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Post by Chris Rice on Feb 8, 2013 9:02:03 GMT -5
I'm just creating my starting party at the moment. However, in doing so I have a few questions. The first is about the weapons table on p114.
I understand that the ST requirements have been reduced from those in Melee/Advanced Melee primarily because Attributes are now fixed at the start. But some of the values don't seem right.
A ST10 hero with swords skill can carry a Broadsword for 2d6+2 (4-14) or even a Bastard Sword for 2d6+3 (5-15) and still have a hand free for a shield. If he spends a further two of his precious starting ATT points to reach ST12 he can do away with a shield for a two-handed Great Sword 3d6-1 (2-17). This doesn't seem much of a bargain.
If our ST10 hero takes the Axe/Club/Mace skill instead he can use a 2 handed Pick for 2d6+1 (so he's getting 1 damage less than the broadsword and losing his free hand.) Or he can use a warhammer similarly for 2d6+2. Oddly, if he has ST8 he can use a Morningstar one-handed for 2D6! The Maul is even worse than the Greatsword at 3d6-2 (1-16) with two-hands.
With Axes, same problem. He has to swing a War Axe two handed to get 2d6 damage.
Now I appreciate that Swords are more expensive to buy than the Axe/Mace equivalent, but this is really only going to affect starting characters with their limited coin allowance. Once they have a bit of gold in their pockets they'll want the best weapon they can get for their ST – and that seems to mean swords as the rules are written.
I may, of course, be reading this wrong or have missed something somewhere else in the rules.
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Weapons
Feb 8, 2013 17:48:43 GMT -5
Post by madwill on Feb 8, 2013 17:48:43 GMT -5
i've noticed the same things, so, i lowered the broadsword down to 2D+1 to keep the progression the same for all the swords.
some weapons seem better than swords on the weapon list, but, it's not until you start applying the the skill bonuses that the advantages of swords shows up. the sword skill gives an extra attack OR parry action per round per +3, while axe/mace/club only gives an extra attack per +3 points of skill. if you wanted to further show how versitile sword are compared to the heavier, unbalanced axe/mace/clubs i'm thinking about also giving swords a +1 to all parry attempts for every +3 skillpoints.
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Weapons
Feb 8, 2013 20:53:10 GMT -5
Post by Fenway5 on Feb 8, 2013 20:53:10 GMT -5
Weapons in the Melee/Wizard/TFT system were limited by ST...and since you could increase your ST through experience, you "earned" your way to heavy weapons. I never liked that. I liked that D&D allowed one to buy weapons (if I had the coin) to reflect the character I wanted to play. HOW is an amalgam of that idea. The ST minimums were in general made lower to reflect: 1) weapons available better reflecting character conception 2) Knowing you can't change your attributes, I did not want to leave low ST folks with crap weapons selection. 3) Base ST is 8 for humans and I wanted their choices to be more varied than rapiers, slings, and daggers. If you want to make swords in general more deadly/sought after as a weapon, allow the Fencing skill to apply to any sword. House rule away!
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Weapons
Feb 8, 2013 21:15:51 GMT -5
Post by chrisrice on Feb 8, 2013 21:15:51 GMT -5
The problem I have with this approach is that there is little incentive for a character to have a high Strength. ST10 allows the use of the broadsword and even worse the Bastard sword.
Where are the mighty heroes of Legend. Or even the slightly stronger than average heroes of rumour? I would like some reason for a character to have a ST of 13 but there really isn't any.
I'd rather see the heavy 2 handed weapons at ST13, and a clear gradation of weapons available for 8-12. At the moment there are no melee weapons for ST 9 and 11 which seems strange.
I'd also only allow heavy armour for stronger characters, again to create an incentive for some characters to have higher than average ST.
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Post by sirgawain on Feb 9, 2013 8:07:28 GMT -5
@ chrisrice:
I think a 1 point increase in the strength requirement would be sufficient for both weapons and armor, unless the weapon chart was reworked (along with some playtesting). It seems to me that the game is slanted towards offense, because the defensive options are limited.
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Post by madwill on Feb 9, 2013 8:45:41 GMT -5
there is an optional rule for using str to determine armor usage. it's ARx3= str needed to wear the armor.
melee weapons could be broken down into str catagories. str 8 or less range from 1D6-1 to 1D6+3, str 10 range from 2D6-2 to 2D6+2 str 12 range from 3D6-2 to 3D6+2.
add in the optional rule of +1 damage per 2 points of str over the required number and i think there is plenty of justification for making higher str characters.
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Weapons
Feb 10, 2013 0:45:26 GMT -5
Post by falcon on Feb 10, 2013 0:45:26 GMT -5
Another optional rule would be to let a hero improve, with XP, his attributes to a total of 50 pts, no more, and use the ST min. that DCG or TFT use for weapons. I like that you can't just keep jacking up your attributes until they are all 20 +, but a person can improve their ST, DX, IQ, & EN over time to a limit. I see a hero as I would see a professional athlete(fighter) or a top notch scientist(wizard). They are born with the ability to excel in areas that others are not. But they still have thier limits. I think of the human average as 10 and the top most attribute score as 20. Anyway just some thoughts I've had over the years of playing TFT and GURPS. I like HOW and am looking forward to playing it when it's my turn to GM.
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Weapons
Feb 10, 2013 8:20:39 GMT -5
Post by chrisrice on Feb 10, 2013 8:20:39 GMT -5
I like the fact that ATTs can't improve as they did in TFT but I agree there should be some flexibility.
What I'd probably do is, after a player had gained some experience, ask him to nominate one ATT only. I'd then allow them to increase that ATT, in time, by up to 2 points. But I'd make it very expensive.
I wouldn't want a player to be able to increase all of the ATTs or we could get back to the TFT situation where everyone has good stats in all ATTs.
But, it's down to individual taste.
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Weapons
Feb 14, 2013 15:24:27 GMT -5
Post by ewookie on Feb 14, 2013 15:24:27 GMT -5
Another optional rule would be to let a hero improve, with XP, his attributes to a total of 50 pts, no more, and use the ST min. that DCG or TFT use for weapons. I like that you can't just keep jacking up your attributes until they are all 20 +, but a person can improve their ST, DX, IQ, & EN over time to a limit. I see a hero as I would see a professional athlete(fighter) or a top notch scientist(wizard). They are born with the ability to excel in areas that others are not. But they still have thier limits. I think of the human average as 10 and the top most attribute score as 20. Anyway just some thoughts I've had over the years of playing TFT and GURPS. I like HOW and am looking forward to playing it when it's my turn to GM. that is a brilliant idea! i would love it even if the limit were 45 (which only allows you to increase stats 3 times). how much XP do you think it should cost to increase an attribute?
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Weapons
Feb 14, 2013 17:46:27 GMT -5
Post by madwill on Feb 14, 2013 17:46:27 GMT -5
TFT had a similar concept in the In the Labryinth expansion. the exp need to advance was based on the total amount of your stats. although, in TFT there were only suggested limits. if you go to 50 points max the first 3 should be relatively easy the next 3 points harder and the last two even harder to earn. reflecting how hard it is, and how few people actually achive human perfection.
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Weapons
Feb 14, 2013 18:14:58 GMT -5
Post by ewookie on Feb 14, 2013 18:14:58 GMT -5
TFT had a similar concept in the In the Labryinth expansion. the exp need to advance was based on the total amount of your stats. although, in TFT there were only suggested limits. if you go to 50 points max the first 3 should be relatively easy the next 3 points harder and the last two even harder to earn. reflecting how hard it is, and how few people actually achive human perfection. yeah, i had read that at some point...but i'd rather just have a very limited limit and a hard number for advancement...for various reasons. in LAW, i would use 20 XP instead of the 'current score + 1' XP. there's a big difference in XP between LAW and HOW. basically, 1 XP in LAW is 10 XP in HOW, except LAW didn't do the sliding-scale (current + 1) thing on skills...so i don't have a feel for it yet. i'm thinking 200 XP to increase any attribute by 1 point and you can only do it 3 times in the character's life.
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Weapons
Feb 15, 2013 19:23:04 GMT -5
Post by falcon on Feb 15, 2013 19:23:04 GMT -5
To be honest I will probably be using the LAW XP rules. I love the LAW rules, just wanted DCG to expand them. Then came along HOW and I really like most of those rules but find there are parts that I don’t agree with at all. That being said, I will probably buy all the HOW books because they are so useful. So when I run this system I should call it LAHOW. 20% LAW & 80% HOW. The one good thing about them both is you can put them together and with a little tweak you can have a game that suits your GM groove. The Terrors, Treasures, Equipment lists, Creating your own dungeon, and Hirelings are excellent in HOW. I can see why C.R. Brandon had limits on the ATTs, and I somewhat agree but they are too confining for me. 10 is an average ATT score to me and if you put 2 pts in each one to bring them up to 10, then you have only 2 points to increase an ATT(or 2 ATTs) to just above average. Then you are stuck with a little better than average PC. I keep trying to make a PC that is a Hero, but it always comes up as my neighbor with no chance to improve his ATTs. I like my neighbors, but I don’t think they are going to be slaying any monsters and taking their treasure. Please don’t take this wrong some of my own attempts at expanding LAW are not very good and HOW fills in those holes for me so thank you C.R. for putting out an excellent product. Hats off to you, and keep up the good work, cuz old school rules.
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Weapons
Feb 15, 2013 19:46:32 GMT -5
Post by chrisrice on Feb 15, 2013 19:46:32 GMT -5
I think that's an excellent assessment, Falcon and summarises some of my own feelings about HOW.
Just started a solo run-through of Orcs of The High Mountains from the rulebook. Felt strange that, in an early encounter with a few Orcs, they were a lot higher in ST and DX than my best fighters. OK, we had EN points and skills that gave us an advantage, but still felt a bit odd.
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Weapons
Feb 16, 2013 9:21:50 GMT -5
Post by ewookie on Feb 16, 2013 9:21:50 GMT -5
i agree with you falcon and chris. in fact, i was planning on using LAW XP rules anyway! i was just afraid to say such things here. i didn't want to discourage anyone from buying HOW stuff. it's an excellent resource whether you use the HOW core or the LAW core and Christopher Brandon deserves to be financially rewarded for his extensive efforts.
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Post by tempbadpixie on Apr 1, 2013 7:36:30 GMT -5
One issue is "Why bother to use anything but swords, as they do more damage and are much better than anything else." In eg Pathfinder when choosing between a Battleaxe and a Longsword you are balancing the fact that a Battleaxe inflicts more damaging criticals vs. the fact a Longsword will do them more frequently. In HOW everyone should just use a Bastard Sword and do much better damage all the time.
There needs to be some attraction (other than flavouring) for using anything other than a Sword.
Another issue is Weapon STR: It would not make the rules more complex by shifting STR requirements slightly so that some weapons need STR 9, 10 or 11: the range as stated is quite narrow and promotes conformity in STR choice.
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