fmitchell

Despite all the forgoing, I think the distinctions are useful to gamers in that they tell us what to expect. Hard Science Fiction: The game emphasizes real science and realistic technologies, and how technology affects society. (e.g. Transhuman Space, Diaspora, Eclipse Phase) Space Opera: Technology takes a back seat to tales of larger than life personalities and star-spanning civilizations. (e.g. Star Wars, Star Trek, Battlestar Galactica) Science Fantasy: Fantasy with a thin veneer of scientific jargon, and as such centers on fantasy themes. (e.g. Doctor Who, Gamma World, Dying Earth) Thalaba's graph, above, illustrates the differences perfectly. Genre labels aren't perfect ... but gamers (and others) can get annoyed when they buy "science fiction" that's simply fantasy with "quantum" pasted on. BTW, horror isn't merely about characterization, but about mood. Thus a "fantasy horror romance" seems like an odd combination, although a gothic novel might count: heroine moves to a prospective fiancee's remote mansion where supernatural terrors abound. However, romances tend toward optimism and horror towards pessimism ... especially taking the original and wider meaning of romance, which meant fantastic adventures with chivalrous and/or virtuous protagonists (often knights).

I do like fantasy, but I'm sick of Tolclones and D&D wannabes: elves, dwarVes, orcs, quadratic magic-users, dungeons, dragons, etc. I prefer low-magic swords-and-sorcery, planetary adventure, historical fantasy, alternate historical fantasy, and non-European settings. In other words, some of the rules cited above: - PCs and most NPCs are human. - "Demihumans" are rare or nonexistent; those who do exist almost never interact with humans, and might even be incomprehensible or implacably hostile to humanity. - PCs more time with political intrigue, investigations, and exploration and less in dungeon delves and monster hunts. - Magic isn't simply "point and chant": maybe it's a chaotic and corrupting force (e.g. Warhammer), or a subtle and pervasive force (e.g. RuneQuest), or a supplication to greater powers, or hour(s)-long ritual, or mystically enhanced martial arts ... something other than a man in a pointy cap conjuring fireballs. - The world isn't recycled from Tolkien, or even Howard; its authors did historical and literary research and/or built their world from distinctly different principles. Examples of games and worlds that meet my criteria: Glorantha, Barbarians of Lemuria, Tekumel (not my cup of tea, but original), Shadows of Yesterday, Pendragon, and Reign. Honorable mentions to Warhammer Fantasy, which took D&D elements and created an anti-D&D, and GURPS Banestorm, which at least explains why medieval humans, elves, dwarves, orcs, goblins, and reptilemen all live on the same world.

Perhaps only tangentially related to this post, but if you didn't like CoC's insanity system, you might want to take a look at Unknown Armies and its "stress" system: 1. UA tracks five types of stress: Violence, Unnatural, Helplessness, Isolation, and Self (i.e. self-image and integrity). 2. Characters can become "hardened" against a particular type of stress through exposure, but vulnerable or even sensitive to another. Thus a cop or coroner could get used to dead bodies (Violence), but become a gibbering wreck when legions of the dead rise (Unnatural). 3. There's no "SAN 0" at which a PC becomes an NPC. Intense therapy has a chance to bring anyone out of gibbering madness. On the other hand, characters who become "hardened" slide inexorably towards sociopathy: a character totally hardened against Violence would kill you for the slightest reason if he could get away from it, a character completely hardened against Self becomes totally unprincipled with no real personality, and so forth. Sociopaths are still functional, very much so, but very scary people to be around (and to play). Granted, UA models a very different world from Lovecraft's unspeakable horror, but it's probably a little closer to actual psychology. Even if you don't like the categories, you can steal mechanics and make up your own categories: Sorcery, Cosmic Horror, Body Horror, whatever. Here's a very condensed version of the UA stress system: http://fading-suns.mapache.org/u/stresses.pdf

Maybe I'll go see it, maybe not. I'm not that interested. Still, I'm glad Cameron made it, just as I'm glad Lucas made the prequel trilogy despite never ever wanting to see it ever again. By pushing technical boundaries, he's giving tools to the next generation of film makers, which if Moore's Law holds will be faster and cheaper than they are today. Imagine that level of realism with a speculative fiction story that's actually interesting ...

Thirded, despite my kvetching about downloads. Running a board that specializes in an RPG system that's NOT D&D earns you many Allegiance points with the Gods of Gaming. Or something.

Re: Downloads Is this a one-day business trip, a week-long vacation, a months-long movie shoot, or a four-year tour of duty at Pearl Harbor?

Here's a stupid question ... what happened to the Downloads section?

These days, GURPS Thaumaturgy has interesting variations on ritual magic. Also look at A Magical Medley for FUDGE. I particularly like "Occultism", but they also have a section on traditional Chinese magic.

I think a better approach would resemble "Skill Challenges" from the d20 game Iron Heroes: a penalty to your skill roll to pull off some feat. The penalty might be anything from -20% to a Difficult (half-skill) or Very Difficult (quarter-skill) roll. In some cases, you might need a Special or Critical success to pull your manoeuvre; a lesser level of success might mean the manoevre wasn't a complete loss, but it would have worked better if you didn't try to get fancy. Thus, only characters with high skill ratings, generally over 100%, can pull them off with any regularity. GURPS also has a mechanic for special manoeuvres, which if I remember correctly are an additional skill based of another skill at a penalty. You could also adopt the "Martial Arts" approach, of a normal attack that falls under the feat's skill percentile has that special effect.

Or it could be that the original S****b*****r/E***c designers created narrow spells, and the Magic designers created broad spells. (Actually, I believe RQ 2 and 3 had variations for each weapon type, e.g. Bladesharp vs. {blunt instrument version}.) Four spells rather than one doesn't seem like a big limitation, especially if your entire party prefers blades. I'd like to know the straight dope from the designers, if any are watching this thread. At any rate, I suspect magic system design is as much, if not more, about atmosphere as game balance.

However, if you stick with one system of powers (say, Sorcery), you have a far smaller list of abilities out of the box. A GM might choose to allow one system because he wants powers to have the same feel (e.g. psychic abilities, swords-and-sorcery, etc.), or because he likes the mechanic (e.g. percentile abilities like Magic and Psychic Powers vs. automatic success like Sorcery). I'd like to see some innovation in systems, too. Power Points, percentile rolls, domains, time, and material requirements are different ways to limit the scope of magic, and different mixes provide a different "feel". I'm working on a Ritual Magic/Spirit Magic system, based around summoning spirits and invoking deities, which eschews Power Points and skills in favor of extended time, components, and raw POW. I'd love to see "ports" of Ars Magica (syntactic magic), Ghosts of Albion (a "spell construction kit" plus levels of success), and True 20 powers (a mix of broadly-defined Psychic and Magic powers, but based on a common "magical talent" stat).

At the risk of provoking the Moderators' wrath, I'll refer to my answer to similar suggestions on Pen and Paper Games. To summarize, I'd like to avoid a "Perform (Ritual)" skill because thematically the rituals are easy, but getting spirits to pay attention to them is hard. Two people could do the same ritual the same way, but one has more status/presence/whiffie in the Spirit World so he gets an answer. The whole process should be a bit mysterious; I'd like magic to be, well, magical, not just an alternate technology. Also, I'd like to avoid on-the-fly calculation of percentages as much as possible: no more than three or four bonuses to the base probability decided at the last minute, particularly if I'm calculating percentile values and not something in the 1-10 or 1-20 range. (Math not Frank's skill.) To quote myself, here's a mechanic I'm going to go with: For me, I think the next step is enumerating a dozen or more rituals, ranging from basic techniques through master-class magic.

It's an interesting idea, but I don't think it will work. To a large extent, the spirits are my way of providing knowledge to the party, just like corporeal NPCs. For example, the Shaman summons forth a ghost who wants the party to give its body a decent burial, and will grudgingly trade secrets about the ruin at the top of the hill for that service. To play the ghost properly, a player would probably have to know what the secrets are. Also I don't want spirits to exist simply so that our Shaman can clobber them and take their spells (a la RuneQuest 2 and 3). The experience should be more like negotiating with inhabitants of a strange town, and eventually meeting the nobles. Once the Shaman gets to that level, and they regard him as an ally in the corporeal world, then it's time to reduce the rituals to a simple die roll. Finally, since spirits are the gatekeepers of magic in this system, it's a little unrealistic to expect the other players to act against the group's best interests. I'm reminded of a scene in The Gamers, when a player introduces his new character: The Gamemaster: Guys, please! I want you to roleplay this. Remember you've never met this guy before, the last guys you met tried to kill you, and you're standing in the ruins of an evil, cursed castle. Just act appropriately. Magellan: Hello, I'm Magellan, a traveling mage. I notice your group has no wizard. Rogar, the Barbarian: You seem trustworthy. Would you care to join us in our noble quest? Magellan: Yes. Yes I would.

I was thinking along similar lines, but instead of "Perform(Ritual)" I'd just add a random factor to your point tally. It still doesn't factor in Allegiance, but maybe I'd add Allegiance/5 to the total. BTW, I was initially tempted to make all magic a roleplayed negotiation with spirits, but then I'd run into the "netrunner effect": one guy is roleplaying, the rest are twiddling their thumbs.

(I've also posted on Pen and Paper Games, but this is probably a better place.) I'm trying to nail down a Ritual Magic system, along the lines of the Buffy RPG's Sorcery system, "Occultism" from Fudge's A Magical Medley (the prime inspiration), and Spirit Magic from GURPS Voodoo/Spirits/Thaumatology. Here's how I initially described it to players in the game that I'm starting Real Soon Now: The third, fourth, and fifth bullet points I class collectively as "props"; some are necessary prerequisites, others provide bonuses. Low-POW and untrained assistants might also count as props, although multiple magicians might be able to pool their POW somehow. Allegiance is the mechanic from BRP. Every ritual has a Power Level, nearly always high enough that a magician needs both a high POW and one or more optional props to have any reasonable chance. The mechanic I'm toying with is (POW - Power Level) x 5% + Allegiance + prop bonuses. However, that would require a fair amount of on-the-fly calculation at the table, which I would like to avoid. Other mechanics I've considered: Using different mechanics for different "classes" of rituals. Summoning spirits directly may rely mainly on POW, while invoking "the spirits" to create a fog would rely mainly on Allegiance. Making two rolls, e.g. a POW + Prop Bonuses vs. Power Level to judge base success, and an Allegiance roll to upgrade the success level. Making all props "required" for the spell to work, although the absence of some props might cause an entirely unexpected effect. Any other ideas would be appreciated.

The only part that bugs me is using percentile skills to represent magical lore, especially when you have to divide by 20 to get actual Magic Ranks. How about simply representing Ranks directly? Here's one possible mechanic for skill checks with ranks: A magician gets a Rank check if he sucessfully casts a spell requiring more than half of his Ranks in that lore. In a Rank Check, roll a number of dice equal to the magician's current rank. If the number of successes is equal to than the magician's current rank, then he advances one rank. That would give a fairly fast progression at first, but quickly taper off at higher ranks. EXAMPLE: Flamel has Fire Magic 5. He casts a Rank 2 spell, which gets him no check. He then successfully casts a Rank 3 skill, which then permits him a Rank Check. For his Rank Check, he rolls five dice, and only gets three successes, so he fails to go up a rank.

There is precedent: WFRP uses percentile rolls for nearly everything, but using magic adds up a number of d10s equal to (or less than?) the wielder's magic ability, usually a low single digit. A roll in the Ubiquity system will average out to half the number of dice, with a standard deviation of approximately sqrt(N)/2, N being the total number of dice thrown (using the binomial approximation where N >= 10). On average, each spell will cause burn equivalent to the summoned power.

Many gamers have a hard time doing something that puts their character at a disadvantage, because somewhere in our psyches we know the point of a "game" is to win. Others lack either the experience or motivation to get into a role. A friend of mine has a quite Pavlovian solution: provide a concrete, in-game bonus for good role-playing, especially if doing so prevents your character from succeeding. The Aspects idea from FATE is brilliant in this respect: a quality that provides an arbitrary situational bonus or a hindrance. The economy of Fate Points in Spirit of the Century gets really interesting, especially as the session continues and players hoard their Fate Points for when they really need them. Those Fate Points the GM offers for compelling an Aspect start looking really good ...

IIRC, the section on Creatures has an appendix that rates creatures based on their challenge to Standard, Heroic, Epic, etc. characters. (Giant Robot and Giant were the only challenges at the highest tier.) The Warhammer Fantasy supplement Old World Bestiary rates creatures based on how much of a challenge they were to a specific character, named Hans I believe, statted out at the beginning of the "crunch" section. Notably, dragons and ghosts were both "Impossible" challenges, although if Hans had magic at his disposal ghosts would come down to his level, more or less.

There's also an option of letting PCs use point-buy, and only rolling up NPCs. The campaign I hope to get off the ground next month or after New Year's will take that approach. (The PCs are actually young orcs, so a baseline of 10 for all stats including INT and SIZ actually works.) You can borrow solutions from other games, too. WFRP has a rule called "Shallya's Mercy" in which a player can change exactly one below-average roll to average. D&D 4e has a "standard array" (16, 14, 13, 12, 11, 10 if I recall) of stat numbers a PC can assign to his stats; BRP needs a couple more for SIZ and possibly EDU. Finally, since rolling up characters is fairly quick, one can roll up N proto-characters at once and let the player choose which one he wants. (Or N+k for N players, and let them choose the ones they want.)

Chaosium is selling The Unknown East for $5, as part of their ongoing Stormbringer clearance.

Well, The Most Popular Role-Playing Game isn't the best example of a simple die mechanic ... or it would be, if it weren't for TMPRPG's obsession with having modifiers for everything. Spirit of the Century, and other Fudge-based games, are a better example: roll Fudge dice (bell curve from -4 to +4, average 0) and adjust your skill level up or down by that many steps, then compare to the difficulty number. Granted, Stunts and Aspects in SotC add to the die roll (in standard increments of +1 or +2; stunts rarely give +3), and the GM can adjust the usual difficulty number a bit based on the situation. Generally, though, there are only a few small numbers to deal with ... often just two compared to one. In that case, while most people can't rattle off the exact probability, you know higher is better, and that your die roll will usually only adjust your static numbers by +/-1 about 2/3 of the time (62.9% to be exact). As much as I like BRP, I prefer roll-high bell-curve mechanics. Roll-high systems scale linearly with increasing power, while roll-low systems have to deal with "skills over 100%" sooner or later. Bell curves occur so often in nature that it's easy to justify their use in a game, plus they reduce the influence of luck in skill tests (e.g. an 18 or 3 is much less rare on 3d6 than a 1 or 20 on 1d20 ... never mind the "Linear D6" system in Grimm which is actually two exponentially decreasing curves).

Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay has switched entirely to percentiles with a few supplementary d10 rolls (e.g. 1d10 + mods for damage, and Xd10 for sorcery spell casting). Having said that, I don't think there's a "comeback", except that more game designers are looking for a simple unifying mechanic. Percentile fits the bill, but so do fixed NdX, dice pools, One-Roll Engine, Grimm's "Linear D6" system, etc. Honestly, I hope the confusion and dismay around D&D Fourth Edition will provoke some gamers to look at alternative systems.

Grey Ghost Games publishes A Magical Medley for Fudge, which has several magic systems detailed. Given that it's Fudge, which is basically "build your own game", conversion shouldn't be too difficult. My favorite is "Occultism", inspired by Call of Cthulhu and ritual magic in general. BRP already has a "Sixth Sense" (POW) stat, an Occultism skill, and a Sanity system, which is all you really need. EDIT: To answer your question more directly, you can find Avalon Hill's RuneQuest 3 materials on eBay and used games sites. Despite the publisher, RQ3 is essentially Chaosium's RQ system revised and expanded. The "Sorcery" system is essentially an expansion of BRP's Magic rules, and some "Spirit Magic" or "Divine Magic" spells might work in BRP's Sorcery.

My take is that the SIZ characteristic doesn't strictly correlate with weight or height; partly, it's your ability to use your weight and height to advantage. Dwarfs (in RQ) have a handicap in that they're so compact; (RQ-sized) elves are longer-limbed but lack the physical mass to shove people around and avoid being shoved around in turn. SIZ contributes to HP because a larger creature has more volume to burrow through. I guess if they're all made of meat, approximate mass is a decent indicator ... but a dwarf-sized creature of stone might be several times heavier without having much more in the way of SIZ. (Armor, certainly.) Granted, a dwarf from D&D or Warhammer who's as wide as he is tall probably rates a 3D6, but "dwarf" as a stout humanoid 4 feet tall (e.g. Glorantha or Discworld), just like a 5 foot but spindly elf, is somewhere in the 2D6 + (0..3) range. An average Melnibonean or LotR Eldar might be more lightly built, but he's taller than a human, so it all washes out.