival points, and did their major henchmen, and to a lesser extent flunkies. That was to prevent things from becoming to easy or an adventure ending prematurely should PC decide to just "blast Goldfinger's Head off" five minutes into the mission.

Or if you restrict everyone's Hero/Survival/Fate points to only defensive uses it also avoids that sort of effect (and it's 'fair' on NPCs, if you care about that sort of thing).

I think I'd prefer skill bases equal to a single stat, perhaps +/- some modifier. Anyone tried that and found problems with it?

I've personally found that it somewhat defeats the purpose, as there's usually at least two attributes that contribute too much to a given skill for me to be comfortable settling on one. You can do it of course (a lot of games do) but it doesn't really seem to follow to me.

Or course the add two stat method is a popular alternative in some circles. Melee Weapons starting at STR+DEX, missile weapons as DEXx2 or CON+DEX (Con for eyesight).

Thanks. Matters of taste, but no technical problems, then? One-stat is probably enough - I'll keep it simple, like me...

I didn't know it was that kind of site.

Well it wasn't - until you posted those pictures of a skyful of enormous mammaries... :shocked:

What was the concept behind Questworld? Gates from which you could travel form world to world or something like that?

I can't see anything like that in what few descriptions of QuestWorld I can google. Or was the concept just the same old 'blank lands' thing (or 'let everyone have an island')?

Anyway, your inter-world gates idea is much better: authors would keep complete control of their own worlds (universes, even...)

Anybody who has their own world, and wants to take part in the project, can publish what they have. ...the download list arranged as a "league table".

Is nobody interested in this project? Doesn't anyone want to put their own world forward as a prospective 'New Glorantha' for BRP?

The benefits of PCs increasing in abilities are more than offset by the drawbacks of the escalation of foes increasing in their abilities.

Yes, I found this insight amazing - and I'm still reeling from the shock of illumination...

So as the PCs get better the foes get more criticals.

Ah, well, not strictly true if you use the over-100% skill-reduction mechanism, as perhaps Gnarsh said. But your shocking principle of "character progression is bad!" still holds in general.

The observation is actually not a game balance issue, since it is based on absolute ability rather than ability relative to the PCs, but a campaign with balanced encounters will be more dangerous since the foes abilities will always be about the same relative to the PCs.

Well, I think it's more related to Game Balance than to skill base percentages...

And this is different then the same players buying a canned aventure themselves? Or sneaking a peak at a friends copy? Of all of the potential problems with this solution, that's honestly the least significant.

Well, just visiting a site is so much easier than spending actual cash or conspiring to cheat with fellow player, so it would be more of a problem than either of those cases. But you're right, it is a pretty pathetic objection.

My excuse is, "I vas only obeying orders...":

Go ahead and tell me why this is a bad idea.

So what are the other potential problems you foresee?

Bonuses and such affect improvement rates, which is significant in the long run.

Yes, I suppose they should. Though my current houserule uses 'roll over skill or 100-INT' (I can't even remember the official rules). One player whinges terribly about it, and I suppose he has a point (but he just likes to play 3 INT characters - typecasting, I say!).

Either way, I assumed that in the context of whether or not higher skills/abilities gained over time helped or hurt you, we'd restrict the conversation to foes against whom those skills and abilities are actually relevant.

No worries, it happens. I haven't really been following your argument, but it strikes me it's probably more relevant to the "Balance" thread than this one.

I suspect the cleanest implementation would be to use the simple 'core' stats in the book, and include an appendix with say all the stat blocks from the book done up with Hit Locations and SR and seperate Attack/Parry% for example, or whatever optional rules the author recommends for the setting.

Hmm, tricky. If the author doesn't recommend just the core stats, it'd be a bit odd to have them right there in the main text. Maybe no stats in the main body but all in appendices - either core first, recommended second (or vice versa?) and then any extra options felt useful.