From: owner-rq-rules-digest To: rq-rules-digest@hops.wharton.upenn.edu Subject: RQ Rules Digest: V1 #58 Reply-To: rq-rules Errors-To: owner-rq-rules-digest Precedence: bulk Content-Return: Prohibited Return-Path: owner-rq-rules-digest RQ Rules Digest: Wednesday, 1 February 1995 Volume 01 : Number 058 RULES OF THE ROAD 1. Do not include large sections of a message in your reply. Especially not to say "Yeah, I agree." Those who do will be lynched. 2. Use an appropriate Subject line. RQR: will be prepended to it. 3. Do not engage in a point-by-point analysis or rebuttal of another person's message. It is too confusing for others to follow, qualifies as nit-picking, and it usually leads to flame wars. 4. There is no number 4. TABLE OF CONTENTS Brent Michael Krupp RQR: Combat Skill Reduction SPerrin@aol.com RQR: Sorcery skills Mustafa Unlu RQR: Dump All Points... Loren Miller RQR: Dump All Points... J. Eric Baldeschwieler RQR: ok, how does one get RQ4 David Dunham via RadioMail RQR: Steve wants to change everything SPerrin@aol.com RQR: Suggested Changes Steven E Barnes RQR: Steve wants to change everything Andrew Joelson RQR: Combat Skill Reduction Brent Michael Krupp RQR: Suggested Changes SPerrin@aol.com RQR: Steve's "Mandate" ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Brent Michael Krupp Date: Wed, 1 Feb 1995 10:45:11 -0800 (PST) Subject: Re: RQR: Combat Skill Reduction On Wed, 1 Feb 1995 SPerrin@aol.com wrote: > A long perceived problem with the RQ rules has been that they encourage > players to use every weapon, "just to get a check mark," even though there is > no good reason to do so. This is a problem with players and referees, not rules. If a GM lets his players get away with abuses like this, it is not the fault of RQ. Simply insert a line or two in the gamemaster section encouraging GMs to exercise control over their games. > How about we have one set of basic combat skills. Successful use of any > weapons (perhaps in categories like missile, thrown, and melee) allows an > experience roll with all weapons, on the theory that an insight about the use > of one weapon could, in fact, apply to all weapons. Hmm, that's not entirely > clear because I was coming at it from two directions... > > Too complex? Too hard to describe? An elegant solution? (I, of course, > prefer the last response, but I can deal with any.) It sounds like change just for change's sake. Brent Krupp (fletcher@u.washington.edu) "In the faculty of writing nonsense, stupidity is no match for genius." -- Walter Bagehot, 1826-1877 ------------------------------ From: SPerrin@aol.com Date: Wed, 1 Feb 1995 14:04:56 -0500 Subject: Re: RQR: Sorcery skills Quick background here: The plan (okayed by Greg, waiting for AH OK) is have two books--a RQ rules book with no world connection, and a Glorantha book that adapts these rules for Glorantha. The sorcery rules I postulated would be for "generic" sorcerers. Tweaking would have to take place for sorcerous "traditions." Sorcerers can start with a higher percentage in the Sorcery Skill. We can say that INT+POW x 3 (just to take a number out of the air) is the start of the Skill, no apprentice is allowed to seriously practice without the initial training that takes him to that point. Also, the levels of powers do not have to be as constrained as they are in RQ3. The simple 1st level of a damage spell can be intensity 1d6, with a range of 10 meters, a Duration of 1 Turn, and and Area of Effect of 1 Hit Location. This could even be the "zero setting," the setting that takes no reduction at all to the Sorcery chance. Need playtesting? You bet. Get to it. CORPS? Never heard of it, but great minds (he said modestly)... Cumulative effect would just be a matter of adding the various threshold results together. The guidelines I gave are really rough, I haven't played them yet. Other versions are gratefully accepted. I have a hard time justifying the Loss of Spell for a Time idea for a botched spell. I'd much rather strain the magic throwing capacity (for a period of time of course, not permanently). It may even be necessary to resurrect Magic Points as the "Magic" of the character, which is reduced with botches while POW stays the same. The idea, though, is for actual POW to (temporarily again) be reduced with failure so that a person becomes less magically able. I also was using (POW - Intensity) x 10 with the original idea that the multiplier would be reduced by failure (x9, then x8, etc.). POW x 5 has the problem that small-POW characters are essentially driven out of the game because they can never use magic successfully. However, keeping the multiplier the same and reducing the POW has a simpler feel to it. Sorry, ideas are my business. Check some of these ideas out and see what you think... Steve Perrin ------------------------------ From: Mustafa Unlu Date: Wed, 1 Feb 1995 14:15:02 -0500 (EST) Subject: Re: RQR: Dump All Points... Hi, I am new to this list. Everyone seems to be talking about RQ4 draft rules. I presume these are different from currently published rules? Are they available by any public means or propietary to playtesters? I would like to see them and contribute to the discussion. Please answer by private e-mail to cut noise on the d-list. Thanks in advance, M. ------------------------------ From: Loren Miller Date: Wed, 1 Feb 1995 14:21:04 -0500 (EST) Subject: Re: RQR: Dump All Points... I know the questioner asked for private replies, but since this is the kind of thing that lots of people might want to know I'll put it on the list instead. The RQ4 draft rules are only available to official playtest groups. So unless you can find someone in your area who is in on the RQ4 playtest you can't get them. - -- +++++++++++++++++++++++23 Loren Miller "I don't have to practice what I preach 'cause I'm not the kind of person I'm preaching to!" The Book of The Subgenius ------------------------------ From: "J. Eric Baldeschwieler" Date: Wed, 1 Feb 1995 11:25:41 -0800 Subject: RQR: ok, how does one get RQ4 All this talk about polishing the RQ4 rules is kind of frustrating for those of us without a copy to look at. Is there any way to get a copy of them? ------------------------------ From: David Dunham (via RadioMail) Date: Wed, 1 Feb 1995 11:31:55 -0800 Subject: RQR: Re: Steve wants to change everything Steve Perrin asked >I would like people to take another look at the Duration, Intensity, Range >rules for RQ sorcery (If I'm missing something, it's because I'm at work and >my RQ4 rules are at home). My own feeling is that they can be subsumed into >one Sorcery Skill roll, and the (level?/power?) of each aspect of the spell >can be dealt with by subtracting 5% increments from the skill roll (or, just >to make things really chancy, figure out how many levels of power are going >into the spell [3 levels of intensity, 2 of duration, 4 of range, and 3 of >Area of Effect] and roll that many d6 [12d6] to see what must be subtracted >from the Sorcery Skill.). This encourages sorcerers to get well over 100% >with their Skill to be really magnificent. That might work, but it doesn't fit in as well with the Gloranthan cultural dictates that only certain people are allowed to learn sorcery skills. I can't imagine why you want to add another die roll to the game, one that requires adding up lots of dice at that. > The RQ4 rules drop Fatigue Points (yea!) and put in an optional Fatigue >Roll. Why don't we eliminate Hit Points and Magic Points, too? Short answer: because then it wouldn't be RuneQuest. Nobody used Fatigue Points, so those could come and go at will. >Hit Points > This characteristic is still figured, as Health. From the character's >Health we determine the Wound Thresholds of each Hit Location. In combat, we >compare the damage that gets through (yes, we still have damage points) the >armor against the Threshold. Exactly what happens to the Hit Location depends >on the multiple of the Threshold that is obtained by the damage. > Up to and including the Threshold -- location bruised/cut, vital >locations unphased, arms and legs cause reductions to appropriate skills >(including combat skills) > More than 1x, up to 2x Threshold --Location stunned, unusable for the >next turn, reduction in appropriate skills %iles > More than 2x, up to 3x Threhold -- Location useless for fight > More than 3x Threshold -- Location maimed, vital locations mean death >either instantly or shortly Health? That hasn't been a RQ term up to now. HP is the average of SIZ and CON. And I don't see how your system is greatly different -- are you simply saying that nobody dies from gradual blood loss, and that combats get slower because everyone's skills go down as they get bruised locations until they can no longer hit each other (probably realistic, BTW)? > This means that Healing would have to change, probably to a simple >reduction of threshold effects. And you'd need new rules for stuff like drowning, that effects HP directly. >Magic Points > > Essentially, we go from a spell point system to a klutz system. Failing >to make the roll means a temporary reduction of POW. > Spirit Magic -- starts off at (POW - Intensity of spell) x 10. The usual >rules of 96-99 mean failure and 00 is fumble apply. A failure means the >reduction of POW by 1, a Fumble means the reduction of POW by 1d6+1. So someone with a POW of 12 can cast Heal 1 almost all day? (Note that in RQ3, you can theoretically reattach severed limbs with Heal 1.) > See what happens when you let the original designer into the process? So what's your charter from Avalon Hill? Is this still supposed to be compatible with all the published material? >A long perceived problem with the RQ rules has been that they encourage >players to use every weapon, "just to get a check mark," even though there is >no good reason to do so. RQ4 had various approaches to this (not all of them good), mostly based on limiting the number of checks you could roll for. I tend to prefer the Pendragon approach that you only receive the check when the GM tells you it's OK. > How about we have one set of basic combat skills. Successful use of any >weapons (perhaps in categories like missile, thrown, and melee) allows an >experience roll with all weapons, on the theory that an insight about the use >of one weapon could, in fact, apply to all weapons. So why not allow successful use of your brain to allow a check in any skill? Steve, these would all be much better ideas if you were designing a new game. I don't think they work as well in a game called RuneQuest. Bryan J. Maloney replied >I suggest that the success chance for Spirit magic still be made POW*5 (with >your minus of intensity). Thanks a lot Bryan, give my 1 POW character absolutely no chance of casting any spell at all. (I could be misremembering this, it might have been POW 2 after a Divine Intervention; he managed to get it back up thanks to having a magic crystal.) POW*5 is really too low as it stands. The average character fails to cast a spell almost half the time, which isn't much fun -- especially since he then loses MP. David Dunham * Software Designer * Pensee Corporation Voice/Fax: 206 783 7404 * AppleLink: DDUNHAM * Internet: ddunham@radiomail.net "I say we should listen to the customers and give them what they want." "What they want is better products for free." --Scott Adams ------------------------------ From: SPerrin@aol.com Date: Wed, 1 Feb 1995 14:29:48 -0500 Subject: Re: RQR: Suggested Changes Brent, I can understand your objections. Much of what I'm proposing is to get the ideas out there and see what everyone thinks. Most of the ideas are, in fact, being done so that someone can look at the characters from previous supplements and make an easy conversion without changing any number, just how the numbers are used. The RQ4 rules make lots of changes to RQ3, but you don't seem to be denigrating them for that. What's an RQ3 player supposed to do when his Fatigue stat suddenly disappears? (Assuming, of course, that he ever paid attention to this very unpopular addition to the rules.) Would my changes drastically change the game? I don't know. I hope people with an ongoing RQ campaign will try them out and see (1) how drastic a difference they make and (2) what their players think about the changes. Some of what I'm doing here is attempting to attain an "elegance of style," by unifying design concepts. Maybe this means I have my head up my ass and shouldn't be messing with a proven system. All I know is that the system is not selling at a plateau that Avalon Hill likes. I also know that game systems rarely sell games. Oh, and yes, Mike McGloin and Oliver J. still have the rewrite contract with Avalon Hill and, one supposes, the final say as to what actually goes into the rules. Pleasure talking to you. Steve Perrin ------------------------------ From: akuma@netcom.com (Steven E Barnes) Date: Wed, 1 Feb 1995 11:49:43 -0800 Subject: Re: RQR: Re: Steve wants to change everything >Steve Perrin asked >I would like people to take another look at the Duration, Intensity, Range >rules for RQ sorcery (If I'm missing something, it's because I'm at work and >[etc...] >That might work, but it doesn't fit in as well with the Gloranthan cultural >dictates that only certain people are allowed to learn sorcery skills. I disagree. I agree that in some cultures, a priviledged caste gets better sorcery training than others. Why this has to have the label "Intensity" is not clear to me. Those training restrictions are game system artifacts, and merely aproximations of cultural restrictions. >> The RQ4 rules drop Fatigue Points (yea!) and put in an optional Fatigue >>Roll. Why don't we eliminate Hit Points and Magic Points, too? > >Short answer: because then it wouldn't be RuneQuest. "It's just a nutty idea..." - N. Gingrich :-) >>A long perceived problem with the RQ rules has been that they encourage >>players to use every weapon, "just to get a check mark," even though there is >>no good reason to do so. > >RQ4 had various approaches to this (not all of them good), mostly based on >limiting the number of checks you could roll for. I tend to prefer the >Pendragon approach that you only receive the check when the GM tells you >it's OK. I prefer a system where the checks you get is not related to who performs the most actions in a game. This reward mechanism is responsible for both "skill-check frenzy", and also situations where the skill-god makes all the rolls (he is best, after all) and walks away with all the checks. Also, I've long favored consolidating weapon expertice into a smaller number of skills. Oh yeah- POW checks must go! - -steve ------------------------------ From: joelsona@cpdmfg.cig.mot.com (Andrew Joelson) Date: Wed, 1 Feb 1995 13:55:35 -0600 Subject: RQR: Re: Combat Skill Reduction > A long perceived problem with the RQ rules has been that they encourage > players to use every weapon, "just to get a check mark," even though > there is no good reason to do so. Sorry, Steve, but you're making a mountain out of a molehill. This problem cropped up in my campaign and ended when the judge said, "No one in their right mind would really do that, knock it off!" Andrew Joelson ------------------------------ From: Brent Michael Krupp Date: Wed, 1 Feb 1995 11:59:22 -0800 (PST) Subject: Re: RQR: Suggested Changes On Wed, 1 Feb 1995 SPerrin@aol.com wrote: > I can understand your objections. Much of what I'm proposing is to get the > ideas out there and see what everyone thinks. Most of the ideas are, in fact, > being done so that someone can look at the characters from previous > supplements and make an easy conversion without changing any number, just how > the numbers are used. Okay, good then. It was hard to tell from your tone how final these ideas were, or how much control you would have over insuring that they appeared in RQ4, irrespective of objections. Keeping backwards compatibility as a goal is a SUPERB idea, btw. > The RQ4 rules make lots of changes to RQ3, but you don't seem to be > denigrating them for that. What's an RQ3 player supposed to do when his > Fatigue stat suddenly disappears? (Assuming, of course, that he ever paid > attention to this very unpopular addition to the rules.) Because it was so unpopular, and minor to boot, it can be safely altered. But HP and MP are pretty darn central to the whole basic role-playing thing, aren't they? > All I know is that the system is not selling at a plateau that Avalon > Hill likes. That's because of their mishandling of marketing and support of the game for lo this many years. Hacking the rules is probably irrelevant to this issue (for all that we might argue about it). > I also know that game systems rarely sell games. Indeed, but I'd bet that a bad game system can prevent sales. Also, alienating your "hard-core" of RQ3ers is probably not good for helping the new rules succeed. No, the changes may not do that, but the bigger the change to the "flavour" of the rules, the riskier it gets. HP and MP seem pretty central to the RQ "look-and-feel". > Oh, and yes, Mike McGloin and Oliver J. still have the rewrite contract > with Avalon Hill and, one supposes, the final say as to what actually goes > into the rules. Well, last time (the old playtest list) they showed a remarkable disregard for what the online playtesters said anyway, so why would this time be any different? I guess I really shouldn't argue with you. Brent Krupp (fletcher@u.washington.edu) "In the faculty of writing nonsense, stupidity is no match for genius." -- Walter Bagehot, 1826-1877 ------------------------------ From: SPerrin@aol.com Date: Wed, 1 Feb 1995 15:50:56 -0500 Subject: RQR: Re: Steve's "Mandate" A few further clarifications: As I said before, Oliver J. and Mike McG. are still the refurbishers of record on the RuneQuest rules. I'm tossing these things out into the discussion on a "wouldn't it be neat" and "but what if we did..." basis. I would really like to see these things _tested_ and get some results back. My own life is sufficiently tied up at the moment that my opportunities to test things are virtually nonexistent. Most of my local players who play any RuneQuest at all play RQ2.3 or so and haven't really played in years. And yes, Dave, this could all end up being "Perrin's new game, not RuneQuest." But, new systems don't necessarily sell (they almost necessarily do not sell) and it might help my cash flow (via Chaosium royalties) if they got accepted into RuneQuest and the game took off. But mostly I am tossing all this stuff out to you guys because I love to tinker. BTW, both Oliver and Mike have told me several times that the RQ4 rules have undergone massive changes since their dispersal last year mostly through commentary from the Internet. So some of you out there have been heard, though they may not have been very good about telling you so. My semi-official contact with the project is as editor of the Glorantha book (a situation that has not been okayed by AH, yet). As such, my main function will be to organize everyone's contributions, massage the words-phrasing if they need it and (the biggest part) get it past Greg S.'s approval. However, as a dyed-in-the-wool game mechanic, I intend to say lots about the rules... And is everyone here familiar with the "Runepower Pool" proposal that would have Rune Priests sacrificing POW to the god and then just using whatever spells he or she needs until the Pool runs out? I like the idea (and came up with it independently, as a matter of fact) but current theory (as of RuneQuest Con 2) is that this might be part of the "generic" rules, with sacrificing for specific spells still being part of Glorantha. Oh, and Dave, if I didn't manage to say it then, I enjoyed the run at RQCon 2. ------------------------------ End of RQ Rules Digest: V1 #58 ****************************** This is the bottom of the RuneQuest Rules Digest. RuneQuest is a trademark of Avalon Hill, and Glorantha is a trademark of Chaosium. With the exception of previously copyrighted material, unless specified otherwise all text in this digest is copyright by the author or authors, with rights granted to copy for personal use, to excerpt in reviews and replies, and to archive unchanged for electronic retrieval. Send electronic mail to Majordomo@hops.wharton.upenn.edu with "help" in the body of the message for subscription information on this and other mailing lists.