Michael Cule wrote:
"I'm sorry. I was a playtester for a while. And I
found that my two
groups could not get their heads around the system.
Its basic workings
did not appeal to them. Examples? Like: you cannot
during combat look
down on yourself and see how badly you are wounded
because that would
not be heroic (or something). Consequences are worked
out at the end.
And if you kick someone lying groaning on the floor
and make a mess of
it he gets back up and fights you again. ("I kick him
in the balls and
he gets better?")
It may be me (but I'm sure it won't be *just* me) but
I loved the
character generation and the basic resolution system
but I hated the
APs
and the Extended Resolution System. And I'm dumping it
as soon as I can
and writing something that works."
You are right, I'm sure it won't just be you that won't like the AP system. I'm still friends with most of the people that I started gaming with, over 20 years ago (gad, I feel old!). Were we to actually get together to do some role-playing (something which, despite claims of willingness, hasn't happened in a few years) there is no way I would try and get them to play Hero Wars. A good half of them find even the level of simulation in RuneQuest to be far too basic (to give you an idea of what they adore, we had a home brew system that broke the body down into 30 different areas, tracked not just hit points but broken bones and bleeding caused by different types of damage at different levels. Quite accurately, the typical loser of a combat was left unable to stand, slowly bleeding to death. Unfortunately, from my point of view, a typical party vs. similarly capable group of opponents would take well over an hour to determine who was left dying in their own gore).
Having said that, I think there will be a lot of
people who are really going to like this system�-I
think I'll be one of them. Fact is, we all like to do
"cool" things. It so happens that generally in role
playing game, your best chance of doing cool things is
in those areas for which the rules are most extensive.
For a typical role playing game, this is combat,
possibly closely followed by magic, so most character
development went into those areas. Social areas,
amongst otheres, were usually largely the domain of
role playing. Not that role playing social
interactions is bad, but it made it more of a function
of the player than the character. If you wanted to do
any other sort of competition, you either had to
settle for determining it with a few bare die rolls,
or coming up with special rules to cover it (Circus
Maximus sure came in handy when my Mastakos worshipper
was trying to defeat the lunar governor's son in a
chariot race, but usually there isn't such a
convenient fall back). I mean, seriously, how
effectively could you describe the drama of climbing
the Matterhorn or putting on a play using RuneQuest
rules? And most other games are no better.
Hero Wars has me excited because I can make a character who can fight when he has to, but can do many other "cool things" which can actually be played out in a dramatic and compelling fashion. A tribal moot, negotiations to buy a treasure, lobbying for a priesthood, entertaining a crowd, climbing a mountain, wooing a prospective mate, conducting a major battle, sailing through a storm, and dominating a powerful spirit all have the potential to be the climax of a story, rather than something settled with a quick die roll on the way to the big fight. I guess what I'm saying is, it's nice to see combat not be the coolest part of the game.
Which is not to say I think the system is perfect. I'd love to see some extended examples of the system in action, to see how some of the odd blends discussed here are envisioned working out by the designers. There are certainly points that some cludging of the system looks needed. For example, if I only have three arrows, and that is a major story point, how do you simulate that? Are there suggestions somewhere for modifying for fatigue and encumbrance? and so on. I guess I really hope they get the game out to the stores ASAP so that those of us who weren't play testers can read the whole rulebook and then come up with more coherent questions.
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