RULES CLARIFICATION

[parejf63]

Hey there, I Love OQ so do my players.  However, we have a few questions which we hope can be answered.  

1) The book SHAMANISM chapter mentioned non-shaman binding spirits.  So, we take this to mean that any one can choose the shamanism spells and use them, and not be a shaman?

2) Why are Shaman's not recommended for starting characters?  They seem to round of a group very nicely.

3) On opposed rolls, it says the higher roll wins in circumstances, it makes more sense to me that the lower roll wins, as it comes closer to a critical.

4) We are not quite certain when a characteristic is reduced, what exactly happens?  I cannot find the answer in the book.   Are skills reduced?  If they have to be recalculated, that seems to be a lot of work.  

Done with that.

Now, I found OQ and Magic World (BRP) to be incredibly compatible.  I have taken a lot of the spot rules for combat and applied them to my game, and I changed a few rules that seemed a little akward -

1) We play if your skill is under 100%, your chance of Fumble is 95-00.  If your skill is greater than 100% that is reduced to 00

2) The rule for suffocation and drowning seems a little too much.  I made a change there, you can hold your breath for a 1/4 of your con.  After that, you must make a resilience test at -10% per round (Cumulative) to keep holding it.

Major Wound:   the chart remains, and I love it.  However the rules change.  I just do a resilience roll (not opposed) Fail = Unconscious.   they lose 1/2 DEX and INT as it applies to INITIATIVE.  (they are so much in pain, they go later in combat).  Each attack, parry, and dodge are at -50%, -25% to all skills for the remainder of HP in rounds.   

RULES I ADDED MYSELF

Attacks vs. Larger targets:   +10% for every 5 points of size larger  (reversed for smaller than yours)

Blind opponent rules added  (throwing sand or dirt in opponents face)

Combined Armor damage with critical hit.  They can choose for forgo damage to the body for damage to the armor.  (only if not parried or Dodged)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Al.]

Ref: the size bonus/penalty

OpenQuest has always been gloriously simple and used big bonuses or nothing

I'd suggest a flat smaller SIZ gets +20, larger SIZ gets -20 (inspired by the rule for faster ships in the old Elric! sailing rules)

[Mugen]

About the "highest roll wins" versus "lowest roll wins".

There's a problem with "lowest roll wins' : if the character rolls over his opponent's skill and below his own skill, he can't win if both rolled a success.

Say for instance I have skill 65 and my opponent has 40. If I roll 55, my only chance to win is that my opponent misses his roll.

With the highest roll win option, it's the opposite : if I roll between 41 and 65, my opponent must roll a critical to win.

With some skill values, high roll wins even gives higher chances of success to the lowest skill.

[Newt]

16 hours ago, Mugen said:

About the "highest roll wins" versus "lowest roll wins".

There's a problem with "lowest roll wins' : if the character rolls over his opponent's skill and below his own skill, he can't win if both rolled a success.

Say for instance I have skill 65 and my opponent has 40. If I roll 55, my only chance to win is that my opponent misses his roll.

With the highest roll win option, it's the opposite : if I roll between 41 and 65, my opponent must roll a critical to win.

With some skill values, high roll wins even gives higher chances of success to the lowest skill.

This system was inherited from Mongoose RQ, and I will almost certainly be dumping it in refreshed version of OQ. If nothing else I never use it my games

I'm erring towards a system where only the player rolls, and their roll is modified if the opponent is especially competent.

[Simlasa]

5 hours ago, Newt said:

I'm erring towards a system where only the player rolls, and their roll is modified if the opponent is especially competent.

You mean as in Dungeon World and its associated games? Do GMs ever roll?
 

[Newt]

No, merely a replacement for Opposed Rolls.

[nDervish]

23 hours ago, Newt said:

I'm erring towards a system where only the player rolls, and their roll is modified if the opponent is especially competent.

Given the context of it being a BRP-family game, if you want to replace opposed rolls with a single roll, wouldn't the Resistance Table be the obvious way to do so?

Note that I like opposed rolls in general, and blackjack-style opposed rolls in particular, but, if you don't and you want to get rid of them, then why reinvent the wheel?

[Newt]

I'm not going to go any further with this discussion, because I'm not actually working on its not something I've thoroughly playtested yet. It may be all that needs to fix Opposed rolls is a through look at the Opposed Roll Table.

It maybe that the OQ refresh leaves the text 99% untouched and the remaining 1% being existing areas of confusion clarified, its main outcome is just new art and layout.  

[Joerg]

On 28.3.2017 at 2:14 PM, Newt said:

This system was inherited from Mongoose RQ, and I will almost certainly be dumping it in refreshed version of OQ. If nothing else I never use it my games

High roll wins is an inheritance from Pendragon, and with that heritage is almost certain to remain in RuneQuest.

The statistics show that high roll wins gives a fairer distribution of results. Otherwise any success of a low skill participant will trump a normal success of a high skill participant.

Quote

I'm erring towards a system where only the player rolls, and their roll is modified if the opponent is especially competent.

What are you going to do when it is player vs. player, whether as result from berserk rage or some other form of madness or mind control, or in a contest?

Edited March 29, 2017 by Joerg

[Cdr Vimes]

I use winner is the one with greatest amount of success. Mainly because I read the rules wrong but as an example.  A has a skill of 80% and B has a skill of 40%.  They oppose and by a massive coincidence both succeed by rolling a 30%.  A wins as he made his roll by 50% as opposed to B making his roll by only 10%.  A little bit of maths but works oK.

[Mugen]

On 28/03/2017 at 2:14 PM, Newt said:

This system was inherited from Mongoose RQ, and I will almost certainly be dumping it in refreshed version of OQ. If nothing else I never use it my games

I'm erring towards a system where only the player rolls, and their roll is modified if the opponent is especially competent.

In my view, "roll under, highest roll wins" is a very simple and efficient way to solve an opposition between 2 characters, and in my opinion the most elegant way to do it in a roll under game, even though it needs special rules for skills above 100.

[Mugen]

16 minutes ago, Cdr Vimes said:

I use winner is the one with greatest amount of success. Mainly because I read the rules wrong but as an example.  A has a skill of 80% and B has a skill of 40%.  They oppose and by a massive coincidence both succeed by rolling a 30%.  A wins as he made his roll by 50% as opposed to B making his roll by only 10%.  A little bit of maths but works oK.

Note that, In terms of probabilities, this method gives almost the same results as "roll under skill, highest roll wins", but requires 2 additional subtractions.

Edited March 29, 2017 by Mugen

[Cdr Vimes]

Agreed but my players prefer it as they feel that the lower roll is always better, i.e. nearer to a crit or special success.  Also i started them on Dark heresy so they understand a 'degrees of success' with a roll a little more.

[jux]

On 3/29/2017 at 4:09 PM, Newt said:

I'm not going to go any further with this discussion, because I'm not actually working on its not something I've thoroughly playtested yet. It may be all that needs to fix Opposed rolls is a through look at the Opposed Roll Table.

It maybe that the OQ refresh leaves the text 99% untouched and the remaining 1% being existing areas of confusion clarified, its main outcome is just new art and layout.  

Wouldn't it be a great idea to share the system changes with the community for the upcoming OQ refresh?

I think it is very interesting to move from opposed rolls  to roll against target number (%) mechanic. I wonder what else would be changed. What about ideas from community?

[Newt]

When I'm ready to share OQ Refreshed with people here I will.  OpenQuest was originally done as Open Design, with me posting whole chunks of the rules and the beta document here for comments. But I'm not ready yet

[Sunwolfe]

Greetings all,

Just adding my two cents to this wonderful conversation!

Good call Newt. Keep those refresh-cards close until you're ready to pull the trigger .

IMHO leave the damn resistance table out. To me, it's a symbol of crunch and munch, and I want squish and swish. Other BRP iterations have plenty of rules-creep and granular bits for those who want depth and distraction; indeed, the chart's absence is one of the reasons I've picked OQ over those variations.

Highest roll wins in my games. It's quick, easy and keeps the action moving. You roll; I roll. Mine's higher: I win. Done. No additional steps; no extra calculations; no chart consults; no inner maths...just more immersion and mood to enjoy. Regardless of skill disparities, there is always a chance to roll a critical or a fumble that can change the fate and fortune of the lowest or highest percentage. My players role-play very hard for their Improvement Points and deserve to have as big a chance to nail that skill as their percentage can offer. This is why I shy away from crunchy degrees of success, happily discarding "specials" in favor of Critical, Success, Fail, and Fumble. That's more than enough.

Don't get me wrong, I've changed and modified a lot of OQ's rules, particularly where magic is concerned (developing Newt's single magic system idea mentioned in an earlier thread). I say change it until it feels right for your group and style (ah, the beauty of BRP) but for me and my players, storytelling and roleplaying trumps mechanical simulation and thus, OQ's simplicity and a swift problem solving mechanic are the way to go.

As far as a refresh goes, IMHO, Newt couldn't go far wrong with a simple clean, correct, and clarify. Art work is wonderful, but I don't play art. Textual clarity is more important to me than illustration. If I need a picture of a lamia that more accurately represents them as they are in my game setting, I'll either verbally draw it myself or use Pinterest to help me out, but that's just me .

Cheers, mates!

[jux]

To me OQ is also all about simplicity, but there are also some little things that bother me.

Skills should be cap-ed to 100%. I understand that way high-skilled fights go on forever - this is should be fixed somehow (-25% attack results -25% for parry for example).

The general skill-list should be looked over:
Athletics should be STR or DEX check
Perception is not skill, at least it's a stupid skill that is always maxed - I'd rather want it to be a derived stat
Driving, Sailing, Riding - these skills just bother me - could be replaced by DEX or INT check and character background for bonuses

[Newt]

Feel free to house rule these changes into your House Ruled version of OQ, JuxQuest? 

[Simlasa]

On 4/12/2017 at 7:22 AM, jux said:

Perception is not skill, at least it's a stupid skill that is always maxed - I'd rather want it to be a derived stat
Driving, Sailing, Riding - these skills just bother me - could be replaced by DEX or INT check and character background for bonuses

I'd favor linking Perception to POW for a default level, but I do think it's a skill that can be trained. The average policeman or soldier probably has a higher Perception... artists might also.

I'm not sure why you think Driving, Sailing, and Riding aren't skills... none of those seem like something a person can just jump into because they're smart or dexterous.

[jux]

On 4/13/2017 at 9:49 PM, Simlasa said:

I'd favor linking Perception to POW for a default level, but I do think it's a skill that can be trained. The average policeman or soldier probably has a higher Perception... artists might also.

I'm not sure why you think Driving, Sailing, and Riding aren't skills... none of those seem like something a person can just jump into because they're smart or dexterous.

Perception is too important - like in CoC. But I guess it can be trained. It's just the most trained skill after fighting.

Driving, Sailing, and Riding - my problem with these is, that they have so little "game" use. I think they are for chase checks. And how often does that come up in your adventures? How much skillpoints you must waist to be good at it? 

For my perfect game, I would wish a skill-list so that all the skills are equally important. For Athletics, Perception and Sailing - they are not comparable. Sailing is a clear dump-skill. That means all the characters will be very very similar, unless one deliberately wants to be useless.

Edited April 15, 2017 by jux

[jux]

On 4/13/2017 at 9:07 PM, Newt said:

Feel free to house rule these changes into your House Ruled version of OQ, JuxQuest? 

It'll be EpicQuest!

[nDervish]

17 hours ago, jux said:

For my perfect game, I would wish a skill-list so that all the skills are equally important. For Athletics, Perception and Sailing - they are not comparable. Sailing is a clear dump-skill. That means all the characters will be very very similar, unless one deliberately wants to be useless.

That's demonstrably impossible.  Even if the skills are perfectly balanced mechanically, the specific campaign and specific GM will change that balance, often radically.  If you're playing a campaign where the PCs are pirates, then Sailing is going to be a pretty important skill, regardless of how useless it might be in the kinds of campaigns you're envisioning.

[soltakss]

18 hours ago, jux said:

Perception is too important - like in CoC. But I guess it can be trained. It's just the most trained skill after fighting.

Driving, Sailing, and Riding - my problem with these is, that they have so little "game" use. I think they are for chase checks. And how often does that come up in your adventures? How much skillpoints you must waist to be good at it? 

For my perfect game, I would wish a skill-list so that all the skills are equally important. For Athletics, Perception and Sailing - they are not comparable. Sailing is a clear dump-skill. That means all the characters will be very very similar, unless one deliberately wants to be useless.

If you have a campaign that involves sailing on ships then the Sailing skill becomes very important. If your campaign is in the middle of a desert then Sailing becomes redundant.

I would have a skill list that reflects the camapign setting. A setting without mounted animals, for example an Old Stone Age or Middle Stone Age setting, would not need Riding or Sailing, for example. 

[blackyinkin]

4 hours ago, soltakss said:

If you have a campaign that involves sailing on ships then the Sailing skill becomes very important. If your campaign is in the middle of a desert then Sailing becomes redundant.

I would have a skill list that reflects the camapign setting. A setting without mounted animals, for example an Old Stone Age or Middle Stone Age setting, would not need Riding or Sailing, for example. 

Of course if your desert has Sand Yachts and your sailing campaign has dolphin riders....

[soltakss]

21 hours ago, blackyinkin said:

Of course if your desert has Sand Yachts and your sailing campaign has dolphin riders....

Exactly, tailor your skill list to the setting ...