New to BRP, somes questions about combat

[LaBear]

Just bought the latest Player's Handbook from Amazon, was curious about this game. How does the cumulative -30% defense work? I know for each successful cumulative parry or dodge you get a -30 until you fail. The book only mentioned that you get rid of it when you fail a defense check. Does it end after a fight, like does it carry into the next combat? What happens if you disengage from a bout for a turn or two, does the penalty go away then? It feels a little wierd for the penalty to carry over all the time.

[tooley1chris]

Any parry/dodge action after your first in a given round carries a penalty. Each new round resets this.

Welcome to the last RPG You'll ever need and welcome to the forums!

[LaBear]

Any parry/dodge action after your first in a given round carries a penalty. Each new round resets this.

Welcome to the last RPG You'll ever need and welcome to the forums!

 

Thanks! Where does it say that in the book, I can't find it. So does that mean the only ways to hit opponents with over 100% to parry or dodge is to ovewrwhelm them with numbers or rolling specials and crits?

[Chaot]

Or get them into a situation that gives your opponent a negative modifier to their skill roll, but yes.  To a certain extend, combat at the high skill level becomes dicing for criticals.  That's why it's good to have a fighting partner mechanically.  One of you splits your attacks, bringing the opponent down -60%, then the other goes in for the kill.

 

For in the immortal words of the Wonder Pets, "What's going to work?  Teamwork!  What's going to work? Teamwork!"

[tooley1chris]

OK. So re reading thru the action phases of combat, I don't see where is actually spells out the negative modifiers reset at the end of each round. However, given that you can only Dodge/parry an actual attack, and there are Only so many dex ranks in a round, it's pretty safe to assume that if your attack skill percent resets each round (as it must for weapon skills less than 100%) then your other combat skills must as well. Implying that a weapon skill doesn't reset after a round would make it impossible to continue combat.

[tooley1chris]

Also, don't forget some weapons allow more than 1 attack per round, as does having a weapon skill over 100%

[Moonowl67]

Don't forget to employ the best quality of BRP; it's modular-ity.  If a rule doesn't fit your concept or group, ditch it!  However, something as basic as the combat system shouldn't be tinkered with too much . . . I'm finding that it works pretty well.  There's another However;  That being said, may own group did away with BRP dex ranks.  I guess the archer got tired of going first most of the time.  So, we instead adopted the D10 + 1/2 DEX or INT optional rule, along with making attacks go simultaneously with powers (I felt that it gave an unfair advantage to spell casters).  Also, after playing DnD 4E for years, they were used to thinking of things in terms of Move, Actions, Minor Actions, so we came up with a way that puts the BRP mechanics into the DnD 4E combat round structure.   It actually works pretty well. I combined that with index-card tracking method and we now have a great, quick system for running conflicts.  

 

Welcome to the game!  it's the one system that runs smoothly with most genre, and really shines when you blend the genres (my players are about to quest for a legendary suit of magical mecha forged during the Dragon Wars to rid the town of a small horde of demons and take out a ship-carrying demon dirigible commanded by the infamous ogre-mage Capt. von Falkenheyn)!

[soltakss]

Also, some rules are not very clear, for whatever reason, so people interpret them differently.

 

Don't be afraid to houserule your BRP - it is almost designed to be houseruled, by having many interconnecting modules.