Non human playable races and encounter balancing

[shadythedevil]

I want to start out by saying that I generally enjoy the rules and look forward to trying them out, but there are a few things holding me back while I design my own campaign.

My biggest issue with the entire system is gauging the general balance of... anything. I am writing this post after doing a handful of google searches looking into the issue and spending several hours reading various forum posts.

What I want is a system for understanding the baseline power level of any specific monster I might design. I am not a math wiz, but would there be a way to categorize HP versus a group of players, as well as potentially averaging their baseline chances to hit as well as the baseline level of damage output? Is there a way to turn all of those numbers into one number, which can be compared to a single number from the group of players?

I also definitely do not want just humans as playable characters. There will be a handful of alien races that I want to be playable, so how would one go about making non human races unique and different, without making it unbalanced in either direction (under powered/ overpowered). For example, if we use the average stats of humans as a baseline, if I want to make a smarter race, if I add 3 points to the baseline INT stat, should I also subtract 3 points from another stat? Would it be the same for a skill boost to the base (if I increase a baseline skill by 30%, should another skill be reduced by 30% for the sake of balance? Would combat skills be weighted differently than non combat skills, and how?)?

I also want to say that the vast majority of responses that I read on this particular issue are... not helpful. I do not want to be told to just design my encounters with an emergency escape (I do this anyways, but what if I don't want to? How do I know what the probability of player success or TPK is when they enter the inescapable room with some monsters?) I don't want to hear about how it is a futile act to design a CR system, or that the system is inherently more lethal than others, blah blah blah, I don't care for any of that, and I wont be responding to any posts that tell me to play differently. I hate to call a group of people out for being the epitome of the comic book guy in The Simpsons, but a large majority of responses in the past asked by others asking the same questions as me, are majorly cringe.

I will be making my own systems to attempt to understand these general baselines of monster difficulty and non human player races, but I just want to know if anybody has any pointers for potentially doing this myself?

Thank you in advance

[Susimetsa]

I know I probably fall into your category of "not helpful" responses, but it is good to see questions posed on public channels more as invitations to discuss rather than company customer service forums where all you want is an easy answer to your question.

Chaosium is planning to publish non-human player races for RQ, but it has apparently been delayed for reasons similar to what you quote (how to balance etc.):
https://www.chaosium.com/blogcoming-later-this-year-for-the-runequest-starter-set-14-more-pregen-characters-nonhuman-adventurers/

So, basically, if you want well-balanced or official rules on non-human characters, we have to wait for a while longer. OR you can refer to earlier Runequest editions and judge the balance from there.

As for designing monsters, you seem to be looking for something that cannot exist in an organic, levelless-design, chance-based game system: an easy-to-calculate method to balance enemies to player groups. We are talking about a design where a character's power is not easily transferable to single numbers (e.g., lvl vs. lvl thinking) etc. My entertainer is highly skilled in singing, dancing and playing instruments, but he is horrible when fighting against anything armoured (his Strength only allows him to use a rapier and a rapier cannot hurt anything that is wearing good armour).

Again, there are monster manuals for (also earlier generations of) RQ products that will give you a nice idea of the power balance. Similarly, there are several published or player-made adventure modules that you can take a look at. However, these can never take into account all possible player actions or possible actions and player's tactical thinking tendencies (or, if they are roleplaying their characters, the characters' ineptitude or "eptitude" in tactical situations). A good approach would be to run adventures to your players, see how they manage against certain challenge levels and then approximate from there.

Edited May 17 by Susimetsa

[Nozbat]

Shady.. there are different ways of approaching this... you have been looking at the mechanics of the game which I think people have acknowledged is a difficult concept and balance in particular is difficult to get right.

I would tend to look at a more political-societal-psychological-cultural angle for balance.

If we are assuming a more human dominated 'medieval-based'' world where other 'alien' cultures live separately from human settlements, you need a rationale for them to leave their own people and come to live in a human culture. There is likely to be discrimination, racism, sectarianism, blatant refusal to deal with other races etc.

• Why would a Wood Elf leave the forest to live in a smokey, smelly, unhealthy town? Does the elf suffer from smoke sickness as a result? Do they find it difficult to go to the pub to play music of their lost homeland because people pick fights with them for having pointy ears? 
• Why would a dwarf who is somewhat agoraphobic in open spaces, has a deep distrust of other races, is known for hoarding money want to leave the hive-mind of the mines to pursue an individualistic, independent approach? Are there negative modifiers if they operate in the open spaces? Do they create jealousy because of their supposed wealth? Do people make fun of their size? Or beards? 
• Why would a Troll leave their clan? Are they refused entry to towns and cities? Do their friends get told to make sure the Troll is secured in chains outside the inn so they won't eat the other traveller's horses? Do they have difficulty operating in sunlight? Maybe they get a 50% reduction of skills for being in sunlight? Maybe they are damaged by holy objects? Or do they, like elves, take double damage from cold iron? 
• Why would a halfling leave their made-up Tolkien-generated English 18th Century shire to hang out with a bunch of humans that toss them into dangerous rooms to carry out risk assessments of being eaten by dragons/ green slimes/ wildebeest? Would they not rather be drinking mugs of foaming ale in the inn and discussing the cow that got loose in the lane? Their size makes harming humans (or elves or trolls) difficult as they have not the strength to cause an armoured being any real damage. 

Those are just a few thoughts off the top of my head. I think that you could have many pros and cons for each race. Then include motivation, rationale, passions, stereotypes, racial directives which are relevant and give great opportunities for roleplaying.

Add some racial bonuses and some detrimental aspects. ie. Elves are fast. An obvious DEX bonus but tend to be weaker in hand-to-hand combat (negatives in STR and SIZ) and wearing armour means they lose the ability to move dextrously, etc. Trolls are big and strong but may suffer in sunlight. Both may not be able to touch holy objects, enter consecrated ground and may even not be able to touch iron. Both may be considered 'soulless' by humans and thus can be killed out of hand.

Add some cultural stuff like xenophobic reactions, misunderstanding social etiquette (eating the pet hamster mistaken as an entree), the need to be in open or closed spaces, in dark places, see the stars, suffer smoke sickness, need a specific diet etc. They may have cultural motivations that are not understandable to humans etc

Add psychological aspects. Who understands the motivations of a High Elf? They stare at the stars and talk of drowned lands where they used to live. They find it difficult to make friends/ find love because other races are so short-lived and their lives are over in a flash. Dwarfs may be suspicious and paranoid and like living underground. Do they suffer fear of heights? Are halflings all thieves? Do they forget everything if offered mushrooms? 

These are only ideas that could be developed further and could make your game unique and focused on roleplaying rather than game balanced systems or on mechanics which as you pointed out can be modified to suit specific situations.

I'm not sure if this is any different from other ideas that you have read (and disparaged) but I thought I'd tell you how I would do it if I was playing in a classical fantasy world.

My penchant tends to be for historical fantasy.. that is mostly historical with my own twists on why things happen. For instance, did the storm that re-opened the silted up river Zwin to commerce and gave Brügge (Bruges) its golden age, have a supernatural origin? Was it magical beings that did it? Or was it human agents using forbidden powers? Was the Dancing sickness in the Early-modern period Holy Roman Empire (southern Germany) caused by the svartalfr?  I generally don't have to define other races, they just are. Mysterious, aloof, ineffable and definitely scary for players.

I should say that even if I play games that have a higher magical context, I still tend to use humans, for as all the fantasy/ science fiction writers tell us.. the human race is the most adaptable.. can be the cruellest and definitely make the best baddies in the game, particularly if they are as morally dubious as most player characters.

[rsanford]

Hey @shadythedevil, 

I don’t have any great ideas yet, but maybe the people here could be of more help, if you tell us a bit more about what genre your setting will be in and how your players typically handle threats. For example:

1. You used the word “alien” in your original post. Just to verify, is your setting high-fantasy, science fiction, or something else? You also mentioned “CR” and I usually associate that with high-fantasy. 

2. How do your players (not characters) typically handle potentially dangerous encounters? Do they frequently assume an encounter will result in combat? Do they tend to rely on being the biggest and baddest force around? Do they tend to settle things with a sword? If they tend to depend on the sword, how tactical are they? Do they consider things like gaining the high ground, or the reach of their weapons, or are they more into the thrill of battle and thus rush right in?

This is blasphemy in BRP circles, (please forgive me everyone in advance), but if your players tend to relish rushing in, and you want some type of “combat rating” useful for balancing encounters maybe you implement something like the below:

1. Assume the character will always use their most damaging weapon and most protective armor, thus the combat rating will be based on a character’s maximum potential. Also assume that there isn’t a separate parry skill. 

2. Condense the weapon and armor options offered by BRP such that they can be represented by a 1 to 5 ranking. For example,  maybe you rate a characters weapons by max modified damage and have daggers rated as a 1,  short swords 2, long swords 3, pole arms 4, something else 5. Likewise you could rate armor 1 to 5 based on how much damage it can soak.

3. Use a similar ranking for a character’s hit points; highest modified melee skill; and defense skill (dodge or weapon skill - whichever is higher). For example perhaps a character with 30% or less in his highest melee weapon skill would rank 1, 31% to 50% a 2, 51% to 70% a 3, etc… And yes everyone, I know this effectively adds levels to a traditionally “skills-based” game, but some GMs might appreciate that kinda thing.

4. Here is where  I’m not sure what to do next, but maybe some smart person has an idea, or better maybe someone has already done this. At this point you would have 1 to 5 rankings for five different elements: max weapon damage; armor soak; hit points; highest melee skill; and defense. We need to correlate those five elements for each party member and combine them into a preferably simple equation.

Note, I realize I’m not addressing the part of your request where you ask how to trade off things like an alien’s +1 dex versus +2 con but I think those, with the exception of intelligence, would be handled for the most part by using the modified values specified above. I have no idea how to model intelligence, because in the BRP games I have played in, an adversary’s higher intelligence usually reduces the chance they are caught in melee combat in the first place.

If you did this, I think it would be kinda loosey goosy, but it might be a good rough measure of max potential for armed melee combat. Of course, modeling the impact of sorcery, weapon reach (example a pole arm versus a long sword), hand-to-hand, encumbrance, etc, would be a lot more complicated. Also the notion above in 1 that a character will always use his most damaging weapon is problematic. What if the character’s most damaging weapon is not the weapon he has the highest skill in? Or what happens when a player chooses to use a weapon that they are less skilled in because they suspect their opponent might have some sort of immunity to sharp, blunt, silver, etc weapons?

Just my thoughts…

 

 

 

Edited May 18 by rsanford
Typo

[soltakss]

On 5/17/2024 at 6:28 AM, shadythedevil said:

What I want is a system for understanding the baseline power level of any specific monster I might design. I am not a math wiz, but would there be a way to categorize HP versus a group of players, as well as potentially averaging their baseline chances to hit as well as the baseline level of damage output? Is there a way to turn all of those numbers into one number, which can be compared to a single number from the group of players?

That isn't in BRP, so you might need to do something yourself.

RuneQuest2, which is similar to BRP, had Treasure Factors TFs), which some people liked and some people hated. Basically, you worked out the TF of each combatant, based on skills, armour, hit points, spells and so on. Then you totalled the TFs to get a TF for the group. You could do the same for the party and see how they matched up.

RuneQuest3 had Monster Classes, which simply gave a rating to a monster and allowed you to compare them. I didn't like this particularly.

On 5/17/2024 at 6:28 AM, shadythedevil said:

I also want to say that the vast majority of responses that I read on this particular issue are... not helpful. I do not want to be told to just design my encounters with an emergency escape (I do this anyways, but what if I don't want to? How do I know what the probability of player success or TPK is when they enter the inescapable room with some monsters?) I don't want to hear about how it is a futile act to design a CR system, or that the system is inherently more lethal than others, blah blah blah, I don't care for any of that, and I wont be responding to any posts that tell me to play differently. I hate to call a group of people out for being the epitome of the comic book guy in The Simpsons, but a large majority of responses in the past asked by others asking the same questions as me, are majorly cringe.

Here is my experience.

• A well-organised group of PCs can take out a disorganised group of better NPCs. So, any way of working out balance needs to take this into account.
• A well-organised group of PCs can take out a big boss monster, regardless of how superior it is.
• Anyone can get a lucky blow. If you use Hit Locations, as all right-minded people should, then a critical hit to a vital hit location can kill an enemy, or PC, really quickly. It is very difficult to take this into account when designing encounters.
• Sometimes, unbalanced encounters are good, as they give rise to stories that the gaming group tell for years afterwards.

Apologies if those are cringey answers.

My recommendation would be to use, or adapt, Treasure Factors. You could get a base factor for the PCs and then work out how any encounters score, thus seeing if it would be balanced.

My other recommendation would be to not worry about balancing encounters, as it is far more fun that way.

[Nozbat]

The like was for ..

37 minutes ago, soltakss said:

My other recommendation would be to not worry about balancing encounters, as it is far more fun that way.

I think that is sage advice @soltakss.. players always remember the David and Goliath moment.. that one in a million chance where the seemingly unconquerable is overcome, usually by a lucky shot, a fine piece of oratory that won the legal dispute but made an implacable and powerful enemy or the crazy airborne assault of the bandit village… etc etc

its never the mechanics of a game that are remembered.. and not what I remember as a GM.. cleverness, glib tongues, crazy stunts.. 

One of my players recently threatened a Dominican Friar who they had kidnapped and needed vital information from. Reluctant to actually torture the Friar, they threatened his fine collection of gingerbread animals..‘I think it’s advisable to tell us the truth or the gingerbread doggy gets it‘. It worked when coupled with his intimidation skill.

 

[g33k]

+1 for  the notion that "balance" isn't as much of a thing in BRP as it is in (for example) D&D; as such, you may be fighting an uphill battle.

By intent, a "critical hit" in D&D is just "do a bit more damage".  Unless it's a low-level fight, or late-stage in the combat (where the meatsack full of HP's has been eaten away across multiple rounds), the Crit isn't going to down the foe.

With RQ/BRP, in contrast, the Crit often IS ... well... critical : Hit Locations, Major Wounds, etc; when these subsystems get engaged, it's a critical moment that very-often defines someone's fate, defines the combat itself.


That being the case, the Crit is a far-from-rare element (when considered across all the rolls, from all the combatants) that entirely bypasses any effort to "balance" that encounter.

The corresponding lesson is:  PC'able races don't really "need" careful balancing.

= = =

All of which being said:  it's entirely possible and valid to want balanced PC options!  And to work to get it, despite any "uphill battle."

I would likely begin with a "heroic hit points" option (CON+SIZ = HP), and relegate all "Crit" effects to the D&D-like "do more damage."
This allows for a more stable & predictable "whittle-down" progression in combat.

I also like @soltakss's suggestion to consult RQ2 (now RQ Classic) "Treasure Factors" element:  https://www.chaosium.com/runequest-classic-pdf/
(it's probably the closest mechanism to what you are after)

He undersells the similarity in saying "RuneQuest2, which is similar to BRP..." however:  BRP was created (as a stripped-down-for-simplification & setting/genre neutral) set of rules entirely based upon RQ2.  Later RPGs -- themselves based upon this stripped-down BRP core -- added-in various other subsystems and variations, which later were re-incorporated in a much LARGER book released as the BRP engine... which is what most of us are talking about today.  But the core RQ engine is still driving BRP, and the old "Treasure Factor" rules are still a decent approach to evaluate relative threat.

Edited May 19 by g33k

[svensson]

Replying to the OP here.

First off, welcome to the board. You'll find we're all good with answering questions so don't be afraid to ask.

One of the tropes that RQ has always struggled with is the multi-racial nature of most popular FRPGs. To put point on it, 'there are no half-elves in Runequest'. In place of races, RQ substitutes cults and cultures. For example, a Lunar worshiper of the Seven Mothers, an Esrolian worshiping Ernalda, and Praxian beast-rider worshiping  Eiritha are going to be VERY different builds even though they share the Fertility Rune. Their motivations, conflicts, and goals are going to be wildly different.

The second thing to note is that RQ does have playable races... But those races' cultures are very different than what you might be used to coming from d20 or other systems. RQ trolls, the Uz, have an incredible but very primitive culture based around senses other than sight and an ancient curse. RQ elves, the Aldryami, are actually plants. Sure, the worship a plant goddess so you can relate to that, but the species is literally mobile plants with all the intelligence of humans. The dwarves, the Mostali, are also very, VERY different from what you're used to. For one thing, they have gunpowder weapons. For another they have a very rigid caste system and they see themselves as integral parts of a machine.

And then there are the Ducks. Yeah, no shit, actual talking ducks who got the dirty end of a very short stick, mythically speaking, and have an attitude to match.

Yet all these races are playable, but their interactions with human societies can be very difficult depending on local attitudes. An Uz walking through Boldhome is going to get as many gawking stares as an actual centaur walking through the streets of Athens in Heroic Age Greece.

For guidance on how to generate and include other races in your game, let me suggest The Gloranthan Bestiary, which is available from chaosium.com and drivethrurpg.com.

One last thing... A whole bunch of players are attracted to dragonewts... 'Newts are so different culturally that they make an Aldryami seem 'normal'. But most referees reserve 'Newts as their 'weirdness cannon' - - the bizarre unexplainable event/encounter that tips PC plans on their ear. I suggest you do the same.

Edited July 14 by svensson

[g33k]

54 minutes ago, svensson said:

... But most referees reserve 'Newts as their 'weirdness cannon' - - the bizarre unexplainable event/encounter that tips PC plans on their ear. I suggest you do the same.

I have seen a 'Newt played well, once.

Whacky player, who also had a big ol' rollable table of weirdness.
They'd roll on it sometimes, the GM would call on them to roll sometimes.
They were really good about leaning-in on the rolled weirdness, like the time they swapped their armor for a human's formal ballgown... wore the ballgown to shreds, most of the rest of the campaign.

Edited May 20 by g33k

[svensson]

55 minutes ago, g33k said:

I have seen a 'Newt played well, once.

Whacky player, who also had a big ol' rollable table of weirdness.
They'd roll on it sometimes, the GM would call on them to roll sometimes.
They were really good about leaning-in on the rolled weirdness, like the time they swapped their armor for a human's formal ballgown... wore the ballgown to shreds, most of the rest of the campaign.

Nice!

Yeah, it takes a special player to go 'dragonewt weird' and stick the landing. Most will either go way off course and just do anything they can think for kicks, or they take it way too seriously. Right Action demands a bit of whimsy and a bit of serious roleplay.

[g33k]

(but n.b. we are in the  "BRP" subforum, not RQ!
So (entertaining though they may be) the Uz/Mostali/Aldryami/Dragonewt/Durulz/etc tangents might be being too RQcentric for the OP's query ... )

[svensson]

Fair enough. May I direct everyone to the The Design Mechanism's Classic Fantasy Imperative, which uses the familiar BRP d100 rules for elves, hobbits, etc. It's available from TDM at https://thedesignmechanism.com/

[But no matter what system you play in, ever d100 game needs Uz and Dragonewts 😁]

[Nozbat]

I was going to suggest DM's Classic Fantasy too @svensson.. though I've never read it.. or even looked at it as I had no interest in a D&D type milieu. I have played Mythras, which I enjoy so its probably short-sighted of me not to have a read of it... and its free .. 

I think it's fairly well supported with modules too

[Nozbat]

And while I'm taking time out of what I should be doing .. and I had a thought on reading this...I loved this post by @Bohemond .. but it's also an excellent example why balance is very difficult in any D100 game..

I have to say... I like recurring baddies too... Come on Toadface.. your GM needs you

[svensson]

14 minutes ago, Nozbat said:

I have to say... I like recurring baddies too... Come on Toadface.. your GM needs you

Yeah, Toadface and crew is a pretty solid fight for low-to-mid initiates. And Bigmouth the Rubble Runner Broo also a nasty surprise. Then to have the SOBs turn up with Muria in High Holes 😁

Edited May 20 by svensson

[shadythedevil]

On 5/17/2024 at 3:03 AM, Susimetsa said:

I know I probably fall into your category of "not helpful" responses, but it is good to see questions posed on public channels more as invitations to discuss rather than company customer service forums where all you want is an easy answer to your question.

Chaosium is planning to publish non-human player races for RQ, but it has apparently been delayed for reasons similar to what you quote (how to balance etc.):
https://www.chaosium.com/blogcoming-later-this-year-for-the-runequest-starter-set-14-more-pregen-characters-nonhuman-adventurers/

So, basically, if you want well-balanced or official rules on non-human characters, we have to wait for a while longer. OR you can refer to earlier Runequest editions and judge the balance from there.

As for designing monsters, you seem to be looking for something that cannot exist in an organic, levelless-design, chance-based game system: an easy-to-calculate method to balance enemies to player groups. We are talking about a design where a character's power is not easily transferable to single numbers (e.g., lvl vs. lvl thinking) etc. My entertainer is highly skilled in singing, dancing and playing instruments, but he is horrible when fighting against anything armoured (his Strength only allows him to use a rapier and a rapier cannot hurt anything that is wearing good armour).

Again, there are monster manuals for (also earlier generations of) RQ products that will give you a nice idea of the power balance. Similarly, there are several published or player-made adventure modules that you can take a look at. However, these can never take into account all possible player actions or possible actions and player's tactical thinking tendencies (or, if they are roleplaying their characters, the characters' ineptitude or "eptitude" in tactical situations). A good approach would be to run adventures to your players, see how they manage against certain challenge levels and then approximate from there.

I appreciate the info on an official system being worked on. It really does not make sense that the system lacks this particular aspect of accessibility and respecting my time. To be frank, I have wondered why the book I bought was 30$ and my leading guess is that they did not want to spend the money on a mathematician that specializes in game theory to finish up their set of rules. It is incomplete as it stands, or threatens to waste my time, as it has done already unfortunately.

I have an uncle that teaches high level math at the university of minnesota. I am a bit salty to have spent an entire weekend with the guy developing my own system for understanding the threat or challenge of a monster at a glance. It was not necessarily a waste of time because I wanted to do it, as it will help me develop my own campaign, but I feel like I should have been doing something else with that time instead of finishing up an incomplete system.

While it was not easy to develop my own system with an eccentric uncle that is likely on the spectrum, it is weird that so many people from this community say it "cannot exist." What do you mean? It exists. I am looking at it. It wasn't easy, but its do-able. This really feels like corner cutting laziness on the part of the developers of the system. My system has 8 ratings and functions as a flexible table. The ratings are very easy, easy, "human," tough, very tough, player death common, near TPK likely, TPK almost certainly.

Largely, these are sentiments that were said many times in threads from a decade or more ago and it gets cringey when you start assuming my level of GMing by patronizing me with statements about the vast possibilities that can be factored into a TTRPG encounter. My guy, I have been playing since ad&d and DMing since 3e and have played dozens of systems, including a handful of d100 systems that include a CR type system.

Play testing is another potential time wasting endeavor that I am forced to do here because of the lack of a system that allows me to efficiently plan a fun time with friends that does not also ultimately end up feeling like a game of mother may I. Play testing will definitely be happening but I am pretty annoyed I had to do this all myself.

[Susimetsa]

Wow! What you have done with your uncle sounds very interesting and I'm humbled to hear that my own thinking of the impossibility of the task was proven false. 🙂

I hope you'll consider sharing the system at some point when you have tested it enough. 🙂

[svensson]

16 hours ago, shadythedevil said:

I appreciate the info on an official system being worked on. It really does not make sense that the system lacks this particular aspect of accessibility and respecting my time. To be frank, I have wondered why the book I bought was 30$ and my leading guess is that they did not want to spend the money on a mathematician that specializes in game theory to finish up their set of rules. It is incomplete as it stands, or threatens to waste my time, as it has done already unfortunately.

I have an uncle that teaches high level math at the university of minnesota. I am a bit salty to have spent an entire weekend with the guy developing my own system for understanding the threat or challenge of a monster at a glance. It was not necessarily a waste of time because I wanted to do it, as it will help me develop my own campaign, but I feel like I should have been doing something else with that time instead of finishing up an incomplete system.

While it was not easy to develop my own system with an eccentric uncle that is likely on the spectrum, it is weird that so many people from this community say it "cannot exist." What do you mean? It exists. I am looking at it. It wasn't easy, but its do-able. This really feels like corner cutting laziness on the part of the developers of the system. My system has 8 ratings and functions as a flexible table. The ratings are very easy, easy, "human," tough, very tough, player death common, near TPK likely, TPK almost certainly.

Largely, these are sentiments that were said many times in threads from a decade or more ago and it gets cringey when you start assuming my level of GMing by patronizing me with statements about the vast possibilities that can be factored into a TTRPG encounter. My guy, I have been playing since ad&d and DMing since 3e and have played dozens of systems, including a handful of d100 systems that include a CR type system.

Play testing is another potential time wasting endeavor that I am forced to do here because of the lack of a system that allows me to efficiently plan a fun time with friends that does not also ultimately end up feeling like a game of mother may I. Play testing will definitely be happening but I am pretty annoyed I had to do this all myself.

OK, answering /commenting as it comes up in your post:

1. The BRUGE book is a development of an earlier edition, what some of us called 'the BYB - big yellow book'. It's streamlined a lot of older rules.

2. I don't know of many games of the age of RQ/BRP that actually had a mathematician go over them. I'm not saying it did or didn't happen back in the development days of the 70s, but I've never heard of it happening. I think it's likely that newer system mechanics have had a game theorist go over their work, however.

3. Your uncle sounds like a really interesting fellow, though the maths would fly over my head about three minutes into the conversation. What can I say? I'm a historian, we deal with a whole different kind of 'if this, then that' type of thinking.

4. I really do respect the work and effort you're putting into all this, and I can't encourage you enough to keep going on it. I look forward to seeing what you come up with.

5. I think that a lot of us RQ/BRP/CoC grognards have a similar 'opponent value' system in our heads. The edges might be a little fuzzier, but every experienced gamer has a hierarchy of 'trivial, average, tough, use all the tricks I know, and don't even try it' in their heads.

6. I don't think anyone was being insulting on purpose. It may very well have been just a 'lowest common denominator' answer until someone gets a feel your gaming experience.

7. As regards to play testing, I refer you back to comment 4.

Edited May 23 by svensson

[Saki]

My understanding is that most people who stick with older trad systems like BRP is that everyone just kind of "eyeballs it" when it comes to balance, and will simply fudge either the behavior of foes or the actual rolls themselves if they need to correct it in the moment.

[g33k]

On 5/17/2024 at 3:03 AM, Susimetsa said:

...

Chaosium is planning to publish non-human player races for RQ, but it has apparently been delayed for reasons similar to what you quote (how to balance etc.):
https://www.chaosium.com/blogcoming-later-this-year-for-the-runequest-starter-set-14-more-pregen-characters-nonhuman-adventurers/

So, basically, if you want well-balanced or official rules on non-human characters, we have to wait for a while longer. OR you can refer to earlier Runequest editions and judge the balance from there.

I think you misunderstand what those are. They are merely a few pre-gen PC's for RuneQuest; there are no "rules" there for character-creation, just 14 examples of what comes out of the existing rules.  And -- as ever -- RQ explicitly does not aim for "balance" in this.  Trolls are stronger than humans; trollkin are weaker; the designers' intent is that it be so.  There will be inherently "weaker" PCs among these pregens (I'm expecting Trollkin & Durulz; maybe Newtling...?), and likely stronger ones too (Centaur?  Minotaur?  Dark Troll?  Baboon?).  Note that the RQG Bestiary does have rules for creating nonhuman PC's for several races; I presume these (hopefully still forthcoming) pre-gens will adhere to those rules.

However, none of those rules make any effort to see the PC's "balanced" vis-a-vis humans.

So the OP will still need to wait or look elsewhere for such rules.

[Atgxtg]

3 minutes ago, Saki said:

My understanding is that most people who stick with older trad systems like BRP is that everyone just kind of "eyeballs it" when it comes to balance

Not exactly. It's a bit more complicated, BRP isn't really "balanced" like D&D is. For one thing, "balanced" in D&D really means unbalanced in favor of the PCs. It's more of a thing in D&D since level is so significant to the outcome.  In D&D a 1HD goblin has virtually no chance in a one on one fight against a 10th level fighter. Even naked and unarmed the fighter is going to mop the floor with the goblin. THat how D&D works. Yes, statistically the goblin has a chance of beating the warrior, but statistically the goblin could hit the lottery, and neither is going to happen with enough frequency to be considered a factor. So encounters are "balanced" (that is rigged) to seem just dangerous enough to give the players some sense of excitement and to keep them from becoming complacent about it. It mostly artifcal too, as things like intelligence and tactics (or lack there of) aren't factored into the CR rating for game balance.

But in BRP, with fixed hit points, things are different. A goblin with a measly 10% weapon skill could get  lucky critical or impale and drop a master warrior with a single hit. It's not likely, but it can happen a lot more often than it will in D&D. So a GM doesn't need to keep upping the  opposition like a DM does in D&D. A bunch of "low level" mooks are always going to be a threat. As a result a GM can use a set scale for skill competency, rather than a relative one. That is, if the GM introduces the  town guardsmen with Sword 50% at ths start of a campaign, they can keep them at 50% for the entire campaign, and they will still be able to post some sort of threat even to experienced PCs.

 

So balance, either in terms of encounters or even between player characters, isn't as much of a thing. A starting PC with low skills can adventure with a more experienced one in ways that don't really work in D&D.

 

SO most GMs don't worry about balance as much. Yes they will tend to try to keep the oppositions skill, gear, and numbers down to a level that they believe thier players can handle, but that amount is highly subjective.  The better the GM knows the game system and the abilities of the player characters (not to mention the players) the better they can judge just what their group is capable of.  So most adventures tend to be written with opposition that seems reasonable for that adfventure, and is not determined by the PCs,  and its often up to the players to figure ou if they are they are up to a given challenge or not (i.e. starting characters shouldn't go after dragons). 

 

3 minutes ago, Saki said:

 

, and will simply fudge either the behavior of foes or the actual rolls themselves if they need to correct it in the moment.

Or not. This might be a bit of a shock to a new player, but GMs in old skool  RPGs might just let the PCs suffer the consequences. "Ge,e the bandit cut your characters arm off, that's rough. Too bad you didn't make the parry roll."

Most of the GMs I know (self included) do not like to fudge behavior or die rolls all that much (if at all) as the players will eventually pick up on it, and it will make the game much less enjoyable. Slaying a dragon is an accomplishment, unless you know the GM was fudging the encounter, and the PCs biggest risk was that the dragon might fall on one of then as it was dying. I've seen players start to do stupider things just to see if the GM is fudging and find out how far they will go to "save" the game. Then they will exploit that for the rest of the campaign, because well, the main game isn't all that exciting anymore, since the GM is covering for them. 

 

 

[Susimetsa]

50 minutes ago, g33k said:

I think you misunderstand what those are. They are merely a few pre-gen PC's for RuneQuest; there are no "rules" there for character-creation, just 14 examples of what comes out of the existing rules.  And -- as ever -- RQ explicitly does not aim for "balance" in this.  Trolls are stronger than humans; trollkin are weaker; the designers' intent is that it be so.  There will be inherently "weaker" PCs among these pregens (I'm expecting Trollkin & Durulz; maybe Newtling...?), and likely stronger ones too (Centaur?  Minotaur?  Dark Troll?  Baboon?).  Note that the RQG Bestiary does have rules for creating nonhuman PC's for several races; I presume these (hopefully still forthcoming) pre-gens will adhere to those rules.

However, none of those rules make any effort to see the PC's "balanced" vis-a-vis humans.

So the OP will still need to wait or look elsewhere for such rules.

Nah, I understood what the linked product was about - I merely used it as an indication that non-human races will be coming out, but seem to have been delayed (even as pre-made characters).

But, yes, you are right: RQ doesn't really aim for the D&D style balancing, so the delay is probably about something else.

[Saki]

9 minutes ago, Atgxtg said:

Yes they will tend to try to keep the oppositions skill, gear, and numbers down to a level that they believe thier players can handle, but that amount is highly subjective.  The better the GM knows the game system and the abilities of the player characters (not to mention the players) the better they can judge just what their group is capable of. 

Exactly what I mean by Eyeballing it.

 

9 minutes ago, Atgxtg said:

Or not. This might be a bit of a shock to a new player, but GMs in old skool  RPGs might just let the PCs suffer the consequences.

Would you commit to TPKing the party because you as the GM made a mistake and made the opposition insurmountable to the party? 

[g33k]

14 minutes ago, Saki said:

...

Would you commit to TPKing the party because you as the GM made a mistake and made the opposition insurmountable to the party? 

The thing is:  when "balance" isn't a thing, neither is "insurmountable."
Sometimes the odds are more in the players' favor, sometimes the odds are against them.

When I see my players (who are, at the moment, all less-experienced than I am (both as gamers in general, and with RQ in particular)) making poor tactical & strategic decisions, I try to direct them to think differently, such as with "your character would probably know..." &c.  But even with solid strategies, there's not nearly the surety there is with (for example) D&D's "CR" system.

Then there's just the "luck of the dice..."

Sometimes a single crit or fumble can swing an entire combat; and sometimes you can get multiple such, that all swing the same way.

[g33k]

46 minutes ago, Susimetsa said:

... so the delay is probably about something else.

I think it's just a zero-revenue product (that nevertheless costs them real $$$ in commissioned artwork, layout, etc) and so it's very-low on their to-do list.

I think all the "development" work is done (i.e. they're RAW-compliant playable PCs)... just not up to Chaosium presentational standards.
They are planned to stand alongside the pre-gen PC's from the Starter Set; so folio-style character sheet, full artwork, etc... and it's those resources they haven't gotten, yet.