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#RPGaDAY2017 15th to 18th

I am having a frustrating week this week. I had so many plans, my wife is away at the Edinburgh Fringe so I could really dedicate loads of time to just writing (and horse riding whenever I get stuck). As it happens I have spent the week mostly in the car going from one place to another and have achieved very little and I have the same in store all weekend! This was supposed to be the week I tackled my Rolemaster for young players project (GameMaster Kids). For a bit of light relief I was going to put some more meat on the bones of my HARP/FATE hybrid under the working title of FART. I am way behind with my 50 in 50 adventures and that just about sums up my week.

This weeks questions for #RPGaDAY 2017 could be answered in just two words. I am not a hoarder of games and books and nor do I buy stuff I have no intention of using. When you see the questions you will understand…

15th Which RPG do you enjoy adpating the most?

Well Duh, that would be Rolemaster.

16th Which RPG do you enjoy using as is?

That would be Rolemaster and more specificaly RMC.

17th Which RPG have you owned for the longest but not played?

This would be HARP that I bought last Christmas and is still as yet unplayed.

18th Which RPG have you played the most in your life?

Anyone for Rolemaster?

So the answers were either Rolemaster or HARP. I think RMC specifically works well as is and without any house rules if you want a pretty generic fantasy RPG. I have dropped wholesale into the Forgotten Realms without modification and as D&D was equally generic it just works. I could just have as easily dropped it into Greyhawk and had the same results.

My adaptation of RMC into my own game is a result of wanting to make the rules invisible during normal play. If I had may way there would be no need to pick up a rulebook from the start from the session to the end. I haven’t achieved that because of Arms Law or which ever flavour of combat system you prefer. About 50% of the effort went into adapting the rules to what I wanted and the other 50% went into adapting my prep time. The better organised I am the less time is lost at the gaming table. That is true of every GM but as you all probably know I go so far as to copy and paste sections of the rule books from the PDFs into my game notes so that if someone were to be at risk of drowning then the rule for that is the next paragraph in my notes, if you may fall off a cliff the next page in my notes is the Fall/Crush table from Arms Law and so on. I have merged rules and adventure notes so I need no other documents beyond characters sheets, my notes and the combat tables (and even those I have as individual sheets that I sort so that I only have the weapons/attacks I need for that session to minimise the number of pages. The less pages then the less page flipping to find the right table!)

So there you have it. I fairly uninspiring set of answers this week. Next week is more about publishers and different games so the answers will not all be RM & HARP.

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Random Musings. Thoughts on RM Spell Law high level spells.

My last post mused on the impossible goal of designing balance into a high level adventure. Among one of the issues I touched upon was the lack of effective buffs in RM Spell Law. But the problem is much broader than that–there is a breakdown of spell design at higher levels. Perhaps the original designers didn’t see much game play use for high level spells?

When I deconstructed and rewrote Spell Law I reviewed every single spell, spell list and compared similar spells between the realms. There are tons of inconsistencies, useless spells, redundant spells or spells “out of order” in power level. I started a detailed commentary on the RMU Spell Law forums, but there was so much pushback I just went ahead and started uploading my own version of spell law!

Rather than go analyze all of Spell Law, I wanted to comment specifically on high level spells. And to keep things shorter, let’s just tackle Essence open and closed in the post and only in the context of combat and not general purpose spells. (I’m using 6503 RMC Spell Master for reference btw.)

Elemental Shields. The 50th lvl spell combines the 15th, 17th and 19th spells Lightning, Fire and Ice Armors. These are good spells, but not great spells. Each is +20 to, 1/2 hits and decrease of crits by 1 severity. Fine for 15-19th lvl spells, but for a 50th just combining them, limiting them to 1 target seems inadequate.

The 20, 25 & 30 level spells are Mass–but in game use to buff 25-30 targets is limited. There are a few blank slots, but in my mind the real issue is trying to differentiate the same spells into different categories. Having Resist Light, Lightarmor, and then Lightning Armor is confusing and doesn’t allow much progression.

Overall, the list can be consolidated, improved protection at high levels and needs a good increase on the 50th lvl spell; either make it 1 target/lvl or increase the protection a bit.

Essence Hand. Calling Seal Team 6 Sniper group. The 50th lvl spell, Aim True is perhaps one of the most deadly spells available to Essence users! The spell automatically does max damage, “E” crit with a missile attack. (for large or superlarge it does a slaying crit) Sure the caster has to touch the shooter, but a group against 1 opponent or just a few opponents could make swift work of any adversary. Too powerful?

Spell Wall. The definitive list for protection v. magic. How good is it? The 20, 25 and 30 lvl spells provide +50 v a specific realm magic. Not too shabby…but…it’s 1 target and concentration only. Sad. Or the caster can just utilize Protection V which provides +25 RRs v. ALL REALMS and is 1 min/lvl. Which one would you choose?

Dispelling Ways. A far better list than Spell Law? Dispel XX Sphere creates a moving barrier around the caster that causes any inbound spell to make an initial RR before proceeding against a target in the Sphere (and then requires another RR). Those are good odds…but the caster has to concentrate the whole time. The 16th lvl spell creates a sphere with a RADIUS of 100′!!!! These need some work I think. The 17-19 “Un” spells strip spell casting ability from casters and items for 1 day. That’s pretty good.

Rapid Ways. The 50th lvl Mass Haste provides 50 rnds of Haste (no after penalties) of DOUBLE action. This one is a no brainer! Use this with Aim True and you have a killing machine.

Shield Mastery. Putting aside the issue that Essence Hand and Shield Mastery are doing the same thing (telekinesis), and that the instantaneous but contingent use of these spells creates huge game mechanic issues, is this even a good spell list? I think a lot more can be done. The 50th lvl spell is cool, but how practical for actual game play? Will the caster encounter that much missile fire? Will they be willing to cast this spell every round to the exclusion of all else? A better 50th lvl spell would be 1 rnd/lvl duration vs missiles within 5′ of caster (or target). That would be a great player buff and worthy of 50th lvl.

Spell Enchancement. Rubbish and breaks spell mechanics. Easier and more logical to scale range, radius or duration by PP expenditure than some “spell for a spell” list.

Spell Reins. Not many spells on this list, and really should be combined and improved with Spell Wall. Some good spells, but the 50th lvl, like Shield Mastery only works 1 round. How many possible spells would be directed at a caster during actual game play? Sure in a battlefield with tons of mages it might be useful…this spell needs a duration.

Spirit Mastery. The 50th lvl spell allows you to cast 1 spell/rnd..but only 10th lvl or lower. So this is really only a “economics” spell–it just reduces PP cost but locks the caster into only casting these spells.

So out of those lists, the 50th lvl spells for Essence Hand and Rapid Ways are awesome, but the others are either good spells but too limiting or just not very useful. Feel free to check out BASiL lists for my solutions to these spells and lists.

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Three Wheels On My Wagon

I am intrigued by ITDs critical tables. I have never seen them but it came up recently in a discussion on on armour by the piece that there are different critical tables by location and only three locations; limbs, head and body.

For me the only piece of RM that has to be retained is the critical; everything else has to earn its place at the table. If it is more effort that it adds to the game I am inclined to cut or replace it.

Despite my slash and burn approach to rules I am mostly still following the roll your dice, find the right table, look up the roll and roll your critical procedure.

In all the companions and discussions I have never seen a superior system. I don’t care about the #hits, the rounds of stun, the bleeding or whatever. It is the wit and dark humour I like and the graphic descriptions of wounds. You will never get that with 1d8 damage. Decades ago rolling a 20 and getting double damage used to excite me but “Your bolt goes right through his temple and stands there quivering. Astonishingly enough, he’s still standing. But any attempt to remove it will kill him instantly. +25 hits, stunned no parry 2 rnds and bleeding 12 hits/rnd.” is a level above.

I have a half formed diceless RM combat system and I have an outline for HARP/FATE bastardised system. That uses the HARP critical tables and FATE dice and has a working title of FART.

FART is really good fun and fast to play. It just needs some time spent on it writing it up and putting it out there to the FATE community. The mission objective would be to hook FATE players into trying RMU once it is released. It is my understanding that FATE is one of the most successful games of recent years but despite that you will never get to put your crossbow bolt into someone’s head.

So we have ripped just about everything apart recently on here. What, in your perfect combat system, are the absolutely non-negotiable elements?

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Deconstruction of Character Creation and Game Modeling of Skill Systems in RM.

 

Peter’s recent blog, RMU – to infinity and beyond, created a firestorm of comment activity. 64 comments to date! Much of the back and forth touched up on professions, attributes, knacks and character creation. Certainly, the thrust of the debate was centered around the Professions vs No Professions commentary that Peter and I have continued on the RolemasterBlog and previously on the Rm Forums.

Rather than add more comments to Peters blog post, I thought I would take this topical opportunity to discuss the base modeling of the RM skill system (and other game systems too). As I did with BASiL, my own rewrite of Character Law (I named it SWARM) started with a complete deconstruction of the RM rule set. It’s an ongoing process and even now I’m tinkering and rethinking things based on comments here by Peter, Hurin and ITD. I’m going to discuss my own solutions, but the point here is to examine the underlying principles of the skill system, not argue for my own resolutions.

There are 5 basic rule mechanisms that are used in the RM skill system: Stats, Development Points, Skill Costs, Skill Rank Bonus and Profession Skill Bonus.

  1. A standard RPG/game trope, Stats quantify a PC’s various physical and mental traits—the basis of the character make-up. In RM stats are then used to determine “Stat Bonuses” which are added to the appropriate skills. While there is disagreement about the need for actual stats, everyone agrees with and understands the nature of stat bonuses—it is a measure of a characters “Natural Aptitudes and Abilities”.
  2. Development Points. DP’s are “coinage”—used to purchase skills by rank. In RM, DP’s are variable and based on a select group of Stats, while in RMU characters are given a fixed amount. Either way, Development Points are modelling the “Capacity to Learn”.
  3. Skill Costs. In both RM and RMU skill costs are driven by a PC’s profession. Some argue that Professional Skill Costs are a product of formative learning channels, aptitudes or learning paths. This is an argument for WHY there are Profession Skill Costs—but this is not an argument on what Skill Costs ARE. Skill Costs are a measurement of “Profession Aptitudes” & “Time & Effort” to learn a skill.
  4. Skill Rank Bonus. The Skill Rank Bonus progression basically remains unchanged from RM to RMU; for each rank, there is a subsequent, cumulative bonus that is added to your total. Skill Rank Bonus models a “Learning Curve”.
  5. Profession Skill Bonus. Finally, each Profession is given pre-assigned Skill Bonuses based on the characters Profession. In RM it was a level bonus and in RMU it’s a per rank bonus. The is modeling “Profession Aptitudes”.

The first and foremost problem I see here is that Profession Skill Costs is modelling two separate distinct factors: professional aptitudes AND time and effort. The second is that Profession Skill Bonuses are then duplicative; they are both modelling Profession Aptitudes. Personally, I think that’s sloppy game mechanics—it would simpler to just adjust Profession Skill Costs and eliminate the Profession Skill Bonus. Reducing the cost of a skill is the same as giving a profession skill rank bonus.

Ultimately, the simplest measure to test is: Total Skill Bonus/DP’s spent. Adding layers of complexity to model the same effect (Profession Aptitudes) is pointless.

I think it’s a cleaner solution to make each mechanism discrete unto itself, rather than have several game devices that only serve to reinforce professional tropes. Here would by my suggestion for RMU using Professions:

  1. Stats – Natural Aptitudes.
  2. Development Points. Either stat variable or fixed. (I can see both arguments)
  3. Skill Costs. Time & Effort only. The same skill costs for all professions—this is modelling how hard it is to learn a particular skill or lore. Skill costs can vary by skill but NOT by profession.
  4. Skill Rank Bonus. Learning Curve.
  5. Profession Skill Bonus. Profession Aptitudes.

This solution provides distinct functions of each rule component—no duplication. Plus, Profession Skill Bonuses allow for easier to understand Profession distinctions and an easier process for creating new Professions. You no longer have to assign skill costs by Professions— and you can be more aggressive on the total Bonuses per Profession. Giving a Fighter +4 bonus/rank for 1 Hand Edge is a real differentiator and results in the same outcome as giving them a low skill cost. Plus, this solution eliminates huge charts of professional based skill costs as well.

If, like me, you are using NO PROFESSION you might want to try my solution which is slightly different.

  1. Stats – Natural Aptitudes.
  2. Development Points. Either stat variable or fixed. (I can see both arguments)
  3. Skill Costs. Time & Effort only. Skills all cost 5* with +1 cost per extra rank per level with unlimited advancement. (the +1 resets each level—this measures the law of diminishing returns).
  4. Skill Rank Bonus. Bell Curve. I use a 1,2,3…9,8,7,6….1,1,1 progression. This keeps low level characters from maxing out the cost/bonus curve of important skills.
  5. Variable Skill Bonus. Rather than Skill Bonuses assigned by Profession I give players +6 in bonuses to assign as they see fit. This option models “talents” or “knacks” and gives players more flexibility and customization of their characters outside the profession paradigm.

In the final argument, having Profession Skill Costs and Profession Skill Bonuses is redundant and unnecessary.

For summary:

Mechanism/System RM RMU Suggested Solution (when using Professions)
Stats Natural Aptitudes & Abilities. Natural Aptitudes & Abilities. Natural Aptitudes & Abilities.
Development Points Variable Learning Capacity Fixed Capacity to learn Optional – Variable or Fixed
Skill Costs Professional Aptitude & Time and Effort Professional Aptitude & Time and Effort Time and Effort (same costs for all Professions)
Skill Rank Bonus Learning Curve – Decreasing Learning Curve – Decreasing Learning Curve – Decreasing
Skill Bonus Professional Aptitude Professional Aptitude Professional Aptitudes – Enchanced
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RMU – to infinity and beyond!

There was a comment to my last post that read:

The challenge I see with RMU as opposed to RM2 is the apparent lack of willingness to look beyond fantasy (and even then it’s their definition of fantasy). RM has always suffered (IMO) from the lack of a solid, accessible setting, and RMU just seems to accelerate that trend. They also took steps (especially in the combat system) to render it almost useless for non-magic settings if you leave it RAW. The flexibility that came with RM2 (and even RMSS in its own way) seems to be disappearing.

In addition in a recent comment Hurin had noted the amount of HARP that seems to have found its way into RMU. There is nothing wrong with HARP but HARP is not Rolemaster and definitely not RM2!

That got me thinking. Last year I bought HARP Fantasy and HARP SF. I bought them because I want to run a SF game soon and as I have said many times before I have lost my Spacemaster books.

So HARP is certainly not locked into a fantasy setting and not into one single fantasy setting. Shadow World is statted out for HARP and HARP has its own core setting of Cyradon. HARP SF plays out in Tintamar but by default it also shares the same setting as Kulthea and Spacemaster because of the Shadow World connection.

One of the things I like about HARP is that the last release was to truly unify the fantasy and sf rules and make them interchangeable. I only needed the fantasy rules as monsters make great aliens.

There is a massive gulf between RM2 and HARP and I agree there is a lot of HARP in RMU. The skill system is the same, character creation is very similar. The move in RMU to less combat tables is almost a single step towards the HARP way of thinking and that I think is the problem with RMU. The only weakness as I see it with HARP, looking from a RM background point of view, is the combat system and the criticals in particular. The same old critical comes around again and again way too often and even in the same fight. The rest of the combat system works really nicely as far as I can tell.

Another interesting thing is that the HARP forums are far busier than the RM forums if you exclude the BETA test forums. If you include them then you also need to include the HARP development forums as well. I see a far greater variety of voices in the HARP debates than in the RM ones these days. There is an active HARP community around the game and new HARP books are eagerly awaited,even if most of them are just re-releases to bring them in line with the unified Fantasy/SF rules.

Whether HARP’s firearms are as good as intothatdarkness’s firearms is a completely different question but the fact remains that HARP does have viable settings and it does have modern day and SF elements that make it go well beyond the fantasy genre.

I think RMU is trying to learn from HARP but is struggling to take the old guard with it to some extent. Which is a pity as we are the old guard.

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Project BASiL: Mentalism Spells & Misc.

Most of my emails and forum messages have been asking about when I’m going to post the Mentalism spells for my Spell Law re-write. While Essence and Channeling were fairly straight forward, I’ve ended up re-working Mentalism several times–and now I’m doing it again! Part of this was a desire to really differentiate the realms: Essence is manipulation of the physical world and elements, Channeling is driven by the God’s aspect, “life forces”, and miraculous effects, and Mentalism are spells of mind and will. But what does that mean? What should Mentalism spells encompass for powers?

While Mentalism was never proffered as being Psionics, it was a good reference point for me to re-organize Mentalism spells, clarify their limits and group spells accordingly. Interestingly, I found that like Essence and Channeling, new spell lists and groupings created new profession possibilities.

Here are my initial power/ability groupings and associated lists/powers (same as Base lists). Most of them are just a single or a couple of lists to create a mental “Discipline”–most Mentalists might focus on 2-3 Disciplines for specialization.

Body Enhancement: Body Control, Self Augmentation, Body Weaponry, Self Healing, Body Resistance

Clairavoyance:  Item Visions, People Visions, Place Visions (yes those names are pretty bad–suggestions?)

Glamours: Phantasms/lllusions, Hallucinations, Visual, Sound, Smell, Touch

Mesmerization: Mind Control, Enthralling, Suggestion

Mind Enhancement: Mind Shields, Mind Lore (Absorption list)

Precognition: Future Visions, Awareness, Dreams

Pyschokinesis: Move Objects, Manipulate Object (heat, bend, reform, break)

Pyrokinesis: Control Fire, Manifest Fire

Sense Projection: Astral Projection, Remote Sensing

Subterfuge: Cloaking, Distractions

Telepathy: Absorb Lore, Read Mind, Sense Minds, Mind Speech, Mind Attacks

Right now I’m around 30-35 “Base Lists”, 10 Closed (which are lesser/consolidated versions of base)  and a handful of Open (limited to 10th lvl). Similar to the other BASiL lists, you can easily move things around: “Telepathy” becomes the Mentalist Base, Pyschokinesis and Subterfuge becomes Mystic Base and Body Enhancement becomes Monk base–the rest drop into Closed and/or Open.

My goal was 50 total lists which I think I’m at, but it needs another pass through. If anyone has any ideas, thoughts, spells, spell lists etc feel free to comment. After all the Companions, Guild lists, and add-ons I have no illusions that anything I’m doing is truly original. For me it was re-organizing, filling in blanks, eliminating redundant and or useless spells etc. Happy to hear any suggestions!

 

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SHORT TAKES pt. 2: Alchemical MAGIC IN ROLEMASTER & SHADOW WORLD

So yesterday I blogged about a simple, unified system for imbedding magic into objects: what we term “Enchanting”. I also noted at the end, and linked to a RM Forum blog about a separate, but related system of Alchemy.

Curiously, most of the original RM Alchemist material had little to do with our common definition of “Alchemy”. Sure, Alchemists could make potions, but most of the spells related to the creation of runes, magic weapons and armor and Daily “X” items.

Anyway, after I posted my blog, I got a message asking for clarification about the differences between Alchemy, Crafting and Imbedding. So first to be clearer, these three disciplines are “Three Legs of the Stool” in creating magic items.

  1. Imbedding is the most direct approach—you just imbed certain spell effects into an object to be used “Daily”, with a set amount of charges or with a permanent effect.
  2. Crafting, while applying to a wide range of products, means creating an object out of already enchanted/magical material. The crafter doesn’t actually ADD the magic to an object, but the end result is the same. The blacksmith that forges a blade from an ingot of Eog creates a +30 sword. The carver that whittles a javelin from a Dragon bone creates an enchanted spear etc.
  3. Alchemy is the craft of mixing elements to produce a Compound material. This material can have mundane properties (like glue) or magical properties—depending on the effect and setting.

Alchemy is Chemistry—just in a fantasy world. The art is dependent on Formulas, either researched, experimented, bought or given.  In my RM Forum post, I focused more on mundane creations: fireworks, gun powder, glues, acids, smoke grenades etc. However, it’s easy to add any and all formulas that allow for spell like effects or special powers. (Hurin, I think you brought this up in a blog comment or in the Forums). I never bothered devising specific magical formulas, but it has been done by other game systems, video games and works of fiction. Really the sky is the limit, but a lot will depend on the game setting. The newest Anthony Ryan book, the Draconis Memoria is based on the idea that distilled Dragons Blood gives special powers to the imbiber based on the type of Dragon.

It’s not that I don’t embrace the idea of magical compounds produced by Alchemy, it’s just that I haven’t got around to it yet! Shadow World offers a variety if interesting creatures and materials (and already has magical plants which is basically a narrow branch of Alchemy). Dragons and Shards probably have a lot of organic parts that could be used to make interesting compounds!

So, besides the “Third Leg of the Stool” analogy, Alchemy does several things:

  1. Producing “Substrates”. Liquids for potions, paper for runes, powders, candles etc are all examples of Subtrates—Alchemists produce the BASE product that is then used to imbed magical effects.
  2. Mundane Compounds. Alchemy is used to produce Inks, Oils, Glues, Acids, Itching Powder, Gun Powder, Dyes etc.
  3. Magical Compounds. Alchemy is used to produce magical products by mixing, distilling, reducing Magical Ingredients.
  4. Enhanced Materials. This is the big one that ties into yesterday’s post. Alchemy allows for the production of Enhanced materials that are more effective for Imbedding. For instance, while normal glass has a low item strength, Alchemical Glass can be made with a much higher strength. Or an Alchemist can devise a powder of ground Dragonbone that allows for imbedding of high level spells. In other words, Alchemy allows a user to fabricate an item with a higher Item Strength than  normal.

In any event, Alchemy acts as an important “meta skill” in our Rolemaster/Shadow World game. Maybe this gives you an idea for yours!

 

 

 

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Short takes: Imbedding Magic in Rolemaster & Shadow World

INTRODUCTION:

Although I wanted to slow my blogging pace down for the summer to focus on other projects it’s a hard habit to break! I want to spend less time on house rules; the RM Forums provides plenty of opportunity for rule minutia, and I think most of the active readers here already have their own set positions. So I’m introducing “Short Takes”, a minimized discussion for rule theory where I can offer conceptually ideas without getting into the weeds with my own solutions.  If you look over some recent posts, I’ve already started with this approach. By offering a rule theory in more vague terms, I’ve found that people respond more with their own ideas that I can adopt to fine tune my solution. That’s been the case for “Stats as Skills”, “Resistance Rolls”, “Fixed HPs” and a few others.

ITEM IMBEDDING:

For my first “Short Take”, I wanted to tackle the subject of Item Imbedding. I believe that Rolemaster was one of the first rule sets to tackle a comprehensive system of magic item creation, and while no one in our group ever played an Alchemist we loved to look through those Base lists and play around with making cool items.

While they were a leap forward in the early 80s, a lot has changed over the past few decades. Reviewing the Alchemists lists for BASiL made me realize how inadequate the lists are now. At the very least, they should just be reclassified as Closed lists, but that doesn’t solve the problem of the lists themselves or working in issues with other realms.

The spell lists that I have the biggest issues with are: Inorganic Skills, Liquid/Gas Skills & Organic Skills. These spell effects should be handled with regular RM skills, and by establishing these lists, it infers that spell users are needed to produce certain items and materials. Take the Udahir of the Iron Wind—they have a Laen Crafters Guild but under RM rules the members would need to be 20th lvl to work the material. So either the Guild has an abnormal number of 20th lvl Alchemists or there must be another process to work Laen. Later rules did a bit of hand-waving, offered up ritual magic or other reasons to explain cultures like the Udahir (or Dwarven crafter societies), but ultimately RM established a very high benchmark to work materials that were ubiquitous in the game world: mithril, laen eog etc.

It seemed obvious to me that de-coupling Crafting processes from Enchanting processes (a better word than Alchemy in my mind) was the first step. This allows for societies with high technical competence to make items without the need for Alchemy spells and puts more importance on crafting as a skill in general.

Of course, eliminating those 3 Alchemly lists only leaves 3 Base: Enchanting Ways, Essence Imbedding and Ment/Cham Imbedding. The last two are basically the same so in the end you are left with 2 basic lists to handle RM magic item creation. Let’s put that aside for now (I’ll discuss in another blog re: BASiL Investiture Spells).

So now that we recognize that Crafting is used to work materials, magic and non-magic, how does that tie into imbedding magic? We decided to unify imbedding, crafting & item breakage into 1 mechanic: Item Strength.

Here is the basic chart I posted on the Forums last year. We’ve done some improvements and changes to it since.

SW & RM Material Strength

Meta-physically, this directly ties together a material’s physical strength (fragility), susceptibility (resistance) and its magical capacity (# of spell levels). So, a glass object is fragile, unsuitable for magical imbedding and resistance to holding lots of spells. This means that for someone wanted to enchant/imbedding glass will either need to use a very low-level spell or be a powerful spell caster that can overcome the materials limitations. Conversely, strong items (like Laen) are both easy to Imbed and can hold lots of spell levels, but are difficult to craft.

This also simplified item crafting—the Item Strength number can be used either as an Item Level or a SM maneuver penalty depending on our own resolution process. For example, a crafter wants to make a sword of High Steel (Str 50). The crafting skill check roll would be made using a -50 (Sheer Folly), the sword could conceivably hold up to 50 lvl of spells and if an Enchanter wants to imbed a spell or power the item would save as 50th lvl to accept the spell. (Note that this is a bit counterintuitive–the material making the save would ACCEPT the imbed).

Occasionally there is an outlier (a strong material that is also magic resistant like Kregora, or a fragile material that holds magic well)—but it’s easy to track a few outliers than come up with a more complex system.

These guidelines also mean that potent magic items are going to be made with strong, high quality materials while those made with lesser materials will be weaker, used 1 time or disposable (potions, charms, wards, candles, powders, oil, ointments etc).

Hmm…I’m not sure this turned out to be a “Short Take”! A couple notes:

  1. I think Alchemy Companion and Construct Companion are fantastic books—but for us just too granular and complex.
  2. We’ve expanded our own Alchemy Rules (see HERE) which is different than standard RM Alchemists, so we call making magic items “Enchanting” to differentiate the two.
  3. When Imbedding fails the item makes a breakage check modified by the spell lvl.
  4. We have “Simple Imbedding” spell lists that allow players to make imbedded, 1 time items on the fly. Simplified rules like these make it easy to do “in game”.

 

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Unifying and Simplification: Rolemaster Herbs

One of the early appeals of Rolemaster was it’s “realism”, and while most people thought of the combat system there was also exhaustive material around magical herbs. In many ways, RM herbs supplanted traditional fantasy RPGs reliance on healing magic and healing potions. Some even argue that RM healing spells are relatively weak, or that the detailed injury system required too many spells to heal even minor wounds.

I think many players/groups use herbs in different ways: some to augment natural healing processes while others allow for instant, miraculous healing effects. “Chew and screw” so to speak. Instant effects allow groups without skilled healers to adventure, or groups in intensive dungeon environments to maintain their tempo.

No matter how a GM handles effects and healing times, RM established some basic criteria for herbs: location codes(biome), form, prep and rarity. Peter discussed creature codes  in a previous blog, and certainly RM herb codes were another example of over complexity!

RMU has done much to simplify herb criteria; biomes are simplified, rarity is given a modifier and “form” & “prep” are fairly simple. What RMU didn’t do is completely unify these simplified criteria with the RM skill and resolution process.

What we have done is apply difficulty modifiers to 3 criteria for herbs.

  1. Rarity. The same as RMU, we give herbs a modifier for it’s rarity. This can be applied to a foraging/survival skill check or as a check to see if an herbalist or store stocks the herb.
  2. Preparation.  This is where we diverge from RMU which sort of combines prep and application into one criteria. Each herb is given a prep modifier, based on the difficulty in preparing the agent for use. Whether that’s brewing, distilling, steeping, powdering etc.
  3. Application.  Finally, we give an herb an application modifier, based on the difficulty of delivering it’s effects. For healing and other herbs with a range of effects the maneuver roll can act as a % of success–so a 85% roll would delivery 85% of the healing effect. For herbs with an “all or nothing” effect it’s simply a pass/fail maneuver.

Interestingly, you can have a herb that is relatively easy to prepare but difficult to apply correctly or more commonly, difficult to prepare by very easy to apply. For herbs that require no prep, or the application is easy we just give it an n/a and don’t require a skill check.

Using these criteria gives herbs complexity, but still rely on the simple skill resolution process.  Additionally, players may need to rely on different herbs at lower level that don’t require a high level of skill to prepare or apply, or may need to pay an herbalist to do the preparation for them. (For simplicity sake, I don’t get into much detail on “freshness” and removed most of the herb keeping spells from BASiL).

Also note, we put all rolemaster herbs into our SW Master Encounter table by biome. You can find that HERE.

So this is the last blog for May! Whew, we did a blog every day this month!!! For the next few months I’m going to reduce by blog pace to about 1/wk and focus on getting adventure files ready, finish the other projects I’m working on and do a bit of travelling overseas!