From: Alex Ferguson (abf@interzone.ucc.ie)
Date: Tue 01 Jul 1997 - 19:50:12 EEST
Steve Barnes states his agenda:
> Harrek does not "violate the rules", there is no special case for him.
> Anything he did, a PC should be perfectly capable of (potentially) doing.
I agree in principle, though different campaign foci are obviously going
to want to have (widely) different interpretations of the size of the
"potential" -- and rightly so. The last thing I think a rules system
should do is tie down a GM to a particular "scale", more than it can
help, and this includes foisting unwanted Harreks onto hapless GMs, just
as much as it does forbidding them out of hand.
> I don't care whether the GM believes in Dragon Pass super heroes
> with the Infinity Rune and CF of 20 or the Greg revisionist version,
> where heroes are less powerful than gamers previously had believed.
Are they? I don't think Greg's said this, exactly, just that a CF of 20
and an Infinity Rune aren't necessarily the best models of Gloranthan
reality for playing heroes in an RPG. The second is also a bit of
an exercise in circular definition. A superhero is someone with access
to the Infinity Rune; having access to the Infinity Rune is defined as
being a superhero.
> Lets say I have a rune lord candidate, with all 5 cult traits at 16
> ("legendary" status or whatever it is called). His test is an Orlanth
> re-enactment HQ, and has to roll all five traits.
Where do you get this particular mechanic from? It sounds like the
one PP uses for _DI_, for which I think it's reasonable, but I
wouldn't use it in this context.
> Lastly, if there is always a 5% chance of failing a roll (as in RQ),
(but not as in Pendragon)
> then the chance of making 5 rolls
> is only 77%, no matter how good your traits are.
This is an argument against a particular trait-based mechanic, not
against the whole concept. I'd agree that if someone has all five
religious traits at 19, then a 77% chance of becoming a RL is
probably way too stingy; all traits at 16 should be perfectly fine
in most cases, given all the other "convince the examiners" stuff.
as per a certain fine article. (Still available at all good David
Halls everywhere, I think?)
I can think of a couple of mechanisms off the top of my head that'd
correspond roughly to the above intuition, so I'm far from despondant,
but I won't bore you all with gory details at this point, as I
suspect something considerably more elegant yet is possible.
Good luck,
Alex.
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