Question about Riddle of Steel Rules

[Franklin11Hour]

Ok I got everything down pat except for Proficiencies.  Say I have the priority that gives me 6 points to distribute.  Now what?  In my character designing, I put 3 points for Sword & Shield and 3 points for Longsword.  Now what?  I tried to follow your character creation on pages 24-25 but I am confused about the "Dagger (Def) 5"   I see that the Combat Pool for the sample character on 24-25 is 12/7. Yet on page 22 the Combat Pool shows 11.  How did it change to 12?

[Jake Norwood]

Hi Franklin. Thanks for posting on the Forge. The Riddle of Steel official forum is on the "independent games forums" list, but there's nothing wrong with asking here.

First put points into a weapon into one weapon--frex Sword and shield at 4 points. The default list says Greatsword starts at S&S -2, so you get Greatsword/Longsword for free at a "2", to which you can then add your leftover 2 points, getting you a total of 4 in each. Cool.

The "Dagger (DEF) 5" should be a "4" (my bad) now that I look at it, from S&S -2. (he gets the extra point for Bow from his Nationality bonuses).

The Combat pool in the text is correct. I don't know what happened on that sheet, but what I'm guessing is that originally he had 7 in S&S, and nothing in Bow, and then some stuff got shuffled around to show how the MP works, but some leftovers from the original were left behind. Sorry 'bout that...

Jake

[Durgil]

I'm not so sure that splitting up your proficiencies between "Sword and Shield" and "Greatsword" is a good idea.  If what you want your character to do is fight with a longsword in one hand and a shield in the other, just put the 6 points in "Sword and Shield."  That would give you a default proficiency of 4 (S&S-2) in "Greatsword" and 4 (S&S-2) in Dagger.  You just need to make sure that you use the one-handed stats for the longsword when fighting with the shield.  If you want to use the two-handed stats, just drop the shield and use the greatsword proficiency.

As for all the discrepencies that you found in the book, I believe those are errors.

[Durgil]

You walk away to get a little work done before you check what you typed and hit the send button and someone beats you to the punch, or in this case, the post.

[Franklin11Hour]

Ok.  So let us say I set up my Proficiencies as the following:

Sword and Shield:  4+1 since I am from Stahl):  5
Bow:                                                               2
(since I had decided to have Prof. at priority C which equals 6)


So does that mean that I have for a total of Combat Pool:  11 dice to roll when say, I use the following maneuvers:

Blind and Strike (offensive man.):  11 dice
Cut & Thrust (Default):                   9 dice (11-2 from the Def. indicator)
Rapier (Default):                            7 dice (11-4 from the Def. indicator)

Continuing the information...
Say I buy the following armor:
Chain Shirt has an armor point of 4
Pole Helm has an armor point of 5 but a -1 for Combat Pool
Shield (med) has an armor point of 6 but also a -1 for Combat pool

So I then subtract the two -1's from whichever combat pool I am using (depending upon the situation).  

So how does Bow react to the armor?  Is it that I can't use a shield while using the bow and situations like that?  

I still dont understand the Dagger (def) 4 on the character sheet.  Is it 4 simply because it has a -2 which is subtracted from the 6 that is on that Sword & Shield prof. of 6?  Thanks for all this help I really want to learn and run this game!

Franklin

[Valamir]

Think of it this way.  You're skilled in weapon style A.  You've trained and are competent in weapon style A.  You learned weapons style A in a school of defense.  During the course of teaching you weapon style A, you also had to become familiar with weapons B,  C, and D.  Partially because you might one day have to face those weapons in battle and need to know how they work, and partially because one day you might be stuck in a fight for your life and not have weapon A handy, and partially because sometimes weapon A is the wrong tool for the job (e.g. too long) and you need to use a better weapon (e.g. something shorter).

For this reason, in the course of learning weapon A you learn a bunch of other weapons too.  Those are listed as defaults.  B-2 means you learn weapon B for free at a level equal to 2 less than you learned weapon A.  You can then buy weapon B up seperately starting from there.

No, you can't default from a default.

[Jake Norwood]

Sounds right to me, Franklin.

So does that mean that I have for a total of Combat Pool: 11

Assuming your Reflex is 6, yes.

Jake

[Morfedel]

What everyone else said.

You use only the dice in the singular proficiency. Other areas get "free dice" based off your higher combat proficiencies; the idea is when you have a lot of training in one area, you have a more basic understanding of similar combat styles.

You then add your reflex or aim, whichever is correct, to the number of dice that you have in a single proficiency, to get your total dice.

So, if you had Reflex of 6 and Longsword of 6, then you get 12 dice. If you are using some other proficiency that gets a default off of longsword, then you use Reflex + that default instead.

Take Dagger. You can get Dagger-2 off of longsword. This means, with no points allocated to dagger, you can use dagger as if you had a score of 4 in it, just because of your training in long sword. As such, with your reflext of 6, your dagger combat pool would then be a 10.

Does that help?

(and feel free to drop buy the TRoS forum. Jake, the game's author, and a lot of others of us, hang out there too. Its located off of the independant games section of these forums.)

[Brian Leybourne]

If you have the main book (which you clearly do) you could also download the character generator from the TROS webpage (http://www.theriddleofsteel.net). Having a play with that, and seeing how your proficiencies and defaults go up and down as you buy points might help you understand a little better.

Regards,
Brian Leybourne.

[Franklin11Hour]

I just wanted to thank one and all for the help you are giving.  I have roleplayed for a long long time, seen games come and go.  I have to say this, I love Riddle of Steel.  It is amazingly good.  I am just having a bit of time getting use to the rules.  So thank you all for the help you are giving so far, I am sure though I will have more questions!

[The GM]

I have a few thoughts on RoS. My group has been playing it for a few months, and I've had a chance to run it a time or two. Firstly, it's great fun. Kudos to Norwood for creating a bright, interesting game. I've had only two problems with the game itself. The first one has to do with my own personal preferences. I prefer to see combat 'lite' games. (The joke is that combat charts and graphs make my eyes bleed. ;) )The reason for this is that it seems that most combat sequences seem to be predetermined. IOW, the party beats up the bad guys, accomplishes the BIG objective, and moves on. What this has always meant from my perspective is that we as a group are spending sometimes a significant chunk of time rolling dice and muddling through mechanics to resolve a combat sequence which we pretty much already knew what the eventual outcome would be. In these situations, I'd rather have a description what happens so that we can move on to new and interesting things. Only once in my long gaming career have I ever been surprised by what has happened in combat (in our last RoS game, no less!) Two pcs were terribly mangled, and in short order. I'll guess we'll have to wait until our next session to see if the pcs actually survive. Despite the combat heavy flavor of the game, RoS is still fun stuff. I usually wouldn't make that sort of statement about a combat heavy game, so you know I like RoS other parts.
The second 'challenge' I had with the game had to do w/ the SAs. I really liked them in theory, but in actual play I was having a hard time wrapping my brain around the concept. I thought they were too *limiting* and stifled character actions by essentially penalizing a player for not doing whatever their SAs were in any given session. My PC's SAs had nothing to do w/ the rest of the group, and so while I'd get to play, interact, and have a general good time w/ my pals, their Insight pools were going up while mine stayed woefully stagnant. My GM made the suggestion to change my SAs to be inline with the rest of the group. I figured that was fine, except now I was basically making up SAs simply to gain points to advance my character. I thought that was as cheesy as a plate of nachos. I couldn't see why it was that a player couldn't be rewarded for great role-play, innovative problem solving, or what have you instead of using a table of virtues to gauge how productive a session really was.
This was obviously bugging the crap outta me.
Repeatedly my game group talked about this, but no hard solutions came to mind, other than the aforementioned 'change your SAs' comments. Finally I had a discussion w/ another player in our group, and his advice was to look at SAs as a piece to a puzzle and figure out innovative ways to make the piece fit w/in the other PCs pieces. He gave several examples of how his SAs really had nothing to do with the rest of the group either, but how he constructed a certain 'logic' so that every time he helped someone else accomplish their goals, that his were closer to being met. He admitted that sometimes that logic can get strained, but for the most part there's continuity.
This conversation made me take a second look at SAs, their fluidity, and their ultimate function. Then I got to thinking about how SAs, and the unconventional mixing and matching of different PCs SAs could make for some seriously great interactions, and perhaps take the overall story in directions that hadn't been planned, but were groovy nonetheless. So it's armed with this new way of thinking about SAs that I eagerly await our next couple of sessions of RoS.
I'm sure this discussion has probably taken place somewhere on these forums, although as a new member, and today actually being the first time that I've visited the Forge, It seemed a daunting task to hunt down that thread.
Anyway, RoS is a nifty game, and it's changed my generally negative view of fantasy genre RPGs.

[Jake Norwood]

GM-

I'm glad you're having a good experience with TROS. Remember that SA's don't punish characters for not following them, they only reward them when they do. If PLayers aren't using their SAs, then talk to them about it and remember that all TROS "adventures" should revolve around at least 3 SAs from each character.

Jake

[Draigh]

The GM wrote:

I’ve had only two problems with the game itself. The first one has to do with my own personal preferences. I prefer to see combat ‘lite’ games. (The joke is that combat charts and graphs make my eyes bleed. ;) )The reason for this is that it seems that most combat sequences seem to be predetermined. IOW, the party beats up the bad guys, accomplishes the BIG objective, and moves on. What this has always meant from my perspective is that we as a group are spending sometimes a significant chunk of time rolling dice and muddling through mechanics to resolve a combat sequence which we pretty much already knew what the eventual outcome would be. In these situations, I’d rather have a description what happens so that we can move on to new and interesting things. Only once in my long gaming career have I ever been surprised by what has happened in combat (in our last RoS game, no less!) Two pcs were terribly mangled, and in short order. I’ll guess we’ll have to wait until our next session to see if the pcs actually survive. Despite the combat heavy flavor of the game, RoS is still fun stuff. I usually wouldn’t make that sort of statement about a combat heavy game, so you know I like RoS other parts.

I've noticed that in my games, those exact reasons tend to keep combat sorta rare... unless it's really important to the character.  I ran DnD for years, and hack and slash really got on my nerves.  I tend to run into less of it in TRoS, because the PCs know that it's just as easy for them to sprout an arrow as it is for anyone else.  My first game however wasn't much different from yours, as far as the mangling of the pcs in combat was concerned... Poor guys got mauled by an angry grizzly.

[Brian Leybourne]

I think that a lot of people read TROS, and maybe start to play it a little, and come away with the impression that it's a "combat heavy" or "all about combat" game.

TROS certainly started with the combat system, and it's a very good and detailed one, but the resulting game isn't so much "about combat" as "what's really important?" or perhaps "what's worth risking your life for?"

In other words, unless a fight is important to you (and thus your SA's are firing) then combat is a tiny bit silly, you're in danger. But when it's important, you're probably not in that much risk because of your SA's.

I usually say that TROS isn't "about combat", but that it's about people, and "features combat" :-)

Brian.