Sorcerer questions: martial arts, dices, "game balance&

[DevP]

There's a chance of getting some friends to try Sorcerer out, in an "intense blood opera wish-I-was-Tarantino" way. So, some minor questions. (My search-fu turned up nothing, even though I think some of these have come up before.)

(1) How many d10s, total, do you guys keep on hand for playing?

(2) I'm sure that 6 v. 4 is different from 7 v. 5, and that the currency otherwise holds them as equal. I don't want to quibble that difference, but I'd like to have some better answer than "it's not a big deal" to a player who preferred one application of the currency than another. Any suggestions?

(2a) If I'm understanding correctly, than I could legally handle most contests with, say, just 10 dice on hand. If it's a roll of 5 v 8, I could handle that by giving each divvying up 10 dice into 3 and 6, right?

(3) Looking over martial arts, it seems true that (a) someone adhering to color restrictions for their martial art is at some disadvantage versus a normal non-educated brawler, since said brawler may be strong (or skilled) without posessing linking restrictions; and (b) it seems that breaking out of a linked cycle to do some non-combat action (diving for the amulet or whatever) will incur the one-die defense penalty, unlike unskilled brawlers again. Options: Should I only use the martial arts guidelines in a genre/ruleset where all the important protagonists will stylistically expected to be knowedgeable in martial arts? Should I perhaps only apply these stiff penalties in martial artist v. martial artist combat?

(3a) Just to be sure: any fighter (martial or otherwise) will be rolling one-die defense if they're defending before their move goes off (and they don't abort for defense). The martial art rules suggest that, if a martial artist breaks out of his linked cycles, even aborting for defense won't help; am I right?

Thanks.

[Nev the Deranged]

@.@ (eyes goggling)

Okay, the algebraic nature of the currency concept I can handle... but I'm pretty sure that the mathematical principle you suggest here is incorrect... at least I hope so.

Here's why I think it is: victories. 3 vs 6 is not going to generate the same range of possible victories as 5 vs 8. In theory, a player can have as many victories as dice rolled for an action, and therefore, they can potentially have as many bonuses for the next roll as dice they rolled for the current action. Which is emphatically NOT the case with your example. 5 bonuses carrying over into a roll of 5 yields 10 dice, while 3 bonuses rolling over into 3 dice yields 6 dice. Which I guess works as long as you keep the scores utterly consistent throughout the game, and I'm not sure if that's what you intended or not. If you're really that shy on dice, and plan to use the concept you've suggested here, you'd have to just lower the scores for everything until you reached a sort of "lowest common denominator" where no roll would go over your dice-on-hand. Which seems kinda silly, to my mind.

It seems to me I've run across several messages from people wondering how many dice are needed, or even how few they can get away with... are dice that expensive? Just buy some more, fer cryin' out loud.

Okay, I'm half teasing, dice can get expensive, as I well know from buying enough d12s for the game I'm working on... but they certainly aren't prohibitively so.

Anyway, Ron has recommended 10 per player and 20 for the GM. I say make the players bring their own, and the GM only needs 20. Anybody who GMs should have nearly 20 d10s on hand already, so you prolly only need a few more than you already have.

The martial arts questions.... are good questions. I'll wait for someone wiser to chime in on those ^_^

[Trevis Martin]

As a side note, not to derail the thread.  But with the advent of my group playing many of the dice pool systems that have emerged from authors here at the Forge (Riddle, Donjon, Sorcerer) I've purchased mass bags of  dice of various sizes.  You can get 50 of one die type for about 15 or 16 dollars. Which works out pretty well for these games.

Trevis

[Mike Holmes]

Are you thinking that it's OK to just change 5v8 into 3v6? Is that in the rules? I don't think it is. I'd personally never allow it. For the reasons that Nev points out and others. I think it's important to roll the correct amount of dice.

For one thing, I like big pools of dice.

I have a bag of about 100 d10s that I carry around for games like Sorcerer. I like to be able to give each player at least 10, and have at least 50 for me. I mean, what if I'm rolling for several demons at once?

I usually stop by one of the vendors at the conventions and get bowlsful of ugly seconds. That's the way to go to get big piles of dice like this.

Mike

[DevP]

Purely die-changing alone (5v8 to 3v6) is probably not kosher; but the rules say 1 bonus die = 1 penalty die, so whether I make the roll 6v8 or 5v7 matters. (I'll likely just try gloss over that detail, though, and go with whatever is most convenient in game.)

[Henri]

I have a bag of about 100 d10s that I carry around for games like Sorcerer.

You can get 50 of one die type for about 15 or 16 dollars

Whoah!!!  You guys obviously don't shop at my game store.  Is it possible for regular people to buy large quantities of dice for wholesale prices?  In my experience dice are a lot more expensive than this.  Maybe I've been buying over-priced dice, though.

[Mike Holmes]

Again, what you need to do is check your local conventions, or ones you plan to attend, and see if any of the dice companies will be there. They all have discounts for buying large quantities of dice at these things. Typically they'll have pre-packaged big bags of dice, or huge bowls from which you can scoop cups or bowlsful from. Different prices for hand-selecting, or just random scooping.

Note, these are perfectly serviceable and random dice. I shouldn't really call them seconds, because that's not what I think they are. They're just overstocks of the really unpopular dice that nobody wants anymore, I think.

Random Dice Anecdote - Most Dice Evar: The guys from the Escape Ventures Playtesting Association (used to run Element Masters and GateWars tons at Cons in the wayback) used to carry around map tubes six inches in diameter, and three feet long filled with dice. Several at a time. I think that at any time they probably had on the order of several thousand dice available for demos. They also used to give out free breath mints which was ingenious if you think about it.

Mike

[DevP]

They also used to give out free breath mints which was ingenious if you think about it.

My hero!!! But thanks for the dice-help. I can getting those buckets o' d10s in the near future.

I feel resolved, questionwise, for most things. If anyone had thoughts with those martial arts questions, I'd appreciate it. (Or even just "approving" of my suggestions there being the right track.)