Category: Rolemaster

As with most games, Against the Darkmaster (VsD) tracks Encumbrance Levels—five of them, ranging from Unencumbered to Over Encumbered. Generally, the GM and players use a few simple criteria to eyeball what might be a character’s appropriate Encumbrance Level. An encumbered PC moves more slowly during overland travel and takes penalties on physical activity. No surprise.

Surprisingly, though, for someone like me, the VsD encumbrance system was a bit too handwavy, even while I recognize that, in mostly every game, encumbrance is shrugged away anyway. I consequently went through the Equipment Table, assigned a weight number (usually 1 or 2, if anything) to large items, and ruled that characters possessing these in numerical increments of 5 would go up an EL.

Tucked in between rules for Encumbrance and Wealth is a Hazards Table. Here is a more lingering glimpse of the emulationist aspect of VsD: characters are expected to encounter 2-3 Hazards during mid-length overland travel. The table provides randomized results of Weather, Free People, Natural Obstacles, Minions of Darkness, Wild Beasts and Ancient World Perils. The table is useful but not enough. The QS lacks even a modicum of explanation for these results. Certainly the full rules will rectify this, and I hope that the complete game will contain “breakout” tables with which the GM short on ideas might generate different types of Weather or numinous suggestions for Ancient World Perils. For my game I borrow a strategy from Kent David Kelly, using a standard dictionary to randomly generate words that inspire possibilities.

The rules for Travel are expanded on the VsD blog. As with the fictions inspiring the game, it is very important for characters to find sheltered Campsites and Safe Havens in the midst of adversity.

If the Encumbrance rules weren’t anything surprising, the Wealth and Treasure system was! Instead of tracking coin, every character possesses a Wealth Level ranging from 0 to 5. Everything on the Equipment Table has a Fare score that falls within an equivalent range. If a character’s WL exceeds the Fare of the desired item, that character is understood to have purchased that item immediately. In this instance, the character’s WL does not change. If the WL equals the Fare, the WL drops by one. If the Fare exceeds the WL, well, tough luck—go find some Treasure. Right, Treasure: each trove has a corresponding Treasure Value. If the TV=character’s WL, WL increases by 1. If the TV exceeds WL by any increment, the WL becomes the TV.

I ran a Session 0 for my tabletop game. My players determined their characters’ WLs, I explained the system, and we went shopping! When I described to the designers what I had done, they said something like, “Oh. Well, you can do it that way, I guess, but our intentions had been for WLs to be part of starting equipment. We imagined that all new acquisitions would be roleplayed in-game.”

In VsD, PCs seem to advance in Experience Levels more swiftly than in other games, another feature I appreciate. My gaming table never is going to complete a years-long campaign from Levels 1-10 in traditional play. It’s just not possible. Even if there weren’t numerous other equally-enticing games and genres vying for our attention, we just don’t have the time anymore. Starting PCs possess 10 XP at Level 1. After every session, every person at the table asks his or her character if that PC can say yes to the following questions:

You travelled to or explored a location you’ve never seen before. You faced dangerous foes and/or difficult situations. You completed a quest or mission. You suffered a grievous wound, or suffered a great personal failure.

p. 57

In addition to these are some Vocation-specific queries. Every yes awards an XP. Every 10 XP results in a Level advancement.

As has already been stated, the basics of the VsD spell system are shared with BASiL and some others. What remains to be said is that some spells may be Warped. This means that additional Magic Points can be expended (exceeding the base cost of casting the spell) for greater or additional effects. Another rule regarding Magic emulates VsD’s source fictions: if ever, during a Spell Roll, “doubles” are rolled on the d100 (e.g., 66), the character might “attract the attention of Dark Powers and Servants of the Shadows.” The GM then rolls on another table to see what specific action, if any, the Darkmaster takes in response to this Magical Resonance.

Conclusion

I have examined this game, as presented in its QS, through the lens of the specific fictions that this game seeks to emulate. By this criterium, some of the rules—particularly those that contribute toward lethality in combat—are at odds with VsD’s stated intention. Some features—such as rules for Warfare—are missing and without intention of being developed, but these might be provided for through community contributions or future company support.

I expect my own gaming table will be exploring this rpg for the entire year. Two of my four gamers have expressed great enthusiasm for these rules. They are fairly new gamers, so this kind of surprises me. The presence of a d100 core mechanic (in comparison to the cobbled-together, home-ruled Original D&D I had been running) probably contributes to their enjoyment.

For myself, I love how this satisfies a nostalgic impulse while designing away most of the features that have created difficulty for me in regards to its progenitor. More is to be done, and the basic structure of VsD is porous enough that, should I need to, I can modify this to my own tastes. My main difficulty appears to be Weapon Stats. 

ToM’s recently stated company openness to non-profit community content (and some licensing) and independent OPEN00 (genius name, by the way) game derivations is highly encouraging. With this support, the VsD community is likely to enrich individual game qualities and perhaps appeal to brand new gamers who are seeking an experience outside of the d20 hegemony. I very much look forward to an update to the QS and, above all, the Kickstarter for the full rules later this year.

I think I should have the Against the Darkmaster (VsD) QuickStart introduce this topic:

Combat is a serious thing in Against the Darkmaster.

While characters are assumed to be heroic, even the most skillful fighter must take combat seriously because of the high chance of being wounded or killed with a single blow.

p. 37

Right. Well. Hm.

I don’t disagree that combat should be serious, even for (perhaps even especially for) heroes, but I’m not sure that the type of combat presented in VsD properly emulates the fantasy fictions that inspire VsD. Perhaps I’m off track here. I’ve already admitted that I don’t relate to the Heavy Metal ethos of the 80s, and VsD specifically points to this element as inspiration for its combat.

The combat system in VsD, with some alterations, is that of Middle-Earth Role Playing and various Rolemasters: roll d100, add Skill bonus, subtract Defensive Bonus, compare the result to the appropriate armor on a chart. The armors are the MERP armors—None, Soft Leather, Rigid Leather, Chain and Plate. Results on this table range from a miss to one of the five Criticals, renamed in VsD as Superficial, Light, Moderate, Grievous and Lethal. Okay, simple enough.

But, as with MERP, as with Rolemaster, conditions and qualifiers soon heap on. Does the opponent have Cover? Wait, isn’t she also on Higher Ground? Are you attacking from the Flank? Do you have to Move to get there? Are you at half Hit Points? Is that above the Max Result for your Weapon? Hey, doesn’t that do -10 against Chain?

Ugh. I know that some gamers don’t mind this kind of play at all. In fact, many prefer it. But I think that my table doesn’t like its rules to interfere with its fiction. Don’t get me wrong, these rules do make good fiction. Of course I love granularity and realism. But not when those features become a grind, not when they become fiddly. And not when they so easily can kill my PCs with one blow.

What are you saying, Gabe? Are you forgetting that this also is a game, and no challenge is entertaining if there are no stakes involved? (The voice in my head here, specifically, is Aspire2Hope’s, one that always keeps me honest.) I know, so perhaps I’m saying that the stakes are too high… Or I’m saying that the stakes are too high depending on the situation.

In the fictions inspiring VsD, main characters (our PCs) do die, but they don’t expire because of a stray shot from a Goblin. They perish plunging with the Balrog into the Abyss, they drop while defending Little People against hordes of Uruk-hai, they fail on the Field of Battle, thrown from horseback because of the malevolent terror exuding from a Nazgûl.

Outside of the basic conditions such as Stunning and Bleeding, the VsD combat rules as presented in the QS do not emulate the fictions. Again, they might reflect a Heavy Metal vibe, but arbitrary death does not signify heroic fiction. If this latter is not what VsD is after, there are ways to fix this. VsD already has given players one “character shield”: they can spend a Drive Point to lower a suffered Critical by one severity (but must abide by the new results). Here is another possibility, one admittedly inspired by other games: the character somehow survives death, but she is now Doomed (or Fey, in the Old Norse sense of the word), destined for a truly heroic death. The GM then introduces, as soon as possible, an awesomely terrifying Big Bad and tells the character that this is how he dies; how she goes about doing it is up to him, and usually she should be saving others from a seemingly invincible Presence. The player might choose to die before the GM can roll this out, determining on his own what is a fitting demise for her hero. Or—or in addition to this—most NPCs can be designated a kind of “mook” that has a max damage rating vs a PC. Or NPCs should just be easier to kill. I’m doing this already with my simplified NPC Stats that were slightly revealed last post, and most of my mookish NPCs don’t have DBs.

The easiest way to describe VsD combat as written is to share The Tactical Round Sequence.

I’m not sure how much of this is standard to most iterations of Rolemaster, so forgive me if I go on about anything obvious. I’m going to detail the features that are a bit new to me.

From the top, Assessment Phase. Basically, if the GM determines that any PC might be disoriented—due to being Stunned, taking a fall, getting ambushed, etc.—then this character must succeed at a Perception Roll to take any action without penalty. Other than this, the only thing that is new to me are the order of actions according to weapon size in the Melee Phase. I don’t think anything else should be puzzling to an RM gamer.

The same can be said for what are the three types of Actions—Full, Half and Free—and modifiers to combat that result from taking some of them. It takes time to Load weapons. Characters may use all or half of their Offensive Bonuses to Parry. A low roll could result in a Weapon Fumble. There is a long list of combat modifiers, though this is given as a separate table in the Appendix of the QS.

By now, readers won’t be surprised that I prefer to keep that list in the Appendix. I might memorize the conditions the QS specifies in its text—combat modifiers for characters who are Prone, Surprised, Stunned, Incapacitated, Held, Flanking and at the Rear. None of these are unfamiliar for RM gamers. For the rest, I would rather use the inspiration of the moment and my own “increment” method.

I’m not sure what to do about Weapon Stats, likewise in the Appendix. I think I have to use them for now. It’s important for weapons to be different from one another. I think I’ll try to push the burden of knowing these qualities onto my players.

And now it’s time to play!

No surprises for Rolemaster gamers, in the QuickStart of Against the Darkmaster (VsD), Skill tests are resolved against an easily-memorizable Action Resolution Table (above). For comparisons between this table and others—and how they might be used for narrative purposes—I direct you to Peter R’s recent discussion about Maneuvers in RM games. All that remains to be explained here is that, in VsD, actions are resolved through the character rolling an Open-Ended d100; adding modifiers for Skill, situation and Difficulty; and referring to the GM for the result. VsD gives some rough characterizations for levels of Difficulty, and the mechanical components attached to the descriptions are essentially in increments of ten with a jump from Heroic (-50) to Insane (-70).

I prefer to set my own Difficulties by “increment.” For Level 1 characters, the table is punishing enough—the probability for success is just north of 25%, and, even then, “success” usually means a Partial Success, which almost never allows the character a clean resolution. If one thing is complicating the Action Resolution, I give the roll -10, if two, -20, and so on. Of course, some dangers might qualify singly as -20 or more, and I take these into consideration. My point here is that I don’t necessarily trust myself nor want to take up too much time fussing over what might be an appropriate level of difficulty, so this is my method.

The same is true for any test which involves an NPC. Unsurprisingly, the QS contains rules for Conflicting Actions, which amount to “opposed rolls.” I do use these, sometimes, but it’s more economical to use the NPC Level to set a Difficulty. Is a PC attempting to Deceive a Level 5 con-artist? Well, it’s hard to Deceive a deceiver, isn’t it! The Difficulty modifier is -50. Anyone who remembers my discussion of Skills in VsD will recognize that this value equates to two Ranks per Level in the corresponding “skill” (for any more than this, I’m going to have to multiply Ranks over 10 by 2, then Ranks over 20 by 1). Let’s say that the NPC has been unlikely to develop this specific quality. Fine, perhaps 1 Rank per Level, then, Level x 5. Unskilled? Well, then obviously nothing. But what about Stat bonuses? Yeah, well, what about them? I don’t care; this is an NPC. But, sure, if it isn’t much trouble for you, as a GM, go ahead and toss them in. My point remains: I don’t need to take time, even if it’s just a moment, to make this determination at the gaming table.

The VsD Helping rules, in my own game, have a much wider application than what at first might be expected. I don’t prefer to have my PCs “piling on” rolls for Perception and Lore Skills (for an elaboration of this and “passive” Perception, see my comments in this post), but everyone can Help, even, usually, belatedly. To Help, every aiding character must describe how that person is Helping and succeed at a relevant test. Every success in this way awards a cumulative +10 to the activity roll for the main character attempting the test.

I like to use Helping to simulate other narrative aspects as well. In my play-by-post format, two PCs were passengers on a river ship suddenly beset by a storm. One PC used his Charisma to motivate his followers to help the shipmen steer the boat away from the riverbanks; the other PC did something more direct by seizing a spar and attempting to physically press the hull away from the rocky river edge. If either succeeded, that character would contribute a cumulative +10 to the GM’s roll for the sailors of the ship to keep from crashing. (What happened, you say? The ship smashed and sank.)

Save Rolls are pretty straightforward. An OE Roll is added to the character’s SR bonus in an attempt to beat a Difficulty which is 50 + Level of the effect x 5.

A shorter entry this time. This is because next is Combat! Unsurprisingly, this might be the most involving analysis yet.