I'm a huge fan of the 2nd edition Warhammer Fantasy RPG; I loved the 1st edition way back when, but it had some serious problems, virtually ALL of which were resolved with the 2nd edition, without taking away any of the goodness that was in the 1st ed rules.

Its pretty clear that part of what makes WFRP appealing in comparison to D&D is that WFRP doesn't try to be all that D&D is, rather it is a much more "focused" game, dealing with a much more narrow genre of play, the "gritty renaissance fantasy", in a very european setting at that.  I always thought it exemplified some of the difference between American and British perspectives on what the "good old days" were really like (the Europeans in general having a much less idealized and sanitized view of their own history, whereas Americans tend to be able to romanticize it all a bit more having less direct experience of the real history).

That said, there are a few people out there that try to insist that WFRP can ONLY be played in one way. The WFRP-fans have their own very particular brand of swine, the ones who insist that any WFRP that focuses too much on combat, on fighting monsters, or on anything other than survival+intrigue are somehow "not playing it right".
I don't think that's true at all. I know there's at least two different ways to play WFRP that I've personally done: the kind of "enemy within" campaign where the focus is on a kind of detective story, and the "doomstones" style campaign that is much more classic fantasy.
2nd edition WFRP presented us with the Ashes of Middenheim series of adventures, that do a great job of walking a line in between the D&D-esque adventuring and the "Enemy Within" mystery story; while Karak Azgal takes the traditional dungeon crawl and turns it on its head with all kinds of gritty Warhammer goodness.

What other ways can Warhammer be played? Have people done other stuff with it? Have many of you played outside of the Empire with it? Are brettonian campaigns or Border Princes campaigns very different when you run them? What other neat stuff have you done?

Let's hear it.

RPGPundit

My group never got to play much first edition so we are still exploring the basic world of 2nd edition.  We haven't gone anywhere terribly unusual with it.

I disagree with your statment about the rules of 2nd edition.  Most of them work well, but I have seen significant issues whenever characters with a magical characteristic are involved.

Quote from: Xavier LangMy group never got to play much first edition so we are still exploring the basic world of 2nd edition.  We haven't gone anywhere terribly unusual with it.

I disagree with your statment about the rules of 2nd edition.  Most of them work well, but I have seen significant issues whenever characters with a magical characteristic are involved.

And what issues are those?

BTW, if you never played 1st edition, you have no fucking clue what "significant issues with magic" really means.  :banghead:

Let's put it this way: the magic system is the only mechanic that they changed COMPLETELY from the first edition, where the new magic system has NOTHING to do with the old one. In other words, the old one was a total write-off.

RPGPundit

I have little time for one true wayists (is that even a word?) in any system. WFRP is in the unusual position of having had nothing but fan support for many years between editions, so i think much of the 'WFRP is non-combat based' comes from those who have made do with their own iterations of the system for many years. Added to this is the nostalgia from the first three instalments of the Enemy Within campaign, which was pretty tightly focused and rocked to boot. The fact that just as many subsequent supplements for 1st edition were more combat based doesn't seem to register with some people.

The more deadly combat system of WFRP over other RPGs would seem to add mechanical substance to those who say that combat is not an important aspect of WFRP, but 2nd edition has at least mitigated these problems after adding Fortune Points and a point and fire magic system.

D&D style dungeon crawls may still be problematic if the random character creation is followed to the letter, but adding spellcasting now adds to the survival rating of the party and lets face it, having a good rumble is half the fun of roleplaying anyhow, so it's all good in my book.

I haven't had that much opportunity to explore many types of campaign with the new edition due to freelancing commitments, but i don't see why a more combat heavy game with the new edition can't be tackled.

I believe there were fortune points in 1st edition. I recall using them every single game I played in (I died ALOT) and I never played in second edition yet.

As for one true way: I dunno about that either. I played in two campaigns, one the Doomstones campaign, in which the party had a fair amount of firepower (including one guy with teh firedoomstone who was anything but afraid to use it... we got run out of one town after burning down the local forest....)

THe other I got stuck with a gambler... in a small town... where I wound up buying the local tavern and running it.  IF I had to say, I'd suggest teh GM wanted to do 'enemy within' stuff, but given that the party was playing very much in traditional D&D style :Oh, look, skeletons....get em!  fashion, it didn't seem very intruige filled to me.   We got hired to do adventures (I mean, escort archeological digs...), we protected the town from a vampire and his necromancer allies.  I got rich running the tavern... and I don't think there was a single comment made that we weren't 'doing it right' from anyone.

As for the Doomstones campaign? The GM called it off after he realized that if we ever got the last two stones it meant teh end of the world. Nobody wanted that.

The 1st edition had Fate points. The second edition has Fate and Fortune points.

In my WFRP2 campaign, I have houseruled out the Fortune points, because I really like my games to be deadly. Thus far, we haven't actually had a single character death, but a couple of PCs are already out of Fate points, and now the risk is really present. But I'd made it clear that Warhammer is a very dangerous game/world, and that they would likely be going through more than one character over the course of the campaign.

RPGPundit

I'm running WFRP 2nd atm.

I was disappointed by character gen - I much preferred the "choose a type of character, then see what job he actually got" to "pick a random career"

I'm using fortune points, and they don't seem to reduce the deadliness much - session two almost TPK

Survivors: noble who ran off (and was strongly advised not to go to the watch ooc) and a peasant who was knocked out by the PCs before the fight.

What happened?  The noble decided to coerce a merchant into giving up his room in an inn.  The rest of the group decided to take the merchants stuff while he was tied up.  In the stables the following morning, the noble realises that they are stealing another cart and the peasant starts shrieking about murderous thieving chaos cultists (half the party had been discussing killing his family and baking them in pies).  So some mercenaries (as statted in the Armoury) came in to the stables, to delay them until the watch arrived.  The PCs kicked off, all dead (admittedly, they burned Fate points to try to stay fighting, but...)

No fortune or fate points for the mercenaries, treated as killed at 0 wounds.

I have been allowing the PCs to use Fortune points for automatic successes at cinematic/irrelevant acts (e.g. not falling into the sewer when being reckless along the side)

V.

PS Of course, this is the group who said "let's not play the Skaven game and play goodly characters for a change.  I want to be a necromancer"

Quote from: RPGPunditAnd what issues are those?

Limited spell lists that don't allow for differences between priesthoods.
If you don't spring for the Mage book, they are just as bad.  

The rolling doubles thing only kinda works.  Our priest never had anything bad happen despite hundreds of spells.  The mage had a few bad moments where he shat himself in combat or stunned himself, but no truely bad, or corrupting effects and the GM was hoping for bad effects but wasn't willing to fudge the table to force one upon a player.

Priests:
1st priest profession - no magic, nothing else to compensate or make you useful to a group except for nebulous "status" of priests in a default Warhammer world.
The difference between 2 priests here is roughly a single skill.  Priest of Sigmar, or Priest of Shallya, your combat and non combat skills are the same.  Compare a priest of sigmar, or other combat priest to a mercenary, shield breaker or other basic combat class.  They are much weaker.

2nd priest profession, Advanced profession - minor magics.  Nothing else.  These aren't terrible, but they are on par with the stuff everyone else had with there first class.  Priest of Sigmar and Shallya are still identical.  Both can heal a minor amount and give +5% to various things.  Combat classes are outclassing you signficantly if you are a priest of war or combat.

3rd priest profession, Advanced profession - basic magic, still identical.  The spell list for all priests is the same for minor and basic magic.  At this level, any mage in the party is making you look pathetic as they have received there advanced magic.  The combat types are still outclassing you heavily.

4th priest profession, Advanced profession - advanced magic.  Now you have roughly 6 spells that make you different from every other priest.  Your number of attacks, weapon skill, intelligence, etc... are all the same, but you do have nice unique spells.  

A priest that somehow survives to High Priest is a very cool character but getting there is a nightmare or patheticness that takes thousands of EXP.

the angle we used with Warhammer was always the dark horror fantasy style of the Enemy Within campaign. the idea that the skaven were just the tip of the chaos iceberg that permeated the underground of the cities. certainly there is enough room to incorporate Lovecraft elements

Xavier. You may be pleased to know that a religious sourcebook, although not officially on the schedule yet, has been mentioned for next year by various naughty little BI peeps.

Quote from: One Horse TownXavier. You may be pleased to know that a religious sourcebook, although not officially on the schedule yet, has been mentioned for next year by various naughty little BI peeps.

I was happy to hear about that.  It is frustrating to have to wait several years for it to be available though.  I will admit part of my frustration comes from them repeating an error I have seen in many games.  I don't like it when a game creates different religious groups with different perspectives and outlooks and different feels and then give them identical crunch with no respect to those perspectives and outlooks.

Quote from: Xavier LangI was happy to hear about that.  It is frustrating to have to wait several years for it to be available though.  I will admit part of my frustration comes from them repeating an error I have seen in many games.  I don't like it when a game creates different religious groups with different perspectives and outlooks and different feels and then give them identical crunch with no respect to those perspectives and outlooks.

Fair comment. I suppose it comes down to the fact that you can only get so much material into one book.

Quote from: Xavier LangLimited spell lists that don't allow for differences between priesthoods.
If you don't spring for the Mage book, they are just as bad.  

Really? Because in my book, at least, each deity has his own spell list... the Priests of Ulric can barely heal at all, for example (they can't except for their petty magic), the priest of Sigmar can heal but just basically, and the priests of Shallya rock at healing... just one example.

Of course, WFRP is very different from D&D in its magic "infrastructure"; as a wizard you get way less spells, but you can use them whenever you dare to.

QuoteThe rolling doubles thing only kinda works.  Our priest never had anything bad happen despite hundreds of spells.  The mage had a few bad moments where he shat himself in combat or stunned himself, but no truely bad, or corrupting effects and the GM was hoping for bad effects but wasn't willing to fudge the table to force one upon a player.

Trust me, this was a question of luck.  Also a question of level.  The game is set up so that you will only occasionally get Tzeentch's Curse or the Wrath of the Gods; its not supposed to happen every time you roll. But of course, if you have a Magic score of 4, you are likely to get doubles quite often.  When we were running Ashes of Middenheim, the blind priest (father Odo I think he's called?) was an NPC that accompanied the players to get the Brass Skull.  He has a Mag 4, and his magic was direly needed in the combat against the minotaur and later inside the tomb of the Blood God.  And the poor bastard was rolling doubles every second roll! Until I wised up and started being much more economical in how many of the magic dice I used, instead of just rolling 4 every time.
That's the beauty of the system; the power you use to insure success in your spell, the more the likelihood that its also going to have side effects.

QuotePriests:
1st priest profession - no magic, nothing else to compensate or make you useful to a group except for nebulous "status" of priests in a default Warhammer world.
The difference between 2 priests here is roughly a single skill.  Priest of Sigmar, or Priest of Shallya, your combat and non combat skills are the same.  Compare a priest of sigmar, or other combat priest to a mercenary, shield breaker or other basic combat class.  They are much weaker.

There are lots of pretty useless careers in Warhammer. Its not supposed to be equal. Apprentice priests and Apprentice mages are pretty crappy both, so is the Apprentice runecrafter for dwarves.

Quote4th priest profession, Advanced profession - advanced magic.  Now you have roughly 6 spells that make you different from every other priest.  Your number of attacks, weapon skill, intelligence, etc... are all the same, but you do have nice unique spells.  

A priest that somehow survives to High Priest is a very cool character but getting there is a nightmare or patheticness that takes thousands of EXP.

It sounds like you really felt burned playing a priest. Maybe a Camp Follower next time?

Note that Priests have other, social, side benefits that compensate for their less magic. Note also that pretty well ANY magic is powerful in the Warhammer setting, because its "mana poor".

Note also that the differences between priesthoods need not be a mechanical issue. In the mainbook there's a ton of detail about what the difference is between the priesthoods. None of it has much of anything to do with mechanics.  Its one of those things where if you want there to be a difference you have to roleplay it.

RPGPundit

Quote from: Xavier LangI was happy to hear about that.  It is frustrating to have to wait several years for it to be available though.  I will admit part of my frustration comes from them repeating an error I have seen in many games.  I don't like it when a game creates different religious groups with different perspectives and outlooks and different feels and then give them identical crunch with no respect to those perspectives and outlooks.

The Crunch shouldn't be set up in such a way that it thwarts those differences (ie. the priesthood of Blargh supposedly being utterly nonviolent but getting Mace training anyways, or the Priests of Umlaut supposedly being trained in obscure calligraphy but that class not being allowed access to the skill). But it really doesn't need to be encouraged by the crunch either. You don't need a D20-style "feat for EVERYTHING" mentality, and I think that's the problem.

There's a ton of shit that people try to fix with crunch these days that can really be fixed just as well by just roleplaying it, as long as the crunch isn't actively getting in the way.

RPGPundit

Quote from: RPGPunditReally? Because in my book, at least, each deity has his own spell list... the Priests of Ulric can barely heal at all, for example (they can't except for their petty magic), the priest of Sigmar can heal but just basically, and the priests of Shallya rock at healing... just one example.

Incorrect.  Look more carefully.  Everything you are talking about is the advanced magic that a priest doesn't get until there 4th career.  Only High Priests have the differences.

QuoteTrust me, this was a question of luck.  Also a question of level.  The game is set up so that you will only occasionally get Tzeentch's Curse or the Wrath of the Gods; its not supposed to happen every time you roll. But of course, if you have a Magic score of 4, you are likely to get doubles quite often.  When we were running Ashes of Middenheim, the blind priest (father Odo I think he's called?) was an NPC that accompanied the players to get the Brass Skull.  He has a Mag 4, and his magic was direly needed in the combat against the minotaur and later inside the tomb of the Blood God.  And the poor bastard was rolling doubles every second roll! Until I wised up and started being much more economical in how many of the magic dice I used, instead of just rolling 4 every time.
That's the beauty of the system; the power you use to insure success in your spell, the more the likelihood that its also going to have side effects.

Priests never get more than 3 dice and they don't get that until the 4th career.
There is nothing inherently dangerous on the doubles chart.  There are ones that could be bad situationally, like getting stunned, but none do more than a stun, a single wound level, etc...
Also, most of the spells you want to use regularly only require 1 or 2 dice to suceed at so you never have to risk the dangers of chaos that the entire magic flavor is based upon.  

QuoteThere are lots of pretty useless careers in Warhammer. Its not supposed to be equal. Apprentice priests and Apprentice mages are pretty crappy both, so is the Apprentice runecrafter for dwarves.

Apprentice priests have a magic score of zero.  Apprentice mages have a magic score of 1 possible.  Big difference.
There is one and only one path you can take if you want to a be a priest of any flavor or type.

QuoteIt sounds like you really felt burned playing a priest. Maybe a Camp Follower next time?

I rolled randomly.  This time and I'm a dwarven miner-> shield breaker -> rune bearer.  
Have you ever played a priest as a PC from the first basic career?  I seriously doubt you have.

QuoteNote that Priests have other, social, side benefits that compensate for their less magic. Note also that pretty well ANY magic is powerful in the Warhammer setting, because its "mana poor".

No, they don't.  Like any social benefit, it depends on where you are playing and what is going on.  If you read the sections on clergy, priests of war are only looked favorably upon when war is upon you.  Clergy of Shallya are about the only group that is always well received according to the write ups.

QuoteNote also that the differences between priesthoods need not be a mechanical issue. In the mainbook there's a ton of detail about what the difference is between the priesthoods. None of it has much of anything to do with mechanics.  Its one of those things where if you want there to be a difference you have to roleplay it.

RPGPundit

Actually, yes, they should have to have some mechanical differences.  Priests of Sigmar should have better mechanical bonuses for War than Priests of Shallya.
Priests of Shallya shouldn't be required to buy up weapon skill, ballistic skill, number of attacks, etc... at the same rate as a priest of Sigmar.
Why?  Because if I play a priest of war that can't fight I'm all bluff and bluster.  If I roleplay my priest of Sigmar correctly, I am going to engage in battle, and get my ass handed to me.