--- In dqn-list@yahoogroups.com, "davis john" <jrd123@h...> wrote:

> If that was at the Royal Armouries in Leeds (UK)then what I saw was

a pole

> axe type device, of a rather short-ish nature (barely bigger than a

man).

yess to all those questions

> Lucky enough when I was there to try on a full suit of chain and a

kite

> shield. I am not small, im pretty strong and not particularly

unfit but I

> can imagine getting tired quiet qucikly never the huge reductions

in MD you

> get cos your shields in the way and the fact your PC should drop

quite a

> bit.

Sorry, by "never the huge reductions in MD you get cos your shields
in the way " do you agree or disagree with the rules?

I have helmets in my system which reduce PC

I did look the part so my PB should have least gone up a notch or two.

> Basically dont think you should try and over-simulate / go

into 'too much'

> realism as you can get real bogged down.

Its a very fine balance, and which end you stress is vey much your,
and your player's feelings. I tend to have one climactic battle at
the end, everything building up to it with very few other combats, so
a "realistic combat" system suits my GMing style.

David

Hullo, Bruce,

On Fri, 29 Aug 2003 02:11:01 +1000, Bruce Probst wrote:

>>Unless someone else has a comment to make on this that adds to
>>the discussion of this subject, perhaps this is the best answer for the
>>FAQ?
>
>Well, feel free to quote me if you like. Someone else did make the
>point that spells as written only do generic "damage points" which
>are only applied to EN when there's no more FT, which I think is
>worth mentioning.

Yep, I saw the post about the generic "damage points" business,
and plan to add that to the answer to the question in the FAQ. I
think, btw, that when I finally finish assembling some of these FAQs
(the basic Magic one is going to be quite large, or so it seems right
now), there will be some definitely useful material in them for both
newcomers and veterans of the game.

>>The only real problem that I've had, and several other GMs
>>have had (based on posts I've seen on mailing lists) and the
>>like is that there is the question that arises about whether the
>>illusions are all in the mind or whether they are external. That's
>>the next question that needs answering.
>
>Well, my answer would be "no". The illusion is working on the
>target's mind; if the target doesn't *have* a mind the illusion can
>have no effect on it.

The weird thing about this answer is that if you look at the
Designer's Notes for Magic in ARCANE WISDOM, it is stated, "In answer
to the ever present theoretical question, the illusions *do* actually
exist; they are not simply inside the viewer's mind." This would seem
to imply that the magic of illusions does not affect the mind (and
states so quite nicely, I think).

.....I may not be perfect, but I'm always me.

JohnK
e-mail: jkahane@comnet.ca
web page: http://www.comnet.ca/~jkahane

Hullo, Bruce,

On Fri, 29 Aug 2003 03:06:54 +1000, Bruce Probst wrote:

>> You've actually got me quite interested in the mechanics you're
>>using to raise Ranks for weapons and shiields above the maximum
>>Rank given on the chart. Any chance of posting the rule here, or
>>sending it to me in private e-mail, as I would like to add this to the
>>House Rules that I am using.
>
>That one's easy. The cost to improve a weapon skill by one Rank
>is double the cost of the previous Rank. Just keep doubling.

As you say, very easy...but does that get expensive! Sheesh!
Which is exactly the way it should work, of course.

>(Also remember the extra XP cost involved if you have to train
>yourself, rather than be trained by someone who already has
>the higher Rank. Since "higher Rank" in these weapons is
>going to be, by definition, "unusual", it could be hard to find
>suitable trainers.)

Yeah, I have to wonder how many folks forget the costs that aren't
just involving XPs to gain Ranks with skills in weapons if one has to
train oneself or learn the skill from someone with it at a higher Rank.
Makes things interesting, but is easly forgettable the way the rules
are divided up in the book. (GMs, of course, tend to remember this
rule more often than not!) :)

>If you want to push yourself past the "accepted" limits, you have
>to push *hard* <g>.

<g> The way it should be. :)

.....Our greatest blessings come to us by way of madness. (Socrates)

JohnK
e-mail: jkahane@comnet.ca
web page: http://www.comnet.ca/~jkahane

Hullo, Bruce,

On Fri, 29 Aug 2003 02:35:08 +1000, Bruce Probst wrote:

>> That's interesting stuff to hear. Since I knew that Naming was
>>based on _Earthsea_, I actually use the concept of Names as its
>>found in the books for the game world and the Naming concept.
>>It makes things rather interesting, and puts a good kind of slant
>>into one or two elements of character creation. I've added a few
>>spells to Naming myself, but was curious, what sort of stuff you put
>>into it?
>
>I made Namers more important to the campaign world by making
>them the local "trustworthy types" -- since I figure they *have* to
>be, they're the guys who go around and hand out True Names!
>They're also the generic "repositories of magical wisdom".

I've always felt that the College of Naming Incantations was one
of the most maligned, most "misunderstood" of all the Colleges of Magic
in the game. I'm not going to comment on much of what you've added to
the game for Namers here, simply because my own thoughts over the years
have been along these lines (and you've definitely been influenced (as
you should have been) by the _Earthsea_ stuff in this regard.

>IIRC, I made the Ritual of Remove Curse General Knowledge for
>Namers -- or maybe I made it a Special Knowledge Ritual that they
>could use their Naming Bonuses on, one or the other -- so that
>Namers are the guys you go to when you need a Curse removed
>(e.g., backfire results).

I like this one a lot, and think that it makes sense that Namers
should have the ritual, but I would make it General Knowlege Ritual
(rather than Special).

>I didn't actually *write down* more than a few brief notes, alas:

[stuff snipped]

The bonuses that you added for the College in terms of the Cast
Chances are quite nice, and make good sense to me. Will likely add
them to the Namers.

>Additional Special Knowledge that was Planned (but not written):
>Spell of Paralysis (S-3)
>This is your basic "hold it right there, bub!" spell.

Yeah, makes sense... I did up a Paralysis spell for one of the
other Colleges, and may incorporate it into the Namer side of things,
but with alterations to cover the fact that it's a different College.

>Spell of Shape-Shifting Self (S-4)
>Spell of Shape-Shifting Others (S-5)

Yeah, these always made sense to me, although I've always thought
of them more along the lines of Shaping Magics or perhaps Thaumaturgic
Magics (which I've already created), but more likely Shamism. However,
they fit the Namers because of their origins in _Earthsea_.

>I remember that with the shape-shifting spells there was to be a
>chance, somewhat similar to Shapechanger characters, that if
>you stayed in the "alternate" form too long you would forget
>your original form. This would then be treated as a "curse"
>that only another Namer could remove (sounds familiar, right? <g>).

Yep, straight out of _Earthsea_ and some other fantasy fiction
that is more recent. :) To be honest, I would use the guidelines along
this region from the Le Guin books, rather than the shape-changer
material from DQ, simply because it makes more sense and keeps it
within the "framework" of the books-cum-College.

>Ritual of Item Divination (R-2)
>Ritual of Name Summoning (R-3)
>Ritual of Transmutation (R-4)

[stuff snipped]

Like your reasoning about all of these, but do wish you had written
them up and had them on file. You really do need to go back to running
DQ and getting all this material written up, you know. <g>

>In short, the way I saw Naming was to make it about dealing
>with the fundamental nature of things, and how to alter or
>manipulate that nature.

Yep, that's very much how I always saw them too, although I
haven't had a lot of players play Namers, to be honest. No one seems
to like that College for some reason, but they love finding little
trinkets with Counterspells for Colleges of Magic in them.

>Hope that's of some interest!

Don't know about anyone else, but certainly for me! :)

.....It wantsss to know what we hass on our hard drivesss, Precioussss...

JohnK
e-mail: jkahane@comnet.ca
web page: http://www.comnet.ca/~jkahane

Hullo, David,

On Thu, 28 Aug 2003 16:32:23 -0000, dbarrass_2000 wrote:

>Here's something to stimulate even more discussion ;--)

Like this forum needs more to discuss right now? :)

>With obveous exceptions (such as Namers) Colleges are a
>product of culture, different cultures will have different
>colleges with different collections of spells - discuss

Ah, you're thinking of things like the Chinese elements (fire,
wood, soil, and two others that I've forgotten), and that sort of
thing, aren't you? <g> Many College of Magic could be created for the
DQ system based on various cultures. I had a couple in mind from
Native American Indian and Hindu/Buddist stuff that I never worked up,
and I could see some stuff based around Egyptian mythology. But what
about all the Colleges that could be done based on literature of the
genre (I've already done Spider Magics and Image Magics based on
fantasy works for my own game)?

.....I went window shopping, and bought OS/2!

JohnK
e-mail: jkahane@comnet.ca
web page: http://www.comnet.ca/~jkahane

Hullo, folks,

Well, I've got a question for folks...

How do you all go about determining the characters' Levels (ie.,
Mercenary, Adventurer, Hero) in the game? The rules in the book are
pretty clear on this, but how many folks here actually use Language
skills to "enhance the skill total" for this determination? And if
folks have changed the system in this regard, what sort of criteria are
people using?

Thanks in advance. :)

.....The whole of creation was myth-woven and elf-patterned. (J.R.R. Tolkien)

JohnK
e-mail: jkahane@comnet.ca
web page: http://www.comnet.ca/~jkahane

Hullo, Russell,

On Thu, 28 Aug 2003 14:28:51 -0400,
Russell.Whyte@mail.atkinson.yorku.ca wrote:

>ok, finally have time to dive back into this list!

"Dive" being the right term, given how much traffic there's been
here lately. :)

>Something I dabbled with ages ago, never finished (nor
>playtested), was a college of Metal magics. The idea is
>twofold - the first being effects upon metallic objects, the
>second being taking attributes of metal and applying
>them to other substances, or even living creatures.
>
>As I've recently moved, my notes are lost in space somewhere,
>...

Sounds like an interesting College of Magic. When you finish the
moving process (if such a thing is ever possible) and you find the
notes, perhaps you'd be willing to post them here? :)

.....Life is short; fulfill your fantasies while you can!

JohnK
e-mail: jkahane@comnet.ca
web page: http://www.comnet.ca/~jkahane

Hullo, folks,

I was wondering if anyone could tell me where I might find some of
the new spells and abilities and stuff that the folks at the Seagate
Adventurers Guild added to the game system? I've been reading the old
Adventure summaries and journals from their campaigns, and there seems
to be a ton of new spells and rituals, among other things, and I would
like to find some of this material to look over. Any help with this
would be appreciated. Thanks. :)

.....The monkeys seem willing to strike up the tune. (Jethro Tull)

JohnK
e-mail: jkahane@comnet.ca
web page: http://www.comnet.ca/~jkahane

Pardon the funny message formatting, but my DSL has
been down for the past day or so and I'm forced to use
a web interface from work to respond.

Actually, Far Eastern was precisely what I meant. A
mythic Japan or China. But, there may be an answer.
First, as someone pointed out, one does not need to
come into direct contact with iron to be a *Metal*
mage. *I* get into the metal=iron/steel mindset due
to my experience of learning about the five Chinese
elements. Namely, from martial arts. Steel swords
are generally what are given as examples. But, the
College of Metal Magics that was given earlier
focused, quite rightly, on silver and gold as
elemental metals! Problem, more or less, solved.
Second, the mysterious "fifth" element is sometimes
give as "void". Well, frankly, that's a perfect match
for the Celestial/Shadow College.
Three, another magic tradition in the Far East is
writing. So, modify the Rune Magic College to brush
painting and call it something like "Cartomancy" or
the "College of Chirography".
The rest of the system could stand as is. And, if
that's not a testament to the soundness of the basic
rules, what is? Damn, I love this game. I gotta'
find a game group to teach it to and start playing
again!

Cheers!
Jim
--- Original Message ---
From: Esko Halttunen <esko.halttunen@luukku.com>
To: dqn-list@yahoogroups.com
Subject: RE: [DQN-list] Re: Colleges of Magic

>Unless you want to go the Far Eastern route, I don't

see why Colleges of Me=

>tal or Wood Magics would be necessary at all. Both of

those would be subsum=

>ed under Earth Magic in the traditional Western four-

element split, with fi=

>re influencing metals somewhat and water influencing

plants.

>
>The Earth College already has wall of iron for metals

as already pointed ou=

>t, as well as some other spells if I'm not completely

mistaken, and it also=

> has spells that affect plants (plant growth, speak

with plants etc.). New =

>colleges are all fine and well, but at least I'd

rather see first if someth=

>ing new can fit under the domain of exiting ones to

avoid unnecessary clutt=

>er. I don't think anybody wants to have a huge number

of very narrowly defi=

>ned, rigid colleges that basically duplicate existing

skills (whether origi=

>nal to DQ or added later in supplements such as

Rodger Thorm's PBA or Steph=

>en Clark's DQ Worldly Endeavour) with a few extras

thrown in.

>
>IMHO (or should that be imnsho? Well, you decide...),

of course.

>
>Edi
>
>
>......................................................

......

>Maksuton s=E4hk=F6posti aina k=E4yt=F6ss=E4

http://luukku.com

>Kuukausimaksuton MTV3 Internet-liittym=E4

www.mtv3.fi/liittyma

>
>
>------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor -------
>
>=20
>
>Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to

http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/=20

>
>

--
"It's better to light one candle
than to curse the darkness."
-Chinese Proverb and The Motto of the Christophers
http://www.christophers.org

John M. Kahane wrote:

>
>On Tue, 26 Aug 2003 14:01:12 -0000, ryumaou01 wrote:
>
> >I certainly didn't like the extremes the "Warrior Alternative" took
> >the percieved problem. And, I really liked the inverse application
> >of the EXP for Attribute points rule.
>
> I'm not sure I know which rule you're taking about here. Was it
>someone else on the list who posted this?

Early in our discussion, I pointed out that a non-Adept will
invariably put only 5 Characteristic Points into his MA, whereas
an Adept will put more like 15 into the same stat. Thus, on
average, a non-Adept has about 10 CP more to allocate
among PS, EN, MD, AG, and WP than an Adept. I further
pointed out that we could estimate the "value" of this
benefit at approximately 50,000 XP, based on what it
would cost to raise a stat (other than EN) 10 points as
indicated on the Experience Point Cost Chart [87.8].

Someone (I believe it was Jim) then extrapolated from that
observation a possible house-rule that newly generated
characters could sort of "cash in" a Characteristic Point or
two at the rate of 5,000 XP per Point, and use those XP
to begin play with some Rank in skills and weapons. Since
non-Adepts will be hurt less by such a transaction, this
would provide some benefit to forsaking membership in
a College of Magic at the time of character generation.

I'm not sure I would allow the "inverse application of
the rule" myself, but it's not such a bad idea.

(And thanks for the complimentary responses to my
FAQ message, John!)

-Cameron King

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--- Bruce Probst <bprobst@netspace.net.au> wrote:

> Well, feel free to quote me if you like. Someone
> else did make the point
> that spells as written only do generic "damage
> points" which are only
> applied to EN when there's no more FT, which I think
> is worth mentioning.

As far as I understood the question, yes, the rules
say any damage, no matter what the source, always is
taken to Fatigue first, and then is taken to
Endurance. Moreover, you can't do damage to Fatigue
and Endurance with the same attack, extra damage is
simply lost. However, in my campaign we houseruled a
small exception to those rules I thought might be
worth mentioning for discussion.

I was playing my fire mage, and I had been starting to
get Spell of Dragon Flames up to a fairly decent
level. In fact, I was at the point where I was doing
more damage to a human target with an attack than the
target had fatigue + endurance combined. From my
biased viewpoint, this seemed a little unfair. I
could do 40 points of damage to a target, and if he
had so much as 1 point of fatigue left, I did one
point.

I understand and agree with the philosophy of fatigue
vs. endurance. It's a very interesting system that I
think is unique to DQ. It lets you deflect or avoid
damage from attacks so that you are not actually
physically hurt (Endurance damage), at the cost that
the effort makes you tired (Fatigue damage). Only
when you are completely fatigued do you become unable
to deflect blows. In principle, I can see that you
could say that when I was targeting someone with
Dragon Flames, even that 1 pt of Fatigue meant they
had just enough energy left to... I don't know... jump
out of the way or something.

However, it left me feeling a little cheated by the
game mechanics that even when dragon flames would be
doing 100 pts of damage (or any amount of damage for
that matter), it would still take me two shots to kill
a healthy human. Cripes, to kill a healthy squirrel!
My GM agreed that this sounded a little fishy, and he
agreed that any magical attack that did more than the
target's combined maximum fatigue and endurance in one
attack would be considered a lethal strike, regardless
of remaining fatigue. Any comments on this? As I
say, my viewpoint was a tad biased, but even now it
still sounds like a reasonable rule to me.

Mort

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Talking about damage from spells made me think of
another question. I think somebody brought this up
before, but I don't remember the responses. What are
people's view on the effects of armor vs. magical
attacks?

I know that the rules say that magical damage always
bypasses armor protection. I think that's a fair
rule, and implicit in the low amount of damage
(D-4+Rank being typical for something like an Energy
Bolt) that most spells do compared to weapons. If you
started allowing armor protection to subtract from
those spells, they'd be implicitly worthless against
most armor compared to just attacking with a dagger or
any other weapon (until quite high Ranks).

However, some spells seem to implicitly do physical
damage that it armor should have some effect on.
Examples that come to mind might be Earth Hammer, or
perhaps Diamond Javelins. The latter is a spell that
does a -colossal- amount of damage as written, once
you have even a few Ranks in it. But you also have to
make an attack roll. It makes me feel like the attack
is much more physical than magical. On the other
hand, maybe the point of those diamond tips is to
pierce through any armor like butter. I don't
remember how much damage Earth Hammer does, but if it
also has a high damage factor, I would apply the same
logic: High damage --> armor counts, low damage -->
bypasses armor. Maybe it just me, but that logic even
seems to inform the spells as written: high damage -->
physically based attacks, low damage --> energy based
attacks. There are exception to this, but they are
very low cast chance spells, so that's fair. This
isn't anything we've instituted as a rule in my
campaigns, but what do others think in general about
this subject?

Mort

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--- "John M. Kahane" <jkahane@comnet.ca> wrote:

> >Well, that was long. But, those are just a few
> ideas I
> >have about what an Adventuring Guild is, how it
> >operates, and what service (monetary or social) it
> >provides. I hope this seeds a little discussion.
> I'd
> >love to know what the Guild has been like in other
> >people's campaigns.
>
> To be honest with you, I think that was one of
> the most
> insightful messages I've read in some time about the
> game and about one
> of the more interesting elements of the game world
> that never really
> came to fruitiion. I was wondering if you'd permit
> me to use the text
> of this post verbatim in the FAQ since it seems most
> appropriate.

By all means, I'd be honored. Thanks for the
compliment.

A couple of people earlier this week mentioned
additional service features of the Guild that I -wish-
I'd thought of, so pleaser add their stuff in too.
I'd also note that people's opinion about having an AG
in their game world is obviously pretty... polar in
nature. I totally respect how campaign dependent the
Guild is. I'm in a MiddleEarth campaign right now,
and an AG in that setting would be ludicrous.

Mort

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--- Esko Halttunen <esko.halttunen@luukku.com> wrote:

> I've always found some of the divisions in the
> Branches of Magic (Elementals, Thaumaturgy and
> Entities) downright stupid, and would like to hear
> some other opinions. I've no problem with the
> Thaumaturgies and Entities as such, it's Elementals
> mostly that piss me off, namely the inclusion of
> Celestial Magics there. Their connection to the true
> Elemental colleges is...what, precisely?
> Additionally, Celestial Magics is more like three
> colleges all rolled into one than a single college,
> and while it does work, it could work a whole lot
> better.

Yes, the inclusion of the Celestial Magics into
Elementalism does seem a little strange at first
glance, but there is a good rationale behind it (as
good as any such, all are arbitrary after all.)

It's slightly inaccurate to say that the Greek
philosophers believed there were only four elements.
They believed that there were only four -earthly-
elements. They also discussed the existence of a
fifth element. This concept is still with us today in
our use of the word "quintessence". Namely, they
believed that the heavens and the celestial bodies
within them were composed entirely of another
incorruptible matter. During the times of the Dark
Ages, this concept continued to evolve in discussions
about the "celestial spheres" and whatnot. It is this
ancient idea, I believe, that formed the inspiration
for the College of Celestial Magics as a fifth
elemental college. As with most things, I have to
admit the DQ designers really did their research.

> Rodger and I had a discussion regarding this (I
> guess that was mainly me talking, though) when we
> went over his Sun Magics draft. I was, and still am,
> of the opinion that Celestial Magics should be a
> Branch of Magic all on their own, with a College of
> Sun Magics and a College of Moon and Stars, which we

[snip]

Actually, I think that's a great idea. I've always
thought that the subdivision of the Celestial Magics
really should just be called individual colleges, and
the idea of Sun Magics and Moon Magics seems such a
natural idea. I suspect the designer's lumped things
together because they found they had so many spells
naturally in common, but that's just a guess. I
believe the Seagate Adventurer's Guild houserules had
a similar reworking of the College.

> Thoughts?
>
> One other question: With all the colleges added by
> the people who've played DQ for a long time and that
> are available online, what does the
> Thaumaturgy/Entities division look like? With just
> DQ and AW, Entities is leading 6 to 4, and with the
> addition of White, Fey, Spider, Time and that fifth
> one, how does it stand? Fey is obviously Thaumaturgy
> and White an Entity college, what about the rest?
>
> Edi

Hmmm. Good question, that. My natural inclination
would be to put Time into the Elemental branch. My
rationale for this is that the Elemental colleges all
have to do with manipulation of -material- reality,
whether of an earthly or celestial nature.
Thaumaturgies seems distinguished by manipulation of
intangibles and abstracts (mind, intrinsic essence
[True Names], subjective perception, and magic
itself), the things that lie behind the material
universe, while Entities is of course about dealing
with things that lie outside the material universe.
What's more intrinsic to the nature of the -material-
universe than the concepts of Time and Space, the
stage upon which all matter and energy perfoms its
dances?

I have no idea what to do with Spider. Of course, I'm
an arachnophobe, so I don't even like thinking about
it... :O ;>

Mort

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Russell.Whyte@mail.atkinson.yorku.ca wrote:

> ok, finally have time to dive back into this list!
>

Cool. It's like having a DQ genie. "Hmm," I say, "It'd sure be nice to
have a College of Metals". *POOF* There it is. Nice work.

Thanks,
Jim

--
"It's better to light one candle
than to curse the darkness."
-Chinese Proverb and The Motto of the Christophers
http://www.christophers.org

oops, meant to say 'never mind ' the big MD reduction, so yes rules spot on

JohnD

>From: "dbarrass_2000" <david.barrass@ed.ac.uk>
>Reply-To: dqn-list@yahoogroups.com
>To: dqn-list@yahoogroups.com
>Subject: [DQN-list] Re: Realism and Weapons rank limits
>Date: Fri, 29 Aug 2003 13:34:55 -0000
>
>--- In dqn-list@yahoogroups.com, "davis john" <jrd123@h...> wrote:
> > If that was at the Royal Armouries in Leeds (UK)then what I saw was
>a pole
> > axe type device, of a rather short-ish nature (barely bigger than a
>man).
>
>yess to all those questions
>
> > Lucky enough when I was there to try on a full suit of chain and a
>kite
> > shield. I am not small, im pretty strong and not particularly
>unfit but I
> > can imagine getting tired quiet qucikly never the huge reductions
>in MD you
> > get cos your shields in the way and the fact your PC should drop
>quite a
> > bit.
>
>Sorry, by "never the huge reductions in MD you get cos your shields
>in the way " do you agree or disagree with the rules?
>
>I have helmets in my system which reduce PC
>
>I did look the part so my PB should have least gone up a notch or two.
> > Basically dont think you should try and over-simulate / go
>into 'too much'
> > realism as you can get real bogged down.
>
>Its a very fine balance, and which end you stress is vey much your,
>and your player's feelings. I tend to have one climactic battle at
>the end, everything building up to it with very few other combats, so
>a "realistic combat" system suits my GMing style.
>
>David
>

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On Fri, 29 Aug 2003 09:18:45 -0400, "John M. Kahane" <jkahane@comnet.ca>
wrote:

> The weird thing about this answer is that if you look at the
>Designer's Notes for Magic in ARCANE WISDOM, it is stated, "In answer
>to the ever present theoretical question, the illusions *do* actually
>exist; they are not simply inside the viewer's mind." This would seem
>to imply that the magic of illusions does not affect the mind (and
>states so quite nicely, I think).

Yeah. Not exactly how I pictured them working, but ....

----------------------------------------------------------------
Bruce Probst bprobst@netspace.net.au ICQ 6563830
Melbourne, Australia MSTie #72759 SCA #80160
"I want to decide who lives and who dies."
ASL FAQ http://www.users.bigpond.net.au/mantis/ASLFAQ

On Fri, 29 Aug 2003 17:59:09 -0700 (PDT), Steven Wiles
<mortdemuerte@yahoo.com> wrote:

>As far as I understood the question, yes, the rules
>say any damage, no matter what the source, always is
>taken to Fatigue first, and then is taken to
>Endurance. Moreover, you can't do damage to Fatigue
>and Endurance with the same attack, extra damage is
>simply lost. However, in my campaign we houseruled a
>small exception to those rules I thought might be
>worth mentioning for discussion.

I had a similar rule, which I can actually quote (I didn't keep *everything*
in my head <g>):

Damage caused by magic is usually one of two types: “magical energy” that
ignores armour, or a physical effect that does not. The GM will determine
whether armour is applicable against a particular magical attack form.
Magical damage is done to FT, and to EN once FT is exhausted. A single
damage Check will not “wrap” from FT to EN, unless the total damage exceeds
the target’s combined full FT and EN.

>However, it left me feeling a little cheated by the
>game mechanics that even when dragon flames would be
>doing 100 pts of damage (or any amount of damage for
>that matter), it would still take me two shots to kill
>a healthy human. Cripes, to kill a healthy squirrel!
>My GM agreed that this sounded a little fishy, and he
>agreed that any magical attack that did more than the
>target's combined maximum fatigue and endurance in one
>attack would be considered a lethal strike, regardless
>of remaining fatigue. Any comments on this? As I
>say, my viewpoint was a tad biased, but even now it
>still sounds like a reasonable rule to me.

I agree. I had a similar rule for non-magical damage too (I mean, you have
to squash a bee *twice* to kill it?), although it would be extremely rare
that non-magical damage of the amount to worry your typical PC or monster
would be dealt. (Maybe a giant boulder dropping on someone's head, or
something ....)

----------------------------------------------------------------
Bruce Probst bprobst@netspace.net.au ICQ 6563830
Melbourne, Australia MSTie #72759 SCA #80160
"I want to decide who lives and who dies."
ASL FAQ http://www.users.bigpond.net.au/mantis/ASLFAQ

On Fri, 29 Aug 2003 18:11:27 -0700 (PDT), Steven Wiles
<mortdemuerte@yahoo.com> wrote:

>Talking about damage from spells made me think of
>another question. I think somebody brought this up
>before, but I don't remember the responses. What are
>people's view on the effects of armor vs. magical
>attacks?

See my previous reply to you.

>However, some spells seem to implicitly do physical
>damage that it armor should have some effect on.

I agree, but it should be decided on a case-by-case basis.

----------------------------------------------------------------
Bruce Probst bprobst@netspace.net.au ICQ 6563830
Melbourne, Australia MSTie #72759 SCA #80160
"I want to decide who lives and who dies."
ASL FAQ http://www.users.bigpond.net.au/mantis/ASLFAQ

On Fri, 29 Aug 2003 12:46:31 -0400, "John M. Kahane" <jkahane@comnet.ca>
wrote:

> How do you all go about determining the characters' Levels (ie.,
>Mercenary, Adventurer, Hero) in the game? The rules in the book are
>pretty clear on this, but how many folks here actually use Language
>skills to "enhance the skill total" for this determination? And if
>folks have changed the system in this regard, what sort of criteria are
>people using?

I used the standard 2nd ed. "8 things at Rk 4/8" rules. My ruling was that
anything that cost XP to get Ranks in was kosher, so languages or whatever
were fine (and I didn't use the "languages only count as half a skill" or
whatever rule from 3rd ed.). However, I also used a minimum amount of XP
spent -- from memory it was 10 000 XP for Adventurer, and 50 000 for Hero --
so you couldn't get there *just* by buying really cheap skills or whatever,
and also not to penalise people who invested a lot of XP in improving
characteristics (particularly PC, which you really *need* to spend a
substantial amount of XP on). It didn't seem fair to me that a player who
spent a lot of effort improving his character's abilities but not his skills
should have that effort count for nothing in terms of his character's
overall "level".

----------------------------------------------------------------
Bruce Probst bprobst@netspace.net.au ICQ 6563830
Melbourne, Australia MSTie #72759 SCA #80160
"I want to decide who lives and who dies."
ASL FAQ http://www.users.bigpond.net.au/mantis/ASLFAQ

Hmmm...kinda like the idea of cashing in some stats for xp as a start...sort
off 'I am disadvantaged as im not as fast, strong clever etc as
others...therefore had harder life, and had to rely on waht i have learnt
rather than natural talent'

Ok question is then....how much xp per point lost....I like the idea of a
sliding scale, getting exponentially more xp . That is first point you wont
get much, next a bit more, next a bit more, etc. If you really punish
yourself by ditching a lot of stats at the start should get benefit of a lot
of xp.

Will give some thought to some numbers....maybe 500xp for each of first
three points, 750 each of next three etc. I think 5000xp a point is way,
way too high....

JohnD

_________________________________________________________________
Get Hotmail on your mobile phone http://www.msn.co.uk/msnmobile

davis john wrote:

>
> Hmmm...kinda like the idea of cashing in some stats for xp as a start...sort
> off 'I am disadvantaged as im not as fast, strong clever etc as
> others...therefore had harder life, and had to rely on waht i have learnt
> rather than natural talent'
>
> Ok question is then....how much xp per point lost....I like the idea of a
> sliding scale, getting exponentially more xp . That is first point you wont
> get much, next a bit more, next a bit more, etc. If you really punish
> yourself by ditching a lot of stats at the start should get benefit of a lot
> of xp.
>
> Will give some thought to some numbers....maybe 500xp for each of first
> three points, 750 each of next three etc. I think 5000xp a point is way,
> way too high....
>
> JohnD

I don't think it's too high, but make them buy skills, etc. at full
cost. And, they have to buy rank 0 first, remember!
But, maybe just put a cap on how many attributes you can swap for EXP.
Say, no more than 3 to 5. But, then, charge for *every* level of
*every* skill. Also, you might give EXP at the "Perception rate" of
1000 for the first point and 750 for ever one after the first. That
should keep it from getting *too* out of hand.
At least, that's how I'd handle it.
Anyone else have suggestions?

Thanks,
Jim

--
"It's better to light one candle
than to curse the darkness."
-Chinese Proverb and The Motto of the Christophers
http://www.christophers.org

>>As far as I understood the question, yes, the rules
>>say any damage, no matter what the source, always is
>>taken to Fatigue first, and then is taken to
>>Endurance. Moreover, you can't do damage to Fatigue
>>and Endurance with the same attack, extra damage is
>>simply lost. However, in my campaign we houseruled a
>>small exception to those rules I thought might be
>>worth mentioning for discussion.
>
>I had a similar rule, which I can actually quote (I didn't keep *everything*
>in my head <g>):
>
>Damage caused by magic is usually one of two types: "magical energy" that
>ignores armour, or a physical effect that does not. The GM will determine
>whether armour is applicable against a particular magical attack form.
>Magical damage is done to FT, and to EN once FT is exhausted. A single
>damage Check will not "wrap" from FT to EN, unless the total damage exceeds
>the target's combined full FT and EN.

In my campaign, we have always played with the rule that if the damage
taken from a blow or spell exceeds 20 points, once fatigue is gone, any
additional damage bleeds over into endurance at a rate of 3 to 1 (i.e. 6
points of damage would do 2 points of endurance damage). If the blow or
spell does 40 or more points of damage in a single shot damage bleeds over
into endurance at 1 for 1.




Jason Winter
Alarian@direcway.com
http://www.darkrealms.com/~alarian/

I have played with the idea of setting up a new magic college grouping (in
addition to Thaum, Elemental and Entity) based on the Aspect Table.
Yours and Rodger's work on Sun Magics, Moon and etc. would seem to fit right
in.
I did not flesh out this idea because I could never come to grips with how
best to Align this new Group into the Alignment table.
I did move some Colleges around. I do not have easy access to my notes
right now (they are in storage) but I know I moved Necro summon into death,
etc.
Perhaps Dark Mage could fit into Death Aspect? White Magics Could be Life
Aspect.
As for the Celestial Magics, there were seasonal bonuses tied to PC Aspect
and also season specifc spells that sort of created Winter, Spring, Summer,
Fall sub-colleges for Celestial.
Just my thoughts dredged up from 15 year old memories. :)

----- Original Message -----
From: "Esko Halttunen" <esko.halttunen@luukku.com>
To: <dqn-list@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Friday, August 29, 2003 1:30 AM
Subject: [DQN-list] Branches of Magic


Ok, this is a spinoff of the Colleges of Magic thread, and ties to them
somewhat.

I've always found some of the divisions in the Branches of Magic
(Elementals, Thaumaturgy and Entities) downright stupid, and would like to
hear some other opinions. I've no problem with the Thaumaturgies and
Entities as such, it's Elementals mostly that piss me off, namely the
inclusion of Celestial Magics there. Their connection to the true Elemental
colleges is...what, precisely? Additionally, Celestial Magics is more like
three colleges all rolled into one than a single college, and while it does
work, it could work a whole lot better.

Rodger and I had a discussion regarding this (I guess that was mainly me
talking, though) when we went over his Sun Magics draft. I was, and still
am, of the opinion that Celestial Magics should be a Branch of Magic all on
their own, with a College of Sun Magics and a College of Moon and Stars,
which we basically already have, the Star Mages from the original Celestial
Magics. (I must note that this is my view, Rodger's view of the Sun College
was as one of the Entities, and he has very sound reasons for it that I do
agree with, the viewpoint is different than what I have taken, but quite
valid and perfectly reasoned out.)

This would sort of orphane the Shadow Weavers and Dark Mages, but since the
Celestial Magics (the Branch) as a whole deal with the heavenly bodies that
produce light for the world, these two would be easy to incorporate to the
new model. Dark Mages draw their power from the absence of light, and Shadow
Weavers would be, as they are now, in the middle of the two, since shadows
are the interplay of light and darkness. I guess they'd stay in Moon and
Stars, though you might have Dark Mages (or Night Mages) of the Sun College
if anyone bothers to go to the length of designing reverse spells for them.
And if you change Star Mages to Moon and Star Mages, you'd have yet another
division where their modifiers for the moonlit and moonless nights would
probably have to be opposites. This last would increase complexity even
further, which is not such a good thing on its face, but I don't think it's
overly unwieldy. Not for me anyway. And it'd have the benefit of making the
divisions of the branches consistent. As things stand right now, Celestial
Magics as it was written into the DQ rules is the odd college out, something
which I really hate because I'm very partial to it myself (especially Shadow
Weavers).

Thoughts?

One other question: With all the colleges added by the people who've played
DQ for a long time and that are available online, what does the
Thaumaturgy/Entities division look like? With just DQ and AW, Entities is
leading 6 to 4, and with the addition of White, Fey, Spider, Time and that
fifth one, how does it stand? Fey is obviously Thaumaturgy and White an
Entity college, what about the rest?

Edi

............................................................
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Kuukausimaksuton MTV3 Internet-liittymä www.mtv3.fi/liittyma





Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/

> I was wondering if anyone could tell me where I might find some of
>the new spells and abilities and stuff that the folks at the Seagate
>Adventurers Guild added to the game system? I've been reading the old
>Adventure summaries and journals from their campaigns, and there seems
>to be a ton of new spells and rituals, among other things, and I would
>like to find some of this material to look over. Any help with this
>would be appreciated. Thanks. :)

Try www.dragonquest.org.nz

Keith.

Hullo, Edi,

On Fri, 29 Aug 2003 08:05:38 +0300 (EEST), Esko Halttunen wrote:

>> So, out of curiosity, have you looked at the Priest skill yet?
>> If so, any comments so far? (I haven't heard a lot of comments from
>> anyone on it, other than David over on the DragonQuestCathedral ml.)
>
>I haven't had time yet. :-(

Sounds like the typical story, Edi...

>I intended to do that yesterday, but I had to slog through 186
>(Yes, count'em, a bleeding 186!) backlogged DQN-List messages
>in my mailbox I hadn't had time to go through earlier, including all
>of the Character creation discussion of the past few days. Took
>me three and a half hours. I'll read the Priest stuff on the weekend
>and email you on Sunday or Monday.

...since I'm also in the process of trying to catch up with the
backlog of e-mail that I've got. After having the foot surgery that
I've had, I can't sit at the computer for hours trying to work on
anything.

In any event, I look forward to your comments on the Priest
business, either here or in personal e-mail. :)

....."Be careful, John, this star is unusually erratic." - Zhaan "Sounds
like Crichton." - Aeryn (FS; TtBRC)

JohnK
e-mail: jkahane@comnet.ca
web page: http://www.comnet.ca/~jkahane

Deven Atkinson wrote:

>I have played with the idea of setting up a new magic college grouping (in
>addition to Thaum, Elemental and Entity) based on the Aspect Table.
>Yours and Rodger's work on Sun Magics, Moon and etc. would seem to fit right in.
>

Rodger's the one working on it, he just bounced the idea off me because
of the mention of Sun Magics in the Optional Aspect rules I crafted (see
files section in dq-rules group for those), it was on my list of to-do
things also. The work he is doing is completely his own, except perhaps
one ritual I suggested that he liked. The Moon Magics comment was mainly
a spur of the moment idea about modifying the existing Clestial Magics
slightly.

>I did not flesh out this idea because I could never come to grips with how
>best to Align this new Group into the Alignment table.
>

You could have opposing subdivisions within the new grouping itself and
ignore the traditional grouping table. I don't think the traditional and
the new view can work side by side, but that's just a gut feeling.

>I did move some Colleges around. I do not have easy access to my notes
>right now (they are in storage) but I know I moved Necro summon into death, etc.
>Perhaps Dark Mage could fit into Death Aspect? White Magics Could be Life Aspect.
>As for the Celestial Magics, there were seasonal bonuses tied to PC Aspect
>and also season specifc spells that sort of created Winter, Spring, Summer,
>Fall sub-colleges for Celestial.
>Just my thoughts dredged up from 15 year old memories. :)
>

It's a good idea, and could work wonders in certain types of settings.
I'll keep this thing in mind, it's intriguing. By the way, how would the
optional Aspect rules, if one chose to use them, fit with this scheme,
or would they fit at all?

Edi

--- In dqn-list@yahoogroups.com, "Don Hawthorne" <ravenglass@e...>
wrote:

> Just thought I'd shar ethis with the list.
> No major change, just a bit of color I put in my campaign.
> I let characters with Qquarterstaffs (staves?) have a 2% defense

bonus per Rank with the Quarterstaff even when attacking. It just
made for a nice "feel" for the parry/block/attack nature of the
weapon.

> Good defensive break for Adepts, too.
> Anyway, try it out see if you like it.
> Don Hawthorne

Pritty much what I do too, with the addition that a person using a
spear or such like If can use it like a quatestaff as well with the
defence bonus

David

We followed the rules. Speaking another language, say Dwarvish, when human
bad guys could hear came in very handy in our party. It also would come in
handy to obtain minerals and gems at wholesale prices from Dwarves, instead
of the markup prices at any city's bazaar or gem district.
Not only did language enhance a PC to Adventurer and Hero, but it enhanced
gameplay because of a well rounded character(s). We had a good GM and it
took a while for our all Human party to find a Dwarf to teach the PCs.

----- Original Message -----
From: "John M. Kahane" <jkahane@comnet.ca>
To: "DragonQuest RPG Mailing List" <dqn-list@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Friday, August 29, 2003 12:46 PM
Subject: [DQN-list] Determining Levels?


> Hullo, folks,
>
> Well, I've got a question for folks...
>
> How do you all go about determining the characters' Levels (ie.,
> Mercenary, Adventurer, Hero) in the game? The rules in the book are
> pretty clear on this, but how many folks here actually use Language
> skills to "enhance the skill total" for this determination? And if
> folks have changed the system in this regard, what sort of criteria are
> people using?
>
> Thanks in advance. :)
>
> .....The whole of creation was myth-woven and elf-patterned. (J.R.R.
Tolkien)
>
> JohnK
> e-mail: jkahane@comnet.ca
> web page: http://www.comnet.ca/~jkahane
>
>
>
>
>
>
> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
>
>
>

----- Original Message From: "Esko Halttunen" <esko.halttunen@luukku.com>

> Deven Atkinson wrote:
> >I did move some Colleges around. I do not have easy access to my notes
> >right now (they are in storage) but I know I moved Necro summon into

death, etc.

> >Perhaps Dark Mage could fit into Death Aspect? White Magics Could be

Life Aspect.

> >As for the Celestial Magics, there were seasonal bonuses tied to PC

Aspect

> >and also season specifc spells that sort of created Winter, Spring,

Summer,

> >Fall sub-colleges for Celestial.
> >Just my thoughts dredged up from 15 year old memories. :)
> >
> It's a good idea, and could work wonders in certain types of settings.
> I'll keep this thing in mind, it's intriguing. By the way, how would the
> optional Aspect rules, if one chose to use them, fit with this scheme,
> or would they fit at all?

I have always thought that form followed function. Your Owl form aspect
should never be paired with Sun aspect as you state. But should also be
resricted on your Magic Aspects. (Never be Sun, or perhaps can only be
Moon, Star, Wind, Life or Death magic aspected.)

To answer your question, I would not begin to attempt to grow the Aspects
beyond the basics. I had trouble fitting magic into the original list. :/

Deven Atkinson wrote:

>I have always thought that form followed function. Your Owl form aspect
>should never be paired with Sun aspect as you state. But should also be
>resricted on your Magic Aspects. (Never be Sun, or perhaps can only be
>Moon, Star, Wind, Life or Death magic aspected.)
>

Probably. I think I'm going to update that at some point, after I'm done
with a project I'm working on now. Didn't think to check aspects other
than Demon and Unicorn, which exclude Life and Death respectively. I'm
going to have to put in a few more exclusionary notes (such as
disallowing life/death and death/life combos for action/magic Aspects)
and cross check that there aren't obvious logical conflicts. Thanks for
bringing it up. It's this sort of things why feedback is so crucial. I
owe you one. :-)

>To answer your question, I would not begin to attempt to grow the Aspects
>beyond the basics. I had trouble fitting magic into the original list. :/
>

For the Aspect based division of magic, I definitely agree. If you keep
the traditional magic, then the new aspects aren't a problem in that
respect. I know what you mean, I wouldn't even try to fit the new
aspects in your system either, especially the Aspects of Magic, it's
just asking for a colossal headache. I do like the idea, though. :-)

Edi

Steven Wiles <mortdemuerte@y...> wrote:

> --- Esko Halttunen <esko.halttunen@l...> wrote:
>
> > Rodger and I had a discussion regarding this (I
> > guess that was mainly me talking, though) when we
> > went over his Sun Magics draft. I was, and still am,
> > of the opinion that Celestial Magics should be a
> > Branch of Magic all on their own, with a College of
> > Sun Magics and a College of Moon and Stars, which we
> [snip]
>
> Actually, I think that's a great idea. I've always
> thought that the subdivision of the Celestial Magics
> really should just be called individual colleges, and
> the idea of Sun Magics and Moon Magics seems such a
> natural idea. I suspect the designer's lumped things
> together because they found they had so many spells
> naturally in common, but that's just a guess. I
> believe the Seagate Adventurer's Guild houserules had
> a similar reworking of the College.

Where could I get my hands on that material? I checked the
www.dragonquest.org.nz site, and couldn't find it. If it was supposed
to be in the Mort's Library section, that's still under construction, no?

I do agree that the Celestial Magics as it stands has three quite
different colleges lumped together, where the Dark Mages and Shadow
Weavers should be in a college of their own and not have access to the
meteor spells or the Dwarf Star spell. Even if you do rework those
that way and change Celestial Magics to have an internal Moon/Stars
division and then add Sun Magics, they could stay in Elementals, given
the "element of ether" concept. That way there would be no fourth
Branch of Magic as such, but the elements would make somewhat more sense.

> > One other question: With all the colleges added by
> > the people who've played DQ for a long time and that
> > are available online, what does the
> > Thaumaturgy/Entities division look like?
>
> Hmmm. Good question, that. My natural inclination
> would be to put Time into the Elemental branch. My
> rationale for this is that the Elemental colleges all
> have to do with manipulation of -material- reality,
> whether of an earthly or celestial nature.
> Thaumaturgies seems distinguished by manipulation of
> intangibles and abstracts (mind, intrinsic essence
> [True Names], subjective perception, and magic
> itself), the things that lie behind the material
> universe, while Entities is of course about dealing
> with things that lie outside the material universe.
> What's more intrinsic to the nature of the -material-
> universe than the concepts of Time and Space, the
> stage upon which all matter and energy perfoms its
> dances?

That makes sense to me, and certainly clears away some of the cobwebs
that I've had in my brain when trying to figure these things out.
Thanks. :-)

I'm really going to have to scan and post the picture my friend Kalle
drew about the relations of the different colleges, it incorporated
most of your ideas about the purviews of the different Branches and
made some other nifty divisions and connections between the Colleges
and Branches that are eminently sensible and logical to boot. With
that one, the old adage of one picture telling more than a thousand
words just couldn't be more accurate.

>
> I have no idea what to do with Spider. Of course, I'm
> an arachnophobe, so I don't even like thinking about
> it... :O ;>

I haven't even checked that one out, guess I'm going to have to. :-)

Edi

Hello all. My apologies for spamming the list once more. ;-)

I have now for some time been working on a compiled weapons, armor and shields list that would put all of the aforementioned things in one, single reference. I've included everything from 1st, 2nd and 3rd Editions and Poor Brendan's Almanac, as well as included almost all of the oriental weapons that appear in the 1st Edition AD&D sourcebook Oriental Adventures. That latest part used the oriental weapons for DQ by Michael Coyne as a base to start from, something I owe Rodger for once again, because he emailed them to me.

Now, a few things that I think would merit further discussion before I just plow ahead and post the whole thing in the DQ-rules files section:

1) Weapon weights.

There is a huge discrepancy between the weights listed for the weapons in 2nd/3rd Editions and what is listed for them in 1st Edition. 2nd Edition weights, when they differ (and they do, a lot), are typically only one half or one third of what the weights originally were in 1st Edition, and this makes for some really bizarre figures. Battle axe is listed as having a weight of 5 pounds in 2nd, and 6 in 1st, which is no big deal as such, it's even reasonable. Its bigger brother, the two-handed great axe, is listed as having 6 pounds and 18 pounds, respectively, which is a bloody significant drop in weight, especially when you look at the strength requirements to use one. Similarly, the lance has dropped from 20 pounds to 7. Did they switch to balsa wood when we weren't looking? Those things were heavy and sturdy for a reason, they had to be useful against plate armor after all. Most of the other pole weapons weights don't bear examining either.

Of course, switching back to the original weights is going to hamper players more, as they will be more encumbered, but by and large, the 1st Edition weights are, in my this time not so humble opinion, far more realistic and reflect their historical counterparts better. Having just two weeks ago seen a genuine poleaxe in a museum of medieval weapons during my visit to San Marino on my Italian vacation, I'm just not going to buy a figure of six or seven pounds for it. That'd be about half the blade at best.

So far in that document, I have listed weights for both 1st and 2nd Editions where they differ more than one or two pounds, depending on the weapon, so that if there is no consensus, people can choose whichever figure they want to use.

***

2) PS and MD requirements.

These are according to 2nd Edition, because that's what we all use as the baseline. Many weapons had different PS and MD requirements in 1st Edition, but those are listed only where the difference is two points or more. Typically 1st Edition had slightly lesser PS and slightly higher MD requirements, but there were differences as large as three or four points for some weapons. I didn't want to make arbitrary decisions in this regard, therefore both values are in for the sake of completeness.

***

3) Polearms.

On reading the excellent discussions on weapons and rank limits, and seeing the comments especially on pole weapons, I am reassessing what to do with them. Most people seemed to agree that the general rank limit of 5 was far too little for polearms, and the arguments in favor of this position were convincing. Convinced me anyway. So, two questions specific to pole weapons:
a) Should the pole weapon maximum rank limits be raised across the board to 7? For all except the Pike anyway, because that one has a specific and limited use, and is so bleedingly heavy that only a fool would use it for anything other than trying to spear charging horses.
b) There was a house rule posted for quarterstaves that allowed a 2% per rank Defense Value bonus, to account more realistically for its nature. I'm going to include that in the document as an optional rule. Should that rule be also applied to polearms such as halberd, spear, trident and glaive, with the stipulation that when used for such defensive purposes, the wielder can only inflict quarterstaff damage, or with no such limitation at all? This question was inspired by John Davis's description of the demonstration of poleaxe fighting he had seen. If this house rule is applied to polearms without the damage limitation, they suddenly become a lot more attractive to players, but I don't think this would necessarily be a problem at all. My players typically will not even glance at the pole weapons section.

***

4) Missile weapons.

To put it bluntly, the crossbow and heavy crossbow as they are desribed in the rules are a joke. The medieval and renaissance era heavy crossbows were designed to punch through plate armor with fatal results, and they did accomplish this. They also had good range, not quite as good as the longbow, but a lot better than what has been listed. Consequently, I tossed out the crossbows as they were and just used those as a basis for a wider range of things. I added the hand crossbow for an assassin's weapon, but it's mainly a curiosity. The original crossbow became light crossbow and is unaltered, basically the same with the formerly heavy crossbow that got downgraded to medium. I added a heavy crossbow that does +5 damage and has a greater range, and an arbalest which does +6 damage, has even better range, weighs about a ton and has rather stringent strength requirements to use (need PS 16 to load with cranequin in 3 pulses, otherwise takes four pulses and can't be loaded without a cranequin at all, or even with one unless PS greater than 13).

Giant bow had its range seriously checked (45, when the short bow has a range of 60?! I think not?) Given the ranges for composite bow, long bow and great bow (from 1st Edition), I just multiplied by 10, which on second thought is far too much. But perhaps multiplying by 4 or 5 would be enough, as the giant arrows would also have to be a lot bigger and consequently would not fly as far before gravity pulled them down. I'll probably multiply by 4, that'll still give 180 hexes, or roughly 270 meters.

***

5) Armor

2nd Edition cut the armor list a lot shorter than it originally was. Now these vanished armor types are making a comeback, and there are a couple of more additions. The revised list has the following:
Cloth
Leather
Wicker (removed from 2nd Edition)
Chain
Lamellar (includes brigantine, splint mail and similar, removed from 2nd Ed)
Scale
Banded mail (the Roman legionary type armor, completely new addition)
Half-plate
Plate
Improved plate

The protection values have a lot of overlap, meaning you can take a lot of different types and get same protection, but now different styles can be accommodated, and if anybody has house rules regarding armor effectiveness vs weapon class (e.g. chain mail not being as effective against class A weapons), they might find this especially interesting.

I decided not to add a bazillion new types of armor, which is why brigantine and splint armor are included in lamellar, as they are basically exactly alike or only have stylistic differences. Not enough that we should make overly complicated divisions for them anyway. I have tried to make all of the armor types have something attractive and something less so, while keeping to the 2nd Edition rules (meaning the already listed armors haven't been modified, the new ones have been molded around them and based on them).

The one thing that did get heavy modification was the imo utterly ridiculous stealth penalties. Somebody with full plate armor on is definitely going to get more than a measly -20 to their stealth roll! This also makes some of the new additions competitive against the old ones because the stealth penalties are not the same across the board.

***

Hmm, that's all I can think of right now that would require input from the group, and it should, methings, be enough to start a lively little discussion about the subject. The more input I get, the better it's going to be for the final result, especially where the pole weapons question, weapon weights issue and missile weapons are concerned. Fire away!

Edi

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> I have now for some time been working on a compiled weapons, armor

and shields list that would put all of the aforementioned things in
one, single reference. I've included everything from 1st, 2nd and 3rd
Editions and Poor Brendan's Almanac, as well as included almost all
of the oriental weapons that appear in the 1st Edition AD&D
sourcebook Oriental Adventures. That latest part used the oriental
weapons for DQ by Michael Coyne as a base to start from, something I
owe Rodger for once again, because he emailed them to me.

>
> Now, a few things that I think would merit further discussion

before I just plow ahead and post the whole thing in the DQ-rules
files section:

>
> 1) Weapon weights.
>
> There is a huge discrepancy between the weights listed for the

weapons in 2nd/3rd Editions and what is listed for them in 1st
Edition. 2nd Edition weights, when they differ (and they do, a lot),
are typically only one half or one third of what the weights
originally were in 1st Edition, and this makes for some really
bizarre figures. Battle axe is listed as having a weight of 5 pounds
in 2nd, and 6 in 1st, which is no big deal as such, it's even
reasonable. Its bigger brother, the two-handed great axe, is listed
as having 6 pounds and 18 pounds, respectively, which is a bloody
significant drop in weight, especially when you look at the strength
requirements to use one. Similarly, the lance has dropped from 20
pounds to 7. Did they switch to balsa wood when we weren't looking?
Those things were heavy and sturdy for a reason, they had to be
useful against plate armor after all. Most of the other pole weapons
weights don't bear examining either.

>
> Of course, switching back to the original weights is going to

hamper players more, as they will be more encumbered, but by and
large, the 1st Edition weights are, in my this time not so humble
opinion, far more realistic and reflect their historical counterparts
better. Having just two weeks ago seen a genuine poleaxe in a museum
of medieval weapons during my visit to San Marino on my Italian
vacation, I'm just not going to buy a figure of six or seven pounds
for it. That'd be about half the blade at best.

>
> So far in that document, I have listed weights for both 1st and 2nd

Editions where they differ more than one or two pounds, depending on
the weapon, so that if there is no consensus, people can choose
whichever figure they want to use.

I - like you - thought that the weights of weapons were rediculously
small, so I got the catalogue of the Walace collection of arms and
armour out of the University library where I used to work. This is
one of the foremost arms and armour collections in europe, of all
ages, and lists the weights of everything in the collection. To my
suprise I found that the 2nd edition DQ weights were accurate!

David

> 3) Polearms.
>
> On reading the excellent discussions on weapons and rank limits,

and seeing the comments especially on pole weapons, I am reassessing
what to do with them. Most people seemed to agree that the general
rank limit of 5 was far too little for polearms, and the arguments in
favor of this position were convincing. Convinced me anyway. So, two
questions specific to pole weapons:

> a) Should the pole weapon maximum rank limits be raised

across the board to 7? For all except the Pike anyway, because that
one has a specific and limited use, and is so bleedingly heavy that
only a fool would use it for anything other than trying to spear
charging horses.

> b) There was a house rule posted for quarterstaves that

allowed a 2% per rank Defense Value bonus, to account more
realistically for its nature. I'm going to include that in the
document as an optional rule. Should that rule be also applied to
polearms such as halberd, spear, trident and glaive, with the
stipulation that when used for such defensive purposes, the wielder
can only inflict quarterstaff damage, or with no such limitation at
all? This question was inspired by John Davis's description of the
demonstration of poleaxe fighting he had seen. If this house rule is
applied to polearms without the damage limitation, they suddenly
become a lot more attractive to players, but I don't think this would
necessarily be a problem at all. My players typically will not even
glance at the pole weapons section.


It was me actually :--), I didn't use polearms, nor did nay of my
PCs, until I saw the demo. I started using them for NPCs and they
were very effective, especially of you allow use as quaerstaff and
say that people with normal weapons have to get past the end of the
weapon before they can attack. All of which I consider resonable.
They must have been effective or nobody would have used them in real
life


David

> 4) Missile weapons.
>
> To put it bluntly, the crossbow and heavy crossbow as they are

desribed in the rules are a joke. The medieval and renaissance era
heavy crossbows were designed to punch through plate armor with fatal
results, and they did accomplish this. They also had good range, not
quite as good as the longbow, but a lot better than what has been
listed. Consequently, I tossed out the crossbows as they were and
just used those as a basis for a wider range of things. I added the
hand crossbow for an assassin's weapon, but it's mainly a curiosity.
The original crossbow became light crossbow and is unaltered,
basically the same with the formerly heavy crossbow that got
downgraded to medium. I added a heavy crossbow that does +5 damage
and has a greater range, and an arbalest which does +6 damage, has
even better range, weighs about a ton and has rather stringent
strength requirements to use (need PS 16 to load with cranequin in 3
pulses, otherwise takes four pulses and can't be loaded without a
cranequin at all, or even with one unless PS greater than 13).

>
> Giant bow had its range seriously checked (45, when the short bow

has a range of 60?! I think not?) Given the ranges for composite bow,
long bow and great bow (from 1st Edition), I just multiplied by 10,
which on second thought is far too much. But perhaps multiplying by 4
or 5 would be enough, as the giant arrows would also have to be a lot
bigger and consequently would not fly as far before gravity pulled
them down. I'll probably multiply by 4, that'll still give 180 hexes,
or roughly 270 meters.

I have a problem with the entire way missile weapons work in DQ, but
never have the time to do anything about it :--(

My thoughts run allong the lines that missile weapons have a strength
they are best used at. If you have less strength you don't use it
properly, more you can't put your surplus strength into the weapon,
either because you can't draw it back far enough or you risk breaking
it. So my thoughts were running along the lines that you have a
strength 18 bow that does so much dammage with such and such a range
and you have a strength 20 bow that is slighly better. If you have
strength 18 you use the 18 bow to maximum efficieny and the 20 bow as
an 18. Crossbows you would still use as 20, but have to use a
cranequin

This would have to work as a formula, with different formulae for
bows and crossbows.

David

PS I think giant bows were supposed to be crude and ineffective - my
rationalle

> 5) Armor
>
> 2nd Edition cut the armor list a lot shorter than it originally

was. Now these vanished armor types are making a comeback, and there
are a couple of more additions. The revised list has the following:

> Cloth
> Leather
> Wicker (removed from 2nd Edition)
> Chain
> Lamellar (includes brigantine, splint mail and similar, removed

from 2nd Ed)

> Scale
> Banded mail (the Roman legionary type armor, completely new

addition)

> Half-plate
> Plate
> Improved plate
>
> The protection values have a lot of overlap, meaning you can take a

lot of different types and get same protection, but now different
styles can be accommodated, and if anybody has house rules regarding
armor effectiveness vs weapon class (e.g. chain mail not being as
effective against class A weapons), they might find this especially
interesting.

>
> I decided not to add a bazillion new types of armor, which is why

brigantine and splint armor are included in lamellar, as they are
basically exactly alike or only have stylistic differences. Not
enough that we should make overly complicated divisions for them
anyway. I have tried to make all of the armor types have something
attractive and something less so, while keeping to the 2nd Edition
rules (meaning the already listed armors haven't been modified, the
new ones have been molded around them and based on them).

>
> The one thing that did get heavy modification was the imo utterly

ridiculous stealth penalties. Somebody with full plate armor on is
definitely going to get more than a measly -20 to their stealth roll!
This also makes some of the new additions competitive against the old
ones because the stealth penalties are not the same across the board.

I've always though it a pitty that helmets weren't specifically
covered in the rules, they rather neatly work if you have a PC loss

David

Can I send you my arms and arour rules as an e-mail attachment, do
you want them as a word doc a pdf or as an open office document?

<major snippage>
Nice points raised Esko.

Im pretty sure when we first played 1st edition with gave each armour a
different rating against A, B and C type weapons. If you are going to
present something like this in the compilation id be most interested.

JohnD
Who likes house rules as long as they dont add an extra dice roll, and loves
them when they take away a dice roll.

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dbarrass_2000 wrote:

>
> I - like you - thought that the weights of weapons were rediculously
> small, so I got the catalogue of the Walace collection of arms and
> armour out of the University library where I used to work. This is
> one of the foremost arms and armour collections in europe, of all
> ages, and lists the weights of everything in the collection. To my
> suprise I found that the 2nd edition DQ weights were accurate!
>
> David

*stunned look*

This is where I'd really need to use the shock smiley from stardestroyer.net, too bad the mailing list format doesn't support it...

Okay, that means 1st Editions figures go out the window for the most part then. Could be the reason for the low weights is something that one guy over at SDnet mentioned, that the techniques used to make steel that went into weapons back then allowed for lighter weight steel that was just as durable. He also claimed that many of those techniques have been lost and as a result the old weapons can't be exactly duplicated. Mind you, this is based on a not necessarily so accurate recollection of a discussion I had only tangential interest in, so take with a full shaker of salt.

Edi

............................................................
Maksuton sähköposti aina käytössä http://luukku.com
Kuukausimaksuton MTV3 Internet-liittymä www.mtv3.fi/liittyma

davis john wrote:

> <major snippage>
> Nice points raised Esko.

Please call me Edi. While Esko is my real name, it just weirds me out when people use that online. Besides, Edi is a nickname I got from some of my friends IRL too, so I identify with it just as well. No biggie, though. :-)

>
> Im pretty sure when we first played 1st edition with gave each armour a
> different rating against A, B and C type weapons. If you are going to
> present something like this in the compilation id be most interested.

Could be I will, I can always write that as an optional rule in the explanatory section. I've so far concentrated on getting the weapons ready and finished first so that I can give the armor issue my full attention.

>
> JohnD
> Who likes house rules as long as they dont add an extra dice roll, and
> loves them when they take away a dice roll.

This is something I believe most people will agree with. :-)

Edi

............................................................
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dbarrass_2000 wrote:

> On polearms:
>
> It was me actually :--), I didn't use polearms, nor did nay of my
> PCs, until I saw the demo. I started using them for NPCs and they
> were very effective, especially of you allow use as quaerstaff and
> say that people with normal weapons have to get past the end of the
> weapon before they can attack. All of which I consider resonable.
> They must have been effective or nobody would have used them in real life

Sorry, my mistake in crediting the wrong person.

>
> I've always though it a pitty that helmets weren't specifically
> covered in the rules, they rather neatly work if you have a PC loss

That would be nice. The problem is that DQ doesn't really have a specific called shot system, where this sort of thing would come into play. Something like that would necessitate a hit location chart and piecemeal armor rules too, though, and that'd bog down the system.

>
> Can I send you my arms and arour rules as an e-mail attachment, do
> you want them as a word doc a pdf or as an open office document?

Yes, you most definitely can! I would be very pleased indeed! Open Office is preferable, I use that whenever possible, because I detest Microsoft and wouldn't want to use pirated software in any case (I've got a copy of Office on loan from school, but it's not permanent and the damn thing is inferior to OO anyway). pdfs are fine for a finished end product, but otherwise I find them loathsome, too big in size, unwieldy and can't edit or copy-paste anything.

Edi

............................................................
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> Sorry, my mistake in crediting the wrong person.

no problem, Looking back I think John saw the demo too

> > I've always though it a pitty that helmets weren't specifically
> > covered in the rules, they rather neatly work if you have a PC

loss

>
> That would be nice. The problem is that DQ doesn't really have a

specific called shot system, where this sort of thing would come into
play. Something like that would necessitate a hit location chart and
piecemeal armor rules too, though, and that'd bog down the system.

I did that, in a way like Runequest, it worked. But even I found it
too slow and I have one climactic battle at the end with litle combat
leading up to it so slow isn't normally a problem for me.

David

> >
> > Can I send you my arms and arour rules as an e-mail attachment,

do

> > you want them as a word doc a pdf or as an open office document?
>
> Yes, you most definitely can! I would be very pleased indeed! Open

Office is preferable, I use that whenever possible, because I detest
Microsoft and wouldn't want to use pirated software in any case (I've
got a copy of Office on loan from school, but it's not permanent and
the damn thing is inferior to OO anyway). pdfs are fine for a
finished end product, but otherwise I find them loathsome, too big in
size, unwieldy and can't edit or copy-paste anything.

>

I can't email it to you because I don't have your email address and
you haven't told yahoo. You can email your adress to me at
david.barrass@ed.ac.uk

David

----- Original Message -----

From: Esko Halttunen

To: dqn-list@yahoogroups.com

Sent: Monday, September 01, 2003 4:27 AM

Subject: Re: [DQN-list] Armor

dbarrass_2000 wrote:

> On polearms:
>
> It was me actually :--), I didn't use polearms, nor did nay of my
> PCs, until I saw the demo. I started using them for NPCs and they
> were very effective, especially of you allow use as quaerstaff and
> say that people with normal weapons have to get past the end of the
> weapon before they can attack. All of which I consider resonable.
> They must have been effective or nobody would have used them in real life

Sorry, my mistake in crediting the wrong person.

>
> I've always though it a pitty that helmets weren't specifically
> covered in the rules, they rather neatly work if you have a PC loss

That would be nice. The problem is that DQ doesn't really have a specific called shot system, where this sort of thing would come into play. Something like that would necessitate a hit location chart and piecemeal armor rules too, though, and that'd bog down the system.

>
> Can I send you my arms and arour rules as an e-mail attachment, do
> you want them as a word doc a pdf or as an open office document?

Yes, you most definitely can! I would be very pleased indeed! Open Office is preferable, I use that whenever possible, because I detest Microsoft and wouldn't want to use pirated software in any case (I've got a copy of Office on loan from school, but it's not permanent and the damn thing is inferior to OO anyway). pdfs are fine for a finished end product, but otherwise I find them loathsome, too big in size, unwieldy and can't edit or copy-paste anything.

Edi

............................................................
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Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the Yahoo! Terms of Service.

Hi There,

My name is Steven Ross, I'm a new DQ GM. Just this last Sunday I started
creating characters with my players. However, in the course of character
creation we discovered several problems. The Character Sheets I'm using are
Third Edition (not a problem), My GM Screen is First Edition (a surprise,
but not a major problem). No, the major problem I discovered is that the
PDF of the Bantam Second Edition I was using is glairingly incomplete.

Does anyone know of an intact PDF of the Second Edition hard cover,
preferably the SPI version, but the Bantam version would do. I would look
on E-Bay but the campaign starts in a couple of weeks and I can't compete
with most of the bidders on that Auction House.

Steven P. Ross
sross@comnet.ca

> Giant bow had its range seriously checked (45, when the short bow has a range of 60?!
> I think not?) Given the ranges for composite bow, long bow and great bow (from 1st
> Edition), I just multiplied by 10, which on second thought is far too much. But
> perhaps multiplying by 4 or 5 would be enough, as the giant arrows would also have to
> be a lot bigger and consequently would not fly as far before gravity pulled them
> down. I'll probably multiply by 4, that'll still give 180 hexes, or roughly 270
> meters.

The max range of a long bow (volley fire) was about 300 yards or 900 feet.
Divided by 5, that would be '180' in DQ speak.

From what I've seen of most archers, even with a modern bow and sight, a
100 yard (300ft) or 'range 60' is a fairly difficult shot.

The giant bow may be justified as having a shorter range due to the weight
of it's projectile. Balissta-sized perhaps?

Just some thoughts.

John M. Kahane wrote:

> How do you all go about determining the characters' Levels (ie.,
>Mercenary, Adventurer, Hero) in the game? The rules in the book are
>pretty clear on this, but how many folks here actually use Language
>skills to "enhance the skill total" for this determination? And if
>folks have changed the system in this regard, what sort of criteria are
>people using?

My group always followed the book. Thus, every character started
out with two skills at Rank 8 (Speak Common + R/W Common if
human or Speak [racial tongue] if non-human). This has the
unfortunate side effect of favoring non-humans, however, since
it costs 1/2 XP to increase your R/W skills when you Speak the
language at a higher rank. The book rules also make *every*
human literate, and *every* non-human illiterate, which we
considered lame. So we house-ruled starting languages slightly:
humans could either R/W Common or Speak a different human
tongue (we had four besides Common in our campaign world).
Non-humans could opt for R/W Common at the expense of
speaking their racial tongue.

It may be worth mentioning that no player of a non-human
ever chose to be literate over bilingual, though some players
of human characters chose bilinguality (?) over literacy.

-Cameron King

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--- esko_halttunen <esko.halttunen@luukku.com> wrote:

> Steven Wiles <mortdemuerte@y...> wrote:

[snip]

> > naturally in common, but that's just a guess. I
> > believe the Seagate Adventurer's Guild houserules
> had
> > a similar reworking of the College.
>
> Where could I get my hands on that material? I
> checked the
> www.dragonquest.org.nz site, and couldn't find it.
> If it was supposed
> to be in the Mort's Library section, that's still
> under construction, no?

Well, I got my hands on it several years ago, and a
good thing I did, because it vanished from their site
not long after. The document I'm referring to was a
pdf file which presented the complete 2nd edition
rules with all SAG houserules already written in.
Although vastly altered in form and content, it was a
complete reproduction of the basic rules, and so I'm
presuming it disappeared for legal reasons.

There are many fine things in it, including some very
interesting new colleges and extremely sensible
modification to existing colleges (all fully
playtested, I believe). I'd love to distribute it to
others, but I'm loathe to do so for obvious reasons.
If I was only laying -myself- open to the litigious
wrath of WotC, I might be seduced into some
copyright-violating wickedness. However, I'm much
more concerned with the original SAG members whose
work this is. I don't really know why the thing was
taken down, and I would have to have their consent
before I did anything.

Incidentally, as long as I'm on the subject, any SAG
members here? Why were the Seagate Adventurer's Guild
Rules removed? Does anyone else have a copy of them?

> I'm really going to have to scan and post the
> picture my friend Kalle
> drew about the relations of the different colleges,

Please do. It sounds interesting.

> >
> > I have no idea what to do with Spider. Of course,
> I'm
> > an arachnophobe, so I don't even like thinking
> about
> > it... :O ;>
>
> I haven't even checked that one out, guess I'm going
> to have to. :-)
>
> Edi

Mr. Kahane has kindly posted a number of people's
ideas for colleges. In case you don't already have
his link,

http://deathstar.comnet.ca/~jkahane/dq/library/magic/new-colleges.html

Mort

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--- Esko Halttunen <esko.halttunen@luukku.com> wrote:

> > I've always though it a pitty that helmets weren't
> specifically
> > covered in the rules, they rather neatly work if
> you have a PC loss
>
> That would be nice. The problem is that DQ doesn't
> really have a specific called shot system, where
> this sort of thing would come into play. Something
> like that would necessitate a hit location chart and
> piecemeal armor rules too, though, and that'd bog
> down the system.

The question of helmets is an vexed one. As you say,
the system is not really set up for hit location
mechanics. Adding such would seriously complicate an
elegant system, which I doubt any of us wants.
However, I've been in campaigns where people found
helmets, and the only reason they wore them was
becuase they had some sort of magic in them. That is
a bit silly.

I'm just going to throw out a couple of suggestions
that fit within the existing mechanics for how to
incorporate helmets:

1. Helmets add to your defense rating some fixed
amount. I can't really defend the in-game philosophy
of this too well, other than to say that the added Def
represents all the head buffets you took before that
you are protected from now. The only other protection
stat to modify is Protection Rating, and I really
can't see helmets adding to that, i.e. subtracting
damage from -all- hits. This may be a workable
option, but to me it seems a little fishy. Comments?

2. Helmets protect against head-and-neck based
Grievous Injuries. Admittedly, this isn't an issue
that comes up too often. However, when a character
does receive such an injury, it's usually either fatal
or subtracts permanently from some character stat. In
short, rare but nasty. Now, if a helmet prevented, or
at least forced a reroll of these types of injuries (a
second reroll that is also head based should
stick...), I could see a character feeling justified
in wearing a non-magical helmet. Again, comments?

Mort

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