Quote from: Madprofessor;883735BoL magic can work well, but because it is a player driven improv system, you need a very good GM to keep it under control.  BoL sorcery requires good GM judgment (and that can be good or bad depending if your GM gets it or not) or it can be overly powerful, even game-wrecking, in my experience.

BoL magic, sorcery in particular, seems to work well if it is relegated to the bad guys. I also feel like the GM can get some control of it by designating specific side effects from the sundry list provided in the game. For example, the "3rd magnitude spell requirement list" seems pretty restrictive:

Personal Ordeal: The caster must undertake ritual scarring and/or mutilation and bloodletting to achieve the right frame of mind for casting

Casting Time: To correctly execute, the spell will take at least 3d6 hours of meditation, chanting, dancing etc.

Ritual Sacrifice: A sentient being must be slaughtered to empower the spell (a beautiful wench would be most suitable, but they tend to have hairy barbarians trailing behind them that frequently take issue with the whole
sacrificing deal...)

The Stars ARE Right: The spell may only be cast when the necessary stars and planets are correctly aligned.

Place of Power: There is only one place known to man where this spell may be cast and – guess what? It's not close!

Demonic Transformation: Casting the spell will permanently (maybe) transform the caster into some horrible demonic form with an even
more clichéd maniacal laugh

Wounds: The magician suffers 2d6+1 lifeblood damage when the spell is cast

Group Ritual: Requires 3d6 assistants, each with Magician 0 or higher

You pile one or two of THOSE on a PC caster, it's quite the undertaking. Granted, what constitutes "3rd magnitude" is not 100% codified, but that certainly looks like some decent control mechanisms.

Quote from: estar;883805By all means do that. But then again the original material is out there for you to read and to come to your own conclusion. Everything I laid out can found in books that are readily available.

Yes, I know, but seriously, man - I have compared them:). It looks to me that your explanation is an ex post facto one, while Gronan's is how it was meant to be.
Yes, I know it started as a wargaming system, I just suspect that this doesn't preclude it from being adapted to model Eroll Flynn movies.

QuoteYou can see the rules for hero and super-hero in the fantasy supplement section for Chainmail. You can see the fact that the level title for 4th level fighter is Hero and the 8th level title is Super-Hero.

I could, after they release it in PDF, you mean:D. But I know most of the basics from threads like this one.

QuoteYou can see the chainmail-OD&D link in the fact that fighter get one attack per level against creature of 1 HD or lower. Exactly the same mechanic in Chainmail where a Hero attacks as four figures and a Super Hero attacks as eight figures.

Agreed. The problem is in the fact that the same fighter also can suffer hits that would kill 8 mortals...and yet when he rests, he doesn't recover X HP per level, he just recovers X HP. See also: Cure Light Wounds not becoming more efficient on higher level characters.
Thus, I'm forced to conclude HP are either "meat points", and the fighter has been getting more resistant to damage (possibly by becoming like a sumo wrestler?), or that it's an out-of-game mechanic that doesn't need to simulate anything.

Quote from: Baulderstone;883810The Stormbringer/Elric/Magic World magic systems are a lot of fun, but none of them really reflect magic as it worked in Moorcock's books. The truest version to the books is Elric of Melnibone for MRQII. It's written by Lawrence Whitaker, so it is very easy to blend with RQ6/Mythras.

Thanks for the advice:)!

Quote from: ArrozConLeche;883811Ron Edward's Sorcerer & Sword has been touted as a great treatment of the S&S.

And indeed it is, even if you're not using Sorcerer;).

Quote from: AsenRG;883862Thus, I'm forced to conclude HP are either "meat points", and the fighter has been getting more resistant to damage (possibly by becoming like a sumo wrestler?), or that it's an out-of-game mechanic that doesn't need to simulate anything.

or, you miss the real answer, that it's an in-game mechanic that failed at adequately expressing the concept in all situations it needs to.

An IC mechanic that fails can be just as disruptive to IC Immersion as an OOC mechanic can.  It doesn't mean it's not still attempting to model something 100% inside the setting.  It just doesn't do it very well.

QuoteOriginally Posted by Cranebump
BoL magic, sorcery in particular, seems to work well if it is relegated to the bad guys. I also feel like the GM can get some control of it by designating specific side effects from the sundry list provided in the game. For example, the "3rd magnitude spell requirement list" seems pretty restrictive:

Personal Ordeal: The caster must undertake ritual scarring and/or mutilation and bloodletting to achieve the right frame of mind for casting

Casting Time: To correctly execute, the spell will take at least 3d6 hours of meditation, chanting, dancing etc.

Ritual Sacrifice: A sentient being must be slaughtered to empower the spell (a beautiful wench would be most suitable, but they tend to have hairy barbarians trailing behind them that frequently take issue with the whole
sacrificing deal...)

The Stars ARE Right: The spell may only be cast when the necessary stars and planets are correctly aligned.

Place of Power: There is only one place known to man where this spell may be cast and – guess what? It's not close!

Demonic Transformation: Casting the spell will permanently (maybe) transform the caster into some horrible demonic form with an even
more clichéd maniacal laugh

Wounds: The magician suffers 2d6+1 lifeblood damage when the spell is cast

Group Ritual: Requires 3d6 assistants, each with Magician 0 or higher

You pile one or two of THOSE on a PC caster, it's quite the undertaking. Granted, what constitutes "3rd magnitude" is not 100% codified, but that certainly looks like some decent control mechanisms.

I'm not knocking the system.  I like it! The requirements you posted here are great example of the flavor.  I'm just saying that its easily abused if the GM isn't on top of things. I agree that it work's best for NPC sorcerers.  It can and does work for PC sorcerers too but the GM needs to keep it under control because every new spell a PC comes up with potentially sets a precedent.

An example Simon gives of 3rd magnitude spell is summoning a volcano in the middle of a city. A PC could do this taking wounds and casting time from the list above - a small price to pay for a nuke!  (Technically, players pick their restrictions not the GM). Theoretically, a player could destroy an entire civilization this way in short order.  Not that any reasonable GM would allow a PC to do that.  Even seemingly simple 1st and 2nd mag spells like "hide in plain sight," "create water," or "heat metal" could be game breaking.  I'm just sayin the RAW allows for anything and the GM has to be prepared to get a handle on the bizarro things that players might try to get away with.  The magic system in BoL doesn't run on autopilot like it does in D&D or even Chaosium style games so the GM has to make rulings to get the system to cooperate with a particular setting or else game balance and/or flavor can go out the window.

Quote from: Madprofessor;883930An example Simon gives of 3rd magnitude spell is summoning a volcano in the middle of a city. A PC could do this taking wounds and casting time from the list above - a small price to pay for a nuke!  (Technically, players pick their restrictions not the GM). Theoretically, a player could destroy an entire civilization this way in short order.  Not that any reasonable GM would allow a PC to do that.  Even seemingly simple 1st and 2nd mag spells like "hide in plain sight," "create water," or "heat metal" could be game breaking.  I'm just sayin the RAW allows for anything and the GM has to be prepared to get a handle on the bizarro things that players might try to get away with.  The magic system in BoL doesn't run on autopilot like it does in D&D or even Chaosium style games so the GM has to make rulings to get the system to cooperate with a particular setting or else game balance and/or flavor can go out the window.

All true. What I was proposing was the GM making those rulings by stipulating the requirements, especially for momentous magic. For example, if I wanted to level said city, the GM could determine that I can only cast it on a certain time, with specific materials, at a cost of blood and sacrifice. Feel like someone casting a 3rd magnitude spell has to find out how to do it, rather than decide for themselves.  Of course, you might have to deal with players who feel their "agency" is being destroyed by such a requirement. But S&S magic should carry some sort of a cost, which the system emulates fairly well by mandating one requirement, with no reduction in cost unless you take a SECOND requirement. Nothing that says the GM can't rule that the first requirement is always lost lifeblood (or something to that effect).:-)

(P.S. I think "hide in plain sight" is listed in the Mythic book as a First Magnitude, because it is something anyone with training could learn to do...according to Simon's rules, that is. "Create Water" has to be at least 2nd magnitude -- it's something from nothing. The mythic rules give examples of summoning ships and demons at second level, so that would seem appropos. In a sense, I kinda wish we had some D&D analogues listed in BoL, i.e., "summoning is 2nd magnitude," and so on. So, I definitely understand your concerns with the nebulous and elastic nature of magic in the system. Hard to say no PC magicians, but I could see doing it, if only to make things a bit easier. Alchemy and Miracles seem easier to deal with from a player standpoint.).

QuoteOriginally Posted by AsenRG
Thus, I'm forced to conclude HP are either "meat points", and the fighter has been getting more resistant to damage (possibly by becoming like a sumo wrestler?), or that it's an out-of-game mechanic that doesn't need to simulate anything.

Who/what is "forcing" you? Is it someone here who won't let the issue go, does the impeccable  logic of your sumo wrestler imagery have some kind of power over you, or do you just have an irresistible need to categorize mechanics?

(Edit: sorry, I realize that wasn't very nice)

Hit points represent how much punishment your character can take. That seems obvious.  Like an attribute or a skill they are mathematical representations of in-game objects.  They represent something tangibly in game.  

There are basically two types of HP.  D&D HP which scale with level/hit dice and are a broad measure of how much punishment a character can take, or chaosium style HP which do not scale and represent actual physical damage (your meat points).

In meat point games characters don't get more resistant to damage as they gain XP so your sumo analogy simply does not apply.  In CoC, GURPS, RQ whatever, HP are static, and when you lose HP you have taken physical IC damage. Period.  There is no way you can spin that to be an OoC narrative mechanic.  

D&D HP can represent more than one thing - exhaustion, luck, physical stress, wounds, or whatever - it still measures the punishment that a character can take - it's just over a broader spectrum.  It is still an IC mechanic, in fact it is the same IC mechanic as BRP, it's just covers more things.

...and I don't even care.  Not everything has to be a dichotomy and fall into one artificial category or another.  I mean, what is the point of debating the categorization of HP on this thread. It has been discussed to death elsewhere and isn't really even relevant to "what's your favorite Conan game."  Is it?

We've got like five game theory threads going right now full of narrative vs simulation arguments.  Do we have to turn this into one too?

QuoteOriginally Posted by Cranebump
All true. What I was proposing was the GM making those rulings by stipulating the requirements, especially for momentous magic. For example, if I wanted to level said city, the GM could determine that I can only cast it on a certain time, with specific materials, at a cost of blood and sacrifice. Feel like someone casting a 3rd magnitude spell has to find out how to do it, rather than decide for themselves. Of course, you might have to deal with players who feel their "agency" is being destroyed by such a requirement. But S&S magic should carry some sort of a cost, which the system emulates fairly well by mandating one requirement, with no reduction in cost unless you take a SECOND requirement. Nothing that says the GM can't rule that the first requirement is always lost lifeblood (or something to that effect).:-)

Yup, I agree.  The system works better if the GM picks the costs/consequences.  A player who has a character with the power to level a city, whatever the cost, shouldn't whine about his agency, IMHO.

Player says, "can I do this?" GM says "yes, if..." - seems a lot more reasonable than - player says "I am going to this and it will cost me that."

QuoteIn a sense, I kinda wish we had some D&D analogues listed in BoL, i.e., "summoning is 2nd magnitude," and so on.

Yeah, it would help.  We got a slightly bigger list with Mythic edition, and I can understand the design decision not to include a large comprehensive  list, but such a list would make the game a little more accessible for a lot of groups.  

Back to Hyboria - I don't think improv magic systems are too well suited to the Hyborian Age, in general.  Specific spells make a little more sense to me as sorcerers in the stories worked long and hard for the formulas of their incantations.  Improv magic "feels" like the sorcerer is manipulating some energy force and sculpting it to a desired effect.  It seems a bit off to me.  Of course, you could improv some spell and then narrate, after the fact, how you faced the spider haunted towers of Zamora for the forbidden knowledge that allowed the spell to take shape - but ...nah, that's hardly ideal either.

Quote from: Madprofessor;883933Who/what is "forcing" you? Is it someone here who won't let the issue go, does the impeccable  logic of your sumo wrestler imagery have some kind of power over you, or do you just have an irresistible need to categorize mechanics?

force  (fôrs)
n.
3.
a. Intellectual power or vigor, especially as conveyed in writing or speech.

Kindly use that meaning to get what I'm saying:)! It's too early here for me to engage in the game of semantics (a.k.a. replacing the meaning of words until the statement you dislike makes no sense even to its author) that people on this forum love so much.

Quote(Edit: sorry, I realize that wasn't very nice)

But you still wrote it - and didn't edit it away. Hence, the curt reply.

QuoteHit points represent how much punishment your character can take. That seems obvious.

"Seems obvious" to whom?
If it's obvious, give me an obvious explanation how people learn to endure slashing wounds. "I just killed another goblin, and found 3 GP: I can now suffer one more maximum-power blow from a sword".
To the above, I call bullshit and non-sequitur, from a real world perspective.
Compare with:
"I achieved another game objective - I can now upgrade my stats. Hey, cool, I can now take one more successful attack by a swordsman!"
No references to the real world mean it doesn't have to mean anything in the real world. It just means the Referee has to describe more close misses before he goes down.

Yes - I get it, you're used to describing HP as meat damage. It still makes no sense.

QuoteThere are basically two types of HP.  D&D HP which scale with level/hit dice and are a broad measure of how much punishment a character can take, or chaosium style HP which do not scale and represent actual physical damage (your meat points).

In meat point games characters don't get more resistant to damage as they gain XP so your sumo analogy simply does not apply.  In CoC, GURPS, RQ whatever, HP are static, and when you lose HP you have taken physical IC damage. Period.  There is no way you can spin that to be an OoC narrative mechanic.  

Yes. I specifically said they're not meat points. And then there's games like Dragon Warriors where experience does get you maybe 1 more HP per level, representing being used to pain and moving to minimize the damage (as separate from having better defence, which is a different stat in the game). That's still meat points.

QuoteD&D HP can represent more than one thing - exhaustion, luck, physical stress, wounds, or whatever - it still measures the punishment that a character can take - it's just over a broader spectrum.  It is still an IC mechanic, in fact it is the same IC mechanic as BRP, it's just covers more things.

You contradict yourself.
You said yourself that they represent exhaustion, stress and luck, not just actual damage (and they only represent luck if luck is a renewable resource, that you actually can replenish by resting...yeah, sure). Obviously it's not "the same mechanic" as meat points, because it covers more things. And it fails to be an IC mechanic by covering them under the same umbrella stat.
As I said to CRK: it works better as a narrative mechanic. At least then I know why it makes no sense for anything approaching the real world. And if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck...

Quote...and I don't even care.  Not everything has to be a dichotomy and fall into one artificial category or another.

QuoteI mean, what is the point of debating the categorization of HP on this thread. It has been discussed to death elsewhere and isn't really even relevant to "what's your favorite Conan game."  Is it?

It began with me correcting CRK on a part of his statement I saw (and still see) as erroneous.

QuoteWe've got like five game theory threads going right now full of narrative vs simulation arguments.  Do we have to turn this into one too?

Well, why do you keep arguing then:D? I wasn't intending to press the matter, either, just set the record straight. But if you keep pushing back, welcome to Newton's Third Law!

Personally, I'd prefer to discuss the 43AD magic. But it's your choice.

D&D Hit Points model "Meat Points" (modified by Con) and part of "Defensive Fighting Skill" (Dex being another part which gets factored into AC).  Both a character's physicality and their fighting skills exist within the setting.

Nearly every other offshoot of D&D addresses many the issues that Hit Points have, but there's no decision my character can make about Hit Points that aren't tied to the setting.  The only real decision any character can make about Hit Points is whether or not to Multi or Dual class into a class that has more, but that's a character choice.

The fact that my drawing of an orange doesn't look like an orange, doesn't make it a drawing of a Harley Davidson.

You can argue that Hit Points completely fail at what they intended to do, and in certain situations, I'd agree they failed completely.  That doesn't mean they ever intended to model something outside the setting.

It almost sounds like you're saying "These things suck so hard at what they are supposed to do, there has to be another reason, right?"  

Nope.  That's why whenever I play D&D I use rules from other clones/flavors to try and plug the holes, or I just say fuck it, because it's a one-shot.

Quote from: AsenRG;883983Personally, I'd prefer to discuss the 43AD magic.

Romans against Britons - I thought of taking a look at 43AD, even though I thought Zenobia, while very good, was, like BoL, a tad light.  I also thought of Savage Worlds - Weird Wars Rome or even Cthulhu: Invictus, of course, now there's Mythic Britain for RQ6/Mythras.

What was awesome about 43AD magic that makes it good for Hyborian Age gaming compared to any of the other games above that you've tried?

QuoteOriginally Posted by AsenRG
Intellectual power or vigor, especially as conveyed in writing or speech. ...Kindly use that meaning to get what I'm saying

Yes,yes I am truly stunned by your "intellectual power especially as conveyed in writing."  Your dizzying intellect or my thick-headedness must be why your arguments make no sense to me. :rolleyes:

On a more serious note, we seem to have such vastly different perspectives and experiences that it is difficult to come to terms on what seem to be simple concepts to each of us.  As I said, your argument about HP makes no sense, to me, at all.  I am not sure why I think I can explain to you what does make sense. You're obviously not interested. It is just maddening to see these types of arguments come up over and over again, and I foolishly sometimes get sucked into the idea that at some point - logic should prevail.  

I respect your perspective. I wouldn't mind learning about where you are coming from, I just get tired of every RPG discussion being turned into a narrative/simulationist categorization battle for which, more often than not, you are leading the narrativist charge.

QuoteYou contradict yourself.
You said yourself that they represent exhaustion, stress and luck, not just actual damage (and they only represent luck if luck is a renewable resource, that you actually can replenish by resting...yeah, sure). Obviously it's not "the same mechanic" as meat points, because it covers more things. And it fails to be an IC mechanic by covering them under the same umbrella stat.
As I said to CRK: it works better as a narrative mechanic. At least then I know why it makes no sense for anything approaching the real world...

To the above, I call bullshit and non-sequitur, from a real world perspective.

I am not contradicting myself.  You are introducing two elements (realism and mechanical breadth) that have nothing to do with the IC or OoC nature of HP, or frankly of any mechanic.

I am going to try here one more time to explain where I am coming from and maybe that will explain why your argument makes no sense to me:

1) Whether or not a mechanic simulates reality well has nothing at all to do with whether the mechanic is IC or OoC.  If we are playing supers where I can fly, and you can shoot laser beams from your face - that's not realistic.  But it can still be IC.  I could play a sentient radio-active snack cake but my health points are still directly relevant to my unrealistic character.  My twinkie is aware of his own health and has the power to use and influence it.  As a player, knowing the health points of my character helps my immersion because it gives me knowledge about my character that my character would be aware of and able to affect.

2) The number of things that a mechanic covers (its breadth) has nothing to do with whether a mechanic is IC or OoC.  GURPS uses strength to cover D&D's STR, CON and HP.  D&D uses 3 mechanics to do what GURPS does with STR (STR, CON and HP).  GURPS STR is much broader than D&D's STR but they are both IC mechanics.  Knowing how strong my character is knowledge that is shared between player and character.  If my character had only 2 stats, say physical and mental, those are still IC stats even though they are very broad and don't do a very good job at giving the player enough info.

IC mechanics are things that the character can directly experience or affect.  They link the player and character together and cause players to say things in first person like "I am stronger than you" or "I am dying here."  

OoC mechanics are things that the character has no control over or direct experience with and which break down the immersion of the player into the character.  They cause the player to say things that the character would have no knowledge of or power over like "there is a shotgun behind this bar" or "the gods favor the daring."

D&D HP are broad and unrealistic (they drive me crazy and I think they do a poor job of accomplishing what they are attempting to do) but they are still IC.

Maybe, you can understand the above.  Maybe you can't.  Maybe you just don't want to.

QuoteIt began with me correcting CRK on a part of his statement I saw (and still see) as erroneous.

Exactly - you introduced the argument even though it has no place in this thread.

QuoteWell, why do you keep arguing then? I wasn't intending to press the matter, either, just set the record straight.

You did press the matter.  You created the argument and then kept pushing it! You made 4 long argumentative posts about it telling experienced GMs, like estar and Krueger, how they had no understanding of the games they play, arguing that you know their games and play style better than they do, before I "pushed back.":banghead:

QuoteBut if you keep pushing back, welcome to Newton's Third Law!

Fair enough.  It was my mistake to get involved. I guess I should just bow to your self-proclaimed "intellectual power" and let you walk all over me and tell me how my play style is all wrong on every thread.  :rant:

QuotePersonally, I'd prefer to discuss the 43AD magic. But it's your choice.

By all means.  Let's get back on topic. Tell me why you like the 43 AD magic system and why you think it is a good fit for the Hyborian Age.

Fantasy Craft.

With the caveat that I'm not running Hyboria per se, but a far future setting inspired by Conan stories as well as Clark Ashton Smith's Zothique.

As for why: highly tunable, and the classes, skill system, and action dice seem to fit the flow of the action.

Quote from: CRKrueger;883869or, you miss the real answer, that it's an in-game mechanic that failed at adequately expressing the concept in all situations it needs to.

I think it perfect for what it does, telling you that a 4th level Hero is 4 times harder to kill (on average) than a ordinary warrior.

But... it is a valid point to say "I don't my setting works well with the idea that a 4th level fighter is four times harder to kill than a ordinary warrior." You can also view it from standpoint that a 1st level character is not a ordinary member of his profession but rather a novice.

My view is that first level characters are novices partially influenced by the fact that how it was presented in original Judges Guild City-State and Wilderlands products.

Because of the weakness of 1st level D&D character my opinion is that this became the standard view and the various editions of D&D has been trying to hammer out the inconsistency ever since.

And for tabletop RPG gamers who want settings or genre campaign that feature a more realistic progression of experience, this led to development of alternatives like Runequest where experienced characters are better but not 4 times harder to kill after a first few sessions of the campaign have played out.

Quote from: Madprofessor;883963Back to Hyboria - I don't think improv magic systems are too well suited to the Hyborian Age, in general.  Specific spells make a little more sense to me as sorcerers in the stories worked long and hard for the formulas of their incantations.  Improv magic "feels" like the sorcerer is manipulating some energy force and sculpting it to a desired effect.  It seems a bit off to me.  Of course, you could improv some spell and then narrate, after the fact, how you faced the spider haunted towers of Zamora for the forbidden knowledge that allowed the spell to take shape - but ...nah, that's hardly ideal either.

I see what you're getting at here. Not to belabor the point, but I think player and GM running BoL could get together at the beginning and agree to how the player's magic actually works in practice, based on their character conception, and make that the basic rules for the character.

For example, say I am, for all intents and purchases a sort of "voodoo priest" who requires some form of blood, marking and sacrifice. I could propose that all my first magnitude spells use "inanimate materials" (parts of the object I am affecting, which are consumed in the casting) and require loss of life blood. My second magnitude spells could all require "ritual sacrifice" (of specific animals) and "permanent focus" (tattooing the body using the animal's blood and maybe my own). 3rd magnitude could one up this with greater ritual sacrifice (perhaps a person, or a great deal of my own Life blood) and permanent scarring (wounds created from drawing blood).

True, the system itself isn't inherently set up thist way, but I feel like the skeleton is there to use as one sees fit. The only real improv then becomes the determination of magnitude and any additional requirements the GM might stipulate. I feel like you have a better shot at creating the feel you're looking for with the toolkit, rather than trying to adapt codified spells from a rule set. Imbeded spell descriptions DO reduce headaches (and arguments), for sure. But it seems to me, in the various incarnations of Conan I've read (from the original stories, to the Thomas/Windsor comics) feature many different types of mysticism. I feel like an open system might actually be better in the long run, when it comes to genre/setting emulation. Shape to fit, in other words.

Quote from: estar;884027I think it perfect for what it does, telling you that a 4th level Hero is 4 times harder to kill (on average) than a ordinary warrior.

Usually, when the OOC charge is leveled, it comes from falling damage and healing rates, the biggest holes in HPs, usually not the "Some Meat and Mainly Fighting Ability" definition.