So I'm down with some variant of illness. Again.
I've been on-and-off sick for almost three weeks now, with a second wave of "seriously bad" having hit me this Monday. The first time it was serious, I completely missed out on five days of school, and it seems like I'm going to miss this week as well.
And, as a side effect, I have no voice. None. I can cough up a few syllables, but anything I try to say beyond that just - nothing comes out. I've now spent almost 48 hours in near-complete silence. It's an interesting experience, actually, not being able to communicate except through charades. It's a good thing I have kind of an expressive body language, although when push comes to shove I have to write most things I want to convey.
As an even nastier side effect, I'm lagging behind with school worse than I ever have in my entire life. I'm talking to my student councillor now about dropping one of my subjects, because there's no way in the Nine Hells I'm going to pass it (the course book sucks, and I've gone to a total of three lectures out of 14), plus I still have three other subjects to balance - and I have Chinese. To add insult to injury, I've been more-or-less voiceless every weekend save one, so I haven't played any RPG's in three weeks now and once I get well, I will only have minimal time for that since I have so much catching up to do.
So yeah, I'm in a terrible situation right now, but I'm making the best of it. I'm sitting around at home watching Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann and German documentaries, converting D&D-characters into Exalted characters, playing Peggle and generally wasting my time. A few years ago, I would look at such a situation and say, "Sweet!"
Sadly, I'm no longer that person. I need to have something useful to do. I need to feel like I'm making progress, like I'm learning or developing, or I get insanely restless. It's nice to relax, but I'm starting to get rather tired of it.
onsdag 23 september 2009
torsdag 10 september 2009
Transcendent Rules Analysis II
I've been fishing the forums for some more rules-tinkering, and here are two interesting ideas I found in a fixer's thread. Really, the only one interested in this is me, but I'm leaving it here as a note to self. So just go ahead and ignore this post, everyone.
Houserule 1) Perfect Defenses have increased cost when used against Perfect Attacks. The UFIO rule still very much applies, so the Perfect Defense still always wins - but when used against a Perfect Attack, it also costs 1 WP. This makes Perfect Attacks a lot more scary, since they're very straining for your resources. This rule isn't perfect, and it mostly duct-tapes over a hole in the system rather than actually fixing anything, but it was interesting enough to deserve a mention. It works as a temporary fix to the PD-PA unbalance.
Houserule 2) Hardness is applied after soak, not the other way around. In order for this rule to work sensibly, static Hardness values are reduced by 1/4 and DoOM sets Hardness to (your Essence). This means heavy armour is a massive, gigantic problem since you need to land a really good hit in order to do any damage. It also makes high soak a much, much more powerful means of defense, which is good at high Essence, where even Adamant Skin Technique begins turning useless because a good hit can still make your ears fall off or murder all your relatives (sorry about that, Vincent!). By allowing soak to stop ping damage in this way, you improve its power against all non-Sidereal attacks at least.
Houserule 1) Perfect Defenses have increased cost when used against Perfect Attacks. The UFIO rule still very much applies, so the Perfect Defense still always wins - but when used against a Perfect Attack, it also costs 1 WP. This makes Perfect Attacks a lot more scary, since they're very straining for your resources. This rule isn't perfect, and it mostly duct-tapes over a hole in the system rather than actually fixing anything, but it was interesting enough to deserve a mention. It works as a temporary fix to the PD-PA unbalance.
Houserule 2) Hardness is applied after soak, not the other way around. In order for this rule to work sensibly, static Hardness values are reduced by 1/4 and DoOM sets Hardness to (your Essence). This means heavy armour is a massive, gigantic problem since you need to land a really good hit in order to do any damage. It also makes high soak a much, much more powerful means of defense, which is good at high Essence, where even Adamant Skin Technique begins turning useless because a good hit can still make your ears fall off or murder all your relatives (sorry about that, Vincent!). By allowing soak to stop ping damage in this way, you improve its power against all non-Sidereal attacks at least.
söndag 6 september 2009
Transcendent Rules Analysis
I doubt this will interest anyone really, but it interests me, so I'm writing it down anyway.
Grappling is usually a complicated maneuver in most roleplaying systems. It's a move that's bound to evoke some groans from the GM because it's time-consuming and inevitably more complicated than just punching someone in the face - naturally, because punching someone in the face is the "standard" mode of combat, and obviously wrestling is much different.
In most systems, grappling works like this: You make an attack roll. On a hit, you have successfully initiated grapple. On your next action, you're permitted to start using that grapple; inflicting damage, holding the opponent down, whatever you fancy. On their turn, the opponent gets the option to act first - this balances the system somewhat as your character is likely to virtually always have friends on his side, so if he wrestled the enemy into submission immediately, they'd all get a free turn of kicking the grappled guy. As it stands, most game systems allow the opponent to try and break free before your friends can kick him.
Exalted works differently. In line with Exalted's high-action wuxia style of combat, they've been highly successful, I think, in making a grappling style that feels suitably kung-fu. The system is so sleek and simple that I'm surprised I hadn't seen it before, actually.
In Exalted, a grappling works like any old martial arts attack - roll to hit, and if you hit, good to be you. At that point, you have three options: Choose to inflict damage (by headbutt, knee-to-the-groin, whatever maneuver works at close range), choose to wrestle the opponent into submission, or perform a throw. All of these effects are immediate - there's no wait, no grappling check, no nothing. If you grab a hold of your opponent, you can immediately inflict damage or toss him over the ravine's edge. Mechanically, there's almost no difference between grapple-headbutt and an ordinary attack, except the grapple attack does slightly less damage.
There are catches balancing up this speedy system, though. First of all, the damage is slightly lower than if you had just kicked or punched your foe. Second, unless you go for the "throw" option, you're engaged in grappling with the enemy - which can be a problem. In Exalted, your defense is always a static rating; not so once you're engaged in grapple - then it has to be rolled. This makes defense against an already-grappled opponent much less reliable, which means that all-out wrestling becomes a calculated risk - especially in a game where an opponent's knee-to-the-groin can do things like make your ears fall off.
I like how they've done this. The grappling system is still more complicated than regular fighting, but if all you're going for is a cinematic effect, like a throw or a "I grab him and bite his leg"-attack, it works with a single roll. There's much less to keep track of than in other systems.
Grappling is usually a complicated maneuver in most roleplaying systems. It's a move that's bound to evoke some groans from the GM because it's time-consuming and inevitably more complicated than just punching someone in the face - naturally, because punching someone in the face is the "standard" mode of combat, and obviously wrestling is much different.
In most systems, grappling works like this: You make an attack roll. On a hit, you have successfully initiated grapple. On your next action, you're permitted to start using that grapple; inflicting damage, holding the opponent down, whatever you fancy. On their turn, the opponent gets the option to act first - this balances the system somewhat as your character is likely to virtually always have friends on his side, so if he wrestled the enemy into submission immediately, they'd all get a free turn of kicking the grappled guy. As it stands, most game systems allow the opponent to try and break free before your friends can kick him.
Exalted works differently. In line with Exalted's high-action wuxia style of combat, they've been highly successful, I think, in making a grappling style that feels suitably kung-fu. The system is so sleek and simple that I'm surprised I hadn't seen it before, actually.
In Exalted, a grappling works like any old martial arts attack - roll to hit, and if you hit, good to be you. At that point, you have three options: Choose to inflict damage (by headbutt, knee-to-the-groin, whatever maneuver works at close range), choose to wrestle the opponent into submission, or perform a throw. All of these effects are immediate - there's no wait, no grappling check, no nothing. If you grab a hold of your opponent, you can immediately inflict damage or toss him over the ravine's edge. Mechanically, there's almost no difference between grapple-headbutt and an ordinary attack, except the grapple attack does slightly less damage.
There are catches balancing up this speedy system, though. First of all, the damage is slightly lower than if you had just kicked or punched your foe. Second, unless you go for the "throw" option, you're engaged in grappling with the enemy - which can be a problem. In Exalted, your defense is always a static rating; not so once you're engaged in grapple - then it has to be rolled. This makes defense against an already-grappled opponent much less reliable, which means that all-out wrestling becomes a calculated risk - especially in a game where an opponent's knee-to-the-groin can do things like make your ears fall off.
I like how they've done this. The grappling system is still more complicated than regular fighting, but if all you're going for is a cinematic effect, like a throw or a "I grab him and bite his leg"-attack, it works with a single roll. There's much less to keep track of than in other systems.
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