From: owner-runequest-rules@lists.imagiconline.com (RuneQuest Rules Digest) To: runequest-rules-digest@lists.imagiconline.com Subject: RuneQuest Rules Digest V3 #22 Reply-To: runequest-rules@lists.imagiconline.com Sender: owner-runequest-rules@lists.imagiconline.com Errors-To: owner-runequest-rules@lists.imagiconline.com Precedence: bulk RuneQuest Rules Digest Thursday, March 9 2000 Volume 03 : Number 022 RuneQuest is a trademark of Hasbro/Avalon Hill Games. All Rights Reserved. TABLE OF CONTENTS [RQ-RULES] Re : Sheet opinions, please? Re: [RQ-RULES] Re : Sheet opinions, please? [RQ-RULES] RQ/Related items for sale [RQ-RULES] Spirit binding question RE: [RQ-RULES] Spirit binding question Re: [RQ-RULES] Sheet opinions, please? Re: [RQ-RULES] Sheet opinions, please? [RQ-RULES] Speeding up combat Re: [RQ-RULES] Speeding up combat Re: [RQ-RULES] Speeding up combat Re: [RQ-RULES] Speeding up combat Re: [RQ-RULES] Speeding up combat Re: [RQ-RULES] Speeding up combat 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: 08 Mar 2000 17:37:43 +0100 From: Alain RAMEAU Subject: [RQ-RULES] Re : Sheet opinions, please? >I've been working on an Adobe Acrobat form version of the linear-tracking >RQIII character sheet on my web site. I'm about one-third finished, but I >could use some advice. >When finished, the sheet will allow you to easily fill in fields (name, >characteristics, etc.) on the sheet and update them as necessary. Hit >points, magic points, skill category modifiers, and weapon >criticals/specials/fumbles will all be calculated automatically from input >data. >The calculations can also be overridden for special circumstances. >The whole thing is printable and looks like the current Acrobat sheet on >my site. This overriding will be very useful if you want your sheet to be widely used, because almost everybody in this list has his.her own rules, with slight changes in the calculation (for skills modifiers, location HP,...) >Here's the question: should the sheet be fully electronic, or just >partially? The difference is that if it's fully electronic, the sheet >would be designed to be used completely online; a player would set it up >an their laptop or PC during play. >On the other hand, it would be easier to design the sheet to be printed >out instead. In other words, it would allow you to fill in the PC's >name, species, characteristics, skills, spells, etc., but you would then >print that sheet out for use during a game. Skill checks and such would >be written on the paper, rather than being clicked on in the file. >Presumably the electronic version of the sheet would later be updated >from the paper copy. >So would many people use an electronic version of the sheet during play? Not me. >Or do most people (as I suspect) prefer to print out a paper copy? Yes I do ! But I would be quite happy to update my sheet and print out a clean copy before each game session ! >Um, third possibility: Am I wasting my time? Would an electronic form >sheet be of any use to most players? No, it's interesting ! However, I think most of such forms now are for excel or other spreadsheet, which is, I guess, more widely used than Adobe acrobat. In fact, Acrobat reader would not be sufficient to updtae your sheet, I guess, but I would need full Acrobat program to do so ? unfortunately, i don't have it (or have access to it), and don't expect to have in a near future ! >By the way, I'm also working up come other new (non-form) character >sheets; to start with, for RQ2 and Call of Cthulhu. Preliminary copies >of each are available via email for playtesting. Drop me a line if >you're interested. I've already set up my own character sheet (see my web site), but I may be interested to nick a few ideas. :-) Please send me a copy. Alain. http://www.karamo.btinternet.co.uk/rq.htm *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 08 Mar 2000 11:56:18 -0500 From: Tal Meta Subject: Re: [RQ-RULES] Re : Sheet opinions, please? Alain RAMEAU wrote: > > other spreadsheet, which is, I guess, more widely used than Adobe acrobat. In > fact, Acrobat reader would not be sufficient to updtae your sheet, I guess, but > I would need full Acrobat program to do so ? unfortunately, i don't have it (or > have access to it), and don't expect to have in a near future ! Acrobat doesn't really offer the ability to change the text in a document - it's both more and less powerful than I thought it would be before I got my copy. You can add/subtract pages, copy text, etc., but not really alter the text (unless there's some mode I haven't found yet). - -- talmeta@cybercomm.net - Heretic, Dilettante, & God-Machine ICQ - 12594453 AIM - talmeta Homepage - *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 08 Mar 2000 12:17:16 -0500 From: Tal Meta Subject: [RQ-RULES] RQ/Related items for sale I've got the following items for sale - please contact me OFF LIST if you're interested in anything. Prices listed do not include shipping. Unless otherwise indicated, all items are used, but in VG - EX condition. A ""*"" after the price indicates that multiple copies are available. AHG - 857 - RuneQuest Deluxe (Boxed) (EX) $20.00 AHG - 85712 - Apple Lane (SW) $5.00* AHG - 8572 - RuneQuest 3 GM's Box (SW) $10.00* AHG - 8575 - Character Sheets: Non-Human (SW) $2.50* AHG - 8590 - Sun County (SW) $12.00* AHG - 8592 - Strangers in Prax (SW) $16.00 CHA - 2007x - thieves world boxed set (VG) $16.00 CSM - 0003 - TradeTalk Magazine #3 $15.00 FASA - T1 - Traitor (thieves world module) $10.00* FASA - T3 - Dark Assassin (thieves world module) $10.00* GW - 4667 - RuneQuest: Land of Ninja Hardcover $55.00 I also have many Dragon Magazines for sale. The one's listed below contain articles of specific interest to RQ players/GMs. #129 - A Sorcerer's Supplement (sorcery spells) #132 - Resourceful Sorcery (a step by step guide to RQ3 sorcery) #144 - When Gods Walk the Earth (summoning divine avatars) #172 - Into the Spirit of Things (spirit and divine magic) Each of these issues are $1.25 apiece. Grading Guide ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SW - Shrink-wrapped MN - Mint NM - Near Mint EX - Excellent VG - Very Good GD - Good FR - Fair PR - Poor Please e-mail me back if you're interested in anything, or have questions, etc. I now also accept Visa/Mastercard payment via the PayPal Service. - -- talmeta@cybercomm.net - Heretic, Dilettante, & God-Machine ICQ - 12594453 AIM - talmeta Homepage - *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 8 Mar 2000 12:29:42 -0500 From: Andrew Barton Subject: [RQ-RULES] Spirit binding question If you hope for a long and happy career summoning things, you don't just need a Dominate for each kind of being you hope to summon. You need a way to deal with summonings that go wrong, and produce something you weren't expecting. In my Glorantha, sorcerors and wizards who are into summoning are almost always part of guilds or other groupings. That has another advantage: a guild can have a set of items for different types of summoning, and you just sign out the one you need when you need it. The usual arrangement is that you contribute one item to the collection yourself, and are then allowed to use whichever you need. Andrew *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 8 Mar 2000 17:45:51 -0000 From: "Hibbs, Philip" Subject: RE: [RQ-RULES] Spirit binding question >You need a way to deal with summonings that go wrong, >and produce something you weren't expecting. Read Sandy's Grimoire, available on my web site. Excerpt: "Summoning Halls are common in Fonrit and the West. Several magicians each cast 3-4 points of area enchantment, with appropriate spell matrices set to attack disembodied spirits within the enchantment. Hrestoli Colleges of Magic use Drain Soul matrices. All colleges use Dominate spell matrices. This makes the hall relatively safe and convenient to do summonings in." Philip Hibbs http://www.snark.freeserve.co.uk/ Opinions expressed may not even be my own, let alone those of any organisations, nations, species, or schools of thought to which I may be affiliated. *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 8 Mar 2000 11:13:55 -0800 From: "Timothy Byrd" Subject: Re: [RQ-RULES] Sheet opinions, please? (I tried sending this directly to Pete, but it bounced...) Hi Pete, I agree with Philip - I wouldn't use an electronic sheet during play. I would like to see the other filling sheets, though. Only thing is that Steve's game is different enough that I might need to muck with the sheet a bit. - -- Tim *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 9 Mar 2000 01:03:44 EST From: WildECoyoteSD@aol.com Subject: Re: [RQ-RULES] Sheet opinions, please? My vote would be for not being TOTALLY electronic but one that would work printed out. *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 9 Mar 2000 08:05:18 -0800 From: "Timothy Byrd" Subject: [RQ-RULES] Speeding up combat We continued a combat in our game last night. There were about 40 combatants (say 12 PCs, 6 NPCs, 22 enemy). One round took two hours, and then we did a "speed round" which took a little bit over an hour. What would people on the list do to speed up such a combat? - -- Tim *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 09 Mar 2000 08:42:25 PST From: "Leon Kirshtein" Subject: Re: [RQ-RULES] Speeding up combat >What would people on the list do to speed up such a combat? One of the first things I would do is to make sure that players stick with their statement of intent. Do not let them change their actions in the middle of the round. This alone should save you a good 30-40 minutes per round. Unless it is very necessary, abstract the fight between the NPC and the enemy. There is no need for the blow by blow description for henchmen. Lastly, get a smaller group of characters. Anything over 6 and you are asking a difficult session. Leon Kirshtein www.geocities.com/leonbk/ "No good deed shall go unpunished." ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 9 Mar 2000 11:53:31 -0500 From: "Robert Stancliff" Subject: Re: [RQ-RULES] Speeding up combat > We continued a combat in our game last night. There were about 40 > combatants (say 12 PCs, 6 NPCs, 22 enemy). One round took two hours, > and then we did a "speed round" which took a little bit over an hour. > What would people on the list do to speed up such a combat? > -- Tim Generally you start by dumping Statement of Intent and resolving all of each char's actions as you come to them. To allow for multiple actions in a round you might do events before SR6 and go around again for events SR6 or later. This 2-pass resolution system reduces the importance of SR's since they only exist to resolve who acts first, second, etc. Break up sections of the board into combat areas and resolve each area separately. Each char responds to actions in one combat area and is too busy to bother with actions across the battlefield unless they take time to stop and look. Areas may need to be redefined as char's shift and move. The purpose is to cluster the char's that affect each other and resolve them as a group. Classify opponents as 2-wound, 3-wound, or leader NPC's. Based on the char's defenses, assign a min damage to count as a wound, and a min damage to count as instant incapacitation (2 wounds). This will include any blow that crushes or removes a limb. When a 2-wound NPC receives his second wound, he goes down or runs away and will only recover at GM's option. A 3-wound NPC is one with enough HP's or healing to reenter the fight. They need 3 wounds to be out for the duration. Leaders are the ones for which you keep detailed records. The point is to not keep detailed damage counts for grunt NPC's, just know if they are in or out of the fight, and whether they are able to come back. Any char with Strength, or Vigor spells does not need to pay attention to Fatigue, nor does anyone who starts a fight lightly encumbered. You can ignore the issue completely unless someone fails this test. If you have a series of back-to-back battles, start enforcing fatigue rules with the second battle. Tactics can have a big effect on succeeding rounds. By attacking moderate to weak chars with three opponents, you can put them out of the fight and reduce the body count. The more you reduce effective combatants, the faster the rounds will get. Stancliff *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 09 Mar 2000 12:16:19 -0500 From: Tal Meta Subject: Re: [RQ-RULES] Speeding up combat Timothy Byrd wrote: > > What would people on the list do to speed up such a combat? I've dropped hit locations, and use a different initiative system (based loosely on both Elric! and Shadowrun). The loss of even one roll seems to have accelerated combat by quite a bit. - -- talmeta@cybercomm.net - Heretic, Dilettante, & God-Machine ICQ - 12594453 AIM - talmeta Homepage - *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 9 Mar 2000 10:18:02 PST From: Eric Yin Subject: Re: [RQ-RULES] Speeding up combat Timothy Byrd wrote: >We continued a combat in our game last night. There were about 40 >combatants (say 12 PCs, 6 NPCs, 22 enemy). One round took two hours, >and then we did a "speed round" which took a little bit over an hour. > >What would people on the list do to speed up such a combat? Well, I don't know if you're making actual rolls for the NPC's, but if you are, you can make the combat for NPC's more abstract. Perhaps use a system similar to KAP, where the combat is turned to a simple skill contest. I agree that dropping hit locations and dumping strike ranks will speed things up as well. * . * * * . * . . * . * . * . * . * . * * . * Eric Yin * * * . . * . * . * . Molecular & Structural Biology Division * . . * . . * . . Biology & Biotechnology Research Program, LLNL * Free at last, . * . Phone No.: (925) 423-7508 * . . . . . Free at last... * Mail Code: L-452 * . . . . http://www-hsc.usc.edu/~eyin * . . * * * . * . * * * . . . * * * . * . * * . * . . * *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 9 Mar 2000 13:34:53 EST From: SPerrin@aol.com Subject: Re: [RQ-RULES] Speeding up combat As the GM of that particular game, perhaps I should lay out a few of the conditions. I am not using Strike Ranks (I invented them, I can get rid of them), I am giving people two actions based on their DEX, with long actions (like powerful spells) taking the whole round. I am using Hit Locations (though dropping hit locations for NPCs in favor of a wound system or just total hit points for NPCs as suggested sounds like a good idea). Cinematic descriptions of fights between two NPCs is a complication to my life I'd rather just roll dice for. However, I might simplify that dice rolling. The fight is taking place between groups on two ships. To some extent this lends itself to the combat cluster idea, I may pursue that. As you might expect, we are using my combat and magic rules, which I've sent to various of you and are available on Tal Meta's web site. As I think I've said before, any suggestions about the rules are gratefully accepted. There are differences with mainline RQ. The "Speed Round" was supposed to be sans anyone making side comments or getting into off the subject storytelling, and it mostly worked, though it was very difficult with this group (and most other groups I've played with--the game is a social occasion, after all). We also started about an hour late on a work night. Oh yes, one further complication is that I am not using the Resistance table either. Instead we are using opposed POW x 5 rolls with similar mechanics for non-magic situations. The extra dice rolling adds to the time taken inevitably, but it is a step made to increase participation of the character in his own fate. An idea I actually got from the previous RQ list. Steve Perrin, So many systems, so little time *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. ------------------------------ End of RuneQuest Rules Digest V3 #22 ************************************ *************************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list send mail to majordomo@lists.imagiconline.com with the line 'unsubscribe runequest-rules' as the body of the message. RuneQuest is a Trademark of Hasbro/Avalon Hill Games. With the exception of previously copyrighted material, unless specified otherwise all text in this digest is copyright by the author or authors, with rights granted to copy for personal use, to excerpt in reviews and replies, and to archive unchanged for electronic retrieval.