[Stroming the Wizard's Tower] Prognosis

[Neil the Wimp]

Does anyone have any ideas on the prognosis for Storming the Wizard's Tower? Vincent released a playtest version of the low-level game, but I'm ignorant about what's happening with it now.

I'm asking because the kiddies are starting to get into RPGs. Cut-down Hot War was too lightweight, D&D4e too crunchy, so we're about to try StWT as a compromise. I'd like to know how much of it I'd be expected to make up as the PCs progress.

And finally, a rules question about magic and spells. Each spell has a domain. The rules imply that people can only cast spells in domains they've learnt. But learning domains is only available as something you can buy with experience. That implies that starting PCs, without experience, can't cast any spells.

Is that the case? (If so, I can just give starting PCs one domain for free.) More importantly, is it the case that someone has to have learnt a domain before they can cast spells in that domain?

Thanks,

Neil.

[lumpley]

Storming the Wizard's Tower goes back into active development -- and a significant redesign -- after GenCon. I'm excited to work on it again. With luck and effort, there'll be a new playtest PDF in the winter.

You can cast any spells you have, but you can create spells only within the domains you know.

-Vincent

[Neil the Wimp]

That's good news, thanks. I look forward to seeing a new version. I'll post some AP from our game as we get to it.

And thanks for the rules clarification.

Neil.

[Paul T]

My impression has been that Storming... is a working, functional game as-written: but only as long as you have exactly one GM and three players.

Change the number of players and the balance goes out of whack. Vincent tried to institute a "stop-gap" rule, where a monster attacks all the characters it faces every round, but that interacted in funny ways with the rest of the system.

Vincent, can you confirm or deny this? I'm also looking at running Storming... in the next few weeks.

[lumpley]

It's not even quite as bad as that. It's okay for 2 or 4 players too.

When you play it, modify the giving commands setup roll to:
- 1 die per hit, not 2.
- if more than 1 person is shouting commands at you, you choose one to benefit from; ignore the others and their dice.

-Vincent

[Paul T]

Oh, really!

So what's with the "serious mechanical problems", then? Why the serious redesign?

I'd love to hear your thoughts about this, either here on the "Storming" blog!

[Neil the Wimp]

There's a 'Storming' blog? Where, please?

[lumpley]

The serious mechanical problems are: it totally breaks for 5 players, and that's way too soon for it to totally break.

3 players, it works. 2 or 4, it's okay, but it shows the stress. 5 or more, breaks.

This is because players' capabilities scale inappropriately vs monsters'. It needs a serious redesign because there's no "just fix" for the kind of scaling problems it has -- they're baked into the foundation of the battle rules.

-Vincent

[Paul T]

OK, that's what I thought!

But, for those playing it now:

Can't you just scale the *number* of monsters according to the number of characters? E.g. for six players, put in twice as many monsters as you would have normally.

Speaking of which:

Or do you always just roll one set of dice as the GM (like in Dogs)?

Even then, you could have twice as many monsters, just in different locations and not working together. Instead of one monster threatening the village, there are two.

Is there some reason that wouldn't work?

[Paul T]

(As an aside, "Strumming the Wizard's Tower" sounds like a terrible euphemism.)

(See the subject line if you don't know what I'm talking about.)

[Neil the Wimp]

Played our first session the other day, and a couple of rules questions.

* 'Roll endurance' damage checkboxes: what are the number of hits required for each box? I've suggested 1, 1, 2, 2, 3, 3, with players crossing off boxes from the right depending on character endurance (e.g. an endurance 3 character would have boxes 1, 1, 2).

* I take it the XV from a monster is shared equally between all the PCs present. So a 2XV monster defeated by 2 PCs means each PC gains 1XP. Is that right?

* What goes on the group sheet? Specifically, is the group XP the total of all XP gained by all PCs added together? (equivalent to, the sum of all XVs of all monsters defeated by anyone)

* Terrain traversal boxes for group traversal probably need scaling for the number of PCs. For two PCs, I was planning to use 1.5 group boxes for each individual box.

* How does a monster overcome the hinderance from a tactical constraint? In our game, one PC pushed a table in the way of a scary assassin thing, to stop it gutting the King. In the round the table was moved, the monsters hits were reduced by the skill roll. In subsequent rounds, the King was gaining 2 blue dice from a generic constraint. But what mechanical process should I use to reflect the monster smashing the table and leaping over the remains?

Anyway, you can read all about the town of Siyavile. I'm rather proud of my kids, as they came up with all the detail themselves (they're 8 and 10) and it's a funky conflict-laden situation.

Neil.