Blindhamster

Do Chaosium sell printed copies to the UK? Just wondering how cost effective it would be to buy the PDF from them. Would the cost of shipping make it a bad plan overall?

Cooked people? Lovely

27 minutes ago, lordabdul said:

As for the OPs (which, we should notice, haven't posted much since, maybe because the thread went on a big tangent right away... not super awesome), I had some similar questions when I did my first RQG characters. I agree that those bonuses, along with the character sheet, are quite confusing, but I really took the cultural weapon skill bonuses at their broadest. I figured, for example, that young Sartarites are exposed to all kinds of dagger techniques and one-handed spears, and that, as such, the listed bonuses applied to skill categories. Probably when they get a bit older they settle on a specific spear, for instance, and then spend their cult and personal points in that.

To be fair, I think we did answer the OPs question as best as possible, again based on both the rules written in the book and based on the FAQ threads that were shared.

Quote

Think it can be summarized as:

• skills are always for a specific weapon, if a weapon can be used in multiple ways (2 vs 1 hands, melee vs missile), its two separate skills.
• if a culture/rune/occupation gives a bonus to a weapon category, you must choose ONE weapon from that category.
• if a culture/rune/occupation gives a bonus to a weapon, it applies to all skills for that weapon
• any increases via customisation points or improvements during play must be against a specific skill for the specific weapon (if you use it 1 handed, increase that, if you throw a javeline, increase missile weapons javeline etc).

 

To me, the only real ambiguity is around the weapon categories with the same name as one of the weapons as its unclear if the intent is a bonus to the weapon of the name, or one of the weapons of the category.

To break that down some more, based off of the rulebook and the referenced FAQ comments:

Quote

skills are always for a specific weapon, if a weapon can be used in multiple ways (2 vs 1 hands, melee vs missile), its two separate skills.

this is based on:

On 2/1/2019 at 3:43 PM, Jason Durall said:

 

Quote

• There is no mention, in the Javelin description on p.211, of the Throwing Javelin skill, I would have expected the same comment as the above quote in that context. Does someone with a javelin use the same skill for both melee and throwing then?

Separate skills. 

Quote

• Axe, small: same comment. It refers to its use in both melee and as a hurled weapon, no mention of a separate skill. Axe, Throwing even refers back to Axe, Small.
• Spear, Long or Short: same thing.

Separate skills. 

Which makes it clear that when a weapon can be used in more than one way, they're distinct skills.

Then:

Quote

if a culture/rune/occupation gives a bonus to a weapon category, you must choose ONE weapon from that category.

This is based on the text on page 60 of core rulebook in reference to cultural weapons (which was the clear point of the topic, alongside the issue i acknowledged was still vague:

Quote

Where the listed skill is a broad category of weapons (such as 1H Axe), you should pick a weapon within that category (such as Battle Axe).

Finally:

Quote

• if a culture/rune/occupation gives a bonus to a weapon, it applies to all skills for that weapon
• any increases via customisation points or improvements during play must be against a specific skill for the specific weapon (if you use it 1 handed, increase that, if you throw a javeline, increase missile weapons javeline etc).

these are based on:

On 2/1/2019 at 3:43 PM, Jason Durall said:

Yes. It's not explicit, but when get a cultural or professional skill bonus to a starting weapon (such as a javelin) that can be thrown or used in hand-to-hand, you start with both at the same skill. If you add points to them while customizing your character, you should assign those points to one or the other. 

Which clearly covers when a weapon can be used for both melee and ranged. It feels totally reasonable to extrapolate out that the same should apply if the weapon can be used 1 or 2 handed.

But no, there is no real clarity on what to do when a weapon category and a specific weapon has the same name - personally I'd go with it being the specific weapon, but seeing as you specifically HAVE to pick just one weapon from a category I don't think it makes a huge difference either way.

The character sheet would just be MUCH better if it didn't list any weapons on there as half the confusion is caused by the official character sheet including categories on it.

3 hours ago, soltakss said:

It looks like an Elf to me.

In my opinion, Elves have the man rune and this is what a young elf looks like. As they get older or more tied to the Plant Rune, they get more tree-like, with leafy hair and bark-like skin. But, it is a continuum, so there are some at each end and some at all points along the line.

I LOVE that as the logic to follow. young elves potentially having a stronger affinity to the man rune is clever... or maybe you could say that the elves that arent tied to a forest (the ones that actually go adventuring) tend to have higher man than plant in their runes and as such also tend to look more "human".

The elf section does also note that some specifically grow looking more human like as it makes them better diplomats/embassadors as it puts humans at ease.

47 minutes ago, Mugen said:

As a matter of fact, my understanding was the same as yours before Jason Durall clarified things.

Yeah, I honestly think I'd ignore the ruling for home games. It doesn't match the wording to me and makes less sense to me. And is definitely how I read it prior to the quoted response from Jason.

On that note, I wonder if there will be a proper Errata/FAQ any time soon that pulls all these things into one place.

1 hour ago, Julian Lord said:

erm, the reason for parrying with a shield is to deflect or less happily block a blow because you really don't want your body to be wounded, even potentially severed into pieces, maimed, or killed.

The other major uses of a shield are of course in a shield wall, or as mobile cover against incoming missile fire.

The BBC/Netflix series The Last Kingdom is a generally good illustration of these matters, though Season 4 ditched a good deal of it.

Sorry, to be clear, I was talking from the way the rules are setup currently. Not from a real world perspective.

At least mobile cover is a thing with the rules in RQG. I'd probably allow a shield wall to provide cover to more locations (basically making the only area without the cover the legs as far as rented attacks went).

P.s. I love the last kingdom!

20 minutes ago, PhilHibbs said:

That actually says nothing about the situation under discussion, which is parrying with a different weapon, and we have had clarification that parrying with a different weapon also incurs the -20% for additional parries after the first.

You're right, the rulebook says if parrying with the same weapon it incurs subsequent penalties. The Implication being that it doesnt with a different weapon (otherwise referring to the same weapon is redundant phrasing that confuses the matter). I also already accepted that there has been clarification that actually the wording could have been simpler and simply said -20 for subsequent parties without reference to the same or different weapons. However that requires someone that is running the game trawled through posts to find as there isnt a formal errata or FAQ doc anywhere yet.

So yeah, I'm fine with it working the way it does, but it isnt how the rules read, the specificity used with "the same weapon" implied that it meant a different weapon wouldnt apply the same penalty. Which would have been more realistic too, as the primary reason for dual wielding (with a shield or typically a long dagger) is actually defense, not offense in the real world.

As far as parry being a separate skill is concerned, I guess if it were a separate skill per weapon, it would make sense. So broadsword, parry etc.

But if you just have a separate skill called "parry" that is no more logical than using the weapon skill to parry with, because much as a it was mentioned that attacking and defending with a weapon are different skills, defending with different weapons would logically be different skills.

For me personally, I prefer the abstraction  that RQG uses where the weapon skill is used for both attack and defense.  Rather than a separate catch all parry skill that I guess has been used in some other editions.

Literally isnt the wording in the book

"An adventurer may make a subsequent parry with a weapon they have already parried with. Any subsequent parry is at a cumulative –20% penalty for each additional parry."

But fair enough if its RAI to not be per hand, I guess the logical thing to do is have shields base chance be higher than weapons base chance, which I think it is anyway (5-10% higher depending on weapon?)

I get what you mean though, a shield should be easier to defend yourself with than a weapon is, but that's only really possible with the fairly simple rules of RQG by having its base chance even higher. 

I guess with RQG the advantages or parrying with a shield are that you:

- dont risk damaging your offensive weapon

- larger shields typically have more hp than weapons so absorb more damage and take longer to break (although imo, small and medium should be 2hp more each)

- can parry thrown attacks without penalty

- can defend against ranged attacks against some locations without even rolling.

But have the obvious downside of requiring 2 skills to use for offense and defense 

Shields base % probably should have been a bit higher, I generally agree on that.

The reason for parrying with a shield rather than a weapon is you dont really want your weapon getting damaged, which will happen if you're parrying with it.

Using a sword and shield also allows you to parry twice without any penalties (as the cumulative penalty is per weapon not per overall parry attempts) 

Shields also allow you to parry thrown projectiles which weapons do not, and to protect areas without actively rolling vs other ranged attacks too.

Large shields are also more durable so less likely to break and protect from more damage than any weapon can. I personally think the shield hp should be based on material but that's a different issue.

you use your shield skill for defending with the shield. So if you drop it, you'll need to use your weapon to parry instead - parrying with a weapon and blocking with a shield are pretty different!

shields are their own skills, your skill isnt sword and shield. Your skill is sword, and a separate skill would be shield.

So your example when they find a flail, but keep using their old shield, their ability to hit or parry with the flail will be lower than with their battleaxe. But their ability to hit or parry with the shield doesn't change.

13 minutes ago, Orlanthatemyhamster said:

Not sure I get you, but, no, we never found it so.
I roll for my attack and parry, you do the same. If my weapon/shield is unusable I either equip a new one while attacking/frantically parrying with what I have equipped or I don't.

Thats kinda what i was getting at, if you have a broadsword and try to parry, you parry with broadsword skill. If you have a small axe and try to parry, you parry with small axe skill.

Seems nice and simple, and means fewer skills to manage and improve than if you have a separate parry skill.

But, kinda off topic!

Makes sense for game balance. Characteristic training is a pretty big thing I would think. Has an impact on lots of stuff

Think it can be summarized as:

• skills are always for a specific weapon, if a weapon can be used in multiple ways (2 vs 1 hands, melee vs missile), its two separate skills.
• if a culture/rune/occupation gives a bonus to a weapon category, you must choose ONE weapon from that category.
• if a culture/rune/occupation gives a bonus to a weapon, it applies to all skills for that weapon
• any increases via customisation points or improvements during play must be against a specific skill for the specific weapon (if you use it 1 handed, increase that, if you throw a javeline, increase missile weapons javeline etc).

To me, the only real ambiguity is around the weapon categories with the same name as one of the weapons as its unclear if the intent is a bonus to the weapon of the name, or one of the weapons of the category.

3 minutes ago, Orlanthatemyhamster said:

Yeah, Fook that for a game of soldiers. Dumb as a bag of spanners, makes the system more complex in my honest, not less.

As this thread gives some indication of.

really? attack vs parry didn't seem complicated at all? use the skill for the item you're trying to attack or parry with?

Attack and parry are not separate in RQG - you simply use the weapon skill for the weapon you're using

25 minutes ago, Wookie said:

Thank you to everyone who has replied to this thread.

I have looked at the Runequest Core Rules Questions thread, what I could find for an answer was unsatisfyingly vague.

[Now going to type weapon skills as Category (Specific Weapon, method of use), using the listings from p208-212. If in quotes, "Weapon" is what is written in the rulebook.]For reference, my original post listed the different interpretations that each entry could have with regard to the specific skills used.
e.g. "Dagger +10%" in Cultural Weapons - it is unclear whether this is supposed to be a bonus to the category Dagger (covering 4 specific weapons) or Dagger (Dagger) the specific weapon skill.
"Battle Axe +15%" in Cultural Weapons - it is unclear whether this is supposed to be a bonus to the skill 1H Axe (Battle Axe 1H), the skill 2H Axe (Battle Axe 2H), or both skills.

To be fair, the rulebook says:

Quote

Where the listed skill is a broad category of weapons (such as 1H Axe), you should pick a weapon within that category (such as Battle Axe).
Cultural Weapons: These are the different types of weapons available to adventurers from different cultures. Where two or more weapons appear on a line, pick only one.

What that means, is cultural bonuses are always clearly for a specific weapon, just some cultures give you leeway to decide *which* weapon you get the bonus in.

So on the Daggers front, you could indeed argue you can pick any ONE dagger from the category to get the bonus in, or you could argue that it's referring to Dagger and only Dagger. Either way, the bonus applies to one weapon. You never get a bonus to an entire category.

If a weapon can be used both one handed and two handed, it is indeed a bit less clear, I'd probably rule that the character gets the bonus both one handed and two handed. But they'd need, once actually playing, I'd rule that improvements would go against EITHER one handed OR two handed depending on which was used during play that session.

25 minutes ago, Wookie said:

The character sheet doesn't make things any clearer - listing the skills as "1H Axe" & "2H Axe" doesn't  tell me where my bonus for Battle Axe goes.
Broadsword is listed separately to the other 3 weapons in the 1H Sword category, but the sheet states "1H Spear (includes Lance)", instead of listing Lance, Short Spear and Javelin separately; a fact that got past a number of people who've created character generators for this edition of RQ - they've used the skills listed on the character sheet as being the skills, not realising that some of them are categories that need to be made more specific. Also applies to anyone using a fillable pdf version of the character sheet from the rulebook; with no place to write the specific weapon next to the category, it appears some people have not realised that they need to select a specific weapon.

Totally agree, the character sheet section for weapon skills isn't great at all, it could do with a tweak, personally i'd leave all the rows blank and let the person using the sheet fill it in. I was going to modify the fillable PDF myself for this, but the text is an image, not actual text. But the character sheet absolutely is the cause of a lot of confusion with how this part of the rules work!

25 minutes ago, Wookie said:

There is a section in the RQ CRQ thread that makes things even less clear:

Quote 11/13/2018: "Yes. It's not explicit, but when get a cultural or professional skill bonus to a starting weapon (such as a javelin) that can be thrown or used in hand-to-hand, you start with both at the same skill. If you add points to them while customizing your character, you should assign those points to one or the other. "

So that quote would seem to indicate that "Javelin" in Cultural Weapons refers to both 1H Spear (Javelin, melee) and Javelin (Javelin, thrown), with a possibility of also including 1H Spear (Javelin, melee offhand), Javelin (Javelin, thrown offhand), Javelin (Dart), Javelin (Dart offhand), Javelin (Short Spear, thrown) and/or Javelin (Short Spear, thrown offhand). What it and similar skills refer to in Occupations is also unclear - but apparently once you get to Step 7 in character creation, they all become separately identifiable skills that must be increased individually; it's just not clear beforehand.

Yeah, so, the above does pretty much fit exactly how i suggested you'd need to handle battle axes.

You'd have your character sheet with Javelin in both the Melee Weapons and Missile weapons section. You'd get the cultural bonus on both. You'd also get the occupation bonus on both. But when you get to customisation points or skill improvements during play, you'd need to increase them individually.

Again, Javelin has the complexity of ALSO being a category, which is i guess what you were alluding to with the Javelin (Dart) etc. But if you assume the cultural bonus is for any weapon from the Javelin category, rather than the Javelin weapon specifically, you would still need to pick WHICH weapon from the category. If you picked Javelin, it would work as i wrote above. If you picked Dart, you'd only get the cultural bonus on darts.

so yeah, exactly how i read it initially.

Choose specific weapons, character sheet would have been better to have been something like 1H Axe (             ) So you can fill in the choice you made etc.
 

Would be good to understand the intent honestly.

Personally I dont mind the idea that weapons skills would be specific with there being a tangential benefit in that you can use similar weapons, just not as well.

Equally I'd be totally fine if you used categories for skills rather than specific weapons.

Would just like to know what the creators feel it should be.

I'm actually still reading through the rules for the first time myself. So it could be i have it wrong.

Maybe 1h Axe really is the skill. I suppose we won't know someone from Chaosium confirming one way or another.

isn't it just a case that battle axe is a specific skill. you should add it as it's own row, and really its the 1h axe, 2h axe, 1h spear and 2h spear skills which are incorrect on the character sheet, as those arent weapons, they're categories.

99% sure this is the case, in skills it clearly states each weapon is its own skill, all things that give bonuses call out specific weapons or tell you to choose from a type.

Under the weapon rules it states that the category is used so you know you use half your best skill with a weapon when using any other weapon of the same category that you dont have higher % in.

seems pretty clear and simple to me.

But would be nice to get the character sheet fixed to perhaps have small axe (instead of 1h axe), great axe (instead of 2h axe), short spear (instead of 1h spear) and long spear (instead of 2h spear)

okay cool, so looks like we are hopefully getting a starter set after Pegasus Plateau, and Gods/Cults of Glorantha is probably further along the design and publication process than the GM Sourcebook based on some comments later in the thread.

The Red Book of Magic sounds really cool too. And someone mentioned some kind of Arms & Equipment book as well, which would also be cool, more equipment options could be pretty interesting!

i purchased through leisure games, you get the PDF through the Bits & Mortar scheme, but not till the hard copy is released  

So i'm just stuck impatiently waiting for that!

But honestly, it's as much interest in what is coming in the future for RQG and an idea on rough timelines (if available)

Hey, so i know the hard copy of The Smoking Ruin & Other Stories is due any time now (pre ordered in UK, really hoping its soon as i didnt buy the PDF due to hard copy coming with it and PDF not being available till the hard copy releases )
And I saw that The Pegasus Plateau is due *soon* too.

But is there a rough release schedule for the game? I only recently discovered Glorantha and Runequest, and absolutely love it!

Only recently "discovered" runequest. Absolutely love the core book slipcase set and impatiently awaiting my physical and pdf copies of the smoking ruins.

This book also looks lovely! Very excited for more material to devour, I assume that the print for this will be a fair ways out.