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Project BASiL: Channeling & Essence

I’m starting the process of consolidating all of my uploaded files on the RM Forums over here to the Rolemasterblog.com. I’ve uploaded over 200 docs scattered throughout the Rolemaster and Shadow World threads, but to see them or download them requires a user account.

These are just the lists and not the associated notes that accompany each. For info on our Channeling mechanics, I blogged about it HERE and for Essence mechanics HERE.

Channeling pt 1

Channeling pt 2

and an extra Channeling List “Channeling”

Channeling

Essence pt1

Essence pt2

Essence pt3

And Cantrips we use is our SW campaign.

Cantrips

 

 

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Shadow World Weapon: the Urumi

I was doing some research and looking for ideas for a interesting cultural weapon and came across the Urumi. Functionally it’s a steel whip–deadly to opponents and deadly to use for the wielder!

Using RM weapon tables, the whip table makes the most sense with only slash criticals. To differentiate even more, I can devise weapon specific performance using our “Weapon Modifier Chart“.

Of note:

urumi-wielders learn to follow and control the momentum of the blade with each swing, thus techniques include spins and agile maneuvres.[2] These long-reaching spins make the weapon particularly well-suited to fighting against multiple opponents

The benefit of our optional rules for weapon stats is that it allows for  customization and differentiation beyond their efficacy against AT’s and their hit & crit thresholds on the attack chart. RMU established fixed penalties for several combat maneuvers (reverse strike, dual attack, protect etc) when it should be the particular weapon that decides that penalty. Shouldn’t unarmed combat have a lower multiple attack penalty than a warhammer?

Anyway, the Urumi would have a low multiple attack/opponent, flank and rear attack penalty but have a VERY HIGH fumble range and no real ability to parry.

Also:

When not in use, the urumi is worn coiled around the waist like a belt

I have a few cultures or groups where this would be a great weapon: the Daughters of Inis and a special group utilized by the Alliance in Agyra.

I’m sure if I looked the Urumi is probably already included in Combat Companion or some other past publication, but I don’t have those so it struck me as very cool!

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Channeling, it’s not just for Gods anymore?

Why do I keep coming back to Channeling? Tackling Spell Law deconstruction and rewrite forced me to look at all the underlying assumptions around the magic system—not just RM but other games as well. I think Essence (generic magic) is easy: as long as you allow for the phenomena, then simple rules allow for casting spells. Mentalism is not much different than Essence and often conflated as Psionics. Channeling is a whole other can of worms: God given magic REALLY needs to work in a completely different way. We’ve discussed Channeling in depth in several blogs HERE, HERE and HERE.

How might Channeling be different than the other two magic Realms?

Spell Acquisition. Unlike Essence or Mentalism, a PC can’t just go to a library, secure a scroll, learn a spell list and then cast a channeling spell. A “God” must give at least tacit approval for someone to cast a channeling spell. Additionally, you could argue that no learning is really needed—spells could be directly granted by the Diety. This changes the standard process of spell acquisition.

Spell Effects. Common sense would dictate that a caster might not be able to provide magical buffs, benefits or spell effects to targets of an opposing Diety. Unlike Essence which is agnostic, Channeling is driven by an ethos, aspect or belief system. You shouldn’t be able to heal a follower of a mortal foe of your God…right? So the whole group dynamic might be complicated when the Cleric is the primary “buffer” and healer for the group but the other members of the group worship different gods.

Force Majeure. RM Channeling description suggests that PP’s are funneled to the caster and in my BASiL project the spell itself is funneled to the caster (ie like a software download). Either way, the Diety is providing, approving or allowing part of the casting formula. That requires SOMETHING in return on the part of the caster: certain behavior, loyalty, tribute, sacrifice, tithing etc.

Certainly much of this relies on the setting. These may seem like niggling over fine points; and you can certainly hand-wave away any needed explanation—it is religion after all. But RM and RM users take a certain pride in quantifying effects into game mechanics: detailed herbs and spells for healing; complicated Alchemy rules for magic item creation; math driven charts for modelling weapons and armor effects. If Channeling raises some broader questions about its use, than why not establish this in the game rules?

Personally, I’ve come down to two broad options:

Option 1. Disconnect the Channeling mechanism between a caster and a Diety. As Peter argued, Channeling could just be rolled into Essence as “general magic”. That makes sense. Just disconnecting Dieties from spell casting mechanics eliminates all of the awkward questions that Channeling raise in the above examples. If you were you to do that, what then would be the purpose of Dieties?

  1. They can still bestow “beneficence” in answer to prayers for held or assistance.
  2. Lead, create and direct religious organizations.
  3. Control the dissemination of hidden knowledge (spell lists and certain skills).
  4. Interfere in the mortal world

Under this option, Gods are still supreme entities, still have the same powers, play the same role in the world but just don’t act as a conduit for Channeling spells.

Option 2. Go “all in”. Further develop Channeling as a relationship between a powerful being and a follower. If we accept that channeling magic is controlled, allowed, or provided by a Diety than how should that work? More importantly, what prohibits anyone from being having followers and Channeling spells/power to them? I’ve touched upon this with my BASiL Channeling project—spells that only work with designated targets: loyal followers, henchmen, oathbound etc.

The idea goes back to the issues explored earlier—that a Cleric can provide powerful benefits, but only to followers of the same Diety. For Holy Warriors, it becomes even more specific—benefits are only bestowed upon the group, militia or organization of the Holy Warrior. (ie High Templars cast spells to the benefit of his soldiers and/or followers).

The Gods of Shadow World aren’t really gods—just very powerful entities from another dimension. How do they parse out spells/powers? Do they control the entry point of Essaence into Kulthea? Did they devise spells and teach them to their followers? If they are just powerful beings, then can any powerful PC or NPC also grant similar spell ability to their followers? Popular fiction is replete with “Lords” or “Archmages” bestowing their hirelings and henchmen with special abilities—isn’t this Channeling? How about the Dragonlords? Are they powerful enough to act as Minor Gods? Can Minor Gods in Kulthea also provide Channeling to their followers?

At what point can a person bestow spells or power to another? RM already establishes a base mechanism for transferring PP’s or spells  with the Channeling SKILL. I would take it a step further: a formalized process of creating a relationship between “god/lord/being” and “followers”. I played around with an initial spell list concept I uploaded HERE. (RM Forum account needed to access the list). Conceptually, the mechanics of a Channeling process should include:

  1. Bond, link or loyalty or obligations between a god & a follower.
  2. Mutual benefits to both parties. (follower gets spells/benefits, God gets…?)
  3. A substantial downside if the bond is broken, destroyed or a party is killed.

My list needs a lot more work (more specifics on penalties and drains–comments welcome) and is just one possibility of many. (Perhaps the Lords of Orhan use a similar but different spell list). But the framework is there and I like the possibilities for a number of reasons:

  1. It allows a PC/NPC to grow in power outside of the normal experience/level/skill paradigm.
  2. Establishes a known process for Gods to be created/and or a player to ascend to a demi or minor god.
  3. Creates a mechanism for a powerful lord/being/god to influence a local event or encounter.
  4. Provides benefits for a player to pledge to a lord/God.
  5. Balances risk and reward for such a relationship. (need some more work on this)
  6. Acts as an adventure hook.

Is the list too powerful? It certainly wouldn’t be readily available, but let’s review the cost/benefit analysis to a PC using the list:

  1. A follower would have to forgo any other Channeling relationship. (no other god)
  2. The player would need to offer a real benefit to a follower to justify their fealty.
  3. Followers would be a liability. An adversary would target a player’s followers knowing that would weaken or harm the player.
  4. Each follower will require a resource drain on the player.
  5. The benefit would be a growing pool of devoted followers which the player can enact agency through and receive some benefit (HP, PP, stat points?—needs some more thought)

Ultimately Options 1 and 2 aren’t mutually exclusive. I can still disconnect Channeling realm from Dieties and still have the Channeling list and mechanics. Anyway, this went from a thought experiment: “how should Channeling Realm work” to the start of an interesting game mechanic for my SW campaign. Channeling isn’t just for Gods anymore!

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Firearms in Rolemaster – The Mechanics

In my last entry I talked a bit about how I revised the attack tables for firearms in Rolemaster. That’s not the only change you need to make if you plan on adding realistic firearms to a game using any flavor of the Rolemaster rules. I’m a firm believer in using a two second, phased round for firearms, but you also need to make some core mechanics adjustments. That’s what I’m talking about today.

Continue reading “Firearms in Rolemaster – The Mechanics”
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Time Travel in Rolemaster & Shadow World

In a recent BLOG POST, I touched upon Time Travel as a technology or mechanism that could be introduced into a Shadow World campaign. Tricky, right?

A lot has been written on time travel in RPG’s and if you have ever allowed it in your game you know it can generate great adventures but create a lot of hassles as well. Some suggested solutions are only allow travel into the past, time travel only occurs in alternate timelines that don’t affect the current one or there are side effects to encountering yourself in the past etc.

I mentioned a few mechanisms to introduce time travel or time manipulation during game play:

  1. Portals. These can be used not just to transport over distances but over time as well. Several gateways Terry describes in Emer Addendum hint at such a power.
  2. Flow Storms/Foci. Want to change things up? Add a Time jump into the effects of an Essaence effect. Not only can you send the players to another interesting time/place but you create a whole adventure path if they want to return to their own time.
  3. Spells. Spell Law never introduced Time related spells, but I think some were added in a companion? (citation needed). I posted up our Time Mastery spell list on the RM Forums. The list is a work in progress–and very powerful in some aspects and very limited in others. A couple of spells take some work and ingenuity on the GM’s part:

6. Time Jump I – Caster can “jump” 1 rnd/lvl into the past or future.

I thought of only allowing the caster to jump into the future–that’s an easy solution where the caster is basically “out of play” for the # of rounds. But that’s not really useful unless it’s just used to avoid a impending bad situation. So how do you handle a caster going back X rounds into the past? First you have to realize that there will be 2 casters for X of rounds (then the other will cast the spell and go back into time and everything is back to normal).  One option is to have the PC announce that they will be casting the spell in the future and then they can play 2 versions of themselves for those set number of rounds. One issue is that the original caster may not survive or be able to cast the Time Jump spell in the future… One resolution is to qualify that time travel creates a new timeline and that this new timeline might not end up the same way. That also means that there will be 2 casters permanently in this new timeline. Interesting…

This spell gets much simpler at higher levels when a caster can travel forward or back years or decades and thus removes the problem of 2 casters or travelling such a short time that the other “self” is present.

8. Time Bubble I – Caster is enclosed in a unmoving time singularity. He can either slow time by 1/2 or speed time by x2 during the duration. The caster cannot interact with anything outside the bubble or vice versa.(no causality). Perception is modified by the time difference(slow inside will make outside activity appear hyper fast, etc.)

Time Bubble is a more useful and less complicated time spell. Basically the Caster is demising themselves from the current timeline and either speeding up or slowing down time within that bubble. This allows the caster to create extra time to heal, prepare another spell or just get away from a dangerous situation. The bubble wall is inviolate. (Unless someone else has Time Merge to cross into the bubble.)

15. Time Stop I – Target up to MEDIUM size is enclosed in a time singularity where time is stopped. No information(visual or otherwise) can pass through the barrier.

A useful spell, it’s basically a version of Time Bubble that can be cast at a distance on a target–basically freezing the target for the duration of the spell. This does not slow or speed up time within the bubble but stops it completely. For a group, this would allow them time to prepare, heal or buff against a troublesome foe.

But Time Travel doesn’t have to be literal. Here’s the thing–one of the great parts of Shadow World is the immense timeline. It’s a great read, adds a lot of depth to the world building, but most of it will be lost on players: I’ve read it A LOT and I can’t keep track of most of it!So when people ask WHERE they should start a SW campaign I say how about “WHEN”? Want a hack ‘n slash one-off adventure? Introduce the PC’s to a battle during the Wars of Dominion. Want a mixed genre sci-fi/fantasy campaign? Start during the interregnum and have the PC’s be Worim, Taranian or Jinteni characters with technology and interacting with the fantastical creatures of SW.

So many possibilities–anyone play around with Time Travel in their game?

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Seeing the Light—Religious conversions for Channelers in Rolemaster.

I write a lot about Clerics. One interesting phenomena, often featured in popular fantasy literature is the reluctant conversion or initiation of a character into an avatar or priest of a God. Perhaps the PC encounters the God during gameplay and creates an opportunity to pledge fealty. Maybe the God directly recruits the PC as his agent and follower or changes in the pantheons require the PC to choose a new God.

One of the limitations of RM is the inability to switch professions at later levels—precluding a PC from “converting” or choosing to enter a life of a Priest. Certainly a bit of hand-waving and rewarding the player with the appropriate Base List could work, but the PC would still have skill costs assigned by their original Profession choice. To me this is just another limitation of the Profession system; a system that was once advertised as having “no limitations”.

This also speaks to the awkwardness of emulating the Open/Closed/Base paradigm for the Channeling realm. Conceptually it doesn’t work well; was the reason I started my own re-write for Spell Law; and I suspect the need for the Channeling Companion. By its definition, Channeling ability must be given or granted by a God or God-like being. Rather than define Open/Closed/Base from an access viewpoint (a PC must spend DP’s to gain a spell list), it must be defined by a bestowed viewpoint (the God chooses which spell lists are granted–though the PC would still spend DP’s). In other words a God would likely provide Channeling spells to followers based on their need and their position in the church. So even low level admin or devout follower might have some lower level “Open” utility lists. This will just depend on the setting and as Peter pointed out, you could simplify all of this by just merging Channeling into Essence and Mentalism. My game allows for characters to access any or all of the “realms” so I end up with the same result using a different solution.

I like the idea and I like the dramatic potential of the ability to change religious loyalty and in the last few years have really embraced active gods in my Shadow World setting. As a Deux a Machina, I have more flexibility with a Lord of Orhan than a nosy Loremaster, and from a narrative standpoint I can provide unambiguous direction for the group when needed. Again, In my setting there is not difficulty in granting Channeling lists to a new convert—but how should that work in standard RM RAW?

Converting from one God to another is fairly straightforward: just replace current base lists with the lists of the new god. In regular RM this might not require any changes, as Clerics all receive the same Base spells. For people using Channeling Companion or have embraced the concept of God-aspected spell lists this would create a significant change in PC abilities. Can a PC willingly switch Gods—perhaps motivated by the powers/spells they might receive by changing allegiances? Fiction is ripe with stories about characters worshipping dark Gods for additional powers, but what about switching Gods within the same pantheon or “alignment”? Would the discarded God feel betrayed? Punish the PC? Would the new God require a Quest or some other token of loyalty before granting Aspected spells or even Power Points? I think this raises great adventure possibilities!

In the end, the narrative should drive the rules—right? But I would rather create flexibility rather than “one-off” rules to explain away system conflicts. Whether you use Professions or not, the Channeling Realm may benefit from some fluidity or tinkering in your game.

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Rolemaster Spell Law: Revisiting and rethinking Project BASiL.

Our rewrite of Spell Law was always going to be a work in progress: every new idea, every game session of playtesting or a random thought makes us rethink our basic assumptions. So a recent comment on the Rolemaster Forums  and various blogs on the RolemasterBlog has me thinking about “Realms” again.

Peter makes the argument against the Channeling Realm and his solution rolls various Channeling spells into either the Essence or Mentalism realms. I think my discussions of BASiL realms can be misleading—I don’t see “Realms” as separate properties of power; instead we see “Realms” as the separation of magical powers by casting mechanisms. In RMU this is the same distinction between generating magic effects via spells versus magical effects via rituals. We just take it one step further and further divide spell casting into more distinct mechanisms. This just happens to mirror the original Essence, Channeling, Mentalism to some degree, but we added 4-5 other “Realms” so the comparison starts to lessen. (I just haven’t gotten around to put up these other Realms yet). Peter refers to this as Schools of Magic which I think is a pretty good model to view it.

I think RMU and RM in general has it wrong to use the same spellcasting mechanism for all three realms (SCR, 1-3 round casting time .etc). Furthermore it’s clear that some spell lists just don’t fit the assigned realm or that casting process. We attempted to correct that in BASiL and just took the process where it led us. That meant that “Imbedding/Alchemist” magic needed a better casting and process methodology; “performance magic” (bard, dance, sing etc) needed a more unique process and “written” magic (runes/sigils/glyphs/symbols/circles) didn’t really fit into a 1-3 round casting time.

I’ve blogged about increasing distinctions between Realm powers, but in my thinking over these latest posts and blogs I think I made a mistake—one that I write about often. It’s difficult to completely remove all the tropes/memes and biases built up over a lifetime of gaming and I question my thinking all the time when writing new material, but I stuck to a trope I should have reconsidered. Why shouldn’t the Essence realm have healing spells?

In BASiL I made a clear distinction between Essence (manipulation of the physical world) and Channeling (miraculous and affecting spiritual issues): sort of Science versus Faith paradigm. So while it was clear to me that Spirit Mastery, Souls, etc were solidly in the realm of the metaphysical, I kept healing in the Channeling realm (and self-healing in the mentalism). I do remember questioning this during the Spell Law redesign but I kept healing in Channeling for “balance” purposes!!! My hypocrisy.

Spells that heal tissue, stop bleeding or knit tissue and muscle are very much a physical process and should be included in Essence. At the same time the healing spells in Channeling should be less technical and more miraculous—or just more effective—given their source to divinity. So it looks like I’m moving the Healing Law lists to Essence and writing new and improved healing spells for Channeling.

For more thoughts on the Spell Law rewrite:

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

 

 

 

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Don’t It Make My Brown Eyes Blue

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Imagine for a minute a player asks the perfectly reasonable question of “Can I remember what colour her eyes were?”

What I have always done in the past was ask for a skill check using the characters Memory stat bonus as the skill bonus.

When I moved from RM2 to RMC and the threshold for success went from 101+ to 111+ for most casual stat based tests success required an open ended roll. If that was reasonable 19 out of 20 trips to the shops for me would probably end in chaos and that could not be right. For me 1 in 10 trips to the shop ends up with me bringing home the right thing.

So I started thinking about these non-skill rolls. Not everything has a governing skill. Simple tests of memory, trying to catch a plate before it hits the floor or trying to lift a portcullis.

I have often thought that Stats in Rolemaster are largely irrelevant. Once you have rolled them you only ever use the Stat Bonus and never the stat. The exception is body development that uses 1/10th of the Con stat for base hits.

In eliminating the body development skill I have previously suggested using Con + 1/2 SD to find the Total Hits. That would give a starting character a typical 75 hits. That is more than the default starting hits under the RAW but that is not a bad thing. It gives starting characters a bit more longevity and is slightly more realistic than a starting character can take 18hits and a 10th level character can take 150hits. Why is the more experienced character so much more damage resistant?

I don’t use level so there will be no levelling up. I do use a RuneQuest style skill improvement. You roll higher than your current skill total and upon success you gain a skill rank.

I use a similar scheme for stat gains. During periods of rest & recovery you can roll against your stats. If you roll higher than your current stat then your stat increases by 1. You can only roll against stats that have been used. What that means in practice is if you used the Trickery skill you would put a small tick against the skill itself and against Pr and Qu. When it came to doing the tests for improvement then you could roll against those two stats and the one skill. This means that the skills you use tend to improve and the stats you are using tend to improve.

So going back to my simple memory test, to get a result of 111+ just to remember if your girlfriends eyes are Brown or Blue seems a bit of a tough call. That is a open ended roll for most people. If as a GM you wanted to put in a difficulty factor for recalling facts that character saw or heard weeks or months ago then the test becomes almost guaranteed failure pretty quickly.

What if we didn’t use the stat bonus but the actual stat? So Joe average has a memory of 50. What colour are his girlfriend’s eyes? Roll 111+  on 1d% OE +50. That pretty much gives a 60/40 chance of failure which in my experience seems pretty realistic, or is that just me?

So what about lifting a portcullis? Now with an average stat of 50 you, as GM, have scope to put a difficulty factor in there. Sheer Folly is a -50 so trying to lift a portcullis on your own would still require an open ended roll. That also seems realistic. If the character had the Athletic skill then by all means let him or her use it but you cannot make simple tests of strength dependent on such a skill. You cannot tell me that someone with a strength of 90 cannot lift something heavy without learning to play football first?

The final missing part of the puzzle is the racial differences. High Men are about the strongest commonly played race and they get a +10 strength bonus. Elves get a bonus to Memory. If you were to roll these Stat based tests as Stat + Racial Bonus then you would retain the flavour of the races.

Using this method what you get is more competent PCs, greater flexibility as a GM to challenge the characters and Stats gain greater importance beyond just a measure for finding the stat bonus.