With the Rolemaster revision announced and myself off the design team I can now move forward with the project I was working on that I set aside to refight old wars. This is the game that I wrote because I was sick of the RM edition waring and wanted a proper alternative. It's got a lot that needs finishing and filling in but I wanted to share it now rather than hold off for another year or two.
http://www3.telus.net/public/uncouths/SDCH.htm
http://www3.telus.net/public/uncouths/SDRS.htm
http://www3.telus.net/public/uncouths/SDCB.htm
http://www3.telus.net/public/uncouths/SDMK.htm
http://www3.telus.net/public/uncouths/SDBS.htm
http://www3.telus.net/public/uncouths/SDTB.htm
So, now, to some discussion of what the heck all of this is.
Well, first off, to some extent it's Rolemaster Standard System minus the Rolemaster. There's three stats per skill block, general bonuses to skill blocks and specific skill bonuses. Hit points are bought as a skill and so on. The arrangement of the skill blocks is a lot better from where I sit and there's only the one point per point progression. Actually at one point I had a massive universal table with effect levels to drive the thing but then I decided I wanted a game I'd actually use instead of a deliberate confabulation of insane complexity. Actually the original name of the game was "Confabulation" but my son wanted it to be called "Shadow Dragons" Which is all dynamic and stuff but doesn't say anything about what the game is.
There's a lot of structural stuff going on. The costing of spells by hierarchy of effects and base-line monsters with special abilities. It's still a work in progress but I really want to get it hammered out and into play testing at this point.
Please ditch the appellations like "Silly Hat" for Magicians, let them decide whether to wear a silly one or serious one, or happy one.
Serious, while I don't mind some "standard" gear sets, I think I'd focus on just core gear, and gear they've the skill to use, and not worry about so much as clothes specifics.
Just call it "clothes" and move on.
Let the player's imaginations fill out those specifics.
Skimmed over most of it (apart from magic). My initial thought was that d10s for stats was probably a bit too random, though after looking over the whole it looks like it works, since its averaged out a bit by 3 stats per roll and they only modify it slightly (+1%/point).
The diminishing-returns system is an interesting solution to that problem, though I find it a bit binary - more of a curve would probably be the ideal, if something very difficult to implement.
The professions and assorted stuff give a very good feel for a pseudo-medieval but still fantastical world, and the race and monster writeups are very evocative and well-written. Combat looks OK. The optional random damage modifiers system hardly seems necessary since there's often already a random factor in the to-hit roll (and the 1s place is almost independent, since it doesn't have a great impact on actual success chance).
Odds and Ends:
*I liked the 'A narrative simulation game' subtitle, mostly since it should cause an 'aargh' moment to anyone reading it who tends to think in terms of Forge theory.
*not sure I'd ever need the Juggling modifier for small vicious animals, but it has entertainment value.
*The 'armor' skill block annoyed me when I first saw it. From the controlling attributes I could guess it was wearing armour, but the skill name itself is a bit ambiguous - wearing it, making it, eating it...
*like Fortune as a stat. More games need this.
*like dual Strengths for centaurs rule.
*like Habitat: Fjords for the viking guys.
*it seems a bit limiting to be forced to make a 'young adult' PC. I'm imagining there's a rationale for this - with age tying into the levelling system, though still it seems a bit annoying. If its a balance thing, I have seem systems with age-based skills where you in effect can trade in attribute points for extra skill points e.g. some of Clash's games.
Quote from: Silverlion;557747Please ditch the appellations like "Silly Hat" for Magicians, let them decide whether to wear a silly one or serious one, or happy one.
What if I changed it to Awesome hat? Really it's inspired by Granny Weatherwax in Terry Prachett's "Equal Rites." She's a great believer in psyching people out over just dumping magic all over the place and sees the hat as an important part of that.
But yeah once I'm done messing with the costing structure I'll need to go back over the gear to make sure I don't get endless whinging that the cost of the packages is broken.
The idea of the vocations is that they're almost prebuilt characters with very little tweaking needing to be done. If you want a tenth level knight you can pretty much just multiply the package values by ten.
Quote from: Bloody Stupid Johnson;557805Skimmed over most of it (apart from magic). My initial thought was that d10s for stats was probably a bit too random, though after looking over the whole it looks like it works, since its averaged out a bit by 3 stats per roll and they only modify it slightly (+1%/point).
Combat looks OK. The optional random damage modifiers system hardly seems necessary since there's often already a random factor in the to-hit roll (and the 1s place is almost independent, since it doesn't have a great impact on actual success chance).
*it seems a bit limiting to be forced to make a 'young adult' PC. I'm imagining there's a rationale for this - with age tying into the levelling system, though still it seems a bit annoying. If its a balance thing, I have seem systems with age-based skills where you in effect can trade in attribute points for extra skill points e.g. some of Clash's games.
The alternate damage system uses a full set of polyhedral dice. There are a lot of gamers who love their polydice and reject games that don't use them solely on that basis. Also, they produce a little cleaner ranges of results for people who are bothered by edge cases.
As for the young adult PC, that's first level. One of the things we liked about RMSS was that you could be a more experienced first level but I have to admit it plays havok with balance. My solution is a stacking packages lifepath system. Each level reflects a year or two of game time though I'll need to come up with an amusing events table to balance it.
One thing that's still in the making is the birthrights system which will give some traits for customizing a character. Another is the big lists of sample spells by aspect.
As for the d10s for stats, it's also mitigated by the fact that they're all +5 on a 1 - 20 scale and the potential to build any stat up by a full five points.
Quote from: David Johansen;557843What if I changed it to Awesome hat? Really it's inspired by Granny Weatherwax in Terry Prachett's "Equal Rites." She's a great believer in psyching people out over just dumping magic all over the place and sees the hat as an important part of that.
Ah yes. And then an evil hat starts dumping magic all over the place in Sourcery.
Quote from: David Johansen;557844The alternate damage system uses a full set of polyhedral dice. There are a lot of gamers who love their polydice and reject games that don't use them solely on that basis.
Le sigh. True.
QuoteAs for the d10s for stats, it's also mitigated by the fact that they're all +5 on a 1 - 20 scale and the potential to build any stat up by a full five points.
Well, opposed rolls would have the same relative difficulty whether PCs had stats of 1-10 or 1001-1010, though it'd make a difference for stat damage and such. Just quibbling since I don't think its a big problem. The build potential does help, as you say.
Really there's a lot of games that inspired the system. Chivalry and Sorcery first edition, Wizard's Realm, Sword Bearer, High Fantasy, Galloway's Fantasy Wargaming, Powers and Perils, KABAL, Lands of Adventure, Villains and Vigillantes. The skill block stat bonuses are as much inspired by the Combat system in Wizard's Realm as Rolemaster. I've always liked compound attribute values for the things and hated fractional results.
Rolemaster, much as I love it is a very rigid and structured system. I know RMSS went down that road more than RM2 but I've always loved the culture packages and training packages. In The Shadow of Dragons is more of a homage to all the little small press rpgs of the eighties with their saddle stitched books and dense text. It started out as a Rolemaster breaker but got whittled down a bit in the end. There's more to do than I remembered, though, mostly because it was in the middle of some transitional work to cut it back and I was in the middle of reassembling it. I had to cut and paste bits from three different documents to get the combat system seen here. What I need now is some unsuspecting fools, guinea pigs for my master plan...