Recent content by pemerton

Upthread, before I'd actually played Mythic Bastionland, I made these posts about it: After having played it, I made these posts (on another active thread): In this post I want to say a bit about how these "before" and "after" thoughts fit together. It was the players' need for information...

Yes, that is what I posted: I think one of the reasons that Moldvay Basic has such a strong contemporary reputation is because there is a reasonable clear statement of GMing principles, in Chapter 8. AD&D doesn't have the same clarity, and I think there is some tension in the DMG. Contrast, for...

Have you played it?

Your posting is going too fast!

It's not a mechanic, but here's a thing that strikes me as modern when it is found in a RPG: a clear statement of GMing principles. A related thing, which also generally strikes me as modern, is a clear statement of how actions should be resolved, which makes reference to principles as part of...

That's a tenable reading of slots, I agree. Part of the issue in D&D particularly is that in most versions there is no real provision for losing slots as a consequences of a failed action, or of a failed save to avoid hardship. So they become weirdly silo-ed like you say. In 4e, by way of...

That can be an aesthetic preference, sure. But if Force Points are not "meta" - even though, in the fiction, no one earns points or spends points or risks running out of points - then the limited use martial powers aren't "meta" either. Because the requirement for not meta is being set at the...

In our most recent session, one player had to leave about half-way through the session. His PC stayed at the bottom of the mountain, with the horses, while the rest of the PCs ascended.

Love it!

I don't think you have to go as far as Earthdawn. Per the 4e D&D PHB (p 54): Encounter powers produce more powerful, more dramatic effects than at-will powers. If you're a martial character, they are exploits that you've practiced extensively but can pull off only once in a while. . . . Daily...

For violent conflict/combat, I look at 4e D&D as the gold standard on this particular issue. It's encounter level guidelines are really reliable. It doesn't fully articulate the tier escalation (it's correct that at Heroic, Level +2 to Level +4 is pretty challenging, but at Paragon step that up...

Agreed re A and C. I think there's a D, or maybe it's a variant of B, where the group expresses a view about what is/isn't possible based on fictional position. It can verge into A - ie a degree of enforcement - but because it's the group rather than the GM, it doesn't have the horrible...

It's a long time since I've prepped a hex map from scratch (like, 40-ish years?) but found the procedures to be solid. @AbdulAlhazred made the comparison to BitD too, in another conversation: though in the context of Position and Effect (I think the Threat Roll is from Deeper Cuts?, but I could...

I also think of scenes in terms of how much "momentum"/"trajectory" carries across, and in what sort of way. In a RPG, this can include fictional elements (eg which characters are present and able to exert influence on whatever it is that's at stake) and game elements (eg do the players get...

I feel a little bit qualified to comment on this one, having just run a session of it. The rules are pretty straightforward. We didn't notice any particular glitches, though the designer website indicates that the Impair gambit may be a bit overpowered: Impairing Impairing The guidelines for...