Mythras Imperative Now Available

[lawrence.whitaker]

For free download: http://thedesignmechanism.com/resources/TDM110 Mythras Imperative.pdf

Or for print copy: http://www.lulu.com/shop/pete-nash-and-lawrence-whitaker/mythras-imperative/paperback/product-22732074.html

[pachristian]

Downloaded it, read it.

Very well done. I can use this as a rulebook for my players who refuse to read rulebooks.

Things I particularly liked: The fast-use cultural and progression summaries. The clear statements regarding what are "opposed rolls" vs. what are "differential rolls". Simplification of combat styles into a cultural or trained style - that's what everyone I know was using anyway, so that might as well be standard. The "How Combat Works" section - this is an excellent summary, easy to read and very clear.

Things I did not like: Point allotment for character creation. I think that different characteristics should have different costs, based on how they are used in the game. This is a "how I prefer to run the game" issue, not an issue with the Imperative book.

All and all, you guys do excellent work, and Mythras is my go-to system.

 

Thank you!

[rust]

Very well done, I think I have found the right system for my Meridiana campaign now. 

By the way, there are two minor layout problems on page 13, one with the first line of the Merchant career in the left column and another one with the first line of the Sailor career in the middle column.

[Mankcam]

Nice retooling of RQ Essentials, much slimmer, and excellent for a free pdf. Looking forward to many more Design Mechanism books to come!

Edited June 12, 2016 by Mankcam

[TrippyHippy]

17 hours ago, pachristian said:

Downloaded it, read it.

 

Things I did not like: Point allotment for character creation. I think that different characteristics should have different costs, based on how they are used in the game. This is a "how I prefer to run the game" issue, not an issue with the Imperative book.

All and all, you guys do excellent work, and Mythras is my go-to system.

 

Thank you!

I agree with much of that, although my main problem with points allocation (which I tend to prefer these days) is that 75 points is a bit low. That's less than the average dice rolls (not forgetting that INT and SIZ are both based on 2D6+6). 

[rust]

Meanwhile I have used Mythras Imperative to move my Meridiana campaign to the Mythras system, which turned out to be surprisingly easy, I only had to tinker somewhat with the cultural skills and the skills assigned to my campaign's careers. All I have left to do now is to wait for the full Mythras rules and their "modern" supplements for some more hopefully minor changes. 

[groovyclam]

Page 19 typo -  misspelled Hyperborean

There's also several mentions of 'Strike Rank' but I thought this was getting renamed as Initiative? 

[lawrence.whitaker]

36 minutes ago, groovyclam said:

Page 19 typo -  misspelled Hyperborean

There's also several mentions of 'Strike Rank' but I thought this was getting renamed as Initiative? 

It is, and already corrected. Couple of other typo captures too, so those are now fixed.

[daddystabz]

I don't know much about Mythras.  It will replace RQ 6? Is this version (Imperative) like a stripped-down version? Will there be a more full release later?

[rust]

4 minutes ago, daddystabz said:

I don't know much about Mythras.  It will replace RQ 6? Is this version (Imperative) like a stripped-down version? Will there be a more full release later?

Mythras is the new name of Runequest 6 (which became necessary when Chaosium announced their new Runequest, I think). Mythras Imperative is a stripped down version, a full version (with probably only minor changes from Runequest 6) will follow, hopefully soon.

[daddystabz]

I just found some more info about it in another thread, ty.

However, one thing I'm confused by is what will the difference between RuneQuest going forward and Mythras be?

[rust]

Just now, daddystabz said:

However, one thing I'm confused by is what will the difference between RuneQuest going forward and Mythras be?

As I understand it, Runequest by Chaosium will be tied to the world of Glorantha, while Mythras by the Design Mechanism will become more generic, designed for modern and science fiction settings as well as fantasy ones.

[daddystabz]

Just now, rust said:

As I understand it, Runequest by Chaosium will be tied to the world of Glorantha, while Mythras by the Design Mechanism will become more generic, designed for modern and science fiction settings as well as fantasy ones.

 

Awesome, Mythras will be more for me then, since I'm not a big Glorantha fan.

[groovyclam]

4 hours ago, lawrence.whitaker said:

It is, and already corrected. Couple of other typo captures too, so those are now fixed.

The download is still showing the errors - when will the fixed PDF be available? 

[lawrence.whitaker]

Everything is fixed, revised, and uploaded.

[Prime Evil]

This is a very nice refinement of RQ 6 Essentials. I like the fact that each iteration of the rules seems to streamline the system a little more. Heck, if it had a few more critters and some introductory magic it would almost be the Holmes Basic Set for early D&D - and that's intended as a compliment as it's very hard to pare a rule system down that much.

My only complaints is that I think Essentials was a better title than Imperative and that I'm not entirely convinced I like the new layout - I find that Warnock Pro renders much better on small screens, but that may be a personal preference. (At the moment, I'm in love with the Amasis MT font family as it seems to render beautifully everywhere).

[pachristian]

On June 12, 2016 at 3:36 AM, TrippyHippy said:

I agree with much of that, although my main problem with points allocation (which I tend to prefer these days) is that 75 points is a bit low. That's less than the average dice rolls (not forgetting that INT and SIZ are both based on 2D6+6). 

The trick is, that from a mathematical, game-mechanics point of view, some characteristics give you more bang for the buck than others. You can find a copy of my full study somewhere on the Design Mechanism forums. My system works like this: All characacters start with attributes at 'average' (10 or 13 as appropriate). STR, CON, SIZ cost 1 points for +1. INT costs 3 points for +1, DEX, POW, and CHA cost 2 points for +1 (yes, CHA is used for a lot of skills). Characteristics over 18 cost double points (so, 6 points to raise INT from 18 to 19). Max is 21, of course.

If the points are distributed proportionately, a character will be in the 95th percentile - in other words, better than all but about 5% of the randomly rolled characters. Given a group of 6 players, each rolling a couple of characters, this reduces the urge to cheat, as it is unlikely a rolled character will be better than the point-distributed character - unless you try to max out INT. There's an old joke about Classic RQ being the only game in the world where every barbarian had an INT of 21; because the benefits of high INT were so disproportionate to the other characteristics.

By the way, when training characteristics in my game, STR and CON cost 10 IP, DEX, POW, CHA cost 20 IP, and INT costs 30 IP. SIZ cannot normally be trained. I use a flat scale, instead of a variable one, to discourage min-maxing.

[g33k]

On 6/12/2016 at 11:01 AM, daddystabz said:

Awesome, Mythras will be more for me then, since I'm not a big Glorantha fan.

Chaosium's new RQ is being based on a refined and updated version of the venerable "RQ2" rules, that launched the plethora of games & rulesets in the d100/BRP family.

It will indeed by MUCH more "Gloranthan" a game, with "Runes" being a much bigger part of the game... all the way down to character-generation.  It's also bringing in adaptations of some of the familial/ cultural/ campaign- oriented material from the "Pendragon" (Artuhrian) game.  It's looking pretty interesting...

 

[Prime Evil]

3 minutes ago, g33k said:

Chaosium's new RQ is being based on a refined and updated version of the venerable "RQ2" rules, that launched the plethora of games & rulesets in the d100/BRP family.

It will indeed by MUCH more "Gloranthan" a game, with "Runes" being a much bigger part of the game... all the way down to character-generation.  It's also bringing in adaptations of some of the familial/ cultural/ campaign- oriented material from the "Pendragon" (Artuhrian) game.  It's looking pretty interesting...

 

It is interesting, and may even be a good game if your primary focus is Glorantha. But I'm more interested in something that I can use for my own settings, and Mythras looks like the better choice if that's what you are interested in. Of course, there is a trade-off here - a tight focus on a specific area of Glorantha in a specific time period allows the new Chaosium RQ to offer a streamlined ruleset tightly integrated with the setting. By contrast, Mythras is a toolbox that supports a wide range of settings and options. Therefore it can't be as 'rules light' or as integrated with a specific campaign setting as the new RQ will be. In the longer term, this will probably be a good thing as it allows Mythras to be more adaptable to the needs of different gaming groups.

[g33k]

1 hour ago, Prime Evil said:

It is interesting, and may even be a good game if your primary focus is Glorantha. But I'm more interested in something that I can use for my own settings, and Mythras looks like the better choice if that's what you are interested in. Of course, there is a trade-off here - a tight focus on a specific area of Glorantha in a specific time period allows the new Chaosium RQ to offer a streamlined ruleset tightly integrated with the setting. By contrast, Mythras is a toolbox that supports a wide range of settings and options. Therefore it can't be as 'rules light' or as integrated with a specific campaign setting as the new RQ will be. In the longer term, this will probably be a good thing as it allows Mythras to be more adaptable to the needs of different gaming groups.

Absolutely!  I'll just add a little bit more:  With minimal adaptation, this will be extensible to ANY Gloranthan time-period or culture; all it's likely to take is someone who knows the time/culture well enough to prefer that one to the default.

With rather more adaptation -- but still not much work, overall -- it's likely to be able to adapt VERY well to most fantasy settings with mystical "Runes" or "Heiroglyphs" or the like; possibly even Middle Earth (q.v. Gandalf's "Word of Power" in Moria, attempting to seal the doorway against the Balrog).

But I don't expect it will EVER be as versatile a game-engine as "Mythras" is, nor produce a stripped-down minimalist version like "Mythras Imperative."

HOWEVER:  last of all -- but VERY MUCH not least -- the generic "BRP" line is also being updated & released.  I imagine I'm not the only one looking forward VERY eagerly to sitting down with "Mythras Imperative" and (the new) "BRP Essentials" side by side...  But that's for some point in the indefinite future.  At the moment, RQ6/RQE & Mythras / Mythras Imperative are the optioins available!

[rust]

I really like the approach of Mythras Imperative, actually I like it so much that I have now also converted my Thalassa science fiction campaign to the Mythras system. It worked rather well, only a few skills needed minor changes, and most of the science fiction careers had to be designed. Well, and now I am looking forward even more to Mythras and its supplements. 

[Belgath]

4 hours ago, rust said:

I really like the approach of Mythras Imperative, actually I like it so much that I have now also converted my Thalassa science fiction campaign to the Mythras system. It worked rather well, only a few skills needed minor changes, and most of the science fiction careers had to be designed. Well, and now I am looking forward even more to Mythras and its supplements. 

You should take a look at Luther Arkwright has a bunch a science-fiction goodies in there. 

[rust]

5 hours ago, Belgath said:

You should take a look at Luther Arkwright has a bunch a science-fiction goodies in there. 

Thank you for an excellent idea, I will take a look at it. 

Edit.: Downloaded and browsed Luther Arkwright, it is really very useful, especially the chapters on technology and on vehicles. Thank you again. 

Edited June 18, 2016 by rust
new info

[threedeesix]

3 hours ago, rust said:

...it is really very useful, especially the chapters on technology and on vehicles. 

I designed the vehicles, it was me, I designed them. I take credit on the vehicles.

[groovyclam]

@Loz - Hi, I've just had my postie bring my Lulu copy of Imperative but sadly it's got the few goofs and typos in it.

Have you revised the Lulu PDF internals upload file to the "fixed" version yet, so that if I do a reorder I'll get a "fixed" dead-tree version ?

Cheers.