Working out stuff for a variant, house ruled OD&D game I'm building from some Chainmail inspiration, the Perrin Conventions, combat maneuvers and more. Work in progress. Anyway. I took James M's "Dwimmermount" Character Sheet (I liked the little occult symbols in the corners of the sheet) that I then modified to my own specificities.


(Pardon the French...)

Part of the idea is to be able to use ability scores directly for some oppositions, if checks are required, using the RuneQuest resistance table. One could just as well throw d% under the relevant ability score x5 % for a quick and dirty "average difficulty" roll.

Characters also do the same amount of damage regardless of the weapon being used. This damage reflects a progressive curve of power, kinda like Chainmail equivalences in Men, and you can then separate your dice of damage between different attacks during different phases of the round (like the Perrin Conventions), and/or sacrifice dice of damage to perform a variety of moves like blocking incoming attacks, disarming opponents and whatnot, which sometimes will lead to oppositions on the resistance table.

Haven't playtested this yet, and I must say, I can't wait to see how that goes.

Quote from: Benoist;390153Characters also do the same amount of damage regardless of the weapon being used. This damage reflects a progressive curve of power, kinda like Chainmail equivalences in Men, and you can then separate your dice of damage between different attacks during different phases of the round (like the Perrin Conventions), and/or sacrifice dice of damage to perform a variety of moves like blocking incoming attacks, disarming opponents and whatnot, which sometimes will lead to oppositions on the resistance table.

Sounds interesting. I especially like the idea of sacrificing damage to perform special moves.

Quote from: RandallS;390155Sounds interesting. I especially like the idea of sacrificing damage to perform special moves.

The inspiration came from the system of maneuvers from RuneQuest II, where you get some extra moves, maneuvers when attacking an opponent by comparing your degree of success vs the defender's (it's not how it works here at all, but the first ah-ha moment came from it).

Since I was playing with the idea of scaling the character's damage according to their equivalence in Chainmail terms, and wanted to keep the six-sider for everything, I thought it'd be cool to use it as a currency for maneuvers. It aims to model your moves when you attack, and sacrifice brute strength for some maneuver or tactical benefit in combat. It also allows the Fighting man, who of course gets the most damage out of equivalences with Men in Chainmail, to exploit the tactical nature of combat the most, which is particularly fitting, IMO.

Quote from: Benoist;390163The inspiration came from the system of maneuvers from RuneQuest II, where you get some extra moves, maneuvers when attacking an opponent by comparing your degree of success vs the defender's (it's not how it works here at all, but the first ah-ha moment came from it).

I really need to get a copy of MRQ2, but it's hard to justify the cost when I know I'll probably never use it.

Quote from: RandallS;390175I really need to get a copy of MRQ2, but it's hard to justify the cost when I know I'll probably never use it.

One heck of a game, though. It's not perfect (nothing is), but darn, that's a worthy successor to RuneQuest 2 and 3.

Instead of multiplying the attribute by 5 and using d%, why not keep it as it is and use a d20?

Quote from: Age of Fable;391049Instead of multiplying the attribute by 5 and using d%, why not keep it as it is and use a d20?

You could do that, for sure!

I guess my personal problem with this is to have d20 roll under, d20 roll over for attacks, and just d20 for anything and everything. I prefer to have d20 for attacks, d% for tasks, probabilities and saving throws, and d6 for damage, a priori. The type of die implies a certain type of rule, thematically speaking.

Quote from: RandallS;390155Sounds interesting. I especially like the idea of sacrificing damage to perform special moves.

Quite.

I was thinking of a different mechanic a while back, but never got around to asking about it.  Instead of sacrificing damage for special moves, what about gambling with a certain amount of the character's hit points?  In other words, you 'ante' some points to perform a move, as above, then raise the stakes with the remaining pool of hit points available to the character.  Determine success or failure by whatever means, and the hit points are deducted from the defeated party's total, and replaced in the victor's hit point pool at the beginning of their next turn.

So, the Fighter (15hp) antes up with 5 hit points to perform a 'double sweep attack' for whatever bonuses that provides.  The defender, say an Orc(10hp), chooses the 'crouch and spin' or whatever for 3hp.  Going into the bidding portion, the Fighter still has 10hp and the Orc has 7hp.  Looks like the Fighter can just out-bet the Orc, but of course, those hit points don't get replenished until the beginning of their next turn, so that is risky.  Additionally, if they fail whatever test roll or series of rolls, they lose the bet, hence, they lose the hit points.  So, the Fighter bets 5 hit points, the Orc bets 6 hit points.  If the Fighter wins the attack, the Orc's pool drops to 2 hp, and the Fighter has only a 5 hit point pool for defence until their next turn.  Had the Fighter lost that combat round, they would be down to a 4 hit point pool, and the Orc would have 1 hit point for defence until the start of their next turn.

This does imply a random order each round, or it could be calculated mathematically how many points to bet each time, more or less.  So, it could be that the Fighter goes before the Orc in Round 1, then the Orc goes before the Fighter in Round 2.  In Round 2, the Orc would then have their pool replenished, while the Fighter would be down however many points they bet on the previous round.  And of course, if the Fighter went before the Orc on both rounds, well, Fortune favours the bold, clearly, and the Fighter could handily win that combat without suffering any wounds in return.

Sound interesting?

Quote from: StormBringer;391258Quite.


This does imply a random order each round, or it could be calculated mathematically how many points to bet each time, more or less.  So, it could be that the Fighter goes before the Orc in Round 1, then the Orc goes before the Fighter in Round 2.  In Round 2, the Orc would then have their pool replenished, while the Fighter would be down however many points they bet on the previous round.  And of course, if the Fighter went before the Orc on both rounds, well, Fortune favours the bold, clearly, and the Fighter could handily win that combat without suffering any wounds in return.

Sound interesting?

Yes unfortunately as has been pointed out several times with Derelict Delvers--players don't like to risk their precious HP. They really don't, so instead of betting, they'd try and solve it another way. Like shooting arrows at him (which your system doesn't really account for non-returnable attacks, at the moment.) If both sides have bows, maybe.

Quote from: StormBringer;391258Quite.

I was thinking of a different mechanic a while back, but never got around to asking about it.  Instead of sacrificing damage for special moves, what about gambling with a certain amount of the character's hit points? (...)

Sound interesting?

I wasn't thinking of bidding mechanics, but prior to sacrificing dice of damage, I have been experimenting with spending HPs for maneuvers, casting spells, extra attacks, etc. Basically expending some of your resilience, quickness of movement, i.e. all that in HPs do not represent straight "Health", what I called Vitality in my houserules, to perform actions out of the ordinary in the game. This becomes tricky because you have to reevaluate all the HP values in the game, and may alter dramatically the dynamics of low levels in D&D, especially thinking of old school D&D here.

The problem is made lot more complex when you consider that various players will spend their HPs in widely different ways and often... not at all. Which defeats the whole point of the system.

Quote from: Silverlion;391327Yes unfortunately as has been pointed out several times with Derelict Delvers--players don't like to risk their precious HP. They really don't, so instead of betting, they'd try and solve it another way. Like shooting arrows at him (which your system doesn't really account for non-returnable attacks, at the moment.) If both sides have bows, maybe.

I had something worked out for missiles, I will have to look that up again.

Quote from: Benoist;391417The problem is made lot more complex when you consider that various players will spend their HPs in widely different ways and often... not at all. Which defeats the whole point of the system.

Well, if you don't wager HP, then you don't do damage.  

Quote from: Benoist;390153Working out stuff for a variant, house ruled OD&D game I'm building from some Chainmail inspiration, the Perrin Conventions, combat maneuvers and more. Work in progress. Anyway. I took James M's "Dwimmermount" Character Sheet (I liked the little occult symbols in the corners of the sheet) that I then modified to my own specificities.


(Pardon the French...)

Part of the idea is to be able to use ability scores directly for some oppositions, if checks are required, using the RuneQuest resistance table. One could just as well throw d% under the relevant ability score x5 % for a quick and dirty "average difficulty" roll.

Characters also do the same amount of damage regardless of the weapon being used. This damage reflects a progressive curve of power, kinda like Chainmail equivalences in Men, and you can then separate your dice of damage between different attacks during different phases of the round (like the Perrin Conventions), and/or sacrifice dice of damage to perform a variety of moves like blocking incoming attacks, disarming opponents and whatnot, which sometimes will lead to oppositions on the resistance table.

Haven't playtested this yet, and I must say, I can't wait to see how that goes.

Would like to see your house rules when completed.  Also, I love the character sheet!

Quote from: kregmosier;391444Would like to see your house rules when completed.  Also, I love the character sheet!

Thanks, man.

I need to write them down (work in progress) and playtest them first. Hopefully during the summer.

Quote from: StormBringer;391442Well, if you don't wager HP, then you don't do damage.  

That's the thing though: in practice, a unacceptable number of players will be pussies and stay in the back of the fight because they don't want to spend their precious Hit Points. Even if they're playing the Fighting Man, they'll hide behind the MU waiting for him to shoot a fireball. Which completely sucks! But that reaches really the equivalent of a meme amongst role players: virtually nothing is worth giving up HPs freely. It's a last stand kind of thing in any case. Not a casual thing to do. So the house rule fails, in the end.