What haven't we talked about?

[Jake Norwood]

What haven't we talked about from the game lately? There's a lot of stuff, but I wonder what we haven't covered recently. Ideas?

Jake

[Nick the Nevermet]

erm... lessee

Sadly, I could come up with a million mediocre setting discussion threads, but they all defeat the spirit if not the letter of your question. (I mean, we COULD discuss Thayrism, the new world, the Classical Age of Wyerth, etc... but these aren't 'new,' even if we haven't discussed them lately)

How's the Mafia game going?  

Paka was good at putting up "campaign trailers," paragrpah long descriptions of the start of a campaign.  Those may be interesting, but then, actual play usually is.

Sorry I'm pretty useless for this at the moment

[Sir Mathodius Black]

Well my gaming group and i are starting The Riddle of (Enter futuristic name here such as laser gun or plasma or some such thing) which is basically a futuristic version of ROS.  Its very cool, with a slightly gothic, Warhammer 40k kind of feel.  Very little needs to be changed from the basics.  New skill packets were a sinch, GIfts and Flaws such as Born Pilot, Bio-enhanced, Cybernetically-enhanced, and stuff like that.  Weapons were fairly easy, although its hard to judge the damage of some futuristic weapons.  INstead of magic there is a more Psycic feel, and new alien monsters were really fun to create.   Were also going to try a modern day riddle of steel in an urban setting soon.  All in all, very easy to convert and a Hellova lot of fun.

Also, a quick question for jake, I always thought that a heavy crossbow would be more damaging than a long bow.  i have no experience with these weapons however it seems a crossbow would have a more powerful shot.  maybe its just me.

[Eamon Voss]

I want time based rules for improving characters.  That way I can run Ars Magica using the TRoS rules.

[Bankuei]

Hi Jake,

I think OBAM and TFOB will both unleash whole new areas of discussion.  I think a lot of folks are waiting with baited breath on both of those.  

Aside from that, hmm, we've already covered, recovered, and returned to the classic "manuever nit picking" a thousand times, the "magic is too strong" whine, the "What's real?/East vs. West" pissing contests, and the "How do I make guns/cyborgs/Transformers work in TROS?" questions.

It might be kind of nifty if you, or other folks, list some good resources for cultural/historical information as to real-world counterparts of the various nations of Weyrth.  I, for one, am confused as to the various "asian-style" countries and if they're supposed to be more Chinese/Japanese/Korean in style.  I'd also love to be able to pull up some equivalent mythology and stuff to hand to folks so they can understand the culture of whatever nation we're talking about.

It'd also be cool to see some references to real-world battlefield strategies that were employed as well.

Chris

[Sir Mathodius Black]

speaking of "The New World" ( i assume your talking about that piece of land in the corner of the map not labeled), what is it??  i couldnt find it previously discussed.  is it an actual place or was it just put there for the heck of it?

[Nick the Nevermet]

There is a sentence in the book that says something like some navigators claim there is another continent past the sea.  There was a short thread, I don't remember it's name, where we had fun speculating about Aztec sorcerer kings invading Wyerth.  That's all.

Back to this thread, though, reference material is always a good thing, I agree.  

hmm... I must be able to think of something... this is just plain sad

[Jasper the Mimbo]

it seems a crossbow would have a more powerful shot.  maybe its just me.

Your average crossbow had nowhere near the power of a longbow, they're just eisier to aim. Good for mass combat where you're relying on pesant levy to be accurate. A non standard crossbow, some kind of arbalest for example, could have a pull of 1000 lb or more. Yes, more powerfull than a longbow by far. Takes about a year and a half to reload, though and isn't very portable unless you're the Hulk.

[Mike Holmes]

Takes about a year and a half to reload, though and isn't very portable unless you're the Hulk.

But damned if that first shot can't allow a peasant to take care of a fully armored knight with ease. In fact much more effective even than early guns at penetrating armor. I've seen film of crossbow bolts going through cinderblocks. Not into, but right through. Hence the ban on such weapons in Medieval times and now (some places allow parapalegics to hunt with them, but otherwise it's illegal). Sorta like todays ban on assault weapons. What do the commoners need with weapons that are only designed to take out the authorities?

For TROS, I'd halve or just ignore armor against such a weapon (half TO for a big creature). But consider that walking around with one of these would be something akin to walking around with an anti-tank weapon today.

Mike

[Sir Mathodius Black]

what would the stats for such a huge weapon be?

[Valamir]

The crossbow was generally not a peasant weapon.  It was too expensive and required too delicate care and maintenance.  The most common employers of crossbows in battle were companies of Italian mercenaries.  Professional soldiers.  Not peasants.

[Mike Holmes]

I'll take a stab at stats.

2+DR rounds preparation time.
Refresh begins once the arbalest is leveled.
4MP dice to reduce prep time by one second at Reflex/TN of 8.
Attack Target Number (ATN): 6
DR: Oh, anywhere from 8 for your little clawfoot prepped crossbow to 20 for your crew-serviced seige arbalest (this is mounted on a pedestal because it would weigh too much to aim accurately otherwise) using the rules as written. More for your javelin hurling miniature ballistas. Actually, I'd probably reduce this significantly, but then halve TO and armor effects. They don't do more damage than an arrow in terms of size, but they're more likely to penetrate. So I'd go about 6 to 12 actually. That ought to do it.
Range: +1 ATN per 10+2*DR yards.

Why do a weapon like the Ballista when you'll probably get a kill from the smaller weapon? Better range. With a ballista with a DR of 15, you get a weapon that you can expect to hit with out to 160 yards. That's impossible with other ranged weapons of the day.

Does that all make sense?

Mike

[Caz]

I also had the impression that the main reason crossbows were used is that they were like firearms, in that you could train someone in a short time to use something as powerful as a longbow, without having to train for it from childhood.  If the weren't easier, yet at least as powerful as bows, they wouldn't have been used.

[Kaare_Berg]

Mike Holmes wrote:

Hence the ban on such weapons in Medieval times

Papal ban I think, not that it did much good. Another classic "a weapon so horrible it will end all wars" weapon.

However as far as I have understood the armour penetration of a crossbow comes from the shape of its bolts and not nessesarily the power. A longbow is by far more powerful, thus IMO is that damage rating shouldn't exceede that of the longbow. Which also can punch through armour.

[Nick the Nevermet]

Back to Jake's original subject, one thing we haven't talked about in a while was how to handle temporal power.  In other words, a character that has political clout, probably from being a high noble, and wants to use it.  We have talked about this, yes, but not a lot, and not in a while.  This also let's us talk about how we play different kinds of characters, something people brought up in the supplements thread I made a few months back.

So, here we go.  I'll start with what IMO the goals of such rules should be, as a) it's a good to plan where you want to go before mechanics are thrown around, and b) I freely admit to not being as skilled at mechanics tinkering as others around here.

Big picture
We'll start with the tried and true statements of what TROS does well.  It's about characters making decisions based on what they believe and value.  It's about people making life and death choices, for themselves and others.  It's about simulating a lethal world where strategy is key, and then using that simulation as a foundation for making big stories based on character exploration.  Nothing new here; in the terminology of other parts of the Forge, it's a hybrid game with that support Narrative play with a strong sim foundation, focusing mainly on the exploration of mechanics & character.

So how does this relate to political power and its use by players?  My argument is that any rule set must be centered very much on character decisions and the story elements that can emerge from character conflict (be it internal or external).  In other words, the ideal to shoot for would be things like the historical plays by Shakespeare: Julius Caesar, MacBeth, Richard III, etc.  Political institutions are expressions of an individual's will.  There are no 'faceless bureaucracies,' no treating the organization as 'an actor' unto itself.

chargen
For simplicity, we would need to make something that ties neatly into the character generation rules as they currently exist.  This means we would primarily be dealing with priorities A & B, in particular A.  Perhaps an optional chargen table could be made, but I'd like things to be oriented toward 'standard' TROS at the moment.

One addition I'd want to make is that we'd need to figure out how to 'generalize' the social class priority a bit.  For example, I am sure there are merchant lords in Fauth who effectively are priority B, and I am sure there are Archbishops throughout Mainlund that are A or B in practice.  Kings, Popes, whatever: political power is political power.  I believe we would be best served by a mechanic that does not at its core discriminate.

What & How with Power
Keeping in mind the things above, let's first look at what shouldn't be the primary focus of these rules in TROS.  First, these rules aren't centered on resource management, such as taxes or harvests.  To be sure, these things can be important, but they shouldn't be the focus.  If a character has a kingdom, then the rules should be about his vision.  If a character is just a lonely knight with a small fief, then these rules should any influence he may or may not have in Court.

I guess this is the time to talk about other games.  One of the best and most thought out systems for something like what I'm talking about is HarnManor.  Unfortunately, Harnmanor goes in a very different direction than I'd want TROS to go.  It's great if someone wants to micromanage the harvests of a manor & its fields, but I really don't think that fits with a lot of the things we associate with TROS.

What is closer, though, is Birthright.  Birthright certainly has a system that keeps coming back to the character.  Unfortunately, its rule set is very much a part of AD&D2E, which is where its from.  Basing things in classes, levels, and its magical Blood trait are all central to how it works, and really cannot be ported to TROS without doing violence to everything involved.

Nonetheless, there are some interesting things.  I like how it gives characters several actions per season, with an action being defined as a myriad of activities from internal improvements to war to adventuring.  As TROS works off a system of dice pools under several situations, this translates well enough: somehow, we determine a pool which actions' dice are rolled from, with the pool refreshing 1, 2, or 4 times a year.  I don't have this worked out at all, but I think this should be how it works

Problems to keep in mind
Oh, boy, there's a lot:

1) Spiritual Attributes.  A.K.A. the way character exploration becomes The Big Picture in TROS.  Again, I'm unsure how plays out, but I know it's something we need top account for.  It's probably the case that the PC isn't the only SA source to consider, which leads to my second point:

2) The role of society & institutions.  Is society a completely malleable tool?  Does it have a chance to resist the rulings of a sovereign?  Does it have the ability to aid him more if The People believe in him?  How do we measure this loyalty?  Some kind of intersection of SAs?  Some 'loyalty' stat?  Power is often defined as the ability to make others do thing you want that they originally would not have done.  Power constantly has to be legitimated somehow.

3) Blending with other rules.  It is incredibly important that when politics in a game start people keep playing their characters, and not start playing a board game.  Political rules and mass combat rules need to mesh for military actions such as mustering an army, or how long a campaign takes.  Though I can't think of an example off the top of my head, I'm sure there are possible problems with the basic individual rules.

So, anyway, this is my drop for thing we haven't talked about in a while.  If people keep poking me, I'll keep adding to this (but first priority would go to Taveruun)