g33k

Is it, though? Malory wrote in the chivalric/romantic tradition; the specifically-cited-as-OK sources were hundreds of year older (or newer), not mere decades, with one author pointing to another just one generation before or after. As I've previously stated, this isn't a needle I feel qualified to thread (nor do I wish to) ... but I think they're noticeably different in tone, flavor, etc. I did NOT see -- for example -- de Troyes' Lancelot or Perceval (also in the romantic tradition) cited as "OK." In the end, it seems Chaosium's aim here is partly one of "tone" and "flavor" and "character" (i.e. "Mythos" flavor, or "Morte d'Arthur" flavor), not merely a matter of specific text such as "ia! ia! ..." In the end... I wish people would stop trying to cut these issues as close to the bone as they can be cut. It "looks" to me -- as a 3rd party, not Chaosium -- as if people are trying to find out just HOW CLOSE they can come to creating a CoC-clone (or a KAP-clone), and the answer to THAT is "Not close. Not close at all." I don't actually think that this IS the objective: I am NOT accusing folks of trying to clone these Chaosium products! Instead, I think they just want a "nice clear line" that they can be sure they aren't even close to crossing... but the questions look like people's projects are trying to get as close to that line as possible! I think it would serve the questioners well to (a) get as specific as possible, rather than work in general cases; and (b) approach the edges of "prohibited content" a bit more slowly, from a bit further distance. I see plenty of instances of Chaosium saying "yes, that's OK." I see them saying, "no, that won't work." Where the answer isn't clear -- or doesn't come at all -- I suggest you look at how your question might "give cover" for someone who DOES intend to clone or near-clone a Chaosium product. This must be terribly frustrating, sitting in a Chaosium chair, looking at Chaosium IP's. And -- speaking as someone who has begun writing based upon this "BOGL" -- I find this line of questioning (as I expressed it above) isn't helpful: It doesn't clarify matters for me, it doesn't make it easier for me to abide by the license. Given the frustration the questioners express, I don't think it's helping them, either. So I reiterate: I wish people would stop with this approach.

If it's Mythos-y, then avoid it. Easy-peasy! Most of Poe isn't... It'd be kind of contrived to Cthulify Poe (except Pym, which HPL himself cites as a primary inspiration for AtMoM). On the other hand... well, I've seen some pretty contrived Cthulifications... (lookin at you, Cthulhu Plushies, HPL for Beginning Readers, Where the Deep Ones Are, Good Night Azathoth, etc ... ). But really... it's not hard! If your Montressor is doing murder in the name or service of strange -- nay, eldritch! -- Things From Beyond, then best you set down the Amontillado and be a tee-totaller. If it's simple human madness... a lifetime of grievance nursed to neurosis and thence -- quite naturally! -- to psychosis ... why then, drink deep, seize that trowel, and revel in the horror of the sacrifice and the madness! ( n.b. I am not Chaosium, so my POV is unofficial! )

uhhh..... "YGWV" ? I think that's the "canonical" answer. In my Glorantha -- it's anywhere/everywhere the Mostali want it. It's pretty darned common as arms & armor amongst the Humakti Rune-Levels -- it's their Rune Metal, after all! There's a few other cults who also know some or all of the secrets of Iron (I think the upcoming Cults book makes special note of this; I don't recall the list at the moment). Any deity with the Death Rune probably has some access to it. Add it all up.... and that's how common it is. IMG -- YGWV, of course.

The magic still has full effect; so, yes. Sword Trance themselves up to around 200% attack/parry, Truesword for some damage, and it's just a minor delay for the unenchanted iron doing no weapon-damage? But I'll keep saying it: Humakti are melee-supreme, but they CAN be handled. Arguably, they can be handled even BETTER by spirits.

Humakti shred most everything they reach with their swords... Including spirits. The enchanted iron swords (common to many Humakti) are fully effective against spirits. Truesword and Sword Trance can be dire threats to a spirit.

<looks at the original 16pg booklet> <looks at BGB> <clears throat meaningfully> 😇

Not until/unless Chaosium gets permission from Larry Niven. Chaosium AFAIK isn't allowed to sell or distribute this in any form, at this time. I have no idea how much it would cost, how amenable Niven would be to renewing it, etc etc etc. Similarly for Elfquest and Moorcock's Eternal Champion. Those licenses haven't been with Chaosium for decades.

Yeah, yeah, I know. I even said (in my rant above) that they "preserved" this (i.e. from earlier games). But if you're not looking at other BRP games, if you're not embedded in the history and the lore of BRP'dom... if you're looking at OpenBRP as a foundational clean-sheet, this IS a new layer of terminology. My point is that -- with reference to the rest of OpenBRP -- this jargon is "new." It's introduced in Sec. 2.4, and thereafter a "Strength Roll" doesn't exist -- you make an "Effort Roll." I don't at all mind keeping "Characteristic Rolls," in fact I think they're an essential (if minor) part of the core. OpenBRP seems intended to be a minimal framework upon which someone could build their hard-sci-fi RPG, their psychedelic fantasy RPG, etc etc etc ad infinitum. As such, there was no reason at all to introduce -- or to preserve -- this sort of thing in the "new" system.

There's a couple of issues, it's worth not conflating them, I think: "Chaosium BRP" vs "other branches" (e.g. Nash/Whitaker Mythras, Newport OQ), and "Extended BRP Family" vs entirely-different-mechanics (like dicepools of the Ghostbusters lineage, or d20 systems, etc). Generally, I prefer the d100 "family" for most gaming. Within that, I think Chaosium BRP is closest to my "ideal" d100 game (some mix of BGB mechanics). No: of course "type of dice" don't make a game (and as diceless mechanics show, you don't even need ANY dice (nor card-decks or other randomizers)... Amber? Nobilis? Theatrix? ) . BUT... If I'm using a RPG engine to run the WORLD (as opposed to "narrative" engine RPGs, that run the STORY) then I want to have the mechanics work for the world... emulate/simulate the world, to a reasonable degree of accuracy (without bogging down into tabletop pseudophysics instead of role-playing). d100, as a mechanic, has a large number of advantages. I don't know of another system that offers as much. Dice-pool systems have issues with calculating skewed odds, and weird interplays between flat/linear +1/+2/+3/etc bonii (and -1/etc penaltii) vs. the nonlinear / bellcurve pool effect; +/-1 or +/-2 can be almost meaningless in the center of the curve, and a huge (dis)advantage out near the ends. d100? Linear AF, splitting neatly /25 /20 /10 /5 /4 (and /11 /9 /3 if I want them (or at least, close enough that I don't care about the 1% variance)) when linear gradation is desired. PLUS It's so granular that I can closely-emulate a curve (any of several curves) with the 1-100 range. d20 just isn't granular enough, IMHO/IME (and smaller dice-denominations obviously get even worse). Bonus: teaching d100 to n00bs, pretty much everyone gets a %ile score -- 20% is 20%, 75/25, whatever... Incredibly intuitive.

It hits the "d100 sweet spot," for me. Or it's the closest to the bullseye, at least.

Going through the OpenBRP doc again, more thoughtfully... Got another criticism. On the one hand, it's a minor (even petty) thing. On the other hand... geez, Chaosium, really? Section 2.4, "Characteristic Rolls" -- STRx5, POWx5, etc -- "Effort" rolls, "Luck" rolls, etc... My gripe is right... there. A whole new layer of terminology, really? That adds nothing except... jargon? Is there ANY good reason not to just call a "Strength Roll" what it is, a Strength Roll (and so on, for the other 6 characteristics)? It just seems like an utterly needless layer of jargon and confusion. Chaosium was stripping the system down to a barebones framework... and they preserved this bit of obfuscation??? This leads to a slightly more substantive criticism: how utterly LIMITING the terms, as presented, can sometimes be... e.g. an "Idea" roll, when clearly an INT roll may represent other things (recall (an exact detail, or a long-ago memory, etc); solving a logic/reason puzzle; etc etc etc)... Really is just a minor thing. Really, it is. But it bothers me. YMMV.

Also, Humakti typically can only "shred" a spirit that they can bodily approach, that is in melee range of their sword. All the typical anti-Humakti tactics apply... sometimes with unique spirit-twists. Stand off and pepper with spells? Yup. Fly up out of reach? Yup. Maneuver invisibly, then materialize & attack from behind, from straight overhead, from a corner that was empty (when the Humakti set his back against it)? Yup, Yup, Yup!

GOOD GODS, YES! Do it! Put it up on JC! This looks fabulous!

In the Uplift'verse, Humanity (along with "Uplifted" (genetically & surgically enhanced to human-like sapience) chimps, dolphins, etc) gets into interstellar space, where they encounter "Galactic Civilization" (actually "five galaxies"), comprised of a multitude of alien races. Unifying all these races is the common practice of Uplift -- finding pre-sapient / proto-sapient species, and Uplifting them to be spacefaring citizen-sophonts. It is more than mere "practice," though: it has become the overriding ethos, even a religion. Some races have become aggressive and even militant about the issue. Uplifted species trace their ancestry back uncounted millennia, via multiple "generations" of species who uplifted species who uplifted species, to an original "Progenitor" race a billion or more years ago: nobody can really be sure (as a species ages its power waxes and then wanes... sometimes into degeneracy and extinction... sometimes into transcendence... and sometimes the more-active species cannot be sure which is which!) . In fact, Uplift is the universal and overriding reality of civilization: every race Uplifts others; every race is Uplifted themselves. Every. Race. (remember this!) The senior, uplifting race is called a "Patron" and the junior race(s) are "Clients." Client races "pay" their Patron (for the privilege of being Uplifted) with millenia of service to their Patrons. Humanity bursts onto the Galactic scene like a minor bombshell. Are we really a "wolfling" race, evolved on our own? Or are we "feral," partway-uplifted (and then criminally-abandoned) by another race? Only the fact that humans have, themselves, uplifted other species (making us a de facto Patron species) prevents humanity from being helplessly assigned to another race as Clients... to be genetically modified to suit that species designs and desires, and their judgement as to what is "better..." and millenia of racial servitude. If it could be proven that we were abandoned as a partly-Uplifted race, our "Patron" status would be invalidated, and all the Earth-born sophonts (including Humans) would be reassigned as Client species. Generally, Humanity is at the mercy of the Galactics: their tech is so far advanced, their numbers so vastly greater, that should they decide to make Clients of us, we'd be helpless to resist. There's a bunch more to the 'verse, of course... novels and novels worth. Hopefully this precis helps.

Seconded. My absolute favorite (I consider it one of the all-time great sci-fi novels) is Startide Rising. Also worth reading are Cherryh's "Chanur" novels, beginning with Pride of Chanur.

Yes. (snark aside -- I haven't heard anything on this topic for quite a while; but Chaosium has (previously) stated clearly that they intended to get various e-support tools for RQG in place; so I keep hope alive! I would welcome further comment (and actual time/budget on-task) from them <hint,hint>. The lack (in comparison to some other games) begins to loom a bit, particularly in these covid-19 days... ) . (also, it's possible they will go with another site, such as FG or Astral)

No, it's not missing. It's just not where we'd expect (on the Attack) -- it's listed as a Defender result, "... with no armor protection."

Also page 203 box-text "Summary of Special Damage Results," and p. 206, "Critical Hit" -- the core location in the rules defining what a crit is!

Yeah. I mean, I think there are innovations to be had, still; but sure -- the options are pretty well explored these days! But my point is that any elaboration on the very-core "roll-low / d100 skill / crit-or-fumble as portion of hit-or-miss" rule is really exactly that -- an elaboration on the core. As such, it probably isn't a core element that should be included by default; it's something for an "OpenBRP Companion" or "Advanced O-BRP" document. (Edit: also... the more you end up with a product that looks like Mythras Imperative, the more I think you should just use Mythras Imperative! (including using that as the foundation for further building, if so inclined))

Note, however, that the Mythras "Effects" system is a pretty substantive part of the crunch of the system. This is drifting far off from the original "OpenBRP" project.

I enjoy things like skill-thresholds; like sometimes you just randomly knock a weapon out of your foe's hand (actually, that's usually their fumble) but above 75% skill, you're able to intentionally disarm someone -- on a successful & unparried attack, you may declare them disarmed (instead of rolling damage / hit-location / etc). This sort of effect is, in essence, a "stunt/feat" -- it's just an exceedingly common one, something everybody learns automatically, at a certain point.

You seem to have forgotten Chewbacca... And Jabba. Is Darth Maul "important" enough to count? Mon Mothma is "important" in-universe, though not a major character in the movies. But one of the persistent themes of the Empire in Star Wars is that they are racist assholes, so... aliens notsomuch. In Trek, you forgot the Vulcan (and Romulan) lines in TOS. Cardassians, Ferengi... I could go on and on! Quite a few episodes of Trek were "new planet / new alien every week." I think the "general" sci-fi issue is one of special F/X -- humans are just easier! And famously, of course: All Aliens are Humans with Rubber Foreheads. And frankly, I think you've hit a VERY important issue with "it's easier for the actors" -- it's also easier for your players. I am routinely disappointed with sci-fi RPG non-humans. They ALL feel like RP'ing Humans with Rubber Foreheads... there aren't any that really seem alien. I believe players like to play aliens, though; so you should likely include them...

I suspect they'd be willing to add some staff and/or freelancers, if they got the Eternal Champion license back in-house... 😉

If you have any ignorance, I am unqualified to detect it. I spoke strictly of my own! Apologies if it seemed otherwise.

Depends on the Dream Dragon... If it had lots of natural armor, the hide probably makes unusually good armor; there are probably weapons to be made from teeth and/or claws. Venomous bite suggests fangs that might carry venom as swords. Etc Etc Etc. (I would resist the idea of "generic" dream dragons)