From: owner-runequest-rules@ (RuneQuest Rules Digest) To: runequest-rules-digest@lists.MPGN.COM Subject: RuneQuest Rules Digest V1 #156 Reply-To: runequest-rules@mpgn.com Sender: owner-runequest-rules@ Errors-To: owner-runequest-rules@ Precedence: bulk RuneQuest Rules Digest Tuesday, September 22 1998 Volume 01 : Number 156 RuneQuest is a trademark of Avalon Hill Games. All Rights Reserved. TABLE OF CONTENTS [RQ-RULES] strike ranks per round [RQ-RULES] Missiles etc./SR/Mindlinks [RQ-RULES] DMD - Lolth for RQ/Greyhawk [RQ-RULES] Fwd: divinations RULES OF THE ROAD 1. Do not include large sections of a message in your reply. Especially not to add "Yeah, I agree" or "No, I disagree." Or be excoriated. If someone writes something good and you want to say "good show" please do. But don't include the whole message you praise. 2. Use an appropriate Subject line. 3. Learn the art of paraphrasing: Don't just quote and comment on a point-by-point basis. 4. No anonymous posting, please. Don't say something unless you're ready to stand by it. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 21 Sep 1998 08:56:50 -0500 From: stancliff@commnections.com Subject: [RQ-RULES] strike ranks per round RU>Are there significant consequnces in choosing how many strike ranks per RU>round will be used in a campaign? RU>RQ2 uses 12 per round, making 60 SR per minute. How convenient. RU>RQ3 uses 10 per round. RU>RQ:AiG is strange. RU>Why did the authors choose to change from edition to edition? Ever since D&D came out, players have complained about the 1 minute melee round, so after about 3 or 4 years they started to make rules for shorter periods. The ides that you could only have one chance to injure your opponent in all of that time was absurd, and an insult to anyone with a decent knowledge of history. Rune Quest, having come out about two years after D&D, was able to learn something from that initial game, and they went skill based with percentile rolls for more war-gaming in the combat. They also adjusted the time scale down so that the movement for one action was no longer 'across the room, down the hall, and out the door'! As a war-game combat system, it paid far more attention to individual actions and how long they take (still exaggerated), but it is still not desirable to pay attention to every single failed feint, parry, and swing, so you still have some abstraction in the round system. RQ 2 & 3 were both 12 second rounds, but the number of Strike Ranks were reduced from 12 to 10, to reduce the number of different things that could be attempted in one round. The RQ4 rewrite changed the round to six seconds and rewrote the movement rules to no longer mix movement with melee. I believe it was considered to be less confusing. They allowed almost as many actions in a round as RQ3, but I believe the time assigned to each action was move believable (shorter, more hurried). When Hero War comes out you are going to see the extreme in abstraction... combat will be the gambling of some kind of action points to achieve a short term advantage to get a wound on your opponent. No swings, no time scale, I am still not a believer. The intention is about 90% story telling, 10% dice, the practice will be more like 20% story telling, 80% dice. Bob Stancliff (Stancliff@commnections.com) (http://commnections.com/upgrades) *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@mpgn.com with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 21 Sep 1998 12:55:47 +0000 From: "Simon Phipp" Subject: [RQ-RULES] Missiles etc./SR/Mindlinks Rich Olson: > So, no, I don't think archers can REALLY take on Knights, > unless the Knights are idiots and get their horses bogged down > in mud and the archers can take their time turning them into > pin-cushions. But this happened - English/Welsh Longbows at Agincourt, Mongol archers in Poland. The rules should allow it and they do, with a few modifications. When Magic gets involved, missiles normally just bounce off. Brad Furst : > At 05:49 PM 9/17/98 -0400, Simon Phipp wrote: > >Exactly, that is why no sane person would allow these spells to > >stack. > > Perhaps "no sane" [rule-player] "would allow these spells to stack." Now, now, players do not decide what stacks, GMs do. The GM has to look at the rules and decide what is too powerful or what works for the campaign. How can a GM be a PowerGamer? > Unless the character does not _have_ each of these spells. The > character, who recovered the matrix of the Woundart, does not have > Firearrow, but does have a Speedart. In this Gloranthan campaign, > the character is Orlanthi/Sartarite. I was thinking of a Balazar spin, they can use Speedart from Votank and can use Firearrow from Firshala, when the cult is activated. Therefore they could well have the spells Speedart, Firearrow and Woundart available and maybe even Multimissile, but I can't remember if this is a Hunter spell or not (it should be). > Those folks just don't use > Firearrow and it is not even available through any of the cults > except Elmal who has no officially published parameters. This > character is distainful of sun/fire cults and would choose not to > use Firearrow even if it were available. That is fair enough, but allowing a spell to stack because nobody in the campaign AT THE MOMENT has a spell to stack with is is poor design, unfortunately. When designing a spell one should design the spell for any campaign not just the current campaign. > I am fortunate to have > players in my group who are role-players rather than rule-players or > roll-players. :-) We won't get into that discussion, except that I was referring to a GM, as stated above. > I allowed the spell to enter the campaign sans mention of stacking: > > WOUNDART > 2 Points > Touch, Temporal > > This spell affects any single missile, > adding 1d8 damage to a successful hit. > The temporal nature of this spell means > that it can be cast onto a missile and > the spell will work once only if the > missile is used any time within the > spell's duration. > > The spell has not been used yet. > There has been no mention among the players of attempts to stack. If they get the chance then they will try it, probably. Better to nip it in the bud before they try. Brad Furst: > Can one character who is in Mindlink > use the divine/rune spells > of the other character who is 'Linked? > Is divine/rune magic defined as part of "Spell Knowledge," since > they occupy zero Free INT? Absolutely, although they can't use spells known by people linked to the linked target. So, Shergar Mindlinks to Apollo and Solarus. Shergar can use any Divine Spell in Solarus' or Apollo's Mind but cannot access those of Solarus' Allied Spirit, Apollo's Allied Spirit or the Mistress of Light, Guardian of the Fires of Heaven who is Mindlinked to Solarus. > Is the situation different for Familiars > or Allied Spirits which are, by definition, _ritually_ 'linked by > enchantment? The same, treat Allied/Familiar Mindlink as normal Mindlinks. Brad Furst : > At 05:49 PM 9/17/98 -0400, Simon Phipp wrote: > >RQ Dragonewts use a longbow which does 1D10 + 1 and always have. > >They > > My copy of RQ2 has those same dragonewts' long bow & arrow damage at > 1d6+1, however. Wyrms Footnotes 14 has a complete description of Dragonewts. The stats come from there. > Even by smaller [than SIZ 2d6+12] creatures such as humans (STR > 2d6+6)? Yikes! Crested Dragonewts do not use longbows, they use dinky little slings. Warrior Dragonewts use Long Bows and they are meaty. Tailed Priests use Long Bows and they are the same as humans in terms of STR/SIZ. Full Priests use longbows and they are truly awesome. > >I use the RQ2 Imapling/Slashing/Crushing except that crushing adds > >the DB twice, rather than adding the Max DB. In RQ2, Impales did > >Max weapon damage + rolled weapon damage. Firearrows did 3D6 + Max > >weapon damage. It actually worked really well. > > This is the kind of information that we need up front, especially > when you are mixing examples of RQ3 dragonewts and RQ2 Firearrows. > :-) I'm sorry, I thought (probably foolishly) that everyone used the RQ2 rules or at least had knowledge of them. My rules-set is a combination of the best bits of RQ2/RQ3/RQ4 and my own rules, so I forget that other people only use RQ3 or RQ2. Bob Stancliff replies again: >RU>Bob Stancliffe in reply to my points: > Please, that's Stancliff (no -e). Sorry, I get the same with Simon Phipps or (worse) Simon Hibbs :-) >RU>> If you allow these to stack then you don't need >Woundart, it RU>> would be redundant with Speedart, RU>> >and if you made Speedart variable, it would RU>> be the >missile equivalent to Bladesharp. RU>Exactly, that is why no >sane person would allow these spells to RU>stack. > Then I take it you were opposed to the Woundart spell, > since you > don't want any missile spells to stack. Not at all. The spell is fine as long as the stacking restrictions apply. Variable Speedarts are available to the Lunars and I see no reason to make them available to anyone else, except as one-off matrices (an elf in our campaign had a Speedart 4 matrix which was devastating (+60% attack, +12 damage, punches through Plate armour as butter). > RU>So, join the Lunars or steal their matrices. Anyway, you > only get RU>crucified if you get caught or if you don't blame > someone else. > This is unrealistic in Gloranthan terms. Most characters > could never > remain undetected if the item was valuable or the victim was > important. The light of Truth is not easily blocked, it merely > requires money. It all depends on how you play the game. Ambushing a Lunar patrol in the Rubble and blaming Chaos is fairly easy if you feed it to Walktapi afterwards. Things change if one member of the patrol makes his DI and goes home .... > I am not necessarily opposed to all LongBows doing d10+1. > The errata > raised Javelins to d10 and they are thrown. I don't think > that it is culturally right for there to be easy access to > Dragonnewt weapons, but it isn't impossible to get them if you > know about them. They should certainly have harsher stat >requirements. Personally, I think that Dragonewt Longbows are the same as anyone else's. The fact that they have the knowledge and few ptkers have is beside the point. > Simply allowing all specially made Comp and Long bows (or > all missile > weapons) to get strength bonus would go quite a way toward > relieving the damage problem and would be rather realistic. > After all, people today commonly shop for a bow with the right > pull strength so that they can increase their effectiveness. We used the rules for years and never had a problem. Of course, with RQ3 rules STR can get very high, leading to huge damage bonuses but not too big. > Edit that to read 'exceptionally good skill', I have tried > it on > several occasions to no effect... the cost in MP's was never > justified by the damage results. Even at 100%, the 5% > critical doesn't happen very often. If it does, you have a > consistently lucky player or one who traps dice. At 200% you > are starting to see a decent number of criticals that can win > a battle. While this is certainly possible, the spells that > allow it are Rare (can you say Aldrya?). Sorry, "Good Skill: 90%, Very Good Skill: 150%-300%, Exceptionally Good Skill: 500% or thereabouts). Methods of gaining these skills - Aldrya (Arrow Trance), Babeester Gor (Axe Trance), Death Cults (Berserker), Zorak Zoran (Crush) and so on. Admittedly, you need a high starting point and loads of Rune Magic but that's where the good skills are. Ian Thomson: > For special rolls I give maximum damage > For criticals I give maximum ignoring armor > > This seems mighty simple and easy to remember and apply It is, but I liked the RQ2 impale/slashing rules which still work for me. Brad Furst: > Are there significant consequnces in choosing how many strike ranks > per round will be used in a campaign? Yes, if you allow multiple attacks (for high skills or multi-limbed personnel) or use missile weapons. For example, a well-DEXED character such as a Centaur or Elf can have DEX 18. This gives a missile SR of 2 (I think). In RQ3 We have 3 SR between shots. The missiles fired go off on SR 2,5,8 If you allow 12 SR then you get another shot off each round at SR 11. Similarly, in RQ2 a big fast troll with a Maul hits on SR 1. If he was a berserker with a high skill then he could split at SR 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12. (12 attacks needs a skill of 600%) In RQ3 he would attack at 1,4,7,10 (4 attacks which seems more reasonable). Any character with normal or low DEX finds that 12 SR increases the number of options each round. Movement is also affected. In RQ3 you move at a set number of metres per SR. Having 12 SR per round means you move faster. No problem here, I think. Personally, I use 12 SR, as RQ2, but use the RQ3 SR modifiers as they work better. > RQ2 uses 12 per round, making 60 SR per minute. How convenient. RQ3 > uses 10 per round. RQ:AiG is strange. > > Why did the authors choose to change from edition to edition? Because they went metric (?) Because they didn't know what they were doing? :-) See Ya Simon Phipp *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@mpgn.com with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 21 Sep 1998 21:29:40 -0400 From: Tal Meta Subject: [RQ-RULES] DMD - Lolth for RQ/Greyhawk Gods of the Drow LOLTH Runes: Chaos, Evil, Darkness, Beast Lolth is the Spider Queen, chief goddess and creator of the drow race. Cult in the World Lolth was the sister of Corellon, and initially his staunchest ally. However, as the members of the Seldarine grew, his attentions were often more upon others than with her, and she grew sullen at her abandonment. Her most pivotal act of revenge against her former lover was the great Sundering, whereupon the dark olves, or drow, rose against their neighbors and sought to dominate them utterly. In the end, the drow were defeated and forced to retreat from the surface realms, taking refuge beneath the oerth. There they have grown powerful in the blackest of magic and sorcery, and eagerly await the day when they might rise from their underworld to finally slay the last vestiges of their surface bretheren. Lolth's High Holy Day is the 19th of Fruitrot (known as Fruifall among the surface olves), with lesser services each Godsday. Public services are generally held in vast temple complexes dedicated to Lolth, and most drow homes include a shrine to the Spider Goddess as well. Lolth's priestesses wear black robes trimmed in either dark red or purple. Lay Membership Requirements: In most drow cities, it is required for all citizens to worship Lolth. Failure to do so often marks one for special observation at the hands of her Inquisitors. Skills taught by the cult include Climb, Dodge, Intimidate, Orate, Speak Languages, Evaluate, various Lores (Drow, Magic, Mineral, Spider, World), Listen, Hide, Sneak, Ceremony, and Dagger attack. Initiate Membership Requirements: Standard. Females who fail the initiation tests are given a single chance to redeem themselves, generally by carrying out an especially dangerous task for the cult or their community. Failure means death. Males who fail the test may or may not be so lucky. Usually they are transformed into driders and abandoned/exiled from their community, though they may be given a second chance if their family is particularly well connected. Spirit Magic: Annihilate, Bladesharp, Darkwall, Extinguish, Protection, Shimmer, Silence. Acolyte Membership Requirements: As per priests. Priesthood Requirements: Standard. Lolth's priestesses have authority in every aspect of drow culture, acting as rulers, judges, juries, and executioners. They exult in wielding power in the most capricious and cruel manner possible, the better to glorify their Dark Mistress. Priestesses are drawn from each noble house of a community, and though they vie among themselves for petty matters of status and position, when a signifigant threat looms, they come together to form a solid front. In addition to their other duties, they constantly seek out drow who rebel against their cult, drow society (especially males), and the weak. (Weak is personified as any drow who is ruled by emotions such as love, mercy, compassion, or respect.) Virtues for Lolth include Conservative, Cruel, Manipulative, Misanthropic, and Unpredictable. Common Divine Magic: all Special Divine Magic: Bleak, Blessing of Chaos, Control Shade, Dark Walk, Darksee, Fear, Spawnvenom, Spiderlimbs, Summon Shade, Venom Bite Associated Gods Kiaransalee: provides Command Ghosts Vhaeraun: provides Discern Magic Zinzerena:provides Cloak of Illusion - -- talmeta@bellatlantic.net - I *am* one of the Chosen Few! ICQ - 12594453 AIM - talmeta1 TANJ Lives! - Alternate Homepage - *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@mpgn.com with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 22 Sep 1998 00:41:12 -0400 From: Tal Meta Subject: [RQ-RULES] Fwd: divinations From: "Ian Thomson" Subject: divinations I am suspecting that this topic has been hashed and rehashed, so I'd like to ask what are people's personal takes on this how much can a divination tell you? what are the restrictions? do you use it as a simple background device with little PC interaction with such mighty goings on, or do you have hard and fast rules? I wonder that the god knows only what his/her worshippers, especially rune levels have witnessed, and things that occur on (or adjacent to) cult holy ground points I ponder immediately are: - - can a divination tap into knowledge of associate cults? - - if a rune level is slain (or even an initiate) can the god tell when, where, or how, or only that the person is alive or dead? Since often such a person will go to that god's dwelling/sacred spot after death, why can't they then simply tell the god all that happened and have that knowledge communicated back when/if a divination is cast? - - lets say you kill a bunch of Lunars, or an Orlanthi rune lord, and throw the body/ies into a gorp, what do you need to worry about, other than a DI bringing one back to tell on you? - - what if you wear masks, or some obscuring spirit magic, so that even if the person returns or reports they don't know who you were help - its all getting a bit complex! Technical point - someone advised me that my mails are bouncing due to a config problem. I have no idea how to rectify this as all seems fine at my end, and I know my mails are being received. Is there a technician on this mailer I can talk to? cheers *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@mpgn.com with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. ------------------------------ End of RuneQuest Rules Digest V1 #156 ************************************* *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@mpgn.com with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. RuneQuest is a Trademark of Avalon Hill Games. 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