RQ. Alternate methods of gaining POW ?

[weasel fierce]

I never liked the main method of gaining POW in RQ3 too much. Its easy for a new player to end up with a character with no offensive spells (or a character that wouldnt really use them), and end up having any divine magic be a loss.

I guess an easy option is to grant POW rolls for resisting magic, or just let it be a trainable characteristic, though Im leery of the latter.

Thoughts and opinions ?

[Atgxtg]

Well, there is the method they used in Superworld.

That gave the usual chance for overcoming POW, plus a roll for successfully resisting a magical attack (your idea), and a chance to improve whenever a character made a Luck roll by rolling POW as a percentage.

[RMS]

Thoughts and opinions ?

You don't have enough spirits in your games. Then it's not a problem. (Hey, you asked for our opinions! ) Seriously, we end up with POW gain rolls for everyone, almost every adventure.

I'd just allow defensive magic to a POW gain roll. I like the idea of allowing one for a POWx1% luck roll, especially for a game world that doesn't make POW gain rolls as easy to come by.

[frogspawner]

Yes, now you mention it, I too have always felt the RQ POW-gain method was a bit lacking.

But the idea of giving a POW gain roll for resisting enemy magic attacks seems to cover it neatly.

I wouldn't like to give it for Luck rolls, though - that'd make them too formal to do on a GM whim. Similarly, making POW trainable would seem to undermine the limited-POW basis of the magic system.

[Lord Twig]

We always made sure to have an offensive spirit spell when we made characters. A little on the munchkin side, but hey, it worked. Plus spirits were common, so we received power rolls that way as well. Plus we gave power rolls for participating in religious ceremonies.

As for alternatives, I like the roll for successfully resisting spells. We never used the luck roll that much, so it wouldn't be ideal for us, but you might like it.

In RQ we came up with our own rules for truestone, and one of them was that you could put permanent power into a blank truestone and then someone else could take it out to use for ritual spells, particularly enchanting. Eventually we got hold of some and then went around buying power from people.

It wasn't quite that easy though. Basically you were buying small parts of a person's soul, so it was kinda shady. We typically approached down-and-out sorts and offered them a large sum of money to participate with no questions asked. We also did this far from home so if someone started shouting about "Soul Stealers" we could run for it. Of course we were powerful enough that we probably could take out the whole town, village, hamlet, etc., but we really weren't evil and didn't want to harm innocents if it could be avoided.

[Shaira]

I think giving a POW gain roll for resisting enemy magic is definitely the ticket - though I'd only give one if the enemy had a higher POW. I like to be stingy with POW gain rolls, as they're orders of magnitude more effective than skill rolls. You still pretty much end up with one per adventure though.

[Kloster]

I think giving a POW gain roll for resisting enemy magic is definitely the ticket - though I'd only give one if the enemy had a higher POW. I like to be stingy with POW gain rolls, as they're orders of magnitude more effective than skill rolls. You still pretty much end up with one per adventure though.

Same for me. We use that since years.

Runequestement votre,

Kloster

[frogspawner]

I think giving a POW gain roll for resisting enemy magic is definitely the ticket - though I'd only give one if the enemy had a higher POW.

Don't let natural stinginess spoil the system, though - wouldn't it be more consistent/elegant to allow 'em for any except 'automatic' (95%) resistance rolls?

[Shaira]

Don't let natural stinginess spoil the system, though - wouldn't it be more consistent/elegant to allow 'em for any except 'automatic' (95%) resistance rolls?

There's a case for that, sure. But I LIKE my natural stinginess - it's one of my most redeeming GM qualities. That and my propensity for melodrama and messianic scenario plots...

Seriously, it all depends how quick you want your characters to improve. If it's a POW hungry campaign, then by all means make POW gain rolls a bit easier to get.

[drohem]

We did the same thing with our group. If you resisted, then you got a POW gain roll.

[Atgxtg]

Don't let natural stinginess spoil the system, though - wouldn't it be more consistent/elegant to allow 'em for any except 'automatic' (95%) resistance rolls?

That is actually how it is worked in RQ for attacks, so I would assume defenses would work the same way.

[frogspawner]

Exactly. But if someone prefers stinginess to symmetry in their house rules, that's up to them. (Though if the characters are getting one POW gain roll per session anyway, I wouldn't have thought the GM Prime Directive of Stinginess would be compromised by a 95% limit...)

[weasel fierce]

yeah, for some reason we never did have much spirit stuff. Not sure why, come to think of it.

But I'll definately do the "resist" option. Seems to make perfect sense, as evidenced by you good people

[Atgxtg]

yeah, for some reason we never did have much spirit stuff. Not sure why, come to think of it.

But I'll definately do the "resist" option. Seems to make perfect sense, as evidenced by you good people

Either that or pick up an offensive Spirit Magic spell PDQ. Generally it used to be the 2nd or 3rd spell we would take in campaigns. Typically Heal, then an offensive spell and protection.

[Nightshade]

My natural inclination would be to give a Power improvement roll for _any_ use of magic that was meaningful and forget the whole resistance part. The problem with that is that power can ramp up too fast as-is; I'd think about changing the likelyhood of improving if I was going to do that.

[Atgxtg]

My natural inclination would be to give a Power improvement roll for _any_ use of magic that was meaningful and forget the whole resistance part. The problem with that is that power can ramp up too fast as-is; I'd think about changing the likelyhood of improving if I was going to do that.

You could limit the POW gain to a special success, critical or POW as percentage.

[Shaira]

To be honest in my experience the speed at which POW increases is determined not by how easy it is to get a POW gain roll, but by how easy the roll is to make.

Unless you junk the whole experience roll system and do your own thing, the bottom line is that you can only have one experience check per skill / characteristics at any one time, and generally only one per "adventure". If you're campaigning and travelling a lot, you might change that to "one per week".

In my experience, this more or less means that if you're out adventuring, pretty much everyone's going to come back with a POW gain roll (I'm talking RQ here), unless for some reason they don't use magic or don't get into magical attacks or spirit combat - in my games you'd have to deliberately try and avoid these things!

This meant that at the end of the "adventure", basically everyone would get to make a POW gain roll. Now, *making* the roll, that's another trick entirely... ;-)

[Kloster]

To be honest in my experience the speed at which POW increases is determined not by how easy it is to get a POW gain roll, but by how easy the roll is to make.

Unless you junk the whole experience roll system and do your own thing, the bottom line is that you can only have one experience check per skill / characteristics at any one time, and generally only one per "adventure". If you're campaigning and travelling a lot, you might change that to "one per week".

In my experience, this more or less means that if you're out adventuring, pretty much everyone's going to come back with a POW gain roll (I'm talking RQ here), unless for some reason they don't use magic or don't get into magical attacks or spirit combat - in my games you'd have to deliberately try and avoid these things!

This meant that at the end of the "adventure", basically everyone would get to make a POW gain roll. Now, *making* the roll, that's another trick entirely... ;-)

I have the same experience here.

Runequestement votre,

Kloster

[Nightshade]

You could limit the POW gain to a special success, critical or POW as percentage.

Well, you still want it harder to make the roll the higher the POW gets, so I'd avoid the last; the first two could work. Or you could simply divide the current chance by 5 (so instead of someone with 8 points below maximum having a 40% chance, they have an 8%)

I'm not sure that's not too low, but the system as-is seems to march people who do get power checks into high end priesthood when of a mood way too easily, enough so that it doesn't really seem to fit with the expectations of the system.

[Nightshade]

To be honest in my experience the speed at which POW increases is determined not by how easy it is to get a POW gain roll, but by how easy the roll is to make.

Unless you have a lot of spirit combat for some reason, that's only true once someone actually gets an attack spell; if you don't run into many spirit monsters, someone with Protection, Bladesharp and Healing can go a long time without getting a POW check.

[Atgxtg]

Well, you still want it harder to make the roll the higher the POW gets, so I'd avoid the last; the first two could work. Or you could simply divide the current chance by 5 (so instead of someone with 8 points below maximum having a 40% chance, they have an 8%)

I'm not sure that's not too low, but the system as-is seems to march people who do get power checks into high end priesthood when of a mood way too easily, enough so that it doesn't really seem to fit with the expectations of the system.

One thing that would help, would be to give cult members and shamen/sorcerors a POW gain each year. Then you could lower the improvement chances without preventing someone from becoming a Rune Priest. If the POW was by rank, with Priests getting 3, Acolytes 2 and Initiates 1 character could always get some improvement. That allows the GM to be a bit more stingy with the rolls without slamming the door on potential Priests.

[frogspawner]

Or maybe the amount of POW gained is fine, but Initiates should be getting and using more Rune spells? (Though I guess that's a bit campaign-specific).

[Nightshade]

Or maybe the amount of POW gained is fine, but Initiates should be getting and using more Rune spells? (Though I guess that's a bit campaign-specific).

Once they become priests its not going to matter anyway, and that wasn't a long trip, at least in RQ3.

[Nightshade]

One thing that would help, would be to give cult members and shamen/sorcerors a POW gain each year. Then you could lower the improvement chances without preventing someone from becoming a Rune Priest. If the POW was by rank, with Priests getting 3, Acolytes 2 and Initiates 1 character could always get some improvement. That allows the GM to be a bit more stingy with the rolls without slamming the door on potential Priests.

They did something like that in the RQ:AIG draft, and also limited Power gain rolls to a fairly long period.

Its tricky to find the right balance, but I can't help but think the traditional one has been overly fast.

[frogspawner]

Once they become priests its not going to matter anyway, and that wasn't a long trip, at least in RQ3.

I meant, maybe the trip to priesthood should be made longer, with a requirement that the Initiate gained (and used?) at least 30 points (or whatever) of Rune Magic. IIRC, it's been noted elsewhere that Initiates single-use Rune spells (often) aren't worth the POW loss - but this could explain why they'd do it...