RuneQuest Quickstart - The Broken Tower

[Flsocialworker]

I've played CoC, but never played RQ. I'm running the Broken Tower new adventure next week.

I'm confused by strike rank....So is it Dex + Siz + SR of the weapon= When they act in combat? Dex 2, Siz 1, SR 6= 9

Older RQ looks like characters can act more than once per round. The quick start rules look like only 1 action per round. 

I listen to podcasts about RQ and they talk about action points, but I do not see them on the Pregen characters.

 

[Jonas]

54 minutes ago, Flsocialworker said:

I've played CoC, but never played RQ. I'm running the Broken Tower new adventure next week.

I'm confused by strike rank....So is it Dex + Siz + SR of the weapon= When they act in combat? Dex 2, Siz 1, SR 6= 9

Older RQ looks like characters can act more than once per round. The quick start rules look like only 1 action per round. 

I listen to podcasts about RQ and they talk about action points, but I do not see them on the Pregen characters.

 

1. Sort of. Your formula is correct, but the weapon SRs are not in the quickstart rules. What's listed on the characters is the total, after all calculations.

2. No, they're pretty clear that you can do more than one thing. In some cases. Page 8 says that your attack is considered to take up the entire round, but it seems this only applies to melee. The examples on page 7 show that you can, among other things, shoot two arrows if you're fast enough.

3. Action points are a thing from the Mongoose versions of RuneQuest. Never in the editions from Chaosium.

P.S. as opposed to the AP economy of MRQ, it seems we get unlimited parries in this edition. Something all player characters will thank the gods for.

Edited June 10, 2017 by Jonas
Just thought of something else.

[theWoozle]

Are we missing Spirit Combat attack skills/spells?or is it more generic and you just make a 'spirit attack' and success = damage. 

[Jonas]

6 minutes ago, theWoozle said:

Are we missing Spirit Combat attack skills/spells?or is it more generic and you just make a 'spirit attack' and success = damage. 

Unknown at this time. In older editions, spirit combat was pretty bare bones, but p. 19 implies that there is more to come.

[Runeblogger]

On 9 de junio de 2017 at 11:42 PM, styopa said:

Parry p14:  success parry vs failed attack means attacking weapon takes FULL damage?  On average, that means a broadsword (12ap) will break after two failed attacks (avg dmg of d8+1+d4) vs successful parry? Really?

Damage p17 talks about 3x damage resulting in sever or maim (why "irrevocably" when it isn't?), without distinguishing the difference or when it's one or the other...which is critical because one can be healed only with the 6pt heal

P18 refers to healing rate, not mentioned elsewhere, not shown in example character sheets?

P18 focus: if I pick up Jimmy's focus for heal 2, can I use it to cast it if I didn't have the spell? If I did?  If not, why would anyone put a focus in something they could drop?  Do I have to see the focus or touch it? (Ie could it be a tattoo on my back ?)  Could it be a tattoo inside my mouth out of sight?

Visibility- aren't spirits normally affected only by MAGIC already? Do you mean makes it subject to physical attacks?

Can you be in spirit combat and melee simultaneously?  Can you attack in both in a round?

I'm also looking forward to reading the answers to these questions.

As for Visibility, I think what the text means is that it allows you to actually make the spirit visible to other people aside from shamans and people using Second Sight, so anyone can now target the spirit with magic (and with weapons with Bladesharp, for example).

Edited June 10, 2017 by Runeblogger

[styopa]

14 hours ago, Jonas said:

The base SR in melee is DEX SR + SIZ SR, while base SR for missiles and spells is just DEX SR. In the example, DEX SR is used in the casting of the Disruption spell: The rules earlier on the page spell it out: SR for a spirit magic spell is DEX SR plus 1 per MP used above 1. Disruption is a 1-point spell, so it's 3+0=3.

...which was always one of the odd, imo broken mechanics in the RQ2 system: why are missile weapons intrinsically faster than melee?  Likewise the special treatment - only afforded to missile weapons - of repeat attacks based solely on strike ranks, whilst melee are limited to a single attack unless one's attack can be divided.

"Gotta love the Bronze Age"

[snipped tangential discussion about Glorantha and the term 'bronze age']

_________________________

ANYWAY, to continue my previously flight-interrupted list:

P14 - Crit & special damage effects include STR mod, I presume?  I think it's implied, but I don't find it clear from the text.

Crit attack does max rolled, ignoring armor, while special does rolled x2; this means that in some cases it would be BETTER to take the special result than the crit result.  Can we let them choose which, if they get a crit?

(frex, d8+1+d4 max damage would be 13 ignoring armor, or an average of 16 points with a special; if the target has 0, 1, or 2 point armor, the special result would be better)

Shields: of course they can be used with other missile weapons than the sling: javelin, hand-axe, thrown dagger, pretty much ANY one handed missile were historically used with a shield.

The explanation of how to use a shield to block locations vs missiles is missing some bits; I understand what you mean only because of previous rules knowledge.  The text descr is unclear.  It says how many locations they can block, but not how that works (ie can you block locations and still use it for parrying, etc)

P15- Knockback isn't really "knockback" in the colloquial sense of the term; what's being described is a bull-rush.

P16: says "a thrown palm size object ..." but then talks about being able to throw things greater than SIZ 1....are there things that are palm-sized that would be greater than SIZ 1? Further it talks about damage based on 'per 3kg it weighs' with nothing in these rules connecting SIZ to kg.  I think the throwing rules are trying to be comprehensive, but end up being way too complicated and broken.  RAW as I understand: a STR 16 toon could frex throw a smooth, aerodynamic SIZ 10 object - say a nicely rounded 50kg boulder (Call that SIZ 10 from rq2 table) 6m, with a dex*5% chance to hit, for 1d3+(half STR mod)+16d8 damage?

P17 - Death paragraph is wasted space; you already said 0 is death, and nobody in this QS  has resurrection magic

p20 - I presume only 1 spirit magic can be cast per round, or can multiples be cast if enough SR available?

P20 - Rune spells go off on SR 1, even if the character has a higher dex SR - ie it actually fires before the character can act?

P20 - remove reference to illusion spells, nobody in the QS has them.

P21 the increasing spellcasting chance table is...odd.  Why the confusing reference to a 2nd 'kind' of meditation to the kind already introduced?  The table implies that mediation (in this style) only works up to 50 rounds and then after that it's 'ritual practices' of 30+ min.  Seems like a very long way around to avoid just calling it 'ceremony' and getting a simple, single column table...

P22-23: Earthpower is CRAZY overpowered.  Basically, it gives an ernalda caster a free +1 POW between every holy day, which, if invested back into ernalda compounds its value quickly.  Assuming a holy day each week, once the toon has earthpower, they're getting 1 POW per week (assuming no other spell usage).  After 3 weeks they have 3 more POW, so now 2 castings, so 2 POW per week, etc.  After 13 holy days, if I didn't mess up my math, she could have 66 rune points, giving her 22 castable earthpowers or +22 POW per week?  (If holy days are presumed to be 1/season, that really doesn't much change how OP the spell is in a proportional way to other toons.)

Dark Walk - odd caveat about range.  So someone 170m could see someone Dark Walking (since they're outside the range)?

Earth Shield - only specifically a shield, or any parrying device?

Path Watch: effects within 100m of the road, or 100m radius of the caster only?

Spell Trading: no limit on which spells can be traded?  I could trade a 1 point Find Enemy for a (stackable) Lightning  that I could then cast stacked with all my Rune points?

Summon Elemental: spell mentions 'small elemental' and back of scenario describes it as 3m cubed = 27 cbm for 1 point spell, that can engulf 270 SIZ of targets (20+ people in battle formation, for example) and do 3d6 to all ignoring armor?.  That's 'small'?  If so, that makes the Summon elemental spells radically overpowered too.

I'm still parsing the scenario generally, but the two items that leaped out at me:

The rock lizards?  Their initial introduction has them harrying a steer, "...racing alongside it, leaping onto its back, and biting it's flanks..." which sounds more like velociraptors than canonical rock lizards (which have always seemed a little more komodo dragony)?  In fact, the description on the next page uses the term "ponderous" and says that "they are too slow to catch much prey and mostly feed on carrion"

Sprul-pa: there are a couple of places where it says 'they show up on SR5"...does that mean they start appearing on SR1 and people can react the next 4 SR?  But as there's no real changing of Statement of Intent, how does that make much difference?  If the Sprul-pa is surprising the toon, basically when it pops up will be a surprise attack or the SoI phase (if no surprise), to start a round, no?  Sorry if it's obvious to everyone else, that just seems to be confusing me.

Other general comments (not really mechanics):

Hit Loc Table: while the simple number table works adequately, I personally would strongly recommend going back to the anthropomorphic table for hp and ap...it's so much more evocative and frankly fun than a dull table list.

In the thread above, Jeff mentioned that these toons have "herd" and "farm" instead of animal lore (and a resulting rules-kludge in the scenario to nevertheless let them recognize the rock lizards) because they've 'never learned about anything but their own livestock' - but these aren't stickpickers: Vasana fought at Pennel Ford, Moonbroth, and campaigned all the way to the liberation of Pavis...and she never picked up any general animal lore?  Hell, they've all been generally all over the place.

How does Sorala have "farm" & "battle" with her background?

Vasana has a piece of Truestone - nobody in the QS would have any idea what this does.  Both the sisters have TEN point MP crystals?  That's...a lot better than the other toons.

More after I parse the adventure a little better in my head.

[GamingGlen]

I gather that some of the rules, if not all, were copy/pasted from the main set of rules without editing for content in the Quickstart.

Yeah, Sorala and Yanioth seem a bit odd.  Yanioth, from a barbarian culture, has no armor or the Shield spell (gotten from the husband cult of Orlanth), very little Rune Points, or the Protection Spirit Spell.  Yet Sorala, from the city, a Lhankor Mhy initiate (i.e., sage) does have armor although its a small amount.  From my own experience, coming from a farming background, city folk know squat about farming and definitely not the 45% Farm that Sorala knows and I doubt she studied it (spent too much time learning that chicken scratch known as Auld Wyrmish ).  As for her battle experience, it's written up in the background so I don't have any issues with her skills of battle.

I was wondering about the Moon rune for Vasana.  Yeah, that'll get changed.  I'm making my own character sheet for handouts so I've gotten to know the pre-gens fairly well.  It's very hard not wanting to make some changes, like giving more Rune points to Yanioth and Sorala, and giving them all a couple more Spirit Spells. 

What is the difference in knowing Spirit Spells that are supposedly inscribed as a tattoo or on a focus, and having a spell matrix?  I thought all Spirit Spells were on a spell matrix? Why does Vostor have Heal 1, and a Heal 2 matrix? (a weak magic item in comparison to the others, well, except for Sorala's).

 

 

[GamingGlen]

23 hours ago, Zac said:

I had the same general issue. It seems as if weapons are going to break quickly unless you get good at parrying attacks.

I noticed that, too, so I'm borrowing the AP values of weapons from RQ3.

[Jonas]

14 hours ago, styopa said:

...which was always one of the odd, imo broken mechanics in the RQ2 system: why are missile weapons intrinsically faster than melee?  Likewise the special treatment - only afforded to missile weapons - of repeat attacks based solely on strike ranks, whilst melee are limited to a single attack unless one's attack can be divided.

The justification in sim terms seems to be that when you are engaged in melee, your attention is divided between all the stuff that's happening. If you're not engaged you can focus on doing just one thing. In game balance terms, I'd guess the intent is to compensate missile users for the fact that their weapons are useless once an enemy has closed with them (or one of their allies - the shooting into melee rule is pretty harsh).

As for the rune spells going off on SR 1, this seems to indicate that you don't actually "cast" these spells, you just send a thought to your god and bam there it is.

Your other questions are things I'd like to know, too.

[Jonas]

15 hours ago, styopa said:

Crit attack does max rolled, ignoring armor, while special does rolled x2; this means that in some cases it would be BETTER to take the special result than the crit result.  Can we let them choose which, if they get a crit?

(frex, d8+1+d4 max damage would be 13 ignoring armor, or an average of 16 points with a special; if the target has 0, 1, or 2 point armor, the special result would be better)

Maybe we don't have to choose: reading the chart on page 3 literally, every crit is also a special... though the other text on the page seems to indicate differently.

[g33k]

Question for Chaosium and/or those who playtested the scenario:

While there are 5 pre-gen's (and will be 1 or 2 more on the 1 July "general release" date, I understand) I presume you don't need all 5 to succeed.

Is there any consensus as to the minimum number of PCs for this to be viable?  And which are "more-essential" for success, which are "more-optional"?

I don't know how many seats I'll have filled on the Day.   

 

[Fredrix]

On 10/06/2017 at 5:08 PM, Jonas said:

as opposed to the AP economy of MRQ, it seems we get unlimited parries in this edition. Something all player characters will thank the gods for.

So we though? On page 16, in the secretion on dual wielding it's says "Should a character wish to wield a weapon in each hand, they can be used for two attacks, two parries, or one attack and one parry." Which suggests that with one weapon, you get either an attack or a single parry.

[Fredrix]

3 minutes ago, g33k said:

Question for Chaosium and/or those who playtested the scenario:

While there are 5 pre-gen's (and will be 1 or 2 more on the 1 July "general release" date, I understand) I presume you don't need all 5 to succeed.

Is there any consensus as to the minimum number of PCs for this to be viable?  And which are "more-essential" for success, which are "more-optional"?

I don't know how many seats I'll have filled on the Day.   

 

The sidebar on page 25 suggests 3 minimum 

[styopa]

4 hours ago, Jonas said:

The justification in sim terms seems to be that when you are engaged in melee, your attention is divided between all the stuff that's happening.

Oh I've understood that, just arguing against having an entirely unique "rolling" SR system for one category of weapons and no others.  We went to "you get your one shot on your strike rank at your sr" like every other weapon and everyone's quite ok with it.  Generally missiles still fire first because of SR advantage anyway.

Iirc part of the point of RQG was to simplify combat, this would be a good candidate element to simplify.

[GamingGlen]

It's not that difficult, and not unique to missile fire.  Two weapon fighting works very similarly.  You figure it out once, and write down all the SRs you can fire your missile weapon.  For missiles: DEX SR, + 5 (unprepared=reload time) + DEX SR, and again if you got a DEX SR of 0.  (assuming it's going to be just like RQ2).

DEX SR = 0:  0/5/10, note: requires a DEX of 19, not possible for humans until they train DEX (assuming stat generation is the same from RQ2).

DEX SR = 1: 1/7 (a third shot would be at SR 13, which is over 12 so is not allowed)

DEX SR = 2: 2/9

DEX SR = 3: 3/11

The complication could be spell casting (i.e., Speedart on your missile) or moving, but that applies to melee activities as well.

Maybe there's other places they could simplify things, but RQ2's melee and missile combat was not that hard of a system to grasp.  Dealing with spirits on the other hand...

[Psullie]

9 hours ago, Fredrix said:

So we though? On page 16, in the secretion on dual wielding it's says "Should a character wish to wield a weapon in each hand, they can be used for two attacks, two parries, or one attack and one parry." Which suggests that with one weapon, you get either an attack or a single parry.

Hi guys...

my though on this is that you always get a choice of attack/parry, attack/attack or parry/parry wether you have a sword/shield, two weapons or 1x2h weapon (you can attack with shield), the new ruling is that after the first parry you get to make additional parries (not on the same SR) at -20% cumulative. Therefore could you attack twice and then parry at -20 after you have made your attacks? 

Also I think the weapon breaking on parries is more like a save rather than tracking weapon HP's like shields  - an all or nothing view.

[Psullie]

I have another query regarding Runes, which by the way I think is a great adoption to the game!

Harmast for example has Harmony 90% so has Disorder at 10%, Movement 75% so Stasis at 25%. But what about the other two pairs? Can we assume a 50/50 split if not listed? I guess my question is does every one have all 4 pairs because these make for a very useful guide for characterisation.

Again for Harmast I see a compassionate and caring man with restless energy, he's mercurial, juggling many of his clan's concerns at once, and although he's a bit of an idealist he's not above 'politics' to get things done. Great stuff!

[Jason D]

Hey everyone - 

Just back from a convention and am happy to see some vigorous discussion on the Quickstart. 

There are way too many replies to do them singularly, and I find multi-quoting and breaking up quotes to be needlessly fiddly on this forum software (sorry!), so I'm just going to do a big text dump replying to many comments on this thread. 

First off, to clarify, this is not the final version of the RQ rules. Some stuff's been simplified for ease of play and some material was excluded or substituted (for example, Sorala has sorcery in the core rulebook, but it was easier to just give her spirit and rune magic for the quickstart). Every skill not used in the events of the QS was removed, and every non-applicable spell was also kept off the sheets. 

Furthermore, the QS version of the rules is an extract of the state of the rules from about four months ago, and the core rulebook has a great deal of polishing and tweaking since then, and will continue to be refined until it's ready to go to print. 

The QS is also very, very cramped. We cut everything that wasn't necessary for completion of the adventure.

We also didn't want to include anything on the adventurer sheets that wasn't relevant to the scenario or to support the setting and background. 

It is also a quickstart intended to be a preview of the game for playing a single scenario, not a replacement for the core rulebook. There are many more examples in the core rulebook and gameplay systems are explained in more detail. 

So, keep that in mind, here's a host of replies to questions, and clarifications: 

styopa 

• The supplemental character is an assistant shaman. 
• Your movement speed is based on what you're doing during combat. If you're engaged in a combat activity, whether parrying, dodging, attacking, or shooting a melee weapon, you're at half movement speed.
• I am not sure where you're getting the impression that "engaged toons basically don't get to move at all". Could you provide an actual text reference to that? The rules state pretty clearly that "Those moving up to half of their usual movement allowance may also participate in melee, cast a spell, etc." 
• Not much need for a weapons table when everyone's weapons are described on their adventurer sheets, and the NPCs have their weapons. 
• When failing a parry, the full damage is rolled and compared to the weapon's HP. If they exceed, the weapon is broken. If not, it loses 1 HP. That's clearer in the core rules. 
• Since no one in the adventure has Heal 6 and there is no immediately close temple of Ernalda, any severed limb is "irrevocably maimed"... but then the section after that explains what conditions the limb can be repaired/replaced. 
• The adventure takes place over 8-24 hours, so no time for healing rate to become relevant. We did want to suggest that, yes, the rules cover natural healing. Not relevant to the adventure, though. 
• No, you can't cast someone else's spell if you have their focus. You don't know the spell. Not everyone wants tattoos, either... it's a question of personal preference. You don't need to see the focus, just concentrate on it.  
• The core rules cover proportional healing rates... we wanted to keep math simple.  
• Yes, you can use Meditate repeatedly to "speed recover" magic points. That's one of the things the skill is for. 
• The description of Farsee is clearer in the core rules. 
• Visibility - if you can't see a spirit, you can't cast spells against it. It is however subject to the potential magic aspect of a physical attack once it's visible. Again, we didn't want to go into too much depth here, as fighting Lannike is an edge case. 
• You need to pick whether you're in spirit or physical combat. The downloadable QS character also comes with more rules for spirits and spirit combat. 

Sean_RDP

• As Jeff mentioned, Animal Lore is a broader and simultaneously deeper topic... the adventurers know the characteristics of their herd animals, not visual identification of random other creatures. 

theWoozle

• That depends on the GM style. Some people ask for declarations, then resolve actions (the suggested system) and others just start a count-up. I tend to do the latter once people know the system. 
• The DEX ranks are there for spellcasting, and the SIZ rank was put there so that if for some reason someone uses a weapon not on their sheet, the GM could figure out the proper SR without too much hassle. 
• If an NPC doesn't have a Base SR, it was basically because it wasn't viewed as essential, or could be easily derived through consulting another NPC or adventurer. Might have been an oversight, as well. These things happen. 

Jonas

• Carthalo has Spirit Combat 95%. His fetch has 80%. 
• Yanioth is an apprentice priestess, not a priestess. It says so on the top line of her adventurer sheet. She follows the rules for a starting character. She's also a bit arrogant and inflates her credentials a bit in her intro. 
• She's middling with a bow (has provided fire support in every session I've run of this), great with magic, and her role as a representative of an Earth goddess has ALWAYS been highly useful in the resolution of the encounter with a cthonic daughter of Mharan Gor. 

theWoozle  

• The apprentice shaman character comes with spirit combat rules. Basically it's an opposed roll, and winner does damage. In the core rules, there's more info and options. 

stypoa 

• If you're not engaged in combat, it's usually easier to fire arrows quickly at a foe than it is to attempt the ongoing set of maneuvers, steps, positioning, etc. that represent an attack. The description of combat at the top of page 13, column 1, should indicate how much is happening during an actual melee.
• Yes, crits and specials include the damage modifier. 
• Yes, in some cases, in the quickstart you will do more damage with one than the other. The core rules contain different special results per weapon damage type, ranging from impales, crushing, to slashing. 
• You can't pick which result you achieve, any more than you can choose to fumble versus failing. 
• Good catch with the shield and projectile weapons. The correct usage is in the core rulebook. 
• I'm not sure where you're getting that a knockback is a bull rush. You don't need to make any movement to attempt a knockback, which is the definitive characteristic of a bull rush. 
• In trying to keep things simple with thrown weapons, they've perhaps been made too complex. We'll examine the core rules and make sure it's clear. 
• Yes, Rune spells evoke the gods and the Runes themselves, and activate at the speed of thought. They go first (bigger Rune spells taking slightly longer). I'm not sure what's unclear about "Rune spells always take effect at strike rank 1." 
• It will be difficult to "remove reference to illusion spells" as the booklet is in print.  Fixable for the download, though. 
• The "2nd kind of meditation" is the same as the 1st kind. See the description of the skill on page 12. The description at the top of page 20 is explicitly talking about its role in restoring magic points. 
• Earthpower, like most Rune spells, lasts 15 minutes. The top of page 21 says "Unless the spell description says otherwise, all Rune spells are passive with a duration of 15 minutes". The extra POW goes away at the end of the spell's duration. It's not a permanent thing. Not having a D after the spell description is an oversight, though, and it's clearer in the core rules. 
• Darkwalk... not sure what's confusing about that. If you're outside the range, you're "visible", though you're likely still standing in shadow and/or darkness so you might be detected normally.
• Pathwatch is focused on the caster, as long as they're awake. 
• Spell Trading works for whatever Rune spells desired, as long as both parties agree. 
• Yes, elementals are very tough. Their summon costs and the size of elementals available to each cult have been balanced since the QS was released. However, in the QS, players have discovered that the elementals are not the wisest choice to summon against a hungry Earth goddess. 
• Rock lizards have always had a DEX of 2d6+6, faster than humans on average (13 vs. 10.5). Cows, on the other hand, have DEX 2d6 (av. 7). The relative scarcity of food in the Badlands has driven the particular rock lizards to extraordinary behavior. 
• The base for Animal Lore is 05, representing general knowledge picked up from around the world. Only Vasana has any experience dealing with cavalry, and her Ride skill encompasses caring for her bison. 
• Sorala is a revolutionary, having taken part in mass combat on the front lines (a bonus to Battle came up in her character generation process). She's also widely read and has picked up a variety of skills through her studies. Farm was one of the ones she chose. 
• All but one of the sample adventurers are from the house playtest campaign, and they represent the core rules being used to create starting characters. 
• Vasana's Truestone isn't relevant to the particular encounter, admittedly, but it was included for flavor. 
• The storage point crystals came from background rolls. 

GamingGlen

• The core rules were anything but a simple cut-and-paste job. The sections represented span roughly 180 pages spanning 11 chapters in the core rules, condensed down to 24 pages +2 (for the downloadable spirit combat expansion). Some mistakes have been made, as the timeframe on this was quite brief, but it would have been an unimaginable luxury to merely drop the text from the core rulebook into the quickstart as-is. 
• See above about Sorala. They're from the house campaign and are as created using the core rules and player decisions. 
• Vasana's having the wrong rune is a mistake, and we'll fix it in the corebook and for future printings or downloads. 
• You can find, trade, or give away a spell matrix and use it, versus knowing it and having a personal focus. That's been the case since RQ2. 

 

 

 

 

Edited June 12, 2017 by Jason Durall

[Jason D]

New replies for comments that have come up since I started the above epic-length post: 

g33k

• You don't need all five pregens to succeed. You could even play it with as few as one or two, depending on how cautious they behave. In order of relevance/usefulness to the scenario, I list them as Harmast, Vasana, Yanioth, Vishi Dun (the shaman), and Vostor and Sorala tied for last place.
• The suggested minimum is a suggestion, not a requirement. 

Psullie

• Yes, assume 50/50 for any paired runes not described. 
• Harmast, as played, is a fascinating guy, proud yet pragmatic, a bit of a chip on his shoulder yet fully willing to cut a deal when necessary. Should he survive, he'll make a fine clan chieftain. In every version of the playtest I've run, he's instrumental in resolving the negotiations w. Idrima at the end.*

* None of my players have ever fought her, though to be fair, each group has had at least a few RQ/HQ players who know the setting well enough to know why it would be a bad idea. 

[MOB]

8 minutes ago, Jason Durall said:

In every version of the playtest I've run, he's instrumental in resolving the negotiations w. Idrima at the end.*

* None of my players have ever fought her, though to be fair, each group has had at least a few RQ/HQ players who know the setting well enough to know why it would be a bad idea. 

Interestingly, in both times I've been involved in a playtest, the player characters did fight Idrima, or at least started or provoked a fight and then very rapidly decided this was a bad idea and switched gears to negotiate. One group had several people who were Call of Cthulhu players, so they were especially jumpy. At the end, both groups commented that it was interesting and different that Idrima turned out to not to be "evil" per se.

[Psullie]

Thanks Jason, so are the pre-gens representative of newly rolled characters?  

[Jeff]

9 minutes ago, Psullie said:

Thanks Jason, so are the pre-gens representative of newly rolled characters?  

Actually most of them are actually player created (Harmast, Vasana, Yanioth, and Sorala are all actual player characters). I find players create more interesting adventurers than game designers and wanted to capture that in RQ.

[Eric Christian Berg]

4 hours ago, Jason Durall said:

I am not sure where you're getting the impression that "engaged toons basically don't get to move at all". Could you provide an actual text reference to that? The rules state pretty clearly that "Those moving up to half of their usual movement allowance may also participate in melee, cast a spell, etc." 

I believe he's referring to page 8 under Movement, the last sentence of which reads, "An adventurer engaged in melee cannot move until disengaged."

I am also confused as to whether a point of MOV equals 1m or 3m. That section seems to suggest it is 1m while in combat and 3m when not engaged, but that doesn't jibe with what you quote later where folks in combat can move half their movement.

Edited June 12, 2017 by Eric Christian Berg

[g33k]

4 hours ago, Jason Durall said:

Vasana's having the wrong rune is a mistake, and we'll fix it in the corebook and for future printings or downloads. 

Any chance of getting this corrected in D/L'able version (and any other player-facing bits -- PC sheets, player-hand-outs, etc)...

before Free RPG Day ?   

Edited June 12, 2017 by g33k
spacing

[Jason D]

1 hour ago, Eric Christian Berg said:

I believe he's referring to page 8 under Movement, the last sentence of which reads, "An adventurer engaged in melee cannot move until disengaged."

I am also confused as to whether a point of MOV equals 1m or 3m. That section seems to suggest it is 1m while in combat and 3m when not engaged, but that doesn't jibe with what you quote later where folks in combat can move half their movement.

Gotcha. In this case, "move" means non-combat movement. You can take half your movement rate during combat as part of that combat, but you're still technically "engaged" in combat. 

1 MOV equals 1 meter when in combat (so you can move up to 4 meters in combat for free,8 meters doing nothing but moving) versus out-of-combat movement, when you can move up to 24 meters.