I know there are a number of FASERIP fans that frequent the forums here. I've heard a lot of great things about the system for years, and it's always been one I wanted to check out. I recently backed a World of Darkness-esque FASERIP game on Kickstarter and have been going over the playtest files. It's my first time with the system, and everything seems simple enough but I was hoping for a little clarification on something.

Reading over the combat section, it seems like everything is determined with a single percentile roll. Easy enough. But as far as I can tell, nowhere does the defender's ability affect the chance to hit. It seems like a werewolf could bite a superhumanly agile vampire as easily as he could an arthritic grandma (as long as the vampire isn't taking a full turn just dodging). Am I right on that or have I missed something?

There are two methods of defence - passive and active. Your passive defence is figured into a character's Health, this is why Agility and Fighting both add to it. If a character is actively defending, there are 3 options, all of which must be declared at the beginning of the combat round - which Ill describe in just a sec...

The first, and default option is dodging. A character who is dodging rolls their Agility at the beginning of the combat round and determines the penalty to any attacks against that character for the round. The disadvantage is that a Dodging character can only make a single attack at a -1 ES. Unless the character is a tank, you should be dodging most rounds until you wear an opponent down and close in for a full on attack.

The second option is evasion. An evading character is focusing entirely on defence (parrying, feinting, etc) instead of attacking, waiting for the most opportune time to strike. They roll Fighting at the beginning of the round. If successful all attacks against them that round fail, and if they roll well enough they get a bonus to their next attack on the following round.

The third option is blocking, which is usually when a hero runs out and stops an attack from hitting a teammate or innocent bystander. Blocking allows the character to treat their modified strength as "armour" for that round.

Thanks for the fast response. It looks like there have been some changes then. At least I won't have to unlearn anything if I ever decide to run the game.

Dodging/evasion/blocking have all been rolled into dodging in the rules I'm looking at, which is an agility test that shifts the rank of all attacks down depending on how well you roll. It is declared at the start of the round but isn't actually rolled until the character's turn, lasting until the character's turn comes up on the following round. Also, everyone only gets one move and action (unless you have the Fast Attack power) per turn, so dodging means you can't attack at all in the round.

I hadn't caught the part about agility factoring into health. That does help a bit. It just seemed weird to me because I think FASERIP is the first system I've seen where's there's no opposed roll, AC, Dodge/Parry target number, etc.

TristramEvans hit the key points, but it's probably worth expanding on the topic a bit because FASERIP is conceptually very different from a lot of traditional games.

Active defenses in FASERIP don't work very well. This isn't a weakness. It's a feature.

FASERIP works best when you assume heroes are heroes. And heroes take action. They don't delay, they don't indefinitely drag out fights. They attack, they come up with crazy stunts. They do something proactive.

If Spidey stands around and tries to dodge Juggernaut all day, he'll be pulped. That's because he should be trying to lure Juggernaut into concrete, or create a slingshot between two lampposts made of webbing, or whatever.

(If it's plot-important that Spidey stall Juggernaut in a mostly off-screen fight, then the referee should probably liberally interpret the duration of a turn, and allow one roll to account for hours of dodging. But that's the exception. Spidey should be thinking, taking the initiative. So the game pushes Spidey's player to try.)

That's why Spidey's amazing agility is rolled rolled into his overall health. He's got one of the highest health scores in the game, and it's not because he's tougher than the Thing. It's because he gets out of the way of more punches. Adding Fighting and Agility to Health is just a way of abstracting away the defensive rolls that slow down so many other games.

All of that is lumped into one score, and that score is basically a pacing mechanism. Don't look at Health (badly named), and think "that's how tough I am", instead think "that's how long I can last, when I pull out all the stops."

Quote from: Brand55;841162..It just seemed weird to me because I think FASERIP is the first system I've seen where's there's no opposed roll, AC, Dodge/Parry target number, etc.

I recently re-discovered FASERIP, and that aspect threw me as well.

The funny thing is, I don't recall ever thinking about as a kid (playing it when it was brand new!), so I must have picked up the opposed-attack idea somewhere else along the way.

Quote from: AaronBrown99;841166I recently re-discovered FASERIP, and that aspect threw me as well.

The funny thing is, I don't recall ever thinking about as a kid (playing it when it was brand new!), so I must have picked up the opposed-attack idea somewhere else along the way.

I'm sure I would have been the same way. I don't really like AC now, but I never questioned it when I first started playing D&D. I much prefer defense and armor to be separate, but back then it never really came to mind. We were just a bunch of kids having fun and didn't worry about it.

Quote from: Brand55;841162Thanks for the fast response. It looks like there have been some changes then. At least I won't have to unlearn anything if I ever decide to run the game.

 Are you going by the first edition Basic Set rules? Originally Dodging was the only option. The other 2 options wre introduced in the Advanced set and then kept but streamlined in the second edition basic game.

QuoteI hadn't caught the part about agility factoring into health. That does help a bit. It just seemed weird to me because I think FASERIP is the first system I've seen where's there's no opposed roll, AC, Dodge/Parry target number, etc.

FASERIP does turn a few assumptions from other RPGs on their head, which can take a bit for experienced players to adjust to.

Quote from: Pat;841164TristramEvans hit the key points, but it's probably worth expanding on the topic a bit because FASERIP is conceptually very different from a lot of traditional games.

Active defenses in FASERIP don't work very well. This isn't a weakness. It's a feature.

FASERIP works best when you assume heroes are heroes. And heroes take action. They don't delay, they don't indefinitely drag out fights. They attack, they come up with crazy stunts. They do something proactive.

If Spidey stands around and tries to dodge Juggernaut all day, he'll be pulped. That's because he should be trying to lure Juggernaut into concrete, or create a slingshot between two lampposts made of webbing, or whatever.

(If it's plot-important that Spidey stall Juggernaut in a mostly off-screen fight, then the referee should probably liberally interpret the duration of a turn, and allow one roll to account for hours of dodging. But that's the exception. Spidey should be thinking, taking the initiative. So the game pushes Spidey's player to try.)

That's why Spidey's amazing agility is rolled rolled into his overall health. He's got one of the highest health scores in the game, and it's not because he's tougher than the Thing. It's because he gets out of the way of more punches. Adding Fighting and Agility to Health is just a way of abstracting away the defensive rolls that slow down so many other games.

All of that is lumped into one score, and that score is basically a pacing mechanism. Don't look at Health (badly named), and think "that's how tough I am", instead think "that's how long I can last, when I pull out all the stops."

Very well put.

Quote from: TristramEvans;841171Are you going by the first edition Basic Set rules? Originally Dodging was the only option. The other 2 options wre introduced in the Advanced set and then kept but streamlined in the second edition basic game.

I'm looking at the playtest for a game called "human(ish)" which is supposedly based on the FASERIP rules here: http://www.gratisgames.webspace.virginmedia.com/faserip.html

I don't know which set of rules that version is mostly based on, but I do know the one I'm reading uses Dodging as the only option. And yeah, I've noticed that FASERIP is quite different from what I'm used to, but it seems easy enough to wrap my brain around so far. I've been on the lookout for a simple urban fantasy game with the usual suspects (weres, vamps, etc.) so I thought I'd give FASERIP a try. I almost tried hacking together something myself using ICONS awhile back, but the Kickstarter for this game was relatively inexpensive and I figured it would give me an excuse to check out a system I've wanted to look at for some time.

Quote from: Brand55;841174I'm looking at the playtest for a game called "human(ish)" which is supposedly based on the FASERIP rules here: http://www.gratisgames.webspace.virginmedia.com/faserip.html

I don't know which set of rules that version is mostly based on, but I do know the one I'm reading uses Dodging as the only option. And yeah, I've noticed that FASERIP is quite different from what I'm used to, but it seems easy enough to wrap my brain around so far. I've been on the lookout for a simple urban fantasy game with the usual suspects (weres, vamps, etc.) so I thought I'd give FASERIP a try. I almost tried hacking together something myself using ICONS awhile back, but the Kickstarter for this game was relatively inexpensive and I figured it would give me an excuse to check out a system I've wanted to look at for some time.

Interesting, will give it a look.

BTW you can find the entirety of the original FASERIP gameline for free in pdf on the classicmarvelforever website

Hm, based on a FASERIP retroclone that called itself "FASERIP". Honestly, thats just a bit annoying. Just going to cause confusion. Meh, small gripe.

Quote from: TristramEvans;841175BTW you can find the entirety of the original FASERIP gameline for free in pdf on the classicmarvelforever website

Thanks, I'll check it out. No idea when I'll have time to read it as I've got a ton of stuff already piled up I need to get through, but I'm sure I'll manage it one of these days. Right now it seems like new stuff is being published faster than I can read it.

Quote from: TristramEvans;841176Hm, based on a FASERIP retroclone that called itself "FASERIP". Honestly, thats just a bit annoying. Just going to cause confusion. Meh, small gripe.

If you want even more confusing, FASERIP is the 2nd clone of FASERIP. The 1st clone of FASERIP was also called FASERIP, at least during the playtest stage (it only became 4c, later).

Quote from: Pat;841187If you want even more confusing, FASERIP is the 2nd clone of FASERIP. The 1st clone of FASERIP was also called FASERIP, at least during the playtest stage (it only became 4c, later).

Retroclones dont bother me, theres also GCore, the Universalis Game System, MSH 3rd fan Edition, The Superlative system, and for all intents and purposes, Icons, but at the very least 4C did change its name so it doesnt cause any confusion with the original. I really just dont want to have to define which FASERIP Im talking about every time I mention it. Hopefully that wont be the case and Im just fussing over nothing.