PhilHibbs

I agree with him as well. Pete and Loz's system is excellent.

Just a quick history lesson - older editions of RuneQuest always had "special" and "critical", it is a Mongoose simplification to have just one level of "improved" success. It's a change that I like, though.

It seems that the RuneQuest name and and Glorantha line are a package deal. They couldn't afford to keep losing money on the Gloranthan products, so they had to drop both that and the RuneQuest name. At least, I've heard that speculation, I don't know it for a fact.

Indeed. I have no idea if RuneQuest and the Second Age setting are a package deal or not, or whether Greg might licence it to someone who wanted to do a First Age setting.

Personally I think that is unlikely. I think they'll keep the RQ name and Second Age setting (or any other Gloranthan period that does not overlap with HeroQuest) available in case another interested party thinks they can make a go of them, individually or combined. The space for RuneQuest in the market is now very crowded, though, with BRP, Wayfarer, and OpenQuest.

That wasn't actually meant to be a jibe at Mongoose! Just a joke...

I would suggest moving away from a literal interpretation that a parry has to be physically blocking an incoming swing. I think that if someone is coming at you with fists, and you hold up a knife in the way and they think "hang on, this is going to hurt", that could be considered a successful "psychological parry". I don't know if this is a BRP rule but there's an AHRQ rule that says that a failed attacking weapon takes damage from a successful parry. More than one Scorpion Man has lost its stinger to my character's dual-wield broadswords under that rule.

Is there any chance of Chapter 8 arriving at some time? I've only just discovered this thread and have flicked quickly through Creatures, looks absolutely fantastic, thanks!

Were they given any specific directions on choosing locations, and is it possible that they might have landed more blows had they not been going for locations? Clutching at straws here to maintain my slender grip on the position I have assumed...

Damn good point. This hasn't come up in my game yet as I haven't thrown heavily armoured enemies at them. Armour has a high penalty in MRQ as well so that discourages running around in full plate, and when I did throw a big baddie with Shield up, the sorceror's first spell was Neutralise Magic.

Had to stop watching that half way through. Anyone who doesn't like animal cruelty should not watch it, there's no way they would be allowed to treat horses like that in a civilized film studio.

There are many improvements and fixes that have been made to the RuneQuest system since 1980. I loved Chaosium RQ2, but I could never go back to it because of all the fixes that I would have to pick through and apply to solve all the problems that I could simply avoid by starting with a more modern incarnation of the rule system.

The way MRQ2 solves this is with weapon size - Small, Medium, Large, Huge, Enormous. If the attacking weapon is one size larger than the parrying weapon, only half the damage is blocked. If it is two sizes smaller, you have to crit and pick "Enhance Parry" which makes your weapon count as two sizes larger for parrying purposes. So even then, a dagger (S) can't parry a tree, but it could parry a poleaxe (L).

Ah I see. Yes, I had considered implementing something to do with comparing relative success vs success with attack/parry. But it seemed quite a big change, giving the equivalent of a "Bypass Parry" manoeuvre on success v success.

I haven't spotted that rule in MRQ2!

I should probably delete this, as it didn't add anything to the discussion, but I can't find a Delete option.

You could adopt the "adjust skills over 100%" rule in MRQ2 (subtract the amount that the highest skill is over 100 by) - if one is 110% and the other is 130%, then that gets adjusted down to 80% vs 100%. Then, there is a 49% chance per exchange that one of them gets a better level of success than the other. Actually, I don't really see the original problem. With 110% vs 130%, there is already a 20.77% or 24.5% chance per exchange that the attacker gets a better level of success than the defender depending on who's attacking. Something interesting happens 1 time in 5 - either an impaled weapon stuck in a parrying shield, or a critical hit that probably does enough damage to get some of it past the shield (average 13 for most decent weapons plus bladesharp plus damage modifier). Hm, actually shields can be pretty tough, a large shield blocks 16, so most crits with a 1h weapon will bounce off. Maybe I do see the problem. Going back to my original calculation, given that a successful parry will block a crit... that brings even the MRQ2 rule fix down to a 4% chance vs a 19% chance. Well, that's not too bad, but if they are both 120% then it could still drag on (4.75% chance each). Oh, but an Impale vs a Parry robs the attacker of their weapon still. That could be fun, although the "I did better than you but came off worse" thing is a bit of a kicker. I think that RQ2 shields block too much damage. Maybe knock them down from 8, 12, 16 to 6, 9, 12.

Simplicity is indeed a big priority and I think you made the right call. There used to be separate melee/missile hit locaton tables in AHRQ3 and there's nothing to stop anyone from using the charts from that.

There are three answers to that question that I can think of, and I'm sure there are more. First, if your group doesn't like increasing the chance of fumble on an aimed blow, then don't increase the chance of fumble on an aimed blow (or similar voluntary modifier). Keep the full skill's fumble chance (and crit/special if you like) and only change the chance to get a normal success. Oh, and this is the MRQ2 answer, unless the modifier takes you from over 100% to under, as that is the point where the fumble chance goes from 99-00 to just 00. Second, you are restricting your options, and concentrating on one thing above all else, and might make a mistake because of that. Finally, it's simpler, if that's the way you think. It's a side effect and it's not worth fussing over a 1% change here and there, and if you apply a rule consistently then you don't have arguements over what modifiers affect fumble chance and which ones do not. I prefer the first answer, now that you've raised it, athough I would naturally have gone with the last one. But I'm a number junkie.

It's not the person swinging the sword that is making the choice. You are making the choice, your character is swinging the sword. A roleplaying game is never going to be an accurate 1-for-1 reality simulator, it's a narrative engine. I like realism, I like simulationism, but I know that sometimes you have to stop trying to reach perfection because perfection would take an entire game session to simulate one combat round.

Well, that leaves me with the problem with my imagination, because I agree with their logic. Repeatedly hitting the same location every time is a solid tactical choice in nearly every fight, especially with locational hit points and no general hit points, because it takes someone down much more quickly than spreading out the damage. In the final boss fight in the GLS scenario, everyone just hit the thing in the chest and it was dead before the first melee round was half way through. Most of the MRQ2 combat system is great, but Choose Location is ruining the game. My suggested mod wouldn't even have fixed that fight, 'cos it can't parry 6 people.

I think the Old West has a lot of promise as a Call of Cthulhu setting.

I've played FPS games in "cheat mode", it's no fun when you get what you want all the time. Always feeling that you have to choose the most effective option can also be disappointing. And it applies to their opponents as well, they will be receiving fewer aimed blows to their less-armored or already-injured location so it cuts both ways. I think it will change the balance of combat in a good way, but I haven't tried it yet so I'm not certain.

You're trying to hit this guy on the head, but he's got his shield held high stopping you 'cos he's not wearing a helmet. So what do you do? You chop his leg off, or his sword arm, or you gut him. You wanted to hit the head, but the fact that he's actively trying to parry you means you can't choose Head. Nonetheless, he has clearly failed to parry, 'cos you hit him. Makes sense to me. As to rolling Head randomly, well, these things occasionally happen, but you can't guarantee a headshot due to that damn shield being in the way. Part of the reason for restricting Choose Location is that my players pick it every time, and I don't want to use the suggested penalty clause for repeating the same CM. As to "a new class of CMs", plenty of CMs have their own particular restrictions, one more doesn't make much difference.

Yes, on a failed parry you will get a hit through, but he might have prevented you from hitting where you wanted to hit. It seems to me that against an evenly armored opponent, you might want to go for max damage on the first few hits, and then when you've hit a vital location, Choose the same location again to take it down.