Hogscape's House Rules

[Hogscape]

Here's a link to where I'm slowly building all the bits and pieces of my House Rules.

hogscape.googlepages.com/t%26tlite

This incorporates 2-dice combat, and a swag of other bits and bobs. Of course, it's still a work in progress but let me know what you think if you get the chance.

Cheers

[Vin Ahrr Vin]

Looks pretty nice, Hogscape. I particularly like the multiplier to dice chart. Hmmm.

[mahrundl]

Questions from the cheap seats:

If humans use roll 4, drop lowest, do they still get TARO? If not, why not?
Can they drop a die other than the lowest to get a triple and invoke TARO?

[mahrundl]

And another one: what cost are you using for the Leprechaun's 'Wink' spell, if any?

[Hogscape]

Hi Mahrundl, I don't use TARO in this version of my House Rules - the idea is to provide a fairly level playing field at first level then increase Attributes regularly but in small increments. TARO has the potential of blowing out the party's base combat total which means re-jigging the enemy 'on the fly' to maintain the challenge.

In one brief 7e game, I created a 6th level elf Wizard thanks to TARO. He so outclassed the othe characters and all of the competition, I retired him after one session and created a new character. I'd use TARO in a 'canon' 7e game (which I also run) but not in the House Rules.

I'm still undecided on the Wink Wing spell but I'm thinking I'll let Leprechauns use it for free. I've actually never seen a Leprechaun character in play (from either side of the screen) so I can't see it being a huge issue (in my games) either way.

[WSmith]

Excellent work, Hogscape. I like your new avatar, BTW.

[Hogscape]

Thanks WSmith... I'm spreading the joy.

[WSmith]

I see that WIZ is included in Magic Adds. The only thing I might be a smidgeon concerned about is the change from turn to turn in the WIZ stat as spells are cast. Of course, you haven't finished the magic section yet, so there might be something different in store.

I exhalt you you putting this together!

[mahrundl]

Then again, WSmith, in 5th edition casting spells reduced ST, so combat adds changed from turn to turn. That wasn't much of an issue, in my experience.

The thing that it makes harder to calculate is multi-turn damage: "Let's see, casting a level 1 TTYF in round one does IQ + magic adds damage, then on turn 2 my Blasting Power spell will do 3 dice + combat adds + magic adds minus however much WIZ I spent on the TTYF, possibly reduced more if someone with a lower WIZ has hit me with a spell...". I begin to understand why spellcasters need a high IQ!

Hogscape, you do realise that this means that Blasting Power and Freeze Pleeze get boosted by both combat adds and magic adds? Also, do you calculate magic adds before or after the loss of WIZ for casting the spell is factored in?

[Hogscape]

CON and WIZ represent the potential of 2 'pools/resources' that can fall and rise during play. CON is the maximum amount of damage a character can sustain (but Saving Rolls are always based on max. CON, not current CON) and WIZ is the maximum Kremm that can be spent but Magic Adds are based on the max. WIZ.

The SR to cast spells (INT SR at spell's level or target's WIZ divided by 10, whichever is higher) is also based on maximum WIZ (if applicable) rather than current WIZ.

Cheers

[mahrundl]

Ummm, why would you always base SRs on max CON and magic adds on max WIZ?

For example, someone with 5 CON left out of a maximum of 50 is badly injured / weakened, and should be less able to resist. This applies particularly if you use separate hit points to CON (I'm not sure if that is the case for your system) - in that case, the character's 'toughness' has been reduced - but even if you don't, someone whose CON has dropped that low is *not* going to be at full 'toughness'.

I assume that you would reduce a character's combat adds if their ST was reduced, by fatigue or some other effect . If so, why not the same with WIZ? The character is magically 'fatigued' after casting some spells, so their magic adds should drop in the same way as combat adds do if ST (or DX, LK, SPD) is reduced.

If you don't reduce combat adds for reduced ST, or feel that the cases are different, can you say why?

All just my opinion, of course, and if your method works for you then that's great.

[Hogscape]

For simplicity of play Mahrundl. If I think the characters are suffering from fatigue, gruelling wounds or other trauma, and it's based on the narative, I'll increase the level of the Saving Roll required.

After all, if you take damage that reduces your CON to 1 point, do you assume that your character is at deaths door? If so, shouldn't everything he attempts be penalised in some way?

Also, if a character with 100 CON is reduced to 1 CON and a character with a CON of 9 is also reduced to 1 CON point, who is injured the most?

The 5e rules explain that a character fights at peak performance right up until the loss of his last CON point. If he can fight at maximum potenital, why suffer a SR penalty to shake off poison, disease or whatever?

Over to you M.

[mahrundl]

Fair enough on making the SR harder if they are weakened, that's certainly a way to do it. I guess that I prefer that the CON reduction affect the difficulty directly - you get finer gradation that way, and it makes more sense (to me, anyway).

The main reason that I think fighting ability isn't affected by CON reduction is adrenaline. You're fighting for your life - since CON doesn't figure into ability to fight, you can ignore, at least in the short term, damage that you have taken in that sort of situation. I don't know if Ken had a specific reason for handling it that way, but I suspect that it was just to make things a little simpler.

Who is injured more out of the two characters? The first character has obviously taken more damage, but in terms of who is more injured, they are essentially both hurt to the point where the slightest scratch will kill them both (under 5th edition rules). I think you have to look at it in terms of how much more they can take rather than how much they have already taken.

The 5th edition combat examples have characters making SRs on current attributes, including CON. The specific example that I'm thinking of is Rethe Tigersclaw in Section 2.31, Example 2, right at the end of the 3rd combat turn - she has a maximum CON of 18, but is currently on 7, and has to make a 1st level CON SR. It is stated both that she is rolling against current CON and that she has to roll 13 or better, so she is obviously rolling against the 7.

[Vin Ahrr Vin]

mahrundl said:

If humans use roll 4, drop lowest, do they still get TARO? If not, why not?
Can they drop a die other than the lowest to get a triple and invoke TARO?

This question is just sick and twisted. I love it! ;D

I never really thought about this situation before because I rarely use a "drop lowest" die roll, but I love the notion that a player could choose NOT to drop the lowest in order to qualify for a TARO.

I may have to bring in the "drop lowest" idea just to use this!

[mahrundl]

Glad you like it, Vin. I don't tend to use 'drop lowest' either, but I've always thought of it more as 'choose 3 out of the 4' in any case.

I think that being allowed to choose which die is dropped would be a bit unbalancing with TARO. My probability is a bit rusty, but I think that the chance of getting a triple is about 2/27, compared to 1/36 for the standard roll. That would make a character have about a 46% chance of having at least one TARO rolled for an attribute, compared to about 20% for the 3 dice roll.

It probably wouldn't be too bad for one-off situations, though, when you're only rolling a single TARO case.