Could you base a d&d campaign in the 1800's what do you think.
K_O_...@webtv.net
With usual (Unless it's +1 that monster wont be hit! Natural 20 of
course always hits). But anyway the cost of ammo could be high. limited
supply. How would you make a gun crazed D&D world based in the lawless
1800's fair?
GoldRushG
>1800's fair?
Make sure all the PCs have guns? :/
Mark @ Gold Rush Games ICQ: #9614976; http://members.aol.com/goldrushg
San Angelo: City of Heroes nominated for Origins Award - Best RPG Supplement!
Usagi Yojimbo RPG nominated for Origins Award - Best RPG!
Dragonscroll
K_O_...@webtv.net wrote:
> Could it work? Guns of course come to mind in this sort of campaign.
> With usual (Unless it's +1 that monster wont be hit! Natural 20 of
> course always hits). But anyway the cost of ammo could be high.
limited
> 1800's fair?
I recommend taking a good look at the Call of Cthulhu system for
information on this. It has a surprising array of guns and the game
still manages to be very, very unfair AGAINST the players - mainly
because the "monsters" of this game can generally laugh off shots that
would certainly kill a man, or at least use their supernatural powers in
such a way as to make the gun a moot weapon.
Guns in any genre are extremely deadly - to a human. So if you are
planning to have the PCs up against humans primarily, here are some
suggestions:
1. Make the guns in the game very inaccurate (this is somewhat
historically accurate) and apply to-hit penalties.
2. Give the "law" a heavy presence in the game, such that shooting
someone cannot be easily done without being arrested.
3. Modify your system similar to Call of Cthulhu where the damage a gun
does decreases with range.
Any other ideas?
James
Dragonscroll
--
Dragonscroll is your source for fantasy, sci fi and RPGs at 20-40% off!
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--== Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/ ==--
---Share what you know. Learn what you don't.---
L. MacQuarrie
Gazeteer, I think) - it's an AD&D game set in the 1800's,
with new character classes, extensive gun rules, and
a backdrop of secret societies. Yes, guns can be *very*
deadly....
Sidhain
have the likes of villainsous secret societies, Dracula, other vampires etc.
The game actually shows just how flexible AD&D can be creating a good horror
environment (which is far better than standard Ravenloft.--The modules were
fantastic, the world just lacked the feel of the modules and made itself
into a sort of Dark Forgotten Realms but I digress.) The MoRD world is
Horror, it has much in vain with the entire era of "gothic" novels (and no I
don't mean the modern pseudo goth stories) but such things as Varnae the
Vampire, Dracula, The strange case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hide, The Invisible
Man etc...and the original Camarilla story (guess what you people of WW
interest the Camarilla is stolen from a vampire story that predates gaming
by many many years, hell Vampires predate WW purile dreck.)
lam...@my-dejanews.com
Dragonscroll <c...@dragonscroll.com> wrote:
> In article <2677-37...@newsd-141.iap.bryant.webtv.net>,
> K_O_...@webtv.net wrote:
> > With usual (Unless it's +1 that monster wont be hit! Natural 20 of
> > course always hits). But anyway the cost of ammo could be high.
> limited
> > supply. How would you make a gun crazed D&D world based in the
lawless
> > 1800's fair?
>
> information on this. It has a surprising array of guns and the game
> still manages to be very, very unfair AGAINST the players - mainly
> because the "monsters" of this game can generally laugh off shots that
> would certainly kill a man, or at least use their supernatural powers
in
> such a way as to make the gun a moot weapon.
>
> Guns in any genre are extremely deadly - to a human. So if you are
> planning to have the PCs up against humans primarily, here are some
> suggestions:
Other than rate of fire black powder guns are no deadlier than longbows
or crossbows. If you buy the D&D hit point system the only reason to
make guns deadlier is that modern perceptions say they are deadlier.
Guns are low accuracy, and low reliability unless you are using sealed
brass cartrige amunition, which dependes on the year in the 1800's.
> 1. Make the guns in the game very inaccurate (this is somewhat
> historically accurate) and apply to-hit penalties.
>
> 2. Give the "law" a heavy presence in the game, such that shooting
> someone cannot be easily done without being arrested.
>
> 3. Modify your system similar to Call of Cthulhu where the damage a
gun
> does decreases with range.
Some range penalty is a requirement.
DougL
Brandon Blackmoor
Hash: SHA1
Sidhain wrote in message
<7hn20e$9u0$1...@ash.prod.itd.earthlink.net>...
>
>Man etc...and the original Camarilla story (guess what you people
of WW
>interest the Camarilla is stolen from a vampire story that predates
gaming
>by many many years, hell Vampires predate WW purile dreck.)
Are you by any chance referring to Carmilla? "Carmilla" is the name
of a vampire (one of the first of the modern "bad girls", actually).
"Camarilla" is a word referring to a secret cabal (
http://www.dictionary.com/cgi-bin/dict.pl?db=web1913&term=Camarilla&c
onfig=define ).
BBlackmoor
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m
regardless of the game system or era. just as the longsword is
available in a shop on the street in a typical dnd world, so would
guns in a 19th century setting. this would mean that not only pc's
would be armed with guns, but npc's would have equal chances to be so
armed. in fact, if you chose to make them rare it wouldn't matter, as
long as the ease or difficulty in aquiring them is the same for all,
and not just a privilege of the pc's. that is one form of balance.
combat balance is a seperate issue. if you apply the same damage
rolls for the gun as for a sword, you maintain balance without
changing a thing. if you don't find this palatable, you can increase
the damage of the gun in step with increases in toughness in the
beastiary. this has the same effect, but feels different. if this
remains unacceptable, then you must consider changing the balance of
the game. if the gun is viewed as a superior weapon, then as the
effectiveness increases, so does the difficulty in managing combat
balance.
mike
lam...@my-dejanews.com
m wrote:
> fairness is generally based on equality. this would seem to be true
> regardless of the game system or era. just as the longsword is
> available in a shop on the street in a typical dnd world, so would
> guns in a 19th century setting. this would mean that not only pc's
> would be armed with guns, but npc's would have equal chances to be so
> armed. in fact, if you chose to make them rare it wouldn't matter, as
> long as the ease or difficulty in aquiring them is the same for all,
> and not just a privilege of the pc's. that is one form of balance.
> combat balance is a seperate issue. if you apply the same damage
> rolls for the gun as for a sword, you maintain balance without
> changing a thing. if you don't find this palatable, you can increase
> the damage of the gun in step with increases in toughness in the
> beastiary. this has the same effect, but feels different. if this
> remains unacceptable, then you must consider changing the balance of
> the game. if the gun is viewed as a superior weapon, then as the
> effectiveness increases, so does the difficulty in managing combat
> balance.
American Civil War casulties ran about 6 to 1 wounded to killed.
If you assume the average soldier is level zero or level one, with
average con, what does that say about gun damage? Sounds like a
single die two could be too high! A die eight is probably far too
high.
Of course real casulties are disabled and/or in nead of medical care
long before you get to a mortal wound, but that is just as true with
the long sword, and ACW battlefield surgery is little better than
Roman Republic battlefield surgery so it is just as much of a
problem either way.
There is no good reason to give guns a damage even close to that of
a long sword. Over the course of a minute a long sword at short range
can do far more damage to an unarmored foe than one black powder
bullet. (Well, actually they can both kill you dead dead dead, but
the sword could go on to inflict another half dozen mortal wounds
after the first.)
In practice the use of guns (which seem familiar) breaks suspension
of disbelief in the D&D hit point system for some people, but that
problem is there with arrows and falls in the normal game, some
people are simply able to ignore it there.
m
1880's and 90's when more reliable cartridge ammunition and better
firearms - maybe most especially repeating rifles - made guns far more
deadly than in the civil war. the exponential increase in the
technology would make the selection of era a very important decision.
mike
Kerry Harrison
With usual (Unless it's +1 that monster wont be hit! Natural 20 of
course always hits). But anyway the cost of ammo could be high. limited
supply. How would you make a gun crazed D&D world based in the lawless
1800's fair?
Yeah, but I think you'd be better off using the Alternity rules for such a
campaign myself.
Kerry
lam...@my-dejanews.com
m wrote:
> you have some good points. i suppose i was thinking of more like the
> 1880's and 90's when more reliable cartridge ammunition and better
> firearms - maybe most especially repeating rifles - made guns far more
> deadly than in the civil war. the exponential increase in the
> technology would make the selection of era a very important decision.
[SNIP]
Even then, look at the wounds to kills rate for other actions, or for
modern urban life. Heavy machine gun bullets are still quite often
survived. If I go down to the local court-house and read the citations
on the walls I can find people who fought on heroically and effectively
with three or four bullet wounds from heavy rifles or machine guns.
Maybe they were level 2 fighters with above average con.
Seriously, a high powered modern fire arm is probably still only a d4
or so per bullet in D&D terms.
There is a problem with rate of fire, I can put out a lot of shots in
a one minute round. If this is a problem shorten the round to six
seconds or so. Or remember that large amounts of high caliber ammo is
heavy and awkward to carry.
Look in standard D&D a relatively low level fighter, bound and
helpless, is many minutes work for a headsman with an axe. This is
because all the weapons are scaled to kill a level one fighter in
light armor at a not unreasonable rate. It breaks down in other
situations UNLESS you accept that it is just the will of the gods,
or a law of nature, that hero's are amazingly resistant to damage.
Apply this same logic to guns, their effectiveness should be scaled
to make them match reality against a level one fighter who is skilled
at ducking and taking cover, or against a level zero who is just
standing there. Thus they should be likely, but NOT sure kills
against a level zero with one damage roll. i.e. a die four or so.
Of course if you do not shorten the combat round the dozen or so
bullets I put in the air still add up to a lot of ranged damage, this
is like giving everyone a high level wizards magic missiles spell,
reusable (Except that it does not work vs monsters who are imune
to non magic damage). And this results in some balance problems unless
you give the orks guns of their own, and insist that non humaniod
monsters who ARE vulnerable to guns all have high move silently and
hide in shadows skills.
wretc...@my-dejanews.com
lam...@my-dejanews.com wrote:
> Seriously, a high powered modern fire arm is probably still only a d4
> or so per bullet in D&D terms.
Unless those bullets happen to be Black Talon...
Brandon Blackmoor
Hash: SHA1
wretc...@my-dejanews.com wrote in message
<7ih0g9$qke$1...@nnrp1.deja.com>...
>
>Unless those bullets happen to be Black Talon...
If a cartridge or a weapon became more lethal by being vilified by
the media and politicians, the Black Talon, the Uzi, and the AK-47
would be the deadliest weapons on Earth.
In the real world, Black Talon rounds are not magic, and aren't
significantly more or less lethal than any other frangible or
hollowpoint round.
A good resource for ballistic information is
http://www.greent.com/40Page/front.htm .
BBlackmoor
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nos...@myplace.net
>
>wretc...@my-dejanews.com wrote in message <7ih0g9$qke$1...@nnrp1.deja.com>...
>>
>>Unless those bullets happen to be Black Talon...
>
>If a cartridge or a weapon became more lethal by being vilified by
>the media and politicians, the Black Talon, the Uzi, and the AK-47
>would be the deadliest weapons on Earth.
>
>In the real world, Black Talon rounds are not magic, and aren't
>significantly more or less lethal than any other frangible or
>hollowpoint round.
For years now we've made jokes about a "Hollywood RPG", where the damage
a weapon did was based entirely on its reputation: A Katana or Shuriken
would do lots and lots of damage, much like the weapons cited above...
wretc...@my-deja.com
nos...@myplace.net wrote:
> For years now we've made jokes about a "Hollywood RPG", where the
damage
> a weapon did was based entirely on its reputation: A Katana or
Shuriken
> would do lots and lots of damage, much like the weapons cited above...
Try HKAT. Bruce Lee punching does more damage than an Uzi. To a
certain extent D&D does this with its worship of swords (75% of all
magical weapons are some type of sword. Damage tables seem to be set up
so that people will pick swords more than any weapon). I'd wager any
game that uses hit points (ack! classes and levels are considered
archaic now, why can't we shake hit points?!).
Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
wretc...@my-deja.com
> <7ih0g9$qke$1...@nnrp1.deja.com>...
> >
> >Unless those bullets happen to be Black Talon...
>
> If a cartridge or a weapon became more lethal by being vilified by
> the media and politicians, the Black Talon, the Uzi, and the AK-47
> would be the deadliest weapons on Earth.
>
> In the real world, Black Talon rounds are not magic, and aren't
> significantly more or less lethal than any other frangible or
> hollowpoint round.
Which is to say they do a nice job of doing tissue damage to most things
you'll be shooting at.
Håken Lid
>In article <7jaarg$faj$1...@birch.prod.itd.earthlink.net>,
> nos...@myplace.net wrote:
>> For years now we've made jokes about a "Hollywood RPG", where the
>damage
>> a weapon did was based entirely on its reputation: A Katana or
>Shuriken
>> would do lots and lots of damage, much like the weapons cited above...
>
>Try HKAT. Bruce Lee punching does more damage than an Uzi.
A very funny game. You don't run out of bullets unless you fumble. And
the first shot after you reload deals more damage than regular shots.
Haaken
Trent Redfield
The Ravenloft boxed set Masque of the Red Death is set in the 1890s.
It's set in Gothic Earth... the world of Dracula and Frankenstein. I
think it is one of the best things that TSR has done in the last few
years. I really enjoy playing and running Masque of the Red Death.
- Trent Redfield
Triad3204
> I'd wager any
>game that uses hit points (ack! classes and levels are considered
>archaic now, why can't we shake hit points?!).
Because no other damage system is a particularly marked improvement over hit
points -- except explicit hit location systems, and those generally suffer from
more complexity than most people are willing to put up with.
Justin Bacon
tr...@prairie.lakes.com
Trent Redfield
>wretc...@my-deja.com writes:
>> I'd wager any
>>game that uses hit points (ack! classes and levels are considered
>>archaic now, why can't we shake hit points?!).
>
>Because no other damage system is a particularly marked improvement >over hit points -- except explicit hit location systems, and those >generally suffer from more complexity than most people are willing to >put up with.
The Mutant Chronicles (MC) RPG (Target Games/Heartbreaker Hobbies)
uses a nice hit location system in combination with Body Points (BPs),
which are like hit points, but take into account the affect of being
hit in the head or the stomach. Many a MC character has died from one
bullet to the head. So far (luckily), none of mine have!
MC makes up for alot of the problems of hit points with a very simple
hit location chart. Check it out. I highly reccommend MC.
- Trent Redfield
Trent Redfield
Michael Dingler
> The Mutant Chronicles (MC) RPG (Target Games/Heartbreaker Hobbies)
> uses a nice hit location system in combination with Body Points (BPs),
> which are like hit points, but take into account the affect of being
> hit in the head or the stomach. Many a MC character has died from one
> bullet to the head. So far (luckily), none of mine have!
And I thought that a 'bullet to the brain' only makes you insane...
SCNR
...Michael...
Rick Cordes
Trent Redfield <pm3...@ssu.southwest.msus.edu> wrote:
>>>Triad3204 wrote: wretc...@my-deja.com writes:
>>>
>>> I'd wager any game that uses hit points (ack! classes and levels are
>>> considered archaic now, why can't we shake hit points?!).
>>
Hit locations should perhaps also join the dinosaurs. The purpose
of HLs, besides color, is to determine impairment. Impairments are then
expressed as penalties to one or more kinds of abilty. In all hit location
systems I've seen, there are effectively more hit locations than there are
kinds of impairment (I'm excluding systems with subsidary tables and
charts on the presumption these should are also be sleeping with the
fishes). The efficiency could be then, to generate the impairment directly,
rather than the hit location. When it is desired, the HL could be deduced
from the nature of the impairment and how it was inflicted. This is how
we do it, and it saves time, space, matter, and energy.
-Rick
Psychohist
Hit locations should perhaps also join the dinosaurs.
The purpose of HLs, besides color, is to determine
impairment.... The efficiency could be then, to generate
the impairment directly, rather than the hit location.
Of course, some of us like color in our dinosaurs ... er, RPGs.
Warren
Ed Chauvin IV
Cordes conspired to spread the following disinformation about Re: Hit
Points and Hit Locations [Mutant Chronicles] (Was Re: d&d campaign)
>In article <3760C1...@ssu.southwest.msus.edu>,
>Trent Redfield <pm3...@ssu.southwest.msus.edu> wrote:
>>>>Triad3204 wrote: wretc...@my-deja.com writes:
>>>>
>>>> I'd wager any game that uses hit points (ack! classes and levels are
>>>> considered archaic now, why can't we shake hit points?!).
>>>
>>...MC makes up for alot of the problems of hit points with a very simple
>>hit location chart. Check it out. I highly reccommend MC.
>
> Hit locations should perhaps also join the dinosaurs. The purpose
>of HLs, besides color, is to determine impairment. Impairments are then
>expressed as penalties to one or more kinds of abilty. In all hit location
>systems I've seen, there are effectively more hit locations than there are
>kinds of impairment (I'm excluding systems with subsidary tables and
>charts on the presumption these should are also be sleeping with the
>fishes). The efficiency could be then, to generate the impairment directly,
>rather than the hit location. When it is desired, the HL could be deduced
>from the nature of the impairment and how it was inflicted. This is how
>we do it, and it saves time, space, matter, and energy.
Have you taken a look at WFRP? There's 6 basic locations[1], with the
option of rolling on a critical hit table for a more specific[2]
result. The location is derived by reversing the to-hit roll (a d100
roll) and looking at a table that is repeated on the character sheets.
There was also a simpler table which only had death/no death results.
When we were playing regularly, everyone had the locations basically
memorized and we only used the specific tables at my (GM) discretion
(ie: only during the important battles). After using systems like
Aftermath this was much more enjoyable.
[1]: Head, Arm (L/R), Leg (L/R) and Body. What else do you need?
[2]: Actually more of a combined specific location and effect, such
as "The blow severs the target's head clean from the body, causing the
head to fly off and land 2d6 + 3' in a random direction."
Ed Chauvin IV
--
It is by caffeine alone I set my mind in motion.
It is by the Beans of Java that thoughts acquire speed,
the hands acquire shaking, the shaking becomes a warning.
It is by caffeine alone I set my mind in motion.
wretc...@my-deja.com
tria...@aol.com (Triad3204) wrote:
> Because no other damage system is a particularly marked improvement
> over hit
> points -- except explicit hit location systems, and those generally
> suffer from
> more complexity than most people are willing to put up with.
Why hit points though? The idea of whittling down the opponent lacks
the flair of back and forth looking for the vital opening that I deem
necessary in my games. I want heroes striking triumphant blows, not
death by paper cuts.
Determining the impairment of a non-lethal blow wouldn't take too much
effort by players and GM, even without a detailed location chart. Of
course that would be the kind of thing I'd run using logic rather than
charts anyway.
Supermouse
>Why hit points though? The idea of whittling down the opponent lacks
>the flair of back and forth looking for the vital opening that I deem
>necessary in my games. I want heroes striking triumphant blows, not
>death by paper cuts.
That's one of the things that the Storyteller system (though my use of
it is limited to Vampire) seems to me to do, though I hasten to add this
is purely IMHRO. A palpable hit can leave an opponent on their knees, or
out for the count, so between tougher fighters a lot of the action in
the games I've seen is trying to strike the telling blow. Those fights
tend to be tense, with lots of preamble, a few rounds of feinting and
blocks, and then a short one- or two-blow resolution.
Less tough characters, especially inept ones, seem to keep chipping at
each other ineffectually leaving the winner to be the last one who
actually falls over. And a fight between an inept and a highly ept is
very short and very humiliating, and there's very little preamble in
general, IME.
Having the fight being between vampires draws things out a little, as
vampires heal between rounds, but the general scenarios seem to be
similar for that sort of fight, too.
It's also a combat system for which it is very easy to pare down to the
minimum. As a roleplayer who doesn't much enjoy playing or running
combat, this is a definite plus, but I would bet that to the dedicated
enthusiast, or just those that like a touch of realism in a fight, it
has them tearing their hair out. Still, it works for me.
Cordially,
--
Supermouse
My name is Supermouse, Rodent of Rodents.
Look upon my cheese, ye mighty, and despair!
Psychohist
That's one of the things that the Storyteller system (though my use of
it is limited to Vampire) seems to me to do, though I hasten to add this
is purely IMHRO. A palpable hit can leave an opponent on their knees, or
out for the count, so between tougher fighters a lot of the action in
the games I've seen is trying to strike the telling blow.
My impression is a bit different. While the final blow is as you describe, the
key is to be the first to damage your opponent to the point where he has a
significant penalty. In a fight with a well matched opponent, this amount of
damage is an almost insurmountable handicap.
It's still a hit point system, though - just one in which everyone has the same
number of hit points.
Warren
Alain Lapalme
> In article <19990611061120...@ngol05.aol.com>,
> tria...@aol.com (Triad3204) wrote:
>
> > Because no other damage system is a particularly marked improvement
> > over hit
> > points -- except explicit hit location systems, and those generally
> > suffer from
> > more complexity than most people are willing to put up with.
>
> Why hit points though? The idea of whittling down the opponent lacks
> the flair of back and forth looking for the vital opening that I deem
> necessary in my games. I want heroes striking triumphant blows, not
> death by paper cuts.
I agree. However, I really haven't been able to find something which:1)
can provide suspense
2) is not too complex in terms of implementation
3) is fast
4) provides variety in terms of outcome
5) does not require the GM to be a combat expert
I've tried hit points (a la D&D), critical systems (Rolemaster), hit
locations, descriptive combat and many other approaches and they have
all failed in meeting even 4 out of 5 of the criteria I list above.
>
>
> Determining the impairment of a non-lethal blow wouldn't take too much
>
> effort by players and GM, even without a detailed location chart. Of
> course that would be the kind of thing I'd run using logic rather than
>
> charts anyway.
>
That's the easy part!
Alain
Rick Cordes
Ed Chauvin IV <edc...@newsguy.com> wrote:
>
>Along with other members of the ill reputed University of Hawaii, Rick
"Above all nations, humanity."
>>...In all hit location
>>systems I've seen, there are effectively more hit locations than there are
>>kinds of impairment (I'm excluding systems with subsidary tables and
>>charts on the presumption these should also be sleeping with the
>>fishes). The efficiency could be then, to generate the impairment directly,
>>rather than the hit location...
>
>Have you taken a look at WFRP? There's 6 basic locations[1], with the
>option of rolling on a critical hit table for a more specific[2]
>result. The location is derived by reversing the to-hit roll (a d100
>roll) and looking at a table that is repeated on the character sheets.
Warhammer? Not lately but what you describe sounds like what I
was eschewing. Six is more or less a typical minimum for HLs but without
recourse to tables, charts or further die rolls, by just reference
to the HLs, are six or more different kinds of impairment generated? If
not, then perhaps it's more reasonable to generate the impairments
directly.
>[1]: Head, Arm (L/R), Leg (L/R) and Body. What else do you need?
The point is, you may use these to generate impairment
indirectly but you need not. Rather than "I sprain my left little
toe, therefore, my movement is slowed my one hex per round," you
do it directly, "I incur a wound slowing my movement one hex per
round." Whatever die roll you use to generate the hit location,
instead, you use it to generate the impairment.
>[2]: Actually more of a combined specific location and effect, such
>as "The blow severs the target's head clean from the body, causing the
>head to fly off and land 2d6 + 3' in a random direction."
Color like this is sometimes of interest but usually of little
import tactically. (10' seems to be too far for an average unless you
are counting for roll, and even then best this eqation would only be
good for level ground.)
-Rick
Frank T. Sronce
>
> > Why hit points though? The idea of whittling down the opponent lacks
> > the flair of back and forth looking for the vital opening that I deem
> > necessary in my games. I want heroes striking triumphant blows, not
> > death by paper cuts.
>
> I agree. However, I really haven't been able to find something which:1)
> can provide suspense
> 2) is not too complex in terms of implementation
> 3) is fast
> 4) provides variety in terms of outcome
> 5) does not require the GM to be a combat expert
>
> I've tried hit points (a la D&D), critical systems (Rolemaster), hit
> locations, descriptive combat and many other approaches and they have
> all failed in meeting even 4 out of 5 of the criteria I list above.
>
Perhaps you should try Amber? Going diceless tends to meet all of the
above qualifications except the last one... :-)
Kiz
-but it should meet 4 out of _those_ 5.
>
> Alain
Neel Krishnaswami
Psychohist <psych...@aol.com> wrote:
>'Supermouse' posts, in part:
>
> That's one of the things that the Storyteller system (though my use of
> it is limited to Vampire) seems to me to do, though I hasten to add this
> is purely IMHRO. A palpable hit can leave an opponent on their knees, or
> out for the count, so between tougher fighters a lot of the action in
> the games I've seen is trying to strike the telling blow.
>My impression is a bit different. While the final blow is as you
>describe, the key is to be the first to damage your opponent to the
>point where he has a significant penalty. In a fight with a well
>matched opponent, this amount of damage is an almost insurmountable
>handicap.
This 'death spiral' effect is something that I've decided doesn't
belong in games with larger-than-life characters. I've come to believe
that the death spiral in _End of the Line_ is a design mistake;
unfortunately it's too late to change it. It's not a critical flaw,
though, because there's a fortune point mechanic to let PCs blunt its
impact.
Neel
Alain Lapalme
> Alain Lapalme wrote:
> >
>
> >
> > I agree. However, I really haven't been able to find something
> which:1)
> > can provide suspense
> > 2) is not too complex in terms of implementation
> > 3) is fast
> > 4) provides variety in terms of outcome
> > 5) does not require the GM to be a combat expert
> >
> > I've tried hit points (a la D&D), critical systems (Rolemaster), hit
>
> > locations, descriptive combat and many other approaches and they
> have
> > all failed in meeting even 4 out of 5 of the criteria I list above.
> >
>
> Perhaps you should try Amber? Going diceless tends to meet
> all of the
> above qualifications except the last one... :-)
>
I haven't used Amber but have have been running diceless games for close
to 5 years. Diceless gaming does meet requirements 1, 2, 3. I've been
able to handle 5. However, the problem has been that 4) has become
repetitive which has had a negative impact on 1). What hasn't helped
either is that combat is now so rare that I've probably lost the knack
of running a good physical combat scene (somehow a magical/spiritual
combat scene has been much easier - not sure why yet).
Alain
Mary K. Kuhner
>This 'death spiral' effect is something that I've decided doesn't
>belong in games with larger-than-life characters. I've come to believe
>that the death spiral in _End of the Line_ is a design mistake;
>unfortunately it's too late to change it. It's not a critical flaw,
>though, because there's a fortune point mechanic to let PCs blunt its
>impact.
For larger-thn-life games, my experience is that the Death Spiral is good
for a game where the several PCs are often facing off against one
more powerful villain (say, a superhero team versus a supervillain).
It gives a sense of progress, something to accomplish. But it's not
good for a game where the PCs are facing off against hordes of weaker
opponents, because it means that one or two early bad rolls condemn
the PCs either to die, or to become miserably ineffectual and unheroic
due to their wounds.
I think three of the four "oops, let's start over" party-death
debacles in our long Shadowrun game were due to a key PC getting
onto the death spiral too early. We had fortune points, but the
Shadowrun spiral is very steep: unless you realize at the start
that you must immediately spend karma on that trivial-sounding
light wound, you will run out trying to cover all the rolls you
need to cover. I recall one battle where it was discovered that
the PC pack-rat had 17 points squirrelled away. He spent them all,
and managed to stagger away with a Serious wound, rather than
dead: any other PC would of course have died.
I am amused to realize tht I don't know whether _Radiant_ has a
death spiral or not, because no one has ever tried to fight
while injured, not in the whole five year lifespan of the
campaign. Both of its parent systems do, though.
Feng Shui has a mild death spiral which we tended to ignore, though
it is nice when the PCs are up against one too-powerful opponent.
Mary Kuhner mkku...@eskimo.com
Neel Krishnaswami
Mary K. Kuhner <mkku...@eskimo.com> wrote:
>Neel Krishnaswami <ne...@alum.mit.edu> wrote:
>
>>This 'death spiral' effect is something that I've decided doesn't
>>belong in games with larger-than-life characters. I've come to believe
>>that the death spiral in _End of the Line_ is a design mistake;
>>unfortunately it's too late to change it. It's not a critical flaw,
>>though, because there's a fortune point mechanic to let PCs blunt its
>>impact.
>
>For larger-thn-life games, my experience is that the Death Spiral is good
>for a game where the several PCs are often facing off against one
>more powerful villain (say, a superhero team versus a supervillain).
>It gives a sense of progress, something to accomplish. But it's not
>good for a game where the PCs are facing off against hordes of weaker
>opponents, because it means that one or two early bad rolls condemn
>the PCs either to die, or to become miserably ineffectual and unheroic
>due to their wounds.
This last is the problem for me. The PCs and the major NPCs are of
roughly equivalent strength, and a combat-focused main character can
take down another with 2 or 3 blows barring fortune expenditures. So I
don't need to worry too much about grindingly slow combats.
But I don't like that a gang of mooks can grind a PC to ineffectuality,
especially since fighting hordes of inferior foes can effectively
challenge to the characters without challenging the players' character
conceptions.
If the master swordsman is ambushed by a horde of lesser opponents,
and is finally overwhelmed after dispatching dozens of them, he is
still (in everyone's minds) a master swordsman. If a single villain
who isn't supposed to be another ultimate warrior fights him to a
standstill and then beats him, the mental picture of the PC as a
master is weakened -- even though he has been beaten in both cases.
Since I *want* to support the characterization of the PCs as hyper-
competent, poor mook-handling is not a good thing.
In EotL, the mook-handling is not very good, because both PCs and
NPCs can kill each other too quickly. A PC who goes first can often
take out a dozen or more enemies with a single action, but if many
survive that first strike, they can chip him down to human-scale.
If I were starting over, I would make it both harder for a PC to
take out lots of mooks in a single action, and I would make it
harder for mooks to grind away a PC.
>We had fortune points, but the Shadowrun spiral is very steep:
>unless you realize at the start that you must immediately spend
>karma on that trivial-sounding light wound, you will run out trying
>to cover all the rolls you need to cover. I recall one battle where
>it was discovered that the PC pack-rat had 17 points squirrelled
>away. He spent them all, and managed to stagger away with a Serious
>wound, rather than dead: any other PC would of course have died.
I dislike systems where experience and fortune come out of the same
pool, mostly because as a player I really hate watching a slow
accumulation of experience be blown away by a fast run of poor die
rolls. A single bad experience like this can be enough put me off a
system -- my visceral dislike of Deadlands stems precisely from an
experience like you describe.
I think it's because the two are on such different time scales -- if
my PC contracted a disease that damaged learning (-1 xp per session,
say), then after a half-dozen sessions I would be just as much in the
hole as if I managed to spend 6 xp as fate points 6 sessions into the
campaign. But I would resent it a lot less, because the effects of the
drug are on the same (player-level) time scale as the regular gain of
experience.
>Feng Shui has a mild death spiral which we tended to ignore, though
>it is nice when the PCs are up against one too-powerful opponent.
The death checks don't bother; the impairment effects of injuries do.
This is because losing AV weakens both the offense and the defense,
and it's IME important to keep a comeback a real possibility.
Neel
Ed Chauvin IV
Points and Hit Locations [Mutant Chronicles] (Was Re: d&d campaign)
>In article <3761b4c1...@enews.newsguy.com>,
I was all set to defend the WFRP system (which I like particularly) by
saying that a similar efficiency is garnered by combining the to-hit
roll and the location roll. But then it occurred to me, why couldn't
all three of these be combined into a single roll?
I thought about it. I mulled it over. I considered it. I think I
like it. Then it occurs to me that combining the to-hit roll with the
location/effect roll eliminates some potential effects. Almost no
character would ever hit on a 99, and this is not a desirable
situation (not for me anyway, what's the point of working out neat
tables that are utterly useless?). So, I decided it would be best to
scrap the original WFRP to-hit roll/location combination in favor of a
separate to-hit roll and a combined location/effect roll.
As the location table stands for WFRP these are the number of
potential results by location:
Head: 15
Body: 25
L arm: 20
R arm: 20
L leg: 10
R leg: 10
Personally, I think this spread feels right. I can't explain why, but
I don't see any reason mucking with it. Only thing I've got to do now
is convert the existing effect tables (which have 16 results per
table) and maybe add an effect or three where I've got room. I'll
probably also get 'round to working up plausible effects for weapons
other than swords/axes.
Thanks for the inspiration.
>>[2]: Actually more of a combined specific location and effect, such
>>as "The blow severs the target's head clean from the body, causing the
>>head to fly off and land 2d6 + 3' in a random direction."
>
> Color like this is sometimes of interest but usually of little
>import tactically.
Which is why the "Sudden Death" critical hit tables are provided, and
intended for use during most battles.
Just as an aside, WFRP has a definite dramatist feel to it, in more
respects than just this one.
>(10' seems to be too far for an average unless you
>are counting for roll, and even then best this eqation would only be
>good for level ground.)
Well, yes. I didn't mean to suggest that the provided tables were
ideal. In fact, a common complaint of WFRP players is the fact that
it's quite possible to cut your opponent in half with a staff.
Albeit, highly improbable.
Unfortunately, the obvious solution to this problem is to make more
tables.
Mary K. Kuhner
>I dislike systems where experience and fortune come out of the same
>pool, mostly because as a player I really hate watching a slow
>accumulation of experience be blown away by a fast run of poor die
>rolls.
I don't like it either. I dealt with it in the Shadowrun campaign
by telling myself firmly that Karma was for saving one's ass, not
for advancement, and that it was essentially a no-advancement
campaign. This helped--though I still had a terrible time using
Karma at appropriate points, since you really have to use it
early in the death spiral or it's ineffectual. (This is a
bad trait for fortune points, in my opinion; I am not interested
in making their use a tactical challenge.)
The problem then was that the two PCs who were not generally in
lethal danger (being neither mages, front-line fighters, nor
deckers) accumulated huge, frightening Karma pools. If they had
spent it on advancement they would have become unreasonably more
advanced than the other PCs, but it felt wrong that they had
17 points just sitting around. (It was unwholesomely tempting to
spend it on, say, 8 autosuccesses on some strategically important
roll.)
You can get highly unnatural (to my mind) results by conflating
fortune points and experience points. Two bad things can happen:
(1) PCs who do not need to spend karma to survive end up
with too many EXP relative to the others; and (2) if a PC is
a front-line combat type, but a little weak, he will have to
spend more karma to survive and will shortly be even weaker
relative to the others. In other words, it can amplify small
starting differences, rather like the AD&D EXP bonus for
high stats. If you plan a long campaign, this is a bad idea.
_Radiant_ does not have fortune points or EXP, but if it did I
would separate the two strictly. We've discussed fortune points
on several occasions, but the game has too few rolls; many
key episodes have just one roll. Any reasonable number of
fortune points feels, to me as the player, like it gives too much
player control. I don't mind having one fortune point for a
twenty-roll combat, but having one for a one-roll psychic struggle
(Radiant's main form of direct conflict) doesn't work for me.
Also, we have found that the big campaign-threatening disasters
for this particular game aren't bad rolls, but bad consequences
of player or GM decisions, and those are hard to fix with fortune
points.
Mary Kuhner mkku...@eskimo.com
Martin Mertens
>I think three of the four "oops, let's start over" party-death
>debacles in our long Shadowrun game were due to a key PC getting
>onto the death spiral too early. We had fortune points, but the
>Shadowrun spiral is very steep: unless you realize at the start
>that you must immediately spend karma on that trivial-sounding
>light wound, you will run out trying to cover all the rolls you
>need to cover.
A spiral as steep as SR's may also force the characters to attack with
maximum force from the start, even in a situation that is likely
harmless:
We recently had a SR brawl where the PCs would have liked to keep
things non-lethal and not-too-threatening from their end, i.e. attack
unarmed. However, they could not afford to EVEN TRY this as they did
not know exactly how good their opponents were, and losing just one
round of hand-to-hand combat (because your enemy is better than you
thought and is using a melee weapon and you are not) may easily finish
you in SR by starting said spiral.
In a system without a spiral, a PC may be able to afford getting hit a
few times (while trying to get the hang of the opponent) and then
still decide to bring out the big guns (or spells, melee weapons etc.)
himself - and still stand a chance.
Greetings, Martin
--
Martin....@post.rwth-aachen.de
Heaven wouldn't be heaven if you
remembered your friends in hell.
Ero...@aol.com
>
> >I dislike systems where experience and fortune come out of the same
> >pool, mostly because as a player I really hate watching a slow
> >accumulation of experience be blown away by a fast run of poor die
> >rolls.
>
> I don't like it either. I dealt with it in the Shadowrun campaign
> by telling myself firmly that Karma was for saving one's ass, not
> for advancement, and that it was essentially a no-advancement
> campaign. This helped--though I still had a terrible time using
> Karma at appropriate points, since you really have to use it
> early in the death spiral or it's ineffectual. (This is a
> bad trait for fortune points, in my opinion; I am not interested
> in making their use a tactical challenge.)
I'm not that familiar with Shadowrun, having only played it a few times,
but could this be an "assumption clash" between you and the game
designers/playtesters? Maybe they were thinking in terms of "Of course
you use Karma to keep from getting injured for as long as possible. Why
would anyone suck up an injury when they still have the Karma to prevent
it? It's a no-brainer; no tactical decision-making necessary."
Erol K. Bayburt
Ero...@aol.com (mail drop)
Er...@ix.netcom.com (surfboard)
Frank T. Sronce
>
> Neel Krishnaswami <ne...@alum.mit.edu> wrote:
>
> >I dislike systems where experience and fortune come out of the same
> >pool, mostly because as a player I really hate watching a slow
> >accumulation of experience be blown away by a fast run of poor die
> >rolls.
>
> I don't like it either. I dealt with it in the Shadowrun campaign
> by telling myself firmly that Karma was for saving one's ass, not
> for advancement, and that it was essentially a no-advancement
> campaign. This helped--though I still had a terrible time using
> Karma at appropriate points, since you really have to use it
> early in the death spiral or it's ineffectual. (This is a
> bad trait for fortune points, in my opinion; I am not interested
> in making their use a tactical challenge.)
>
Is this an old edition of Shadowrun, perhaps? My understanding under
the current rules is that you have two separate XP and Karma pools.
Whenever you receive an XP award of 10 points or more, 10% of it goes to
the Karma pool instead. And Karma isn't spent permanently (except in
special situations), but can be reused.
Of course, with a long-term campaign, you still have problems- most of
our characters now have 10 Karma, and I'd almost rather it _were_ used
up permanently, because 10 points gives you a lot of rerolls... I find
it amusing that last session other PCs used up their Karma pools
entirely whereas my character never had to use a single point. :-)
The Shadowrun death-spiral is still there, though- even a light wound
can halve the number of successes you get on a roll. There is an Adept
power that lets you ignore some of those penalties, but only adepts can
get it- there isn't even a cyberware equivalent. Personally, I'd like
to see 'em add some rules allowing "tough" characters to get that
benefit through some stat or skill, perhaps.
I'll have to think about some possible rule modifications for that- the
"death-spiral" may be realistic, but sometimes you don't want it in your
game.
Kiz
Frank T. Sronce
> > Neel Krishnaswami <ne...@alum.mit.edu> wrote:
> >
> > >I dislike systems where experience and fortune come out of the same
> > >pool, mostly because as a player I really hate watching a slow
> > >accumulation of experience be blown away by a fast run of poor die
> > >rolls.
> >
> > I don't like it either. I dealt with it in the Shadowrun campaign
> > by telling myself firmly that Karma was for saving one's ass, not
> > for advancement, and that it was essentially a no-advancement
> > campaign. This helped--though I still had a terrible time using
> > Karma at appropriate points, since you really have to use it
> > early in the death spiral or it's ineffectual. (This is a
> > bad trait for fortune points, in my opinion; I am not interested
> > in making their use a tactical challenge.)
>
> but could this be an "assumption clash" between you and the game
> designers/playtesters? Maybe they were thinking in terms of "Of course
> you use Karma to keep from getting injured for as long as possible. Why
> would anyone suck up an injury when they still have the Karma to prevent
> it? It's a no-brainer; no tactical decision-making necessary."
>
> Erol K. Bayburt
> Ero...@aol.com (mail drop)
> Er...@ix.netcom.com (surfboard)
The problem lies with the "light wound". This, clearly, won't kill
you. In fact, you could take a dozen or so of 'em before you'd be in
trouble. And they only impose a 1 point penalty to your rolls. So they
_look_ ignorable- save your Karma for preventing the Moderate, Serious,
and Deadly wounds. But doing so would be a mistake- a 1 point penalty
is a big deal in Shadowrun- it can easily halve the number of successes
you get on all of your rolls, so a lightly wounded person has little
chance of defeating an uninjured person, all else being equal.
Kiz
-oh, and there's a cute one in the rules we found last weekend. Stock
up on survival knives. They cost 450 each and come with a bunch of
extras, including a trauma patch. Trauma patches cost 500 each, so sell
the patch and keep the profit. :-)
Sakura
Frank T. Sronce <fsr...@myriad.net> wrote:
>"Mary K. Kuhner" wrote:
>> I don't like it either. I dealt with it in the Shadowrun campaign
>> by telling myself firmly that Karma was for saving one's ass, not
>> for advancement
>the current rules is that you have two separate XP and Karma pools.
>Whenever you receive an XP award of 10 points or more, 10% of it goes to
>the Karma pool instead. And Karma isn't spent permanently (except in
>special situations), but can be reused.
That was my understanding as well. Maybe there's also rules that allow
you to spend Good Karma? I don't recall.
> Of course, with a long-term campaign, you still have problems- most of
>our characters now have 10 Karma, and I'd almost rather it _were_ used
>up permanently, because 10 points gives you a lot of rerolls...
...and it's very hard to get players to burn their Karma points
permanently. Maybe if the 'permanent loss' option also gave a significant
gain, they'd be more likely to use it, but as of now, it's a fool's
bargain.
> The Shadowrun death-spiral is still there, though- even a light wound
>can halve the number of successes you get on a roll. There is an Adept
>power that lets you ignore some of those penalties, but only adepts can
>get it- there isn't even a cyberware equivalent.
Are you sure? I'm almost certain I remember pain editors or trauma
dampers or some similar kind of cyberware, that basically removes wound
penalties up to a certain level.
J
--
Hostes aliengeni me abduxerent. Jeff Johnston - je...@io.com
Qui annus est? http://www.io.com/~jeffj
Mary K. Kuhner
>I'm not that familiar with Shadowrun, having only played it a few times,
>but could this be an "assumption clash" between you and the game
>designers/playtesters? Maybe they were thinking in terms of "Of course
>you use Karma to keep from getting injured for as long as possible. Why
>would anyone suck up an injury when they still have the Karma to prevent
>it? It's a no-brainer; no tactical decision-making necessary."
I should say, when I said "Shadowrun" I meant "Shadowrun first
edition". The death spiral doesn't change in the later editions, but
the handling of karma points does.
I suppose the game designers might have meant you to spend karma
every single time you took a light wound, but this produces (since
in 1st Ed karma==exp) a godawful exp edge for non-combatant or
non-karma-spending PCs, which will eventually sink the game in my
experience. It also doesn't feel good to me: fortune points are
not hit points, and having to spend them every time you're hit
really makes them into hit points.
Furthermore, if you spend karma on light wounds in little fights
you'll run out (at least at the rate my GM gave it out) and die
in the big fights; but if you don't spend it, and the little fight
turns into a big fight, it's too late. Once you have a light wound,
you are on the spiral and almost no amount of karma will save
you. The GM could give so much karma that no one ever allowed a
light wound to stand, but this would really, to my tastes, suck
the juice out of combat.
Later editions of SR handled this better, I'm told. We had so many
house rules by the time 2nd Ed came out that we never contemplated
switching over.
Mary Kuhner mkku...@eskimo.com
Frank T. Sronce
>
> In article <3767AAD3...@myriad.net>,
> Frank T. Sronce <fsr...@myriad.net> wrote:
> >"Mary K. Kuhner" wrote:
> >> I don't like it either. I dealt with it in the Shadowrun campaign
> >> by telling myself firmly that Karma was for saving one's ass, not
> >> for advancement
> > Is this an old edition of Shadowrun, perhaps? My understanding under
> >the current rules is that you have two separate XP and Karma pools.
> >Whenever you receive an XP award of 10 points or more, 10% of it goes to
> >the Karma pool instead. And Karma isn't spent permanently (except in
> >special situations), but can be reused.
>
> That was my understanding as well. Maybe there's also rules that allow
> you to spend Good Karma? I don't recall.
>
> > Of course, with a long-term campaign, you still have problems- most of
> >our characters now have 10 Karma, and I'd almost rather it _were_ used
> >up permanently, because 10 points gives you a lot of rerolls...
>
> ...and it's very hard to get players to burn their Karma points
> permanently. Maybe if the 'permanent loss' option also gave a significant
> gain, they'd be more likely to use it, but as of now, it's a fool's
> bargain.
>
Yeah, as I recall, burning points permanently lets you lower the
difficulty instead of just getting rerolls- but it specifically forbids
you from lowering it to the point where it would be _better_ than a
reroll, so it's just dumb.
> > The Shadowrun death-spiral is still there, though- even a light wound
> >can halve the number of successes you get on a roll. There is an Adept
> >power that lets you ignore some of those penalties, but only adepts can
> >get it- there isn't even a cyberware equivalent.
>
> Are you sure? I'm almost certain I remember pain editors or trauma
> dampers or some similar kind of cyberware, that basically removes wound
> penalties up to a certain level.
>
There may well be some in an expansion somewhere, but not in the basic
rulebook (unless it's well hidden, I suppose). Cyberpunk had some pain
editors, you might be thinking of that.
I _like_ Shadowrun's wound system in many ways- it's nifty that you can
stage a "light" wound up to a "deadly" wound by getting enough
successes, and you can do the reverse by soaking it well enough.
Unfortunately, it takes at least 6 dice for it to be possible to stage a
light up to a deadly, and an 'ordinary' person generally won't have that
many dice. So an ordinary person with a small handgun (6L damage) isn't
ever going to kill a burglar with a small handgun unless he has a skill
of at least 3 in pistols and allocates some combat pool to it...
Kiz
Psychohist
wounds, Neelakanton Krishnaswami comments that "This 'death spiral' effect is
something that I've decided doesn't belong in games with larger-than-life
characters."
I agree that it's bad for heroic flavor - if it happens to the player
characters, they have to either finish a long battle in which they know they
are doomed, or retreat unheroically; if it happens to the bad guys, they have
plenty of time to retreat or escape, denying the player characters a heroic
victory.
On the other hand, from a gamist perspective, it has its attractions: it can
be quite challenging having to constantly update one's estimates of how
dangerous each opponent currently is, and the resulting tactical decisions can
be quite interesting.
Warren