From: Joerg Baumgartner (rq4@sartar.toppoint.de)
Date: Wed 23 Feb 1994 - 16:17:36 EET
Loren to Bryan J. Maloney
> | Renown: Well, I'm a LITTLE less hostile to it than before, now that I've
> | read its explanation, but I still think it's a bad idea, especially since
> | the implementation is pretty much crap. The greatest weakness: It is not
> | possible to gain or lose Renown during play. Guess what folks, the
> | notoriety of a person CAN CHANGE OVER TIME!!!!!!
> Further ranting deleted. I agree. That's why I proposed that Renown
> (Aspect/Area) be scored as a percentile ability and increased by
> experience (and political campaigning) just as if it were a skill... not
> that it *is* a skill proper... but if the easiest and most consistent
> way to use it is to treat it as a skill then I say "do it."
Make it a characteristic, similar to CoC EDU. Thus by lowering the
multiplier, Renown in neighbouring or more distant areas can be measured.
> | POW gain rolls: I don't think there's any way to do this so that all will
> | be pleased.
> It would be a good trick to model them so that everybody likes them. If
> "worship" is the way that people get more POW then you might get POW
> checks at several types of situations. After a period of contemplation,
> vaguely a week in which you can do your ordinary work, you get to make a
> roll for POW increase and any POW checks you earned during that time are
> wiped from the slate. Time to earn some more.
> 1. You successfully led a dangerous expedition. People are likely to
> offer hero-worship to someone who accomplishes daring feats.
> 2. N people (where N is your current POW) came to you with requests for
> aid and you satisfied their requests, without any payment being offered
> or given. Note the aid could be "smite my enemies" as easily as "heal
> me" and "instruct me" so this isn't a goody-two-shoes rule. People will
> offer hero-worship to someone who helps them and their community.
> 3. A descendant is born. Successful Ceremony roll needed, by the
> birth-parents or someone else in attendance. Note that adoptees would
> count as descendants, so their children would count as your descendants.
> People will offer worship to ancestors.
> 4. You preside over a public or private gathering as the primary
> performer, where there are at least as many people present as POW**2.
> Successful Ceremony roll needed. Note this is the genericized version of
> priestly POW gain.
> While I like the implications of this sort of mechanic for POW increase,
> it trespasses on the territory of APP and Renown. I still prefer the
> model that "Defeating tough enemies with magic makes you more POWerful."
Still, it gives a sensible model. Leading a contingent of men into battle,
or similar leadership tasks, would qualify, too.
> This is where I'm going to re-launch my idea that you only check for
> fatigue when you botch (or fumble). This allows high skill fighters to
> "fight smart instead of hard" and not tire themselves.
This is way too rare. One check per minute seems all right to me, but with
weapon skill (etc) as complementary skill.
In you model even a rookie with a 2% fumble chance won't be exhausted
~50% of the time from a 5 minutes fight.
> I can send a pretty lengthy rant on the subject, in fact. RAG needs to
> cover the difference between Religion and Cult in the rules. Lay
> membership or Low Initiate status is a start. Unfortunately they aren't
> well described in the rules.
Please rant.
> | I'm on the fence regarding duration and range.
> I'm not, at least with Range. I think that Range should be exponential
> as in RQ3, and it could easily be restricted by certain sorcerous
> colleges in the east islands campaigns, et al. In every fantasy world
> that I have read in which long-range magic worked it was true that a
> ship with a wizard would always beat one without a wizard. This is true
> from the Worm Ourouborous to Earthsea to the Black Company to the Wheel
> of Time. I don't think that a good magic system should produce any other
> result. Besides, if you don't allow sorcerous spells long range then
> they'll get whipped by priests and shamans and dwarves (not to mention
> waertagi).
Range, as well as Duration, ought to be more intuitive. A range like
Line of Sight/Horizon would be more helpful, and if visibillity modifiers
make this very variable, so what?
> As for duration, I like the idea of the Maintain skill, but I don't
> think it should be rare. Without Maintain or something like it the
> Regeneration spell is utterly worthless, and so are other spells that
> require duration for any effect (like Immortality, a great carrot for PC
> sorcerors to quest after).
Up to here, I agree.
> I have an idea. Make Maintain work just like
> all the other sorcerous manipulations. You can have as many points of
> spell Maintained as your Maintain/10. It doesn't reduce your MP or MP
> regeneration. The trick to maintaining more spells is to get a huge
> Maintain skill, and that's a tough job if you aren't Brithini or
> otherwise immune to age.
I dislike this. The current maintain skill pretty well reflects magical
ecology as I view it.
> Agreed. You *have* to list the sorcerous schools in/around Dragon Pass.
I.e. you have to work them out. Hard stuff, actually, I have been tinkering
on the Heortlending Aeolians for several months now, and haven't yet come
to a real conclusion.
-- Joerg Baumgartner rq4@sartar.toppoint.de 0,,
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