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Rolemaster Deconstruction: Is it a Skill or an Ability?

As part of our Rolemaster deconstruction I’ve followed two processes: consolidating small “skills” into larger meta-skills and changed traditional skills into inherent abilities. (Perception and Body Development being the two foremost).

Obviously, one of Rolemasters differentials with D&D was shifting almost all abilities into trainable skills. The contrast was clear: D&D imparted abilities through racial mechanics, classes and levels and was on one end of a game  spectrum while RM’s skill focus sat at the other end. The problem (in my mind) of course is that under RM’s approach, EVERYTHING became a trainable skill. Skills became parsed further and further into niche secondary skills, skill bloat became rampant and a more complicated similar skill mechanic was necessary to manage the interrelationship between overlapping skills. Lost in all of the Rolemaster Companions, RMSS and RM bolt-on’s was questioning the very premise of “what is a skill?”

There were a few early exceptions: DB and RR’s. Those kept to their D&D roots and RM never allowed a trainable skill to offset poison, disease or the realms of magic. Adrenal Defense was a skill, but had lots of restrictions and has now been mostly nerfed  in RMU.

As discussed in my various blogs, I’ve reverted some core skills into inherent abilities using stats or other approaches. Just a few examples:

  1. Body Development. I’ve mostly embraced Peter’s approach and set HP’s by race and constitution. However, we also add +1 HP/# of skill ranks in Endurance.
  2. Perception. I’ve moved the skill into a 12th stat. This measures the characters PHYSICAL perceptual abilities: eye sight, sense of smell, alertness, hearing etc. This also is easier to use with a racial modifier.
  3. Feats of Strength/Lifting. Purely based on strength.
  4. Maneuvering in Armor. It’s been discussed in previous blogs and now is being talked about at the Forums, but I just don’t see maneuvering in armor as primarily a trainable skill. Instead I see it as a “handicap” (like adding weight to a race horse). Plus, making MnA a trainable skill, armor becomes a video game like level ability: players progress up in armor type as the gain in levels. As I have argued before, thats akin to players proggressing up in weaponry: start with a dagger and eventually getting to a 2hand sword at 10th lvl.

There are arguments for aspects of a established skill as a being trainable. For me, it’s weighted the other way: if the argument is less than 50/50 for it being trainable I want to work it into an inherent or stat based ability. I know many people want to stick to the core of RM and it’s skill system; but think outside the box…what RM skill should really be an ability?

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Brokedown Palace

The title above is a song by Grateful Dead which I thought was very apt for this post.

So we have a magical throne that urges one towards the dark arts and necromancy. The last human ruler of the city of forgotten heroes was very magical and it was them that caused the throne to be hurled down into the deepest well, or more accurately a cistern, where it should never be found again.

If we are dealing with a lower level party then I would suggest that a Revenant (3rd level) takes the place of the king or queen.

For a mid to high level party I would like to use a Lich. There are three suggestions here.  If you don’t have stats for Sprectre771’s ex-wife we will have to discard the first option. So we are left with two possible Lich ‘builds’. For are hack and slash game a Lich Magician is the most aggressive version. The magician base lists lend themselves to straight out blasting combat and there is plenty of more devious lists to challenge an entire party.

The most fun version if you have the time to role play it out is the Lich Sorcerer. The fun a GM could have with the Transferal and Subjugation spells (Soul Destruction 8th and 11th levels)

A Lich is a 20th level foe and spell caster on its own territory, this is a major opponent.

The Palace

I would like to see the party being surrounded and pushed back and back by overwhelming numbers of undead spectres, ghostly figures. Finally, with their backs to the gates of a palace there is only one place they can go and that is into the palace grounds and the undead don’t follow.

Any experienced players are going to know they have just gone from the frying pan into the fire but right there and then they have a moments respite, a moment to regroup and treat wounds.

Behind the party a palace stands set in dead and withered formal gardens.

It is here that the party can find the actual location of the throne. You could play so that if the party were to simply ask for Lich about the throne then it will tell them that it was thown into a bottomless cistern so no one will ever sit upon it again.

As the party enter the palace there is one ante chamber and then the hall. The most notable thing about the hall should be that there is no throne but a clear place where one had stood. That is a clear and obvious clue.

At its simplest this could be a straight fight with the Revenant/Lich and then search for clues for the location of the missing throne. It will be much more interesting to up the role playing tension here. There is one caveat. As a GM you should read up on the Revenant and what it wants and how it acts before introducing this element to your game. RPGs are meant to be fun and suicide is a serious subject. You should play this in the right way for your group. Alternatively you can swap out the Revenant for either a lesser or greater Shadow (4th or 8th level). I rather like the Shadow alternative as it adds a touch of the vampire palace to the adventure.

The location could be under the palace or at another site. Right now I am inclined to put the throne below the palace.

Thinking about the entire module we have here the party could simply be tasked with retrieving the dark artifact from the city, maybe before some dark agent gets it first. They are told it is referred to as the kings seat of power before the city fell to an undead army. They should be able to find more information at the city library. So the party have to get into the city (gate house or the marshes), visit the library (wight’s domain) and the palace (Lich/Octopus). Between these location we can have a number of semi random encounters. These are easily scaled to the party level. So one to take place in back streets should the party decide to go that way, one for a market place, square or plaza and a third on the city walls. So where ever the party decide to go they will meet a prepared encounter. Then on the way out the party will meet another prepared encounter on the streets of the city, as they now have a cart and heavy load to move and the final encounter is the original gate house with the spectre.

Is that enough?

 

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Kill The Priest

Kill The Priest sees a corrupted priest unleashing a creature to look for a religious relic. The creature is now on a quest to kill any and all powerful female priests of the deity in question. The priest is themselves a dupe, and the characters must stop the creatures and the priest.

This adventure has a Terminator style villain who just keeps on coming. It uses the Black Stalker from C&T in the role of Terminator but the priest in the title is a definite manipulator in the background.

Even if you don’t buy this booklet, look up the Black Stalker (RMC C&T pg 79, ENTITIES FROM OTHER PLANES). Awesome foe and one that deserves to grace every campaign at some point!

I do accept that this adventure has a high chance of killing a PC, at least once. The black stalker has +30 initiative, a 180 OB and a slaying weapon. One top of that they have armour that encumbers as AT4 but protects as AT20 and a cloak that adds +50 to Stalk and Hide, oh yes, the regenerate as well.

If your party is up around level 15 or higher then this is a chance for the GM to play a ‘monster’ to the absolute limit of its abilities.

It is not all about hack and slash though. There is an evil plot going on here that you can weave into your game style be it political intrigue or broad strokes.

The game that inspired this had the black stalker coming back on a weekly basis and the players had no end of trouble defeating it. The highlight, for me, was when one character tried to keep and use the black stalkers weapon which was actually slaying against that actual character. The player was happy enough using a sword that had +30 to initiative until he fumbled really badly and delivered a slaying critical to himself!

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50 in 50 adventure hooks. What works, what doesn’t, what can improve?

I’m in the final stretch of a hectic professional life, so I barely have time to write, post or respond. However, the Rolemasterblog must go on so I’m going to do a quickie for today. Hopefully this will spark some feedback.

We are nearing the end of our “50 Adventures in 50 Weeks” challenge we set for ourselves last year. It’s been a great experience in creativity, deadlines, limitations on using IP, and testing the limits of publishing. The last of my adventures start getting larger and more in depth and I’ll be putting in usable “stats” whenever possible using an abbreviated stat block that can be used with d100 and Rolemaster w/o any IP infringements.

Peter blogged previously about his views on the 50in50 and I wanted to toss out some thoughts and observations of my own:

  1. I’ve made a little money. Nothing significant, but I did buy hardcovers of Xa’ar, Emer III and Cloudlords the other day using my earnings.
  2. In hindsight, I wish my adventures were a bit “meatier”. That wasn’t the original goal of the challenge–it was supposed to be simple hooks and concepts–but looking over the published ones sparked new ideas.
  3. Reviews. No one wants to be criticized but it would have been nice to get some reviews from people. Even “I can believe I paid .50 for that” would have provided some insight.
  4. For my contribution, it seems like the “City of Spiders” and “Haunted Forest” were the two most popular. Some of my other products were encounters or people related so I wonder if the appeal was that they were both physical places that are easy to drop into a adventure or campaign?

Since we are going to continue to publish adventures past the 50 adventure limit I’m going to set a few more goals:

  1. Each of mine will be at least 3 pages of content.
  2. Include Rolemaster compatible stats
  3. Focus on places. Interesting NPC’s or encounters will be rolled into a “place”.
  4. Layouts. Everyone likes the battle maps so each adventure will have one.

I’m open to any suggestions as we move forward! What should we change or improve?

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Q: What has a spine but no bones?

A: A book!

Sorry for the bad joke but the non-corporeal undead also have no bones and one of the best suggested encounter locations was the library, it was just too good an opportunity for a bad joke to skip.

Here we have a rather interesting floor plan of a library. The architecture itself can hint at the former wealth and culture of the city before it fell into decay and abandonment.

We can have the floors littered with a carpet of decaying books and scrolls.

So what the players need to achieve is to find the location of the throne and to learn something of its nature.

I am imagining the library to be abandoned by day but as the sun sets a ghostly presence can be felt.

The monster this time is the former librarian, using the stats of a Wight. These start at 10th level and go up to 20th level. As a single foe against a party of heroes I think that is a fair fight. Given the ability of the undead to regenerate the party may need to fight this wight again and again if they are not adept at getting what they need from the library.

I think it would be important for the GM to describe the wight and it coming for the characters rather than naming it as a wight. If the characters have already fought undead that are hurling shockbolts or lightning bolts and these are doing cold crits it can be one of those situations where the players really have no idea what they are fighting. Most of us started in MERP so wights are nothing new. Against a background of spectres, revenants and apparitions knowing what is what becomes harder.

There is loads of opportunity for atmospheric description here with the sun going down and the characters feeling the temperature dropping. The light fading and then the appearance of burning red eyes in the darkness…

I have not added room numbers to the map intentionally. I think as GMs we can describe a sort of uniform rot and decay. I would suggest that the greyed out areas as the most sodden with swamp water coming up from the ground. the stairs down are flooded with stagnant swamp water. If you need to discourage investigations into the flooded basement we can stick a crocodile down there. Try fighting one of them in the dark. They are only 3rd level but with an 80 OB (Large Bite) and a bit of surprise they could put off the inquisitive!

So now we need to provide the characters with some reward. I do not like the idea of demanding skill rolls to find information that the players need to advance the story. I think rolling to see how soon the information is found is find. I am sure that the RM2 players here probably have Library Use or Research as a skill. I would suggest that good rolls allow for a speedier finding of the right scrolls and books and poor rolls means it takes longer.

Another alternative is that finding the location of the throne is an automatic success but we create a table so that 101+ tells the characters that there is a guardian protecting the throne, 126+ tells the characters that the throne corrupted all who ruled from it. 151+ adds the detail that the throne was known as the necromancers seat and so on.

Any thoughts?

 

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The Tribulations of the Orachu Tribe is our latest 50in50 offering.

In The Tribulations of the Orachu Tribe, the characters encounter a feared local tribe, coming across the tribe when the characters need something, or simply by chance. The characters will be taken by the tribe and will be required to prove their worthiness in a series of tests.

I don’t want to give anything away but there is an interesting Rolemaster-esque point here. In one of the tribulations there are sharpened stakes upon which the characters could fall.

In Brian’s version he gives the stakes an OB and an attack table, in this case +25OB and the Spear attack table. I have used this same threat in some of my adventures but I tend to use “(x number) of ‘A’ puncture criticals” rather than an OB. On the A puncture critical table there are plenty of chances of no extra damage or just a couple of hits but chances are at least one stake will do something regardless of what level the characters are. With Brian’s version a +25OB means that probably most characters won’t take any damage as their DB will cancel most of the OB and the GM would probably have to roll open ended to ‘hit’.

Furthermore there is only one fatal result (a natural 00) on the ‘A’ puncture critical column. No one really wants the hero to die to a fairly simple staked pit trap or in this case a balancing beam style challenge. Heroes should die heroically, at least most of the time. With my version I don’t need to pull any punches knowing that the challenge could harm, hinder and challenge the party, there are still nasty wounds that can happen on the A critical. That 00 result is a severed vein leading to a heart failure but with life keeping plus vein/artery repair (5th, 7th and 8th level respectively) the fatality can be avoided. Even if your party are not 8th level those spells are ‘overcastable’ at a push.

In contrast an open ended attack roll is five times more likely than a natural 00 on the critical and that opens the way to much more severe criticals than just an A.

So for future adventure hooks which method would you prefer for pits and traps? Fixed criticals or OBs for attacks? Do you care? We can use this to improve our adventure hooks for everyone. 

 

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Deconstruction: Rolemaster Arms Law. How often should you fumble?

 

Have you ever fought in a melee? With weapons? Every played around with nunchakus, flails, morning stars or just goofed off with chains, ropes, whips or similar objects? Ever chopped wood? Ever been in a fight? Have you been in a stressful dangerous situation where your heart raced, adrenaline kicked in and your palms started sweating?

If so, chances are you have also fumbled an object: it slipped out of your hands, bounced dangerously off a hard object, it was over-swung and you actually hit yourself or you missed a target completely and lost balance, tripped or even fell. That’s completely normal and expected. Wielding weapons in battle should be more difficult than playing around with mock combat.

Rolemaster has a system for fumbles: each weapon has a fumble range, generally between 1-10 with an optional rule that the # of skill ranks can reduce the fumble range (but never below 1). In practical terms, that means that by level 3-5 most fighter types will  have reduced their fumble to 1 in their chosen weapon(s).

Many people probably feel that fiddling with fumble ranges is like encumbrance and exhaustion: too much realism and/or record keeping for not a lot of benefit. I get that. However, swinging around a sharp object, as HARD AS YOU CAN, in a confusing and disorienting environment is incredibly dangerous!

kill bill GIF

Now imagine weapons even more unwieldy than a basic sword, club, mace or dagger. How about a 8′ glaive? A whip? A chained morning star? Should 2, 3 or  5 skill ranks in these weapons impart enough competency to reduce fumbles to a natural “1”?

As part of our expansion of weapon individualization, I’ve been tweaking weapon fumble ranges–some ranges as high as 20, 30 and even 50. This does several things: it models the actual ergonomics of a particular weapon, it adds a counterbalance to some exotic, dangerous weapons that should be difficult to wield correctly (kynac, chakram) and it ties expertise (not total bonus) into the proper handling of a weapon.

Let’s consider the Urumi. This weapon looks particular dangerous to wield doesn’t it! I give this a fumble range of “50”! Basically only a true master can wield it effectively–in normal progression that’s around 20-25th lvl. (But it also imparts a fairly low combat penalty against multiple opponents so there are benefits to using it as well). But even at 10th lvl and 2 ranks/lvl, it will still have a fumble range of 30! It’s one thing to twirl around and show off, but imagine using that in actual combat. Whipping it up to speed, recovering from a missed hit or withdrawing defensively.

Most common weapons have a fumble range of 10-20 so my players can reduce that to “1” by 5-10 level. That seems right to me. And if they want to use a “special” Shadow World weapon (Irgaak) to benefit from bonuses to AT or extra crits, they’ll probably have to deal with a much higher fumble range. Increased fumble ranges and weapon specific modifiers add a whole new dimension to weapon selection–more than just max damage, critical thresh hold and efficacy vs armor.

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Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps)

So we have our gatehouse on the causeway with its undead guards. We have marshes patrolled by roving undead but where do all these undead come from?

I want a necromancer, but not just any necromancer.

Some where in this city there is going to be access to an underground lake and lurking in the depths of that lake is our Necromancer!

The bottom of a pool is not the usual place to find necromancers, well not BEFORE the party meet them anyway.

I rather like the way that RMU applies Archetypes to any creature to create a unique build. I want to do something similar to that here but using RM2/RMC stats.

You will also remember from the first post in this group that I want to make all of this scale-able to a wide range of character levels.

So our scary monster is going to be an off the shelf creature and then tweaked to make a suitable Super Creep.

I want to start with an Octopus(!). I then want to apply one or possibly two changes to it. The first of which is to give it a profession.

A professional octopus?

Just because Octopi don’t wear tee-shirts and buy coffee at Starbucks does not mean they are not intelligent. They are just differently intelligent. So this Octopus is a cleric and an evil cleric to boot!

A large octopus/squid has 30′ tentacles, is 6th level and has an +80OB which is a fair challenge for a low level party. If we give it the Necromancy (Base) and Calm Spirits (Closed Channeling) lists you have an interesting villain. A 6th level evil cleric given enough time a bit of overcasting or ritual can create type I and II undead and control them. So the villain at the heart of the city can create the undead that protects the city. It has had plenty of time to build its minions so that is all consistent.

So lets scale up our Super Creep.

Using the RAW for GIGANTISM (C&T pages 139 for the RMC version of the book) one increase in size for our octopus takes it from 6th level to 14th level. It also takes its #hits from 70 to 160. As an 14th level Evil Cleric we are now able to create (at a push) Type IV undead. Type IV include Ghosts and Spectres that are up to about 10th level monsters. The Octopus itself now had an OB of 100 and is doing Huge Grapple attacks.

Want something tougher?

Lets scale him up once more!

So with two levels of size increase we have an Octopus that is 16th level, 180#hits and OB of 120. Its criticals are reduced by 2 levels so ignores A&B crits.

I think this kind of end of level boss makes a wonderful Cthulhuesque  mastermind. You can be pretty sure that he party will never have met one before and to be honest I doubt if anyone would be expecting the giant octopus to be a spell caster! That should make the players have to reevaluate their tactics at some point if nothing else.

So what comes next?

I would like to introduce two things, first, something that the party need to bring back from the city, their primary quest. I like the idea of this being so big it needs a cart. I am thinking of some kind of throne that just happens to be sunk at the bottom of the pool.

I also want some interesting suggestions for some ‘set play’ encounters. Something challenging for the players to showcase the city of undead.

Any suggestions?

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Publication Round Up

We have two new things for you this week!

Thar’s Rustlers in Them There Hills is one of my 50in50 creations. The crux of this encounter is that the villains simply know more than the players and make best use of that knowledge. In this case they know the terrain, they know know their horses, how to ride ‘well’ and how to get the most from their mounts.

How big an impact this encounter will have on your campaign is up to you. The amount of stuff my players leave on their horses would make this encounter a serious pain in the arse!

Issue 14 of the Fanzine brings together more of Brian Hanson’s BASiL lists, this time for Mentalism as well as a couple of articles on undead and creating end of level style bosses. Oh, and we also get some more of Craig John’s wonderful Shadow World art.

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Rolemaster Ambush Skill: How Could it work?

In the original Rolemaster, Ambush was one of the skills that worked differently than others. I’m sure at the time, they were just trying to fit a square peg in a round hole to get the desired result, but actually it was quit brilliant and should have been pursued in greater detail for other skills.

What do I mean? That the # of skill ranks can serve as a rule mechanic just like total skill bonus. RM made Ambush a skill rank only skill where the other skills were purely total skill bonus. But why not have both for all skills?

What does Ambush skill really entail? The skill description requires that the skill be developed with a specific weapon, but does that really make sense? Ambush is not about the weapon, it’s about surprise and the ability to target kill points on a body. A competent assassin can kill with a knife, a stapler or a pen by targeting soft spots or vulnerabilities. The type of weapon is irrelevant as long as it can physically carry out such an attack.

So what might be a way to handle Ambush using both # of skill ranks and skill bonus? Here is how we do it. The ambush skill bonus is used for the Offensive Bonus-no matter what the weapon or object. The GM chooses the attack chart/size based on the weapon and type of damage it might inflict (a flail would not be great in close quarters, while a wooden splinter would be great but do very little damage w/o a great attack roll). Obviously this is a close quarter attack, ambush shouldn’t work for missile, or thrown weapons (that’s a called shot with surprise bonus). The skill bonus reflects the versatility of training using any weapon or object to kill. Also, it recognizes that the ambush weapon is being used to kill with a direct strike and perhaps not how the weapon is normally used. If the attack is successful, then the # of Skill Ranks is used to adjust the critical roll. A bit different than the original rules: some would argue that this allows the assassin to use any weapon or object to kill a target. Correct.

In any event, that’s how we play it. does it seem overpowered? The Assassin would need to get into striking range without being detected (a different skill/ability), have some type of damage inflicting weapon, and generate a critical result attack.

Just my take, using my own hybrid system (S.W.A.R.M.). What’s yours?

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